According to a Global Security Newswire on-line article, Obama Adviser: Syrian Transitional Body ‘Only Sustainable’ Way to End Bloodshed, the president’s national security adviser insisted in a Monday speech that the creation of a post-Assad transitional authority in Syria would be the ‘only’ long-term means of ending bloodshed in the Middle Eastern nation’s ongoing civil war.”
Syria’s civil war – likewise the problems in Libya, Pakistan, India, Lebanon, and probably a great deal of Africa as well – can be laid at the door of fat-headed Europeans who knew better than the locals when it came to drawing borders.
Consider tribal loyalties – hardly.
Consider religious affiliations – never; the people are “heathens” anyway, so who cares.
Draw lines where it is convenient for the European conquerors.
Consider the Kurds.
The Encyclopedia of the Middle East notes that There are about 26-36 million Kurds in the world, with the largest concentration, 10-15 million, in Turkey. The map below shows the major areas of Kurdish concentration. The settlements in outlying districts away from the central area of Kurdistan, reflect in part attempts at resettlement and ethnic cleansing by various Turkish and Iranian Muslim rulers. Alone among the major peoples of the Middle East, the Kurds were denied self determination after the fall of the Ottoman Empire.
A glance at the map shows that the Kurds are a widely disbursed people, but there IS a concentration; the majority of Kurds live in an area that includes parts of Northern Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey.
Kashmir is another example.
Rather than create an independent state populated by Kashmiri peoples in India, Pakistan, and China, the Brits drew lines of convenience – for them.. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) map follows. The BBC map cuts off Kashmir from the rest of India and offered it to Pakistan and China.
Obungler wants the Syrians to create a “Syrian Transitional Body” but who will populate this group?
Syria is divided along religion and tribal lines. Add to the indigenous population the imports from Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, and “Palestinians” who fled Israel to clear a path for the glorious Arab armies that would drive the Jews into the sea.
To see how lines could be drawn to reduce intra-religious conflict, the populations of the adjacent states (Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq, and even Israel) need to be displayed together with the Syrian map. See the second Kurdish map as an example of cross-border populations.
Syria and Lebanon are both ancient nations, but their modern borders are the result of French and British map makers who ignored the reality on the ground.
Which begs the question: Who will be represented on Obungler’s “Syrian Transitional Body?” Will imports Al-Qaeda and Hezbollah be included? Will the Kurds, the Druze, the Jews still in Syria – and there are Jews in Syria. How about Christians?
If the so-called Palestinians cannot sit down with Israelis, why would Obungler think Shia, Sunni, and Alawi sit down to draw up an agreement – never mind including the other groups.
Who will be an “honest broker” among the parties? The Arab League? Hardly; it, too, is fragmented along religious lines. “Infidels” would be wasting their time as well as generating increased hostility toward the nations they represent.
Bottom line: Obungler should drop the whole Syria issue and hope the world will forget how his speech writers got him between a hammer and an anvil/rock and a hard spot.
The United States has no business interfering, in any way, in Syria’s civil war. For the U.S. and other non-Muslim countries, interference is a lose-lose situation. Besides, the French and Brits caused enough trouble in the area by drawing maps of their convenience.
