By Count Friedrich von Olsen
Without much fanfare, we – by we I mean the United States – are getting incrementally more and more involved in the fighting in Syria. I am trying hard to not be judgmental here. Other than offering you my view that there is in this circumstance a serpentine mélange of conflicting alliances that bend back on one another similar to those in Europe that led to the conflagration we once called the Great War and which we now call World War One, I want to just give you the simple facts and let you come to your own conclusions…
Of course, the roots of the conflict go back centuries, perhaps even millennia, but I will start in 2011. That year, pro-democracy protests erupted in the southern city of Deraa after government security forces overreacted to some teenaged protestors, prompting further and wider protests, leading to the military opening fire on demonstrators. The protest against President Bashar al-Assad and his regime escalated, first in the form of wider protests and then with opposition forces arming themselves. Violence escalated into outright civil war with the rebels battling to take control of cities, villages and the sparsely populated countryside. The capital Damascus and secondary city of Aleppo were engulfed with fighting in 2012. By mid-year 2013, 90,000 had been killed. By August 2015, 250,000 were dead. A relatively simple struggle between rebel forces and that of President Assad’s government grew more complex, with sectarian overtones. But the lines of opposition are not clear. The Israelis have a saying that “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” That principle does not apply in Syria. In some cases, your enemy’s enemy might also be your enemy. To put it another way, in Syria, your enemy might also be your ally and from time to time, your ally is your enemy. Some, though not all, of the differing factions involved are the Syrian Government; the original rebels; Hezbollah; the Islamic State, known as ISIS; Syrian Kurds; the Russians; the Turks; the Iranians; and we the Americans, with our allies Australia, Bahrain, Canada, France, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates…
Two things are going on in Syria. One is the civil war in which the rebels are seeking to overthrow the government. The second is the war against the Islamic State, or Isis. This is where it gets very complicated. With regard to the civil war, several of the entities I have listed above are aligned with one side or the other, putting each side’s allies in opposite camps. But with regard to the war against ISIS, some of those in opposite camps in the civil war are in league with one another. In this way, Russia, Hezbollah, Iran and several state sanctioned local militias are in with President Assad. Aligned with the rebels are the United States, Turkey and several of the nations on the Arabian Peninsula. Those engaged in fighting ISIS, in the main are the United States, Turkey, the Kurds and Australia, Bahrain, Canada, France, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The Russians don’t particularly care for ISIS either, as ISIS commandos have carried out major acts of mayhem against the Russians. Thus, while the United States and Russia are enemies in the civil war, they are allies, up to a point, in the campaign against ISIS. The United States is doing its best not to involve itself directly in military operations against the Russians. The Russians would prefer to not mix it up with the Americans. Another paradox is that the Turks and the Kurds are fighting against both Syria and Isis, yet the Turks hate the Kurds worse than they hate the Syrians or ISIS. Among the Kurds, the feeling with regard to the Turks is mutual…
In this atmosphere of strange and maleficent bedfellows, anything can, and indeed often does, happen…
U.S. Army Special Forces, America’s Delta Force and Seal Team 6 units have been in Syria for going on three years now. In addition to engaging in fighting, they are also training our Syrian, Turkish, Kurdish and other allies in the fluid battlefield techniques and the use of the specialized equipment being employed in Syria. In recent weeks and months, the fighting in the second conflict, the one against ISIS, has concentrated around Raqqa, a city that is the de-facto capital of ISIS. Within the last fortnight, the Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment along with elements of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, including its Battalion Landing Team 1st Battalion, 4th Marines have entered the fray. According to some Congressional or governmental mandate or other, the sum total of United States military troops to be deployed in Syria is not to exceed 503 without further formal Congressional authorization, although commanders have the authority to temporarily exceed that limit. My very reliable sources tell me that as of the day I am writing this, March 16, 2017, we have military personnel in Syria far, far, far in excess of that paltry number…
The situation is a very difficult and treacherous one. Our troops are very proximate to both allies and foes, and in some cases are intermingled on the ground with our ostensible allies. The enemy may be distant but in certain spots they are literally just a few kilometers away. Throw into this mix that the Russians are blinding us on the battlefield. They are using a device, called the Krasukha-4, a mobile broadband multifunctional jamming station intended to guard against and defeat electronic surveillance and communications, including ground, air and satellite-based radar and radios. The Krasukha-4 is able to effectively shield objects on the ground against radio-locating surveillance satellites, ground-based radars, or aircraft-installed Airborne Warning and Control Systems, our vaunted AWACS, as well as space-based systems up to 170 miles away. They also interfere with our geosynchronous satellites, that is, the ones parked directly above Syria at an altitude of 22,236 miles. We do have some other surveillance satellites that orbit around the earth, passing for a short time of their continuous circular or oblong looping trajectory over Syria. Thus, for maybe 15 minutes or so as many as a half dozen times or thereabouts a day, we can get a fleeting glimpse of things there. But the rest of the time, we cannot see the Russians, we cannot see the Syrian government forces, we cannot see the local militias and we cannot see Hezbollah. For that matter, we cannot see ourselves or our allies, although presumably we have some idea of our own and our allies’ approximate locations. We have our own even equally effective version of the Krasukha-4, but we have not employed it in Syria. That is because it is probably not a good idea to put the Russians or their allies into a position where they can’t see what they are doing or exactly what they are shooting at. When fired upon in a war zone, combatants have a tendency to shoot back. We are bending over backwards, as are the Russians, to keep from clashing with one another. We and our allies, when blinded and fired upon, typically respond in kind or in even greater force. Blind as we are, there is no guarantee that return fire will hit its mark. It is not a matter of if, but rather when, we or one of our allies, so blinded and so fired upon, will strike back and hit our own troops or those of our allies. That will most likely trigger a counterresponse and perhaps an escalation, at first between ourselves and then, quite possibly with the enemy. Will our enemy simply sit back and take it? Or will our enemy respond? Where will that lead? I am reminded of what I cited above, 1914, when a melange of interests and conflicting alliances were concentrated in one relatively small geographical location and a single spark set off the tinderbox, leading to a world conflagration…