The lesson we need for Syria

The clashes between the Assad regime and the opposition in Syria are increasingly beginning to look like a conflict between equals. This image shows that the opposition, which the Baath regime greatly underestimated at first, has reached a size that it can no longer deny or ignore. But at the same time, by accepting this size of the opposition, the regime also hopes to present itself as being in a legitimate war or defense. For to the extent that it can prove that the force it is fighting is its equal, it hopes to be able to make its massacres appear reasonable and justified.

For example, it tries to show this parity by claiming that more than 3 thousand of the dead are soldiers or police, yet this is sheer disinformation, for it both rests on a complete exaggeration of the numbers and on the assumption that every policeman or soldier who died was pro-regime. Yet soldiers suspected of possibly going over to the opposition's side are executed on the spot.

Meanwhile, the propaganda loaded onto the bomb that exploded in the center of Damascus, very close to the Mukhabarat, betrays all the elements of this cheap and simple equation. The regime was too hasty in presenting it as a sign of the terrorism of the opponents or of their cooperation with al-Qaeda. Yet all the data say the opposite. Al-Qaeda has a tendency to advertise itself by claiming even operations it did not carry out, and in this case it did not touch it at all, that is one. Second, the opponents do not have the capacity to undertake such a job in Damascus, where they are at their weakest, right next to the Mukhabarat. The entire combat experience of those among the opponents who have taken up arms is at most 4-5 months. The latest bombing, on the other hand, whichever way you look at it, requires far greater experience and accumulated know-how. All the signs point to the Mukhabarat, in other words.

The truth is that today's picture presents a very different view from a war between two equal forces. What we are dealing with is the uprising or resistance of irregular groups, whose most important source of weapons is the spoils taken from that army, against the attacks of an organized state with extremely powerful, heavy weapons.

Truly, movements that began as extremely peaceful demonstrations inviting the government to carry out reforms turned into an anti-regime uprising as they were treated with excessive violence. At first this uprising was greatly underestimated by Assad, who thought he could easily suppress it with a disproportionate use of violence. Frankly, this was a path that had always been tried and proven successful in the past for the Baath regime. Its cost each time was the lives of tens of thousands of its citizens, but those lives mean nothing to the Baath regime anyway..

Even so, the Syrian regime could have tolerated the people who were trying to fill the squares with democratic demands and who at first marched only with the slogan "islahu'n nizam" instead of opening fire on them. Had it tolerated them, had it even sought a path of dialogue, if only for show, things might be at a very different point today. Indeed, the same thing happened in Jordan too, but thanks to the Jordanian government's different approach, events like Syria's did not occur there. Yet the Syrian regime, as it had done many times before, again responded with fire, resorting to the easy path that would, in its own view, keep its mind at ease for a long time. In any case, with the fear instilled in hearts by the fate of the 35 thousand people it had massacred within a few days in Hama most recently, and of the 50 thousand it had then arrested and destroyed in dungeons, it had managed to create a complete culture of submission among the people. The masses who would remember that the same would happen to them were expected never again to attempt such a thing.

Yet this time the policy of intimidation applied backfired completely. The people were increasingly tearing down the walls of fear and voicing their anger at the treatment they were subjected to by overstepping the bounds of fear. Meanwhile, perhaps in complete contrast to the Baath regime's expectation, the people who have risen up are sure of what could happen to them if they turn back from their path. That is, they really are afraid, but not of what will happen to them because of the uprising; on the contrary, they are afraid of what will happen to them if they stop. Therefore the regime's intimidation convinces the people not to give up the uprising but all the more not to turn back from it. For what the Baathists have done in the past has taught very well what they can do from now on.

Meanwhile, as the process in Syria drags on, Turkey's policy also becomes the subject of more criticism. For Turkey really did take a clearer stand than anyone from the very beginning, and became an open party. Now, looking at Turkey's having been left alone as it risks standing by while the massacres in Syria go on, is it possible to say that Turkey has been on the wrong path from the beginning?

Those who criticize the Syria policy point out that Turkey acted hastily in this matter and how many countries or international powers it has set against itself because of the policy it has followed. As though Turkey had decided on war, they try to explain what this war will cost Turkey. For one thing, first of all, has Turkey declared war on Syria and we are somehow not aware of it?

Turkey has been trying from the beginning to stop the massacre, and for that it says that a state that subjects its own people to massacre will have no legitimacy left. Or does a regime that wages war against its own people have legitimacy and we are somehow not aware of it? Do the critics have anything to say about the massacres other than "fine, but the other side is killing and arming too"? Of course in all conflicts there are two sides. It is of course not necessary to take sides between the two conflicting groups as soon as the conflict begins; the possibilities of peace and mediation should be exhausted to the end, but what if one is committing systematic and continuous injustice and oppression against the other, is it not necessary to take a clear stand against it?

The rhetoric of "games of outside powers" over Syria, unfortunately, does not change the fact that here the killer is Assad and his regime, and that as long as it stands it continues to kill.

Massacre is a universal, accursed crime, and sooner or later people, countries and peoples are judged by where they stood in the face of it. If you like, look a little at history; you will easily find there the lesson we need.