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1. War or Peace? Turkish Moves in Syria

Author:
Gallia Lindenstrauss and Carmit Valensi
Publication Date:
09-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for National Security Studies (INSS)
Abstract:
Recent increased attacks on Kurdish targets in northern Syria by Turkey and the Syrian rebel groups its supports raise the question whether Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan intends to carry out his threat of May 2022 to begin another major ground operation against the Kurds. On the other hand, conciliatory statements regarding the Assad regime have been sounded recently in Turkey, and there has been discussion of the possibility of normalizing relations between the two countries after over a decade of hostility and competition. These two processes appear to be contradictory, given that the Syrian regime opposes existing Turkish control of Syrian territories, and does not wish to see this control broadened. On the other hand, this may be a calculated Turkish move that aims to show the Turkish public a concerted multi-faceted effort to confront both the Kurdish underground and the issue of Syrian refugees in Turkey. Discussion of events in northern Syria and the web of Syrian and Turkish interests can be used to assess the question, which trend will prevail in Turkish-Syrian relations: normalization or escalation?
Topic:
War, Military Strategy, Homeland Security, Peace, and Strategic Interests
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, Middle East, and Syria

2. The Legal Role of Government in Protecting Cultural Heritage and Archaeological Sites in the War-Affected Countries: The Case of Iraq and Syria

Author:
Rukhsar Ahmad
Publication Date:
06-2022
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Liberty and International Affairs
Institution:
Institute for Research and European Studies (IRES)
Abstract:
Conserving cultural heritage and archaeological sites have become a serious national concern in the Middle East for the war-affected countries, including Iraq and Syria. Because looting and violence have caused massive destruction of cultural heritage and archaeological sites, this study aimed to analyze the legal background concerning the protection of cultural heritage and archaeological sites in the context of Iraq and Syria during 2014 with the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). This study used the content analysis method and cross-country analyses for Iraq and Syria. The study is guided by two main questions: What is the government's legal role in protecting cultural heritage and archaeological sites? Are there any legal authorities in Iraq and Syria to protect cultural heritage and archaeological sites during war and conflict? In the end, this paper suggests that protecting cultural heritage is the legal responsibility of government which is supposed to be enforced in the legal foundation of the state as a national sovereign power.
Topic:
War, Governance, Culture, Legal Theory, Heritage, and Archaeology
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, and Syria

3. La dimensión informativa sobre la guerra: su aplicación al caso de la intervención militar turca en Rojava

Author:
José Alberto Moreno
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Revista UNISCI/UNISCI Journal
Institution:
Unidad de investigación sobre seguridad y cooperación (UNISCI)
Abstract:
The Turkish Military Intervention in the Syrian part of the Kurdistan region, known as Rojava, shows that the Syrian Civil War presents a great number of different sides. The objective of the intervention is to create a safe zone where two million syrians could be resettle, expelling from the area the kurd militias that oppose the government in Ankara. The present article wants to deep in the use of frames used by the Spanish written press when covering the Turkish military intervention in the Arab country. Through a classic and cuantitative methodology, named analysis of content, this paper will go into the mediatic discourses of the national press with the purpose of exploring what explanations are having a biggest importance. This contribution tries to explore if the humanitarian question weights more heavily that the ones focused on security./La intervención militar turca en el Kurdistán sirio, conocido como Rojava, demuestra que la guerra civil siria presenta una gran cantidad de aristas. El objetivo de la misma es crear una zona de seguridad donde reasentar a más de dos millones de refugiados sirios y expulsar del lugar a las milicias kurdas, opositoras al gobierno de Ankara. El presente artículo tiene como finalidad ahondar en el uso de encuadres utilizados por la prensa escrita española a la hora de cubrir la intervención militar turca en el país árabe. A través de una metodología clásica y cuantitativa, análisis de contenido, se ahondará en los discursos mediáticos de la prensa nacional con el objetivo de investigar qué narrativas están teniendo mayor peso. Esta contribución intenta explorar si las cuestiones humanitarias presentan mayor relevancia que las explicaciones centradas en la seguridad.
Topic:
Security, War, Mass Media, Military Intervention, Conflict, and Syrian War
Political Geography:
Turkey, Syria, and Rojava

4. Rethinking Transnational Terrorism: An Integrated Approach

Author:
Martha Crenshaw
Publication Date:
02-2020
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
The 2011 civil war in Syria attracted thousands of fighters from at least seventy countries to join the Islamic State. Al-Shabaab carried out large-scale attacks on civilian targets in Uganda and Kenya as retribution for the deployment of peacekeeping forces in Somalia. In this report, Martha Crenshaw considers the extent to which civil war and foreign military intervention function as a rationale for transnational terrorism, and how understanding the connections between terrorism, civil war, and weak governance can help the United States and its allies mount an appropriate response.
Topic:
Terrorism, War, Non State Actors, Islamic State, Transnational Actors, Peace, and Al-Shabaab
Political Geography:
Uganda, Kenya, Africa, Middle East, Syria, Somalia, and United States of America

5. The Cost of Debt-financed War: Public Debt and Rising Interest for Post-9/11 War Spending

Author:
Heidi Peltier
Publication Date:
01-2020
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University
Abstract:
Throughout the 18 years the U.S. has been engaged in the “Global War on Terror,” mainly in Iraq and Afghanistan, the government has financed this war by borrowing funds rather than through alternative means such as raising taxes or issuing war bonds. Thus, the costs of the post-9/11 wars include not only the expenses incurred for operations, equipment, and personnel, but also the interest costs on this debt. Since 2001 these interest payments have been growing, resulting in more and more taxpayer dollars being wasted on interest payments rather than being channeled to more productive uses. This paper calculates that the debt incurred for $2 trillion in direct war-related spending by the Department of Defense and State Department has already resulted in cumulative interest payments of $925 billion. Even if military interventions ceased immediately, interest payments would continue to rise, and will grow further as the U.S. continues its current military operations.
Topic:
Debt, War, Military Spending, and 9/11
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Iraq, Middle East, Yemen, Syria, North America, and United States of America

6. Strengthening Global Regimes: Addressing the Threat Posed by Chemical Weapons

Author:
Ian Anthony
Publication Date:
11-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute
Abstract:
The inadequate response to the use of chemical weapons by a state against its own population was an important catalyst leading to the creation of the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). A great deal has been achieved under the CWC, which is an important example of how multilateral cooperation can succeed. Recent cases of confirmed use prove that the task of eliminating chemical weapons is not complete. Chemical weapons are once again being used on the battlefield and as terror weapons. Moreover, their use in targeted attacks against politically exposed persons presents a new challenge to the commitment made by CWC states parties that chemicals will be developed and produced exclusively for peaceful use. When they come together to review the CWC in late 2020, the states parties will have to assess whether their response to the challenges posed by the use of chemical weapons has been proportionate to the threat. If not, then they will have the responsibility to create the new capacities, invent the new instruments and develop the new initiatives that will make their efforts more effective. This SIPRI Policy Paper provides an explanation of the context for some important recent decisions and an analysis of them. It also proposes some actions that CWC states parties could take together in support of the effort to eliminate the threat of chemical weapons.
Topic:
Treaties and Agreements, War, Weapons, Disarmament, and Chemical Weapons
Political Geography:
Middle East and Syria

7. Coming Home to Roost: War Threatens to Spill Beyond Syria’s Borders

Author:
James M Dorsey
Publication Date:
04-2020
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
The Begin-Sadat Centre for Strategic Studies (BESA)
Abstract:
As tens of thousands more refugees are shunted by Turkey toward Europe and a new phase of the brutal Syrian war unfolds, Russia, Turkey, the EU, and the international community are being handed the bill for a flawed short-term approach to the nine-year conflict that lacked empathy for the millions of victims and was likely to magnify rather than resolve problems.
Topic:
War, Refugees, Syrian War, and International Community
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, Turkey, Middle East, and Syria

8. Essential Players: How do ‘Mercenaries’ affect conflicts in the Middle East?

Author:
FARAS
Publication Date:
02-2020
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
Future for Advanced Research and Studies (FARAS)
Abstract:
The utilization of mercenaries has become one of the key predicaments in the Middle East, particularly in the hotbeds of armed conflict, including Libya, Yemen and Syria. Such militia are usually transferred through the use of civil flights, crossing land borders or smuggling through organized crime networks. This has been reflected by numerous evidence including the escalating tensions between the international powers such as ‘France’ and regional ones such as ‘Turkey’, even affecting the mutual hostility between the ‘Syrian Democratic Forces’ and Ankara, and the latter's policy aiming at disturbing Libya's neighboring countries. In the case of Yemen, the Houthi militia and Islah party have also used African mercenaries. It is further evident in the warning given by the Yemeni government to ‘Tehran Mercenaries’ against turning Yemen into a battlefield after the murder of Qassem Soleimani.
Topic:
War, Non State Actors, Houthis, Militias, and Mercenaries
Political Geography:
Iran, Turkey, Middle East, France, Libya, Yemen, North Africa, and Syria

9. When Russia Goes to War: Motives, Means and Indicators

Author:
Konrad Muzyka
Publication Date:
01-2020
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
International Centre for Defence and Security - ICDS
Abstract:
Since Vladimir Putin declared the fall of the Soviet Union to be the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century, prompting concerns that Moscow would seek to rebuild its influence by conquering territories on its borders, Russia has deployed combat troops into Georgia, Ukraine and Syria, and inserted private military companies into the Central African Republic, Libya, Mozambique, South Sudan and Venezuela. But there is little consensus among analysts about the meaning of Russia’s military behaviour, or how far it might go in pursuing its interests. Is it trying to rebuild a version of the former Soviet Union? Does it have the will and capability to go to war? Under what circumstances might it be ready to commit combat troops? And how do these questions relate to its immediate neighbourhood, in particular to the Baltic region? This analysis examines Russia’s fundamental motives for going to war in the ‘near abroad’, describes how Russia might wage war in the Baltic states, and identifies some of the indicators that might suggest it is preparing to do so.
Topic:
War, Military Affairs, Geopolitics, and Private Sector
Political Geography:
Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Syria, and Baltic States

10. A Plan to End the War in Syria: Competing with Russia in the Levant

Author:
Aaron Stein
Publication Date:
11-2020
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Foreign Policy Research Institute
Abstract:
The United States has an interest in allowing the Russian Federation to “win” an outright victory in Syria, so long as it secures from Moscow an agreement that is favorable to the Syrian Kurds, builds in negative consequences for an external actor targeting the Syrian Democratic Forces, and establishes a “deconflict plus”-type mechanism to continue to target Islamic State- and Al Qaeda-linked individuals in Syria. A forward-looking policy that the incoming Biden administration could consider is to deprioritize the nascent threat of the Islamic State as a key factor in driving U.S. national security strategy, and instead focus more intently on long-term competition with great powers. This approach would seek to shape how Moscow spends finite defense dollars—at a time of expected global defense cuts stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic—in ways that are advantageous to the United States. It also would seek to limit the cost of the U.S. presence in Syria—to include secondary and opportunity costs not accounted for in a basic cost breakdown of the U.S. war against the Islamic State. This approach is not without risk, particularly from a nascent Islamic State insurgency in Russian-controlled territory, but seeks to match U.S. strategic priorities with action and to impose upon a long-term competitor the costs of victory for its intervention in Syria.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Foreign Policy, War, Syrian War, and Strategic Competition
Political Geography:
Russia, Middle East, Syria, and United States of America