Understanding Syria in Six Steps

Even for those of us who can locate Syria on a map, the story of what is actually happening there sometimes gets lost in the news cycle. Or maybe people think that it doesn't affect them, so why should they care? 

Here's why it is important: 

A.) Syria could easily be the flashpoint for World War III. 

B.) Do you really need another reason? 


I'll get to that. For now, let me explain part A.


Civil War

The al-Assad family has ruled Syria for the past forty-five years. This includes the current President, Bashar al-Assad, who took office in 2000 when his father died after ruling the country for nearly thirty years. He was “elected” but ran unopposed. You do the math. 

He grew that mustache when he was 15. Hasn't shaved it since.

In 2011, as part of the Arab Spring movement, protests erupted in Syria. Assad did not want his family’s cult of personality to be dismantled, as this was the source of their supervillain power, so he used the military to fight back, while also demonstrating a psychotic unwillingness to exercise restraint. The situation soon escalated into a full-blown civil war, with a number of factions now angling for control of the war-ravaged country and its many resources.

Competing Pipelines

Among Syria's most valuable assets: location, location, location. This is a prime piece of real estate if you’re trying to build a pipeline to transport natural gas from the Middle East to Europe. You see, moving it by ship is very expensive, which makes it much harder to compete against Russian suppliers. In terms of strategy, the idea is to deny Russia any leverage in their ability to manipulate natural gas prices in Europe, but it's also seen as a way for struggling petroleum-producing nations to turn their economies around... ideally, before their citizens revolt. 

Two separate multi-billion dollar pipelines have been proposed. 

One would run from Qatar all the way through Saudi Arabia. Both of these countries made a deal with Henry Kissinger back in 1974 to convert their currencies to the dollar for trade purposes in return for military protection of their oil fields. This exchange is referred to as the petrodollar, and it is why United States can print money without having the gold to back it up. That's kind of important. It's basically why we can have a national debt of almost twenty trillion dollars and still be a nation of gluttonous consumers while nearly everything we consume is produced somewhere else. 

Hasn't that ever seemed strange to you? 

Basically, the American dollar remains artificially strong despite being unhitched from the gold standard because other countries have agreed to use it for trading oil and other commodities, which are protected by the most powerful (and expensive) military on earth. And guess who needs oil? Everybody. The world runs on petroleum. Oil companies see to it. This means that practically every country on earth has to use dollars in order to buy this very important resource. That said, if the rest of the world was to stop using the American dollar as the de facto exchange currency in international trade, we would be completely screwed. Not only would its value plummet, leading to hyperinflation, but the old trick of printing more money to stimulate the economy would no longer be an option. 

This is one of the reasons why U.S. policymakers think that they can justify spending so much on our military: when it comes down to it, we went from the gold standard to the military standard. Why is the American dollar strong? Because you need it to buy oil. Why? Because we said so, damnit.

This whole forty-two-year-old arrangement is also a large part of why we now have such a strained relationship with Saudi Arabia and other OPEC countries. If those oil fields were to be taken over by some faction that is not friendly toward the United States, that would be the end of the petrodollar, at which point the American economy would utterly collapse. 

It isn't like the U.S. gives a flying fuck about sticking up for a country that thinks it's ok to deny women basic human rights and imprison journalists who speak out against the tyranny of their leadership. Let's not forget that Saudi Arabia was also the home of 15 of the 19 terrorists behind the attacks on 9/11/2001. With these factors in mind, logic would dictate that they were the bad guys. But that's not how it works. Instead, we went to war with Iraq. That's because Saddam Hussain was planning on switching from the dollar to the euro for all petroleum sales, and the U.S. wasn't about to let that happen.

So if you ever suspected that every war in the Middle East that the U.S. has been engaged in has fundamentally been about petroleum, you were absolutely correct. Right on the money. It's all connected, for he who controls the spice controls the universe. Of course, this is one more reason why we need alternative, renewable sources of energy. Unfortunately, the American people don't make policy decisions about these matters; oil company executives do. Like this turd:

Rex Tillerson, former CEO of Exxon/Mobil and Trump's pick for Secretary of State.

This guy will be our number one diplomat pretty soon, and where do you suppose his priorities are? 

My guess is that Tillerson is very much in favor of the proposed natural gas pipeline that is intended to originate in Qatar, then pass through Saudi Arabia and Jordan, across Syria and Turkey, then into Bulgaria: the promised land. In fact, the only country that has refused support for this project is Syria, and the reasons behind this are largely political. You see, the Saudis don't like the fact that Syria is ruled by the secular Ba'ath Party (because you might have noticed, Saudi Arabia is kind of religious), and they have repeatedly called for Assad to step down for his handling of the Syrian civil war. Of course, as made public by Wikileaks, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are also funding, arming and training the rebels who are engaged in that civil war, as is the United States... because they really want that goddamn pipeline.

But what about the second pipeline? I'm glad you asked, my imaginary friend. This proposed multi-billion dollar natural gas conduit would run from Iran, through Iraq and Syria, under the Mediterranean Sea and into Greece. You see, Iran does not use the petrodollar, which is more or less why they're considered an evil empire. Shia militias from Iran have also been fighting alongside the Syrian and Russian troops, which means that this is already starting to look like a world war. Sides are being taken.

Assad has shown to be favorable toward this pipeline over the other, but neither will happen until the conflict in the region is stabilized. 

Russian Involvement

Russia offered military aid to Assad, which he accepted, making this the only foreign power that is officially allowed to set up bases in Syria. This is because Russia wants to maintain their foothold on that European natural gas market, and if Assad is taken out of power, there is no one to stop the Saudi pipeline from being built. Meanwhile, a surprising number of people in Syria actually support Assad, mostly because they see him as the closest thing to stability and relative safety that they have... which isn't saying much. 

American Involvement

Since the U.S. military is prohibited by international law from entering a sovereign nation without first declaring war, the United States has instead teamed up with Saudi Arabia and Qatar to arm and train rebels to fight the Syrian army... because we apparently haven't learned from all the other times that this exact same strategy has come back to bite us in the ass.

Of course, this means that these U.S.-backed rebels are also engaged in combat with Russian troops and Iranian militias by association. This is where that World War III scenario enters the picture. If the U.S. was to declare a "no-fly zone" in Syria, where we have no official business being, we are basically provoking Russia into direct conflict. Call me cautious, but that seems like a bad idea.

ISIS

It is suspected that a lot of these rebel soldiers that received weapons and training from the U.S. and its allies are then being recruited by ISIS and other non-governmental military groups to fight for their cause instead. 

But think about it. If people are faced with a choice between dying for what they've been brainwashed to believe in or possibly being killed at any random moment by drone strikes, in a fucked up way, it actually kind of makes sense that they choose to wear the suicide vest, just because then they have a semblance of control over their destinies. I'm not saying that I condone it by any means. My point is that to them, we are the terrorists, and joining ISIS in Syria is a lot like joining the Army here. It is a paycheck, which for many is a way out of abject poverty. It is also an opportunity to fight who they have been repeatedly told are the bad guys. 

Refugees

As a result of all of this international bullshittery, millions of innocent people have been displaced. This is not a matter of choice, but necessity. These people didn't ride on cushy rafts just to suck on the teat of European socialism. They braved terrible odds because it was better than the alternative. Nationality means little in the face of our common humanity. They did not abandon their country so much as their country abandoned them. 

C.) These refugees are human beings, just like you. That's why you should care.