Aug 27, 2013

When four years ago Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, he dedicated his laureate speech to the subject of just and unjust wars. Apparently, there are cases when the war is not just necessary, but inevitable. He must have had a second sight. As soon as he finished his “unjust” war in Iraq, he was forced to “justly” fight in Libya. Today, they haven’t left Afghanistan, yet nobody knows if their sense of justice might as well take them to the Syrian front. Oh, global leadership is a heavy burden. There is a constant need for proof of the qualities of a super-power, otherwise the rest of the flock may get out of control ...

Events in Syria and in the surrounding lands automatically bring to mind all previous incidents of international interventions since the 1990s. The mysterious use of toxic substances immediately transforms into casus belli, including the involvement of UN inspectors, yet in reality nobody could care less about their conclusions because the powers that be already know who is to blame. And the heartbreaking scenes of children dying from suffocation would get anybody onboard. And the “coalition of the volunteers” appears ready to participate in retaliation against the malicious regime.

In Moscow, hardy anyone believes that the tragedy with the toxic substances in the suburbs of Damascus is connected to the regime of Bashar al-Assad. He would have to be completely out of his mind to put himself at such risk now by using chemical weapons against the civilian population. On the other hand, the opposition, which is incapable of achieving any significant success, will benefit immensely from the scandal with the chemical weapons. However, it will be impossible to prove anything regardless of what the UN inspectors have to say. After all, their instructions were not to find out who was at fault, but rather to confirm or refute the mere fact of using the chemical weapons. Most likely, the verdict will be ambiguous and vague — "It is not yet clear, but there is room for assumption ..." It is not a coincidence that William Hague and John Kerry rushed to announce that the regime already destroyed all evidence and that, purportedly, there would be no proof; however, it does not mean a thing. A massive preparation for the act of retaliation, without waiting for the outcome of the mission, shows nothing except that the outcome is irrelevant.

What is Moscow going to do, if Western states and Arab neighbors of Syria finally launch armed action against Damascus? Naturally, it will be strongly condemned by Russia. Most likely, it will make a statement that in such circumstances, it is meaningless to rely on the “Geneva II” peace conference. In the 1990s, notwithstanding its dissatisfaction with Western politics in Yugoslavia, Russia helped twice to persuade Belgrade to withdraw — in 1995 in Bosnia (which resulted in the Dayton Accord) and, especially, in Kosovo in 1999.

In the latter case, it was the interference of Russia’s special representative, Viktor Chernomyrdin, who told Milosevic, on behalf of Boris Yeltsin, that Russia would deprive him of its support, which let NATO end its useless and unpopular air attack without moving forward with the risky inland invasion. Now, the United States should not expect any assistance from Russia in getting out of this mess and, should the conflict drag on, it would only become more expensive. If you get yourself in a mess, you should be able to get out of it yourself. Especially, given that Russian-American relations are very unpredictable because of Edward Snowden and a number of other issues.