In The Media
Jessica Tuchman Mathews
{
"authors": [
"Jessica Tuchman Mathews"
],
"type": "legacyinthemedia",
"centerAffiliationAll": "dc",
"centers": [
"Carnegie Endowment for International Peace",
"Carnegie China",
"Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center",
"Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center"
],
"collections": [],
"englishNewsletterAll": "menaTransitions",
"nonEnglishNewsletterAll": "",
"primaryCenter": "Carnegie Endowment for International Peace",
"programAffiliation": "MEP",
"programs": [
"Middle East"
],
"projects": [],
"regions": [
"Middle East",
"Iraq",
"Syria",
"Gulf",
"Levant"
],
"topics": [
"Political Reform",
"Security"
]
}
Source: Getty
In The Media
Is There an Answer for Syria?
The rapid rise of the Islamic State means core assumptions driving policy on Syria must be rethought.
Published on Oct 9, 2014
Source: New York Review of Books
The glaring weakness in President Obama’s new Middle East strategy, unveiled on September 24 at the United Nations, is the lack of troops on the ground in Syria. In Iraq, the Kurdish peshmerga, a reformed and remotivated Iraqi army, and the Sunni tribes that played a major part in the success of President Bush’s surge can all be brought into the fight against ISIS. But in Syria—whose disintegration directly threatens the five nations on its borders and indirectly the entire region—there is no one. The Pentagon has made its timetable starkly clear: it has announced that it will take three to five months to identify and vet fighters from the Syrian opposition and another year to train them. What will happen, other than air strikes, in the interim?
No matter how seemingly intractable a problem, reexamining deeply buried core assumptions can sometimes point the way to a solution. The drastic shift in priorities for every country in the Middle East occasioned by the frighteningly rapid rise of ISIS over the past several months may have made it possible to do just that in Syria. Two assumptions that have steered policy from the beginning of the crisis—that the eventual outcome must hinge on whether Bashar al-Assad stays in power or goes, and that the framework of a political agreement must precede any cease-fire—ought now to be rethought.
Notwithstanding the appalling human cost of this war—now standing at 200,000 dead, three million refugees, and six million forced out of their homes—President Obama has clung (and may well have been wise to do so) to what he sees as the lesson of prior American military interventions abroad. He has insisted from the outset that the US not take the relatively easy step of deploying its immense power until there is at least the outline of a political agreement among the warring factions. He couldn’t find one, and neither could anyone else.
In August 2012, not long after former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan stepped down as the international community’s special envoy on Syria, he and I shared a coffee break between airplane flights. Speaking with deep sadness, this consummate international negotiator said he’d never worked harder on a problem with less to show for it. Since then, the widely respected former Algerian foreign minister and international civil servant Lakhdar Brahimi has done the same, with the same result...
About the Author
Jessica Tuchman Mathews
Distinguished Fellow
Mathews is a distinguished fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She served as Carnegie’s president for 18 years.
- Washington Already Knows How to Deal with North Korea
- Trump Wins—and Now?Commentary
Jessica Tuchman Mathews
Recent Work
Carnegie does not take institutional positions on public policy issues; the views represented herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees.
More Work from Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center
- Hezbollah’s Wartime StrategyCommentary
The party’s objectives involve tying together the Lebanese and Iranian fronts, while surviving militarily and politically at home.
Mohamad Fawaz
- A Mission for Lebanon’s ArmyCommentary
While armed forces commander Rudolph Haykal’s caution is understandable, he is in a position to act, and must.
Michael Young
- Trump’s Plan for Gaza Is Not Irrelevant. It’s Worse.Commentary
The simple conclusion is that the scheme will bring neither peace nor prosperity, but will institutionalize devastation.
Nathan J. Brown
- Israel Strikes Hezbollah’s Muslim Brotherhood-Affiliated AlliesCommentary
The Jamaa al-Islamiyya is the local Lebanese dimension of a broader struggle involving rival regional powers.
Issam Kayssi
- What Does the Strait of Hormuz’s Closure Mean?Commentary
In an interview, Roger Diwan discusses where the global economy may be going in the third week of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran.
Nur Arafeh
