Syria was in turmoil as I arrived in Damascus shortly after the Ides of March 2011. Demonstrators in Darʿā spearheaded a movement demanding nothing less than comprehensive reforms, including—but not limited to—removal of emergency laws, releasing political prisoners, clamping down on corruption, and dismissing venal officials. Some even raised sectarian banners and questioned the very legitimacy of the president. Within days, various regions in the country joined the upheaval, and the regime appeared more than ever on the defensive, fighting for its very survival.
Ḥāfiẓ al-ʾAsād faced a similar uprising starting in the late 1970s that culminated in the Ḥamā Massacre in February 1982, when he unleashed his armed forces on the city, killing thousands of people and leveling the center of the old town. Back then such wholesale repression was facilitated by a multiplicity of factors: Syria then enjoyed the protection of the still mighty Soviet Empire, her armed forces were in much better shape, and there was no Facebook, Internet, cell phones, or satellite TV. No photographs, let alone video clips, leaked out to tell the gruesome tale. ʾAsād Senior was brutal but efficient. The Ḥamā tragedy guaranteed his reign till the closure of the 20th century and provided for a smooth transmission of power to his son in the year 2000.
Baššār al-ʾAsād possessed none of the above advantages. The Syria of 2011 was surrounded by enemies. To the south loomed Israel and Jordan, to the east US-occupied Iraq, and to the west a Lebanon that no longer hosted the Syrian armed forces. Regionally Saudi Arabia pursued a hostile policy vis-à-vis the Syria-Iran axis, and globally the USA targeted ʾAsād with sanctions. The Soviet Union was a distant memory. Economically Syria suffered from poverty, a widening gap between rich and poor, dilapidated infrastructure, depleted oil reserves, water shortages, and overpopulation.
ʾAsād Junior could no longer let loose the army against the opposition without risking the wrath of the USA and NATO, as the case in Libya amply demonstrated; at the same time, he had to be proactive and shun the half-hearted incremental measures that sealed the fate of Tunisia’s president and Egypt’s despot. Bahrain’s monarch was luckier, but he enjoyed the favor and protection of the USA and Saudi Arabia. Syria's crisis called for tact and discretion so as to avoid repeating the mistakes that doomed Arab dictators elsewhere. Could Damascus pull a rabbit out of the president's worn-out hat?
To be sure, ʾAsād possessed some advantages. Contrary to his Egyptian erstwhile colleague, he still had the army as well as the security apparatuses firmly lined up behind him. Most Alawites and many Sunnis still supported him. The former to preserve their acquired advantages and the latter to avoid chaos and sectarian strife Iraqi-style that would likely follow reversal of fortunes. Christians certainly were in no mood to have Muslim extremists topple a relatively secular Alawite rule, and neither were probably Druze and Ismailis. Apart from the Kurds, minorities would by and large support ʾAsād, each for its own reasons.
Left to his own devices, ʾAsād surely has more assets than liabilities and would probably not have much more difficulty suppressing the uprisings than his old man did 30 years prior; his dilemma was that he could no longer count on outsiders leaving him in “peace,” especially after witnessing the USAF pounding Libya in the company of the British and the French. His options were sharply reduced to finding the magic formula of sufficient repression to intimidate the rebels without reaching a threshold that would invite outside intervention.
For more than a week, ʾAsād dealt with the opposition with relative restraint, avoiding large-scale bloodshed and leaving the task of keeping order to the police and security forces. The army surrounded Darʿā, to be sure, but stopped short of deploying its guns. He moreover delegated his spokesperson, Dr. Buṯaynā Šaʿbān, to announce imminent reforms, including the promise to increase the salaries of government employees. ʾAsād even released some political prisoners and let it be known that he would be addressing the nation soon. He was biding his time and prudently avoided commitment to a course of action with unforeseen consequences.
The proverbial light at the end of the tunnel appeared on March 27th as US Secretary of State Clinton called ʾAsād “a reformer,“ essentially ruling out military intervention against Syria. To be sure there was no shortage of condemnation of using violence against civilians by different influential figures in the US administration and Congress, but ʾAsād could safely ignore verbal attacks stripped of military force or the threat of its use. Secretary Clinton delivered precisely what he was asking for, and he could, at least for the time being, afford to talk and act with far more confidence than would be the case for someone under an American Sword of Damocles. Instructions were given to the powers that be to organize huge demonstrations in support of the regime, with tens of thousands filling the streets of major Syrian cities waving and repeating resurrected, worn-out slogans of undying loyalty to the president.
Thus emboldened, ʾAsād delivered on March 30th his long-awaited address to the obsequious People’s Assembly in Damascus. The speech blamed the disturbances on outside conspiracies and made no real concessions to the people’s demands, a few vague promises notwithstanding. It was a triumphant speech received by a standing ovation from a dependable audience and interrupted here and there by deputies outdoing each other in flattery and brown-nosing as ʾAsād appeared and sounded more relaxed than ever. It was veni, vidi, vici as Syria's president donned the mantle of Julius Caesar.
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