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Michael makes a number of interesting observations. I agree with many of
them.
I want to share here some thoughts on issues which are under dispute.
Before doing this, I want to raise a “methodological” problem: which
information is reliable and which not?
Naturally, this is not an easy issue. The details of the situation of
the civil war on the ground are often confusing. There is a lot of
propaganda, one-sided information or fake news (real one, not the Trump
way).
My knowledge is based on studying information from our Syrian contacts
which we assembled in the past seven years though our international
solidarity work, reading the statements/reports of the forces involved
war and the information from bourgeois media (mostly Arab and Western; a
bit Russian and Hezbollah).
Naturally, one must be aware of the “typical” dangers each of these
sources have (tendency to conspiracy theories, one-sidedness, etc.) and
the limitations.
For example the pro-Western rebels (which the fools call “moderates”)
have in general a better access to the English-speaking world. They have
more educated people speaking English and they are more interested in
influencing the Western world. This is even truer for the supporters of
Kurdish YPG as well as of the Assad regime. The hard-core Islamists, on
the other, care not too much about the Western audience.
I am not saying this in order to promote post-modernist relativization
of truth (people who have read our literature will be aware that we
strongly disgust such nonsense). I just say this in order to explain
that one has to combine the analysis of the information available with a
Marxist analysis of the class interests involved. One must approach this
numerous (and often contradicting) information with a Marxist “common
sense” (if such a category is allowed in such a context.)
Now I want to deal briefly with two important issues which Michael
raised and where I am not satisfied with his answers.
1) Is it legitimate to speak about pro-Astana and anti-Astana rebels?
Michael emphasizes that one must take into account that there are many
different groups with different (or changing) positions. And, Michael
stresses, one must not forget the still existing local committees etc. I
can assure the comrade that I am fully aware of this. (We have written
about this e.g. in part I of this pamphlet,
https://www.thecommunists.net/theory/syrian-revolution-not-dead/) Even
now, seven years after the beginning of the revolution, many rebel
factions have a local nature.
This is a certain strength as it makes them more dependent on local
pressure. And hence, they can more easily change alliances, etc.
On the other hand, the weakness of this is also pretty obvious: it gives
these factions a much more defensive, local nature and gives the
Assadists a huge advantage as they can centralize their forces and
attack the enemy with superior force.
In addition, these local rebel factions have no say in the important
political and strategic decisions. The whole situation results in that
these local factions are forced to join a certain larger umbrella
alliance (they need weapons, logistic support, etc.) It means that
important decisions are made by the tops of these larger umbrella
alliances with little influence of the local groups.
I have the impression that Michael, in his elaboration, is in danger of
not seeing the forest for the trees (if you understand my primitive
English!).
Yes, the local factions have little to do with Astana. But they are
dependent on the tops of the larger umbrella alliances. And these tops
are, in a number of case, simply bought off by Turkey and, hence,
pro-Astana.
Of course, this process is not without contradictions. The relationship
between Turkey and Assad is full of frictions and contradictions. If
Assad decides to fully attack Idlib, Turkey will find it very difficult
(and may be even not desirable) to stop the pro-Astana factions from
fully engaging in fighting. In such a case, by the way, the whole Astana
process would lose relevance as Assad has no longer any need for it.
Personally, I believe that the Erdoğan regime is currently in a very
difficult situation. Given the dramatic economic crisis and the tensions
with Washington, it can not afford to piss off Putin. Add to this
Ankara’s fears to absorb even more millions of Syrian refugees.
As long as these factors do not change I believe that it is likely that
Erdoğan will do what Putin asks him to do. But we will see.
Finally, it is interesting to point out that HTS has been the only force
among the rebels (I don’t count Daesh/ISIS as such) with a national
presence – i.e. in the North, South and Damascus area). All other groups
were only locally-based factions. Naturally, by now HTS is also
constrained to the North as all other liberated areas have been smashed
by the Assadist/Russian/Iranian forces.
2) How popular or unpopular is HTS?
I am aware that there are numerous reports of people protesting against
HTS as well as people cheering them. But I don’t think it is impossible
to get a rough assessment of the real state of affairs.
In my opinion, Nusra/HTS has gained enormous support because they have
proven in many cases to be more disciplined and determined in fighting
against Assad than many others. In addition, they also try to combine it
with building civilian popular structures (the “popular jihad” concept
as we explained in chapter V of our book,
https://www.thecommunists.net/theory/world-perspectives-2018/)
However, at the same time they repeatedly destroy much popular sympathy
because of their reactionary social agenda and authoritarian tendencies.
(much less than Assad of course as one see with the various rallies
against them in Idlib city; and the YPG-controlled areas also see very
little protest rallies against the YPG – but may be everyone loves Apo!)
So how do people explain the fact that HTS has been the only
organization existing on a national scale and dominating Idlib? There is
the argument that they moved to suppress opponents in 2017. This is true
to a certain degree. After the beginning of the Astana process in
January 2017, the hostility between the factions sharpened substantially
given the contradictory positions towards Astana.
But in the end one must take care to avoid tautologies: it is nonsense
to say HTS is strong because it is strong. There have been various
attempts by pro-Astana factions to defeat HTS but they failed.
Obviously, there is more behind HTS strength than only the weapons.
This is even more so since HTS is the only significant force without the
full backing of a regional or Great power! The pro-Astana factions have
the Turkish state, important sectors of the Daraa rebels had the US and
Jordan, the YPG has the US and Assad obviously has Russia and Iran.
All these forces certainly get much more military and financial support
than HTS ever got!
I know that there are people claiming that the US and Turkey has always
supported Al-Qaida and hence are the secret sponsors of HTS. But,
really, this is nonsense a la Alex Jones and no serious observer of the
Syrian civil war would say so.
Some say Qatar supported HTS. Again, yes, may be there has been this or
that aid but not on a massive and systematic scale. By the way, this
would also contradict the foreign policy orientation of Qatar.
Even if one says that there has been certain collaboration between
Turkey and HTS, every serious observer will agree that HTS is not the
faction which would receive most support from Ankara but that it is
rather the opponents of HTS which get most support.
So where does HTS have its financial resources? In addition to
individual donors amongst wealthy Salafist sympathizers, they have
basically managed to build a certain semi-state in Idlib with taxes and
control of border (i.e. tariffs for import and export). How was this
possible? Because of its local popular strength which resulted in
military strength.
I hope this could clarify some issues.
--
Revolutionär-Kommunistische Organisation BEFREIUNG
(Österreichische Sektion der RCIT, www.thecommunists.net)
www.rkob.net
ak...@rkob.net
Tel./SMS/WhatsApp/Telegram: +43-650-4068314
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