The start of the last quarter-hour of the war on Syria: Solid nucleus of politics and a decisive balance of powers in the field

Written by Nasser Kandil,

The Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad has consistently answered a question addressed to him repeatedly after every political or military victory achieved by the Syrian country about how to measure the entry of the last quarter-hour of the war, by saying that we are not approaching it yet, we approach it just when the borders are closed in front of the funding, arming, and the flow of the militants from the outside, and when the major international and the regional players who stood behind this war be convinced of the priority of the war on terrorism, then the political path is opened seriously and then it becomes possible to besiege the terrorists and getting them out of the Syrian geography radically, then the matter becomes a matter of time. It was clear that the borders which are meant by the Syrian President are not the Syria’s borders with Lebanon, Iraq, and Jordan despite their relation with programmed or uncontrolled leakage of the terrorists and their supply lines to Syria, but because the Turkish borders with Syria are the only borders which have the ability to bear the political and the military burdens which resulted from the entanglement alone in the war on Syria and on which the others depend, and the ability when it decides to get involved in having the influence in the important geographical  demographic depth in the course of the war on Syria. Without Turkey there is no other gap to continue the war from the outside effectively. This is known by Syria and Turkey as well as known by the allies of the two parties of the war which at least half of it was a Syrian Turkish war.

The Syrian solution for the moving to the political path and for enforcing the war on terrorism and which was proposed on Moscow was to close the borders with Turkey by the force of fire and the military resolving, in order to convince who is in Ankara of the ineffectiveness of the gambling and the adventure. Tehran which met after its special tests with the politics and the diplomacy with Turkey has reached even after Damascus to the same conclusions, in which Hezbollah has contributed through its accumulated experience in the fighting fields and in reading their indicators in accelerating their maturity. Russia remained betting on mixing the choice of fire and the choice of politics in order to make the Turks as well as the Americans understand the ineffectiveness of the bet on war. Since the beginning of the year 2015 which means nearly two years ago when the Turks have launched their war against Idlib and Jisr Al Shoughour in favor of Al Nusra front in anticipation of the negotiating track about the Iranian nuclear program, the Syrian leadership has got the image of the equation of the choice of the last quarter-hour , it is Aleppo, the Turkish control over Idlib and its countryside and some areas of the countryside of Latakia as well as the northern countryside of Aleppo is an equation that tempts the Turks and others of the ability to complete their control over Aleppo which the militants who are affiliated to Turkey will have control over the eastern  neighborhoods of it, and thus through the equation of the resolving in Aleppo the war in Syria is at the last quarter-hour.

With signing the understanding on the Iranian nuclear program and thus the Iranian comfort from the burdens of politics and economy, the option of Aleppo has become an opportunity. Russia has relieved from a heavy burden which was the issue of Iran internationally, Iran has relieved from burden as well. The Russian military reposition which was known by the storm of Sukhoi has occurred in the end of the last year, and the aspirations were toward Aleppo, so the countryside of Latakia and the countryside of Idlib as well as the northern countryside of Aleppo were arena for the war in which the Syrian army and the allies have waged and triumphed, till the truce happened in the end of the past February to form security political framework to measure the US Turkish interaction according to Russia, with the calls for a rational political path that coincides with a serious war against the terrorism and reading the shifts and the insistence on proceeding  in them through realistic war, thus was the dual interaction in each of Washington and Ankara, the bet on the battle of Aleppo on one hand, and drawing the contexts of engagement and normalizing the relations under new political ceilings and a common track in the war on terrorism on the other hand. Washington has succeeded in reaching to an understanding with Moscow in Geneva, but the gateway for its application depends on the interaction and the responding of Turkey.

The war of Aleppo was inevitable for Damascus, Tehran, Hezbollah, and Moscow, but this was after the exhausting of the political opportunities. After the resolving in Aleppo there is no hope for a game of armed opposition, nothing is left out the control of the Syrian country but a Turkish area that includes the supporters of Turkey and A US area includes the supporters of US, and the rest is distributed between Al Nusra and ISIS which are classified as terrorists. It was clear the size of the preparation for the war of Aleppo in Ankara, and the acceptance of normalizing the relations without commitments that are further than the intention of not going back to the confrontation either with Moscow or with Tehran, All of these were in a state of waiting for what the Secretary-General of Hezbollah has described since June as the Storm of the North for which Turkey has mobilized thousand and five hundred heavy warship machineries. Saudi Arabia as well according to some reports has put for it a budget of two billion dollars. While Washington which signed the understanding with Moscow was waiting the consequences of the war which was the fierce war of the world wars in which thousands of fighters were killed in each team, but it was resolved by a decisive victory for Syria and its allies. Russia had an apparent active military role in its achieving, moreover the Iranians and Hezbollah have sacrificed and have contributed without return, but the most gratitude is for the Syrian army, the Syrian people and the Syrian leadership especially the people of Aleppo and their choices, it is the victory which Moscow has always foreshadowed its negotiators in Washington and Ankara of it, to respond to the call of mind and to-consider their matters.

In the war of Aleppo the project of the war on Syria has failed, although the war has not finished yet, but the bet on changing the balances and the titles after Aleppo has become impossible. Ankara has started rapidly in implementing the substitute plan for which it has normalized its relations with Moscow and Tehran; the historical moment of the end of the option of war has become clear. The body of the opposition which constitutes an interest to the supporters of Ankara and Washington and which were willing to wage its war according to the restriction of the fight on ISIS and Al Nusra has been separated after the despair in making a change in Syria, and the confrontation with the country, army, and the President. The opposition here is not a symbol of the equation of the Syrian nationalists who call for reform, since there is a strategic meaning for the Turkish Russian Iranian Meeting with the US consent, entitled the priority of the war on terrorism and opening a political track through which Turkey has its conservative speech about the Syrian presidency. But it says what the Russian US understanding has mentioned that the interior Syrian affairs belong to the Syrians themselves, and when they do not reach to an understanding then they resort to the ballot boxes. This means implicitly the recognition of a country where the Turks and the Americans know that its President will be the President Bashar Al-Assad.

On the eve of the launch of the great transformation which sponsored by Russia and after it was announced of the formation of the solid core which based on the end of testing the Turkish options and bets and its joining to a joint document with Russia and Iran, that the US Russian understanding forms its basis. The Russian ambassador in Ankara was assassinated in a bloody protesting message from those who want to continue the war and cannot continue it without Turkey, but no one cares about them, because the response was through a document that can be named Karlov document for the war on terrorism and the launch of the political path for the solution in Syria. Thus those who protested in Riyadh were put in front of a choice of either to join or to be outside the path.

Any one of the Lebanese people is committing a mistake if he decides to take an adventure and to turn Lebanon into an alternative mail inbox for the account of the Saudi protesting messages, which it seems that the bloody aspect which was represented in Ankara is as the bloody pressures which are happening in Jordan, so they are enough just to be cautious.

Translated by Lina Shehadeh,