Syrian Infighting May Be Pretext for Expanded Intervention

While the West will maintain that the conflict in Syria began as “peaceful protests,” readers should keep in mind that Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh in his article, “The Redirection: Is the Administration’s new policy benefiting our enemies in the war on terrorism?” prophetically stated (emphasis added): 

“To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda.”

Hersh would also state in his 2009 report that Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood was already being funded and supported by the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia to prepare for the eventual overthrow of the Syrian government (emphasis added):

There is evidence that the Administration’s redirection strategy has already benefitted the Brotherhood. The Syrian National Salvation Front is a coalition of opposition groups whose principal members are a faction led by Abdul Halim Khaddam, a former Syrian Vice-President who defected in 2005, and the Brotherhood. A former high-ranking C.I.A. officer told me, “The Americans have provided both political and financial support. The Saudis are taking the lead with financial support, but there is American involvement.” He said that Khaddam, who now lives in Paris, was getting money from Saudi Arabia, with the knowledge of the White House. (In 2005, a delegation of the Front’s members met with officials from the National Security Council, according to press reports.) A former White House official told me that the Saudis had provided members of the Front with travel documents.

The New York Times would then confirm in its June 2012 article, “C.I.A. Said to Aid in Steering Arms to Syrian Opposition,” that (emphasis added): 

A small number of C.I.A. officers are operating secretly in southern Turkey, helping allies decide which Syrian opposition fighters across the border will receive arms to fight the Syrian government, according to American officials and Arab intelligence officers.

The weapons, including automatic rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, ammunition and some antitank weapons, are being funneled mostly across the Turkish border by way of a shadowy network of intermediaries including Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood and paid for by Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, the officials said.

The US State Department itself would confirm the presence of nation-wide operations as early as November 2011 by Al Qaeda’s Syrian franchise, in its December 2012 “Terrorist Designations of the al-Nusrah Front as an Alias for al-Qa’ida in Iraq,” which stated:

Since November 2011, al-Nusrah Front has claimed nearly 600 attacks – ranging from more than 40 suicide attacks to small arms and improvised explosive device operations – in major city centers including Damascus, Aleppo, Hamah, Dara, Homs, Idlib, and Dayr al-Zawr. During these attacks numerous innocent Syrians have been killed. 

Clearly, from 2009, long before the US-created “Arab Spring” was entered into the international lexicon, the US and its regional partners had begun tangibly preparing for the violent overthrow of the Syrian government via the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaeda fighters imported into the country. 

For anyone seeking a genuine solution to the rampant violence destroying Syria, they would look to cut off entirely foreign fighters and supporting Damascus in restoring order and stability to the country.