Michael Neumann
Kenneth Roth, who was executive director of Human Rights Watch from 1993 to 2022, tells us that Syria "needs" the International Criminal Court, which holds its sessions at The Hague. His 'explanation' is more an insult and display of ignorance than an explanation.A few comments.First:Syria's...
Michael Neumann
Assad, a monster, has won. He has a firm grasp on all major cities and ports: Aleppo, Damascus, Hama, Homs, Tartus. He has enough control of even the most restive regions, the Daraa and Sweida Governates, to ensure his survival. His lack of control near the Turkish border is a mere annoyance....
Michael Neumann
This attempts to counter some of the foolish comments made about Trump's withdrawal from Syria. The least foolish of these is that the battle against ISIS is not won. No it isn't, and Trump's claim that it is, is plainly false. But to harp on this is absurd. For one thing, there isn't the...
Michael Neumann
The reaction to Syria's horrors did nothing to mitigate them. They will continue for decades. It may be useful to review just how throughly and deeply irredeemable is the failure. To say that there were war crimes and human rights violations is like saying Charles Manson misbehaved. Assad's...
Michael Neumann
The sufferings of Egyptians and Syrians will go on for decades. That will allow plenty of time for think tanks, graduate students, journalists, op-ed writers, scholars and security analysts to build or enhance their careers on the ‘lessons’ of these events. This essay offers the one lesson that...
Michael Neumann
An investigation by Elizabeth Tsurkov entitled "The Breaking of Syria's Rebellion" has elicited debate over what broke it. Did it break because the rebels were corrupted, authoritarian, feuding, oppressive, or did the rebels get that way because something else broke it - most likely Russian and...
Michael Neumann
Trump's policy on Syria is being criticized for inconsistency and inadequacy. No doubt. His shifting stance is also far superior to the consistently inadequate (or worse) policies of the oh-so-more-sophisticated EU leadership. Of course the main motive behind the criticisms is hatred of Trump. ...
Michael Neumann
In “How Assad’s Enemies Gave Up on the Syrian Opposition”, Aron Lund follows many other analysts in his account of how the West 'gave up' on Syria’s rebels. The implication is that the West tried to back them against Assad, but at long last found this well-meaning effort both futile and...
Michael Neumann
Recently there has been a fuss about a document entitled Critical Junctures in United States Policy toward Syria: An Assessment of the Counterfactuals. It says it is part of a 'research project': The project seeks to conduct a systematic review of critical policy junctures in the Syrian...
Michael Neumann
Sam Heller is quite correct. It is a myth that the FSA ever was or ever had a prospect of being an essential counter-terrorist force. He is also correct in saying others performed better. But you can drive a truck through what he infers from these undeniable truths. First, the FSA isn't an...
Michael Neumann
It's sometimes said that Syria is complicated, or at least beset by incoherent alliances. It isn't that complicated if you accept that some of the allies passionately deny they're allied. Bullshit aside, there are three sides in Syria, each opposing the other two (so, yes, just a little...
Michael Neumann
Should we worry about the Muslim Brotherhood Hassan Hassan warns that the Brotherhood is not moderate. His warning is based entirely on the pronouncements of one associated cleric, Yussuf al Al Qaradawi. This, frankly, is not only ill-founded but dangerous. Al Qaradawi, not a member of the...
Michael Neumann
Racism runs like sewage underneath Western attitudes to Syria. It is not obvious, and not the sort we endlessly uncover and deplore. But it is key to an understanding of how the catastrophe could happen. What makes Syrian lives worth so much less than nothing? It is not Islamophobia or...
Michael Neumann
Many abhor the Assad régime and say that 'something must be done'. This typically means 'by People like Us', Westerners who know how to behave morally - an odd restriction given the only world leader consistently to support the rebels against Assad is Erdogan, the president of Turkey. Western...
Michael Neumann
Though it is nothing like the cause of Syria's misery, one culprit has played a major role in its perpetuation. It not only erodes the will of the West to do something. It also actually undermines the international order. That culprit is the human rights discourse that has built up since the...
Michael Neumann
Two claims about some purported ISIS-régime alliance refuse to die. One can be disposed of in short order. Yes, too-clever-by-half Syrian intelligence agencies supported various extremist Islamists in 2008-2011 or so. But this is hardly the same as supporting ISIS, which had no independent...
Michael Neumann
The 'German idealist' Immanuel Kant could be hard-headed. "Whoever wills the end, wills the unavoidably necessary means," he said. There are many non-Syrians who rant and rave against Assad. They demand that the world 'do something' about him. They 'support' the rebels, or some of the...
Michael Neumann
Michael Ignatieff and Leon Wieseltier, in a passionately moralistic Washington Post piece, have revived interest in the idea of a no-fly zone in Syria. This proposal, once attractive, has become preposterous. Even before Russian intervention, the no-fly zone idea was dubious, if only because the...
Michael Neumann
On February 6th, 2016, a Washington Institute for Near East Policy piece brought into full light an aspect of the Syria conflict long shrouded in willed obscurity. Kurdish units - US armed, trained and financed - attacked FSA positions in Western Aleppo. The attackers were aided by Russian...