4 ms·

I don't think it's really possible to argue the country is in any way better off than it was before the insurrection. The question is then, what would

by ido 9y ago

I don't think it's really possible to argue the country is in any way better off than it was before the insurrection. The question is then, what would have been a better solution? Surely as long as Assad was ruling they were stuck (at best) at a local maximum and would have never transitioned to a free democracy without overthrowing the current government.

thriftwy 9y ago
But aren't they stuck in abyss now? If that's the choice, maybe it wasn't a good plan after all.
- ido 9y ago
  The current situation is not a stable state, at some point one of the combating sides will win or the country will split into several independent states.
  - thriftwy 9y ago
    I don't think it will ever recover to pre-war levels. Not in our time.
  - pjc50 9y ago
    The combating sides include outside parties, so the war could continue until every Syrian is dead and then beyond even that.
mafribe 9y ago
as long as Assad was ruling Assad's secular dictatorship is massively preferable to ISIS rule, especially to the 25% of the Syrian population that are non-Sunni.
- jansho 9y ago
  Sigh, it seems so surreal now that the Arab Spring was once cheered on by the whole world. Edit: word
  - varjag 9y ago
    The less Arab revolutions were stomped on, the more favorable was the outcome. The progression from Tunisa through Egypt and Lybia to Syria is quite evident. What's really surreal is so many people in the (still relatively free) West denying basic agency to their fellow human beings in the Middle East.
    - jansho 9y ago
      > so many people in the (still relatively free) West denying basic agency to their fellow human beings Because there's a lot of cynicism with charities and foreign aid. There is an active campaign here in Britain to reduce the latter and anecdotally, I have friends and relatives who refuse to donate to aid agencies because they believe that the whole thing is a sham. Sure there's bureaucracy, but most of them are genuinely hardworking and already operating on shoestring budgets...
      - wavefunction 9y ago
        You could point them to clearinghouses like CharityNavigator [0] (which is probably US-centric) that rate the charities on things like how much of their donations go to administration. The short of it is that one can donate to Oxfam, Save the Children or Medecins san Frontieres and remain confident that >95% of funds raised go to direct relief efforts. [0]https://www.charitynavigator.org/ https://www.charitynavigator.org/
      - varjag 9y ago
        Agency as having their own interests and following their own agenda, it has nothing to do with charity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agency_(sociology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agency_(sociology) For example the view professed here by you and the GP, that Arabs should have quietly suffered in their dictatorship without right to dissent, is denying the agency.
- ido 9y ago
  I agree, but that wasn't my question - can Syria have something better than Assad eventually, and how do you get to it without overthrowing Assad?
  - LostInTheWoods2 9y ago
    Assad eventually dies, probably of old age.
    - ido 9y ago
      Current Assad is already the son of the previous dictator.
      - throwaway29292 9y ago
        Can we get his children interested in programming or something?
        nyolfen 9y ago
        bashar started off as an american-educated dentist
        ido 9y ago
        There was a lot of high hopes in Israel when he succeeded his father, that his rule would be pro-western.
        thriftwy 9y ago
        Assad is an ophtalmologist with a British spouse. Didn't seem to help much.
      - toyg 9y ago
        You can eventually "sublimate away" a hereditary ruling family; that's what lots of European countries have done. In some cases (like Pinochet or Franco), the ruling dictator simply accepts there is no point in continuing and just dies away without bestowing the country on his children. People tend to forget that Middle-Eastern countries are all pretty young from an institutional perspective. Before the mid-XX century they did not exist in forms resembling the current ones. Ottoman collapse, Arab consolidation and general decolonisation were fluid processes that sprung (or were forced to spring) very complex entities with all sorts of growing pains.
- mcguire 9y ago
  And here we have the last 70 years of United States foreign policy in a nutshell.
  - knz 9y ago
    > United States foreign policy Western foreign policy. And in many ways extending back well into the time of European Colonial powers carving out territory and promoting the interests of more friendly tribes/ethnicities to maintain stability and keep the money flowing.
mercer 9y ago
I suppose this kind of question can only be answered in hindsight. If indeed there is a transition to a free, stable democracy, I suppose we could argue that what happened was ultimately worth it. But I don't know if such a thing is likely to happen. It seems quite possible to me that all this turmoil will lead to another local maximum that isn't much better, and perhaps even worse, than the previous one.
- ido 9y ago
  So basically they're eternally condemned to live in either a failed state or a harsh dictatorship?
  - hasenj 9y ago
    Afghanistan used to be a normal country in the 70s by Middle Eastern standard. Not too different from Iran, Iraq, or Syria of those days. It hasn't recovered for over 40 years. Iraq doesn't seem like it will recover any time soon.
jameslk 9y ago
If it's a free democracy we're after, we should get rid of the western double standard provided to other states that had Arab Springs which were violently suppressed by their undemocratic governments. Such as Saudi Arabia[0], Bahrain[1] and Yemen[2]. I don't remember hearing about rebels being armed, no fly zones being established and missiles being launched by western states in these countries. 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011%E2%80%9312_Saudi_Arabian_protests https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011%E2%80%9312_Saudi_Arabian_... 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bahraini_protests_of_2011 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bahraini_protests_of_2011 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yemeni_Crisis_(2011%E2%80%93present) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yemeni_Crisis_(2011%E2%80%93pr...
- hackuser 9y ago
  Generally I agree, but the West's double-standard does at least benefit some countries, such as Tunisia. Also, even support for Syria is based to a great degree on the Western nations' own interests and not those of the Syrian people. Most of the West's involvement is to destroy ISIL and to contain Iran and Russia. There was no credible possibility that the Saudi Arabian government, for example, would be overthrown; there was nobody for the Western nations to support. If there was a credible possibility, of course the Western nations might have decided supporting the Saudi rulers was more important, as they have many times in the past, and portrayed the rebels as terrorists. Finally, it all begs the question: Revolutions are very risky; often the outcome is worse than the starting point, with many dead, a generation in ruin, and no improvement in government. When are they worthwhile? How can they be made more likely to obtain worthwhile outcomes?

by ido 9y ago

thriftwy 9y ago

But aren't they stuck in abyss now? If that's the choice, maybe it wasn't a good plan after all.

ido 9y ago
The current situation is not a stable state, at some point one of the combating sides will win or the country will split into several independent states.
- thriftwy 9y ago
  I don't think it will ever recover to pre-war levels. Not in our time.
- pjc50 9y ago
  The combating sides include outside parties, so the war could continue until every Syrian is dead and then beyond even that.

mafribe 9y ago

as long as Assad was ruling Assad's secular dictatorship is massively preferable to ISIS rule, especially to the 25% of the Syrian population that are non-Sunni.

jansho 9y ago
Sigh, it seems so surreal now that the Arab Spring was once cheered on by the whole world. Edit: word
- varjag 9y ago
  The less Arab revolutions were stomped on, the more favorable was the outcome. The progression from Tunisa through Egypt and Lybia to Syria is quite evident. What's really surreal is so many people in the (still relatively free) West denying basic agency to their fellow human beings in the Middle East.
  - jansho 9y ago
    > so many people in the (still relatively free) West denying basic agency to their fellow human beings Because there's a lot of cynicism with charities and foreign aid. There is an active campaign here in Britain to reduce the latter and anecdotally, I have friends and relatives who refuse to donate to aid agencies because they believe that the whole thing is a sham. Sure there's bureaucracy, but most of them are genuinely hardworking and already operating on shoestring budgets...
    - wavefunction 9y ago
      You could point them to clearinghouses like CharityNavigator [0] (which is probably US-centric) that rate the charities on things like how much of their donations go to administration. The short of it is that one can donate to Oxfam, Save the Children or Medecins san Frontieres and remain confident that >95% of funds raised go to direct relief efforts. [0]https://www.charitynavigator.org/ https://www.charitynavigator.org/
    - varjag 9y ago
      Agency as having their own interests and following their own agenda, it has nothing to do with charity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agency_(sociology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agency_(sociology) For example the view professed here by you and the GP, that Arabs should have quietly suffered in their dictatorship without right to dissent, is denying the agency.
ido 9y ago
I agree, but that wasn't my question - can Syria have something better than Assad eventually, and how do you get to it without overthrowing Assad?
- LostInTheWoods2 9y ago
  Assad eventually dies, probably of old age.
  - ido 9y ago
    Current Assad is already the son of the previous dictator.
    - throwaway29292 9y ago
      Can we get his children interested in programming or something?
      - nyolfen 9y ago
        bashar started off as an american-educated dentist
        ido 9y ago
        There was a lot of high hopes in Israel when he succeeded his father, that his rule would be pro-western.
      - thriftwy 9y ago
        Assad is an ophtalmologist with a British spouse. Didn't seem to help much.
    - toyg 9y ago
      You can eventually "sublimate away" a hereditary ruling family; that's what lots of European countries have done. In some cases (like Pinochet or Franco), the ruling dictator simply accepts there is no point in continuing and just dies away without bestowing the country on his children. People tend to forget that Middle-Eastern countries are all pretty young from an institutional perspective. Before the mid-XX century they did not exist in forms resembling the current ones. Ottoman collapse, Arab consolidation and general decolonisation were fluid processes that sprung (or were forced to spring) very complex entities with all sorts of growing pains.
mcguire 9y ago
And here we have the last 70 years of United States foreign policy in a nutshell.
- knz 9y ago
  > United States foreign policy Western foreign policy. And in many ways extending back well into the time of European Colonial powers carving out territory and promoting the interests of more friendly tribes/ethnicities to maintain stability and keep the money flowing.

mercer 9y ago

I suppose this kind of question can only be answered in hindsight. If indeed there is a transition to a free, stable democracy, I suppose we could argue that what happened was ultimately worth it. But I don't know if such a thing is likely to happen. It seems quite possible to me that all this turmoil will lead to another local maximum that isn't much better, and perhaps even worse, than the previous one.

ido 9y ago
So basically they're eternally condemned to live in either a failed state or a harsh dictatorship?
- hasenj 9y ago
  Afghanistan used to be a normal country in the 70s by Middle Eastern standard. Not too different from Iran, Iraq, or Syria of those days. It hasn't recovered for over 40 years. Iraq doesn't seem like it will recover any time soon.

jameslk 9y ago

If it's a free democracy we're after, we should get rid of the western double standard provided to other states that had Arab Springs which were violently suppressed by their undemocratic governments. Such as Saudi Arabia[0], Bahrain[1] and Yemen[2]. I don't remember hearing about rebels being armed, no fly zones being established and missiles being launched by western states in these countries. 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011%E2%80%9312_Saudi_Arabian_protests https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011%E2%80%9312_Saudi_Arabian_... 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bahraini_protests_of_2011 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bahraini_protests_of_2011 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yemeni_Crisis_(2011%E2%80%93present) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yemeni_Crisis_(2011%E2%80%93pr...

hackuser 9y ago
Generally I agree, but the West's double-standard does at least benefit some countries, such as Tunisia. Also, even support for Syria is based to a great degree on the Western nations' own interests and not those of the Syrian people. Most of the West's involvement is to destroy ISIL and to contain Iran and Russia. There was no credible possibility that the Saudi Arabian government, for example, would be overthrown; there was nobody for the Western nations to support. If there was a credible possibility, of course the Western nations might have decided supporting the Saudi rulers was more important, as they have many times in the past, and portrayed the rebels as terrorists. Finally, it all begs the question: Revolutions are very risky; often the outcome is worse than the starting point, with many dead, a generation in ruin, and no improvement in government. When are they worthwhile? How can they be made more likely to obtain worthwhile outcomes?