OPINION - Many moving parts in Syrian puzzle on brink of new offensives

By Dr. Huseyin Alptekin

- The author is an associate professor of Political Science.

ISTANBUL (AA) - Syria has been through various stages from the outbreak of the so-called Arab Spring to the Arab winter. Such seasonal changes have brought the rise and decline as well as the concentration and fragmentation of rebels in many cycles.

Over the past 4 years, the situation map in Syria had been quite stable, though. Bashar al-Assad's regime had a working relationship with the terrorist organization PKK/PYD/SDF, felt safe under the roof of the Russian air support, and was waiting for the outbreak of chaos in Idlib under sporadic bombardment. The terrorist organization PKK concentrated its forces in the east of Euphrates with a couple of remaining exclaves in the west of the river. The Syrian Interim Government with its Syrian National Army (SNA) was consolidating its rule in the northwestern corner of the country. Finally, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) seemed to be consolidating its monopoly of power in Idlib, where over 3 million Syrians are stuck.

- How has the stalemate changed in Syria?

This stalemate has all changed this week in a matter of hours. The HTS offensive toward Aleppo faced little defensive strength before capturing the center of the governorate. With no hesitation, they have moved down to Hama, and as this piece is being penned, they are getting closer to taking another population center of the country.

The SNA also made a move from the north to the PKK-held Tel Rifaat as the PKK forces fled the town with little resistance. The SNA is currently concentrating its forces around the only remaining terrorist organization PKK pocket in the west of Euphrates. While the parties on the offensive were quick to gain ground in the respective theaters, the defense lines were shockingly soft.

The obvious questions are where the Iranian proxies on the ground are to repel the offensives, and where the Russian air force is, which previously did not shy away from bombing population centers in Aleppo and Idlib, among others.

- Iran, its proxies are unable to help Assad retake Aleppo

To start with the first one, it seems that Iran’s presence in Syria is weaker now as its proxies are overstretched throughout the Middle East. Hezbollah has been hesitant to start a territorial conflict with Israel and tried to keep the escalation under control. But Hezbollah has recently received significant blows at home due to Israel’s indiscriminate attacks as well as its assassinations. Under such circumstances, Hezbollah is now more focused on its home front as Lebanon and Israel are on the verge of a shaky cease-fire. Hezbollah simply does not have enough manpower to fight Iran’s war in Syria.

Iran itself has failed to deescalate the situation with Israel. In the past, Iran’s controlled escalation plan with Israel used to pay off to sell the country’s foreign policy in the Middle East with no severe cost. But a better strategy for Iran might be to drop its offensive strategies in favor of retrenchment for a firmer stance before Trump’s expected “maximum pressure” policies start. In other words, unlike 2016, Assad no longer has tens of thousands of Iranian proxy militias to retake Aleppo.

​ ​​​​​​- How does Russia see the situation?

Russia is on the cautious side too. The war in Ukraine is grinding down the Russian manpower and economy, perhaps in a less severe degree compared to Ukraine, but the current condition still hurts Moscow. With the elimination of Wagner’s effective role in 2023 by Russia's President Vladimir Putin himself, Russia also lacks a handy tool to intervene in conflicts far from its primary sphere of interest.

A third factor for the Russian inertia in defending Aleppo is the Trump factor. Trump has signaled two critical foreign policy goals during his campaign for his second term: implementing maximum pressure on Iran and ending the war in Ukraine with a negotiated settlement. Perhaps, Putin does not want to look too ambitious to Trump. What would be worse is to line up with Iran and Hezbollah, a nonstate armed group Trump is not very fond of. But this is a picture of a dilemma for Putin. He has reasons not to spend his limited fighting power to help Trump’s enemies in Syria right before trying to get a good deal from the same president over Ukraine. However, he also has reasons not to lose his most important gateway to the Mediterranean: the Tartus naval base. It seems like Russia will try to halt the rebels’ advance to Tartus and Damascus but will not be eager to put Assad back in charge of Aleppo. As long as Putin can manage to keep its naval base safe without much coordination with Iran, he thinks that he has a winning hand in the bigger picture.

- Where is Türkiye in this picture?

While not having a smooth but working relationship with both Russia and the United States (US), Türkiye seems to be focusing on the terrorist organization PKK-held territories. The terrorist organization PKK filled the vacuum when the terrorist organization Deash/ISIS was taken down with a bloody fight on multiple fronts, in some of which Türkiye paid a heavy price to defeat Deash/ISIS. Now we see another shrinkage, this time of Assad’s control.

Türkiye is committed not to let the terrorist organization PKK fill in the new power vacuums this time. Even more, Türkiye is using this turbulent time in an opportunistic way to erase the remaining pockets of the terrorist organization PKK in Western Syria: first Tel Rifaat and then Manbij. As the terrorist organization PKK's rule in Tel Rifaat was sitting on the regime stool in Aleppo, they quickly fell to ground once the regime forces deserted Aleppo.

While so many pieces are moving in this puzzle, the clear part is that the HTS-led rebels of Idlib will expand as much as possible and then consolidate their rule in their newly acquired territories. Another clear part is that Türkiye will pursue its goal of erasing the terrorist organization PKK from the Syrian theater no matter how much or how long it takes.

Assad’s options are more limited as his military is falling apart on top of the lack of much-needed Russian air and Iranian ground support. As for the US and Russia, Syria is no longer on the first page of their to-do list. All this shows that Türkiye is the most capable and committed actor with a clear roadmap and endgame in Syria, no matter what happens in the clashes between the rebels and Assad forces.

*Opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Anadolu