The Death of a Dictatorship

Unless you have a heart of stone or are in hock to a strongman theory of anti-imperialism, you cannot fail to be cheered by the scenes pouring out of Syria. Political prisoners, some of whom have been incarcerated for decades, reunited with their families as rebels open up the cells. The inmates of the Assad regime's torture pits, freed. Civilians flooding the streets welcoming fighters and tearing down statues of Hafez al-Assad. One of the world most disgusting dictatorships is finished.

There are those who are arguing that the fall of Assad is an outcome of US-Israeli activities, and that the rebel movement Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) - whose offensive drove the final nail into the regime's coffin - is about to consume Syria in the darkness of an Islamist caliphate, with full backing of the US and Israel. But this gives the West and its clients too much credit and reduces international politics and war to their manoeuvres only. Rather, what has happened is the unforeseen outcome of the acceleration of the Middle East's instabilities, which began with the 7th October Hamas offensive and the appalling genocide Israel has carried out in response.

While there are also domestic political reasons why the United States have generously supplied Israel the weapons necessary for the ongoing massacre of the Palestinians, as previously argued the relationship between the two is straightforward. Israel is a tool of US foreign policy, and its reason for existence in the eyes of the State Department is to enforce the US-led global order. As we'll see when Donald Trump takes over, this is likely to include recognising Israel's annexation of more occupied territories so the new administration can present itself as the presidency that brought "peace" to the Middle East. That's for the immediate future. In the present under Joe Biden, the atrocities in Gaza - despite unconvincing hand wringing - are justified because it's a "war" against Hamas, and therefore rooting out an Iranian proxy. Likewise, the Israeli army's confrontation with Hezbollah in Lebanon was far from the one-sided fight it's typically accustomed to, and poor performance on the battlefield is why Israel quickly suspended ground operations. But its programme of air strikes seriously degraded Hezbollah's capacities, and regular bombings of Assad regime targets and Iranian assets in Syria stemmed Hezbollah's supply of arms and the support Assad has enjoyed from Iran throughout the civil war.

Israel meeting the US's war aims is only part of the story. The Assad family have never benefited from popular consent, choosing instead to rely on fear and coercion. At least outside of the Alawite minority. When Hafez al-Assad seized power in 1970 he institutionalised sectarianism, ensuring that anyone who became a figure in the state had to have a power base among this community. Or, to be more exact, its elite cadres. This included non-Alawite Sunni Arabs. Assad also moved Syria away from Ba'athist commitments to (state) socialism. He championed private property and sought development along capitalist lines, which handily enriched his family and those of his cronies. It was the same old story: kickbacks and the dubious channelling of state funds into enterprises owned by the elite. None of this prevented its aligning with the USSR, though ostensibly out of "anti-imperialist" and anti-Israel commitments. The domestic state of affairs exploded toward the end of the 70s with the outbreak of armed opposition, and after 1980 the state cracked down with repression rather than conceding to demands for a non-sectarian state and anti-corruption drives. This culminated in massacres and the levelling of Homs. The repression only loosened by degree for the remainder of al-Assad's life. When his son, Bashir, secured the succession in 2000 there was a brief period of liberalisation in which some of the worst aspects of the regime were shorn, but almost immediately it clammed up again with a wave of further repression. It was almost as if conceding a measure of freedom was designed to flush out pro-democracy oppositionists. This did not stop Syria from pivoting away from anti-imperialism to cosying up with Uncle Sam during the War on Terror. Having previously dealt with one insurgency that was part Islamist, under Bashir al-Assad it, like Gadaffi's Libya, came in from the cold to strike a new deal with the global hegemon. Syria dutifully played its role during the CIA's extraordinary rendition programme - it was a centre for torturing detainees captured in Afghanistan and Iraq.

When the Arab Spring broke out in 2011, mass protests against the regime was met with the customary brutality it had become known for. With ugly scenes filling up television screens, the Assad regime was hypocritically but ruthlessly abandoned by its US patron and condemned. Syria became subject to Western sanctions. As revolution descended into civil war, Assad's regime distinguished itself by killing even more people than its gruesome opposition in Islamic State managed, which had taken advantage of the power vacuum and seized huge swathes of the country. The regime increasingly became paralysed by infighting and passive opposition among Alawites as IS rolled over government troops. This was despite the fact Iran had begun shipping "volunteers" to Damascus to defend Assad from 2012, backed by fighters from Hezbollah. But it was only the intervention of Russia that prevented the regime from falling to Islamist insurgency. This turned the war around, and though unable to reconquer the entirety of Syrian territory the application of psychotic levels of violence stabilised the situation. As a measure of how successful this appeared, it was only a fortnight ago that neighbouring states were engaged in efforts to normalise diplomatic relations. What the temporary victory Putin's forces brought Assad did not bring was a peace dividend. Sanctions and inflation have made the lot of the ordinary Syrian miserable, giving them no material stake in the regime's continuance either. As such, in retrospect, too much repression and too much recession fatally undermined Assad. All it required was a shove.

And that came from HTS. Having operated in an enclave around Idlib for the last seven years, despite its roots in al-Qaeda it has been in running battles with its local affiliates throughout the 2020s. It's this, rather than a desire to appear acceptable to the West or a cloak and dagger master plan to hide Islamist intent that explains their relative moderation, religious tolerance, and degree of pluralism. Its offensive against Aleppo, which seemingly came out of nowhere on the 27th November was like steam-rolling a collapsing barn. Having been softened up by Israeli attacks but sapped by years of internal crackdowns, massacres, and stagnation, the army melted away. Less than a fortnight later from the initial attacks we are here: to all intents and purposes the dictatorship has evaporated.

None of this was expected by the US, Israel, and the so-called international community. It introduces a range of unforeseen complications. Local powers will try and seize the moment to extend their interests. Israel has occupied its "buffer zone" with Syria, and will undoubtedly look to extend it further. Turkey likewise will be looking to guard its "perimeters" in the north of the country, while making life difficult for the Kurds in their US-backed autonomous zone. But both are consequences of actions to which they were bystanders. Undoubtedly, the latter day cold war re-enactment society will be pleased. If Russia's intervention in 2015 was a demonstration of strength and confidence, this marks an eclipse of such ambitions. Attempted air strikes against bridges in the Aleppo region marked its desultory effort at defending Assad's folding regime, and will encourage the incoming administration to play hard ball over ending the war in Ukraine.

But they are not the only ones looking on with glee. The truth is for hundreds of millions across the Arab world, the final reckoning of a hated tyrant will give heart in the same way the eruption and initial victory of the Arab Spring in Tunisia and Egypt did over a decade ago. For Cairo, the Gulf's absolutist monarchies, for the opposition in Iran, and even here in the West, successful uprisings help encourage and embolden movements from below. As establishment figures welcome Assad's fall, and particularly so in authoritarian states, there is always that sliver of fear that they could face a similar fate. That a movement of the immense majority could come and sweep them away.