Skip to footer

Five guidelines for US role in Syria

The civil war in Syria has reached a stalemate. While strategic military steps like arming the opposition or establishing a no-fly zone present complications, the US can do other things to bring aid, support the opposition, undermine the Assad regime, and counter a rising Islamist influence. Here are five guidelines for the US in addressing the conflict in Syria:

4. Understand the limited role of the exile opposition

The Syrian National Coalition (SNC), the fractured exile opposition, is respected within the Syrian rebellion as a means to facilitate defections and to bring attention to the cause – but for little else. Generally speaking, no one in Syria takes orders from the SNC. It is a waste of time to continue working toward negotiating any kind of deal between the regime and the exile opposition, because they do not have influence on the ground.

There has also been fierce debate as to whether the SNC should even partake in the upcoming Geneva talks with the Assad regime. The SNC should continue coordinating the refugee crisis and stop wasting resources on petty internal debate and negotiations. Any treaty between the SNC and the regime will be ignored by all factions on the ground.

The US should continue to work with the SNC, since they will play some role in the future, but the US should realize that the group is unlikely to ever comprise the Syrian government. The exile groups are most useful in helping the refugee populations outside of Syria and as a forum for activists and the collection of casualty figures. 

4 of 5
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.