(PINR)Stifling the Flow: The Syrian-Iraqi Border

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Power and Interest News Report (PINR)
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11 February 2005
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Stifling the Flow: The Syrian-Iraqi Border
Drafted By: Jonathan Feiser
http://www.pinr.com

Since the end of World War I, the very nature of the porous borders of the Middle East has remained a clear geopolitical threat to the powers that sought to control the region. The porous nature of these young political frontiers has existed throughout the history of the Middle East as a fundamental symptom of tribal and smuggling routes, even before the movement of Arabs from modern day Saudi Arabia.
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It is important to analyze four components of the border problem and how they relate to the security situation for both U.S. forces and the Ba'athist and Alawite regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Issue One: Questionable Intention

The regime of Assad is based on a leadership model that is more tilted toward consensus-based decision-making processes with the final decision itself being subject to Assad's final approval. As in the Cold War, Assad must play the same "diplomatic shuffle" that his father, Hafez al-Assad, sought to achieve. In this sense, the balancing of carrots and sticks, ranging from threats and sanctions to diplomatic concessions based on a "better behaved" Syria, falls into both the internal decision making processes of domestic as well as foreign policy politics; where the former deals particularly with the centers of gravity that exist within the Syrian regime, i.e. Sunni "oligarchs" and Alawite leadership, the latter concerns such issues as the greater Middle East peace process and relations within the Arab world. This category is even more complicated when one attempts to attach complex national security concerns that fall within the scope of Lebanon as well as Palestinian rights.
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Issue Two: Questionable Capability

The second issue is based on capability. After the fall of the Soviet Union, both Syria's technological and economic sustenance evaporated. Although reports indicate that the Syrian military is effective as a conventional force, the border forces on the Syrian side of the Iraqi border are likely ineffective either in training or in support from the centralized government.
A practical likelihood is that the border forces are plagued by massive corruption because they find themselves stationed far from centralized oversight. Another inherent inability is found within the field of physical security. On the ground, the political borders that separate Iraq from Syria are desolate tracts of land with, in many parts, nothing more than a security berm or makeshift roadblock separating the two countries.
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Issue Three: Syria's Geostrategic Role

The "war on terror" has become regionally compartmentalized to the Middle East since the end of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. But the changing nature of the resistance to U.S. efforts in Iraq is only one part of the greater conflict, a conflict that includes Syria's involvement and linkages with Iran.
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Issue Four: Diffusion

Last, the current Iraqi insurgency has become an attraction for both the propagandist and guerrilla. In the case of neighboring Syria, religious fundamentalists, ardent nationalists, former Iraqi regime elements, and Islamists have chosen to take on U.S. forces in Iraq. This reality, therefore, has allowed President Assad to instigate some internal housecleaning courtesy of the insurgency occurring within Iraq.
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Conclusion

Even before the invasion of Iraq, security and regional experts both inside and outside of the loop were well aware of the intrinsic vulnerabilities that the border issue would yield. At present, the situation continues to represent a precarious security situation that contributes to empowering insurgents -- regardless of the banner they fall under -- both within Iraq and throughout the region.
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complete report available at http://www.pinr.com
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Report Drafted By:
Jonathan Feiser
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