Jon Hoffman
After a two-week blitz by rebel forces across Syria, the regime of Bashar al-Assad has crumbled, ending nearly six decades of tyranny under the Assad family. Debates over how the United States should proceed in Syria are now front and center for US Middle East policy.
The United States has limited interests at stake in Syria, namely preventing terrorist attacks against the American homeland and avoiding getting entangled in a costly proxy conflict after Assad’s removal. These interests are best protected by withdrawing US troops from Syria and dealing with the emerging government in Damascus at arms-length.
Assad’s overthrow has its roots in the 2011 Arab uprisings that swept the Middle East. Protests erupted in Syria connected with this revolutionary wave. The Syrian uprising was quickly hijacked and derailed by external actors and the emergence of groups such as the Islamic State (ISIS), leading to a yearslong proxy conflict involving the United States, Russia, Iran, Israel, and Turkey that had a devastating impact on the country. As of 2018, it appeared Assad had won the civil war.
He had not. In roughly two weeks, starting at the end of November, opposition forces, led by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), captured the cities of Aleppo, Hama, Homs, and finally, Damascus, forcing Assad to flee to Moscow. Russia, Iran, and various regional militias backed by Tehran had been critical in propping up Assad’s regime.
However, all of these actors have either been unable or unwilling to save the regime. Russia, preoccupied with its war in Ukraine, and Iran, facing an economic crisis and chief elements of the so-called “axis of resistance” overstretched and degraded, failed to save Assad this time.
No tears should be shed for Bashar al-Assad. Like his father before him, he was a ruthless dictator responsible for the murder and torture of countless Syrians. The Syrian people deserve to be free of Assad’s tyranny.
At the same time, a healthy dose of caution and realism should be applied to the uncertainties ahead for Syria.
First is the nature of the opposition forces, namely HTS. An outgrowth of al-Qaeda in Iraq, HTS leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani (whose real name is Ahmad al-Sharaa) has a long history of extremist behavior, including fighting against US troops in Iraq. Al-Jolani has sought to reinvent himself and HTS, namely by renouncing his ties with al-Qaeda and painting HTS as distinct from the global Salafi-jihadi movement, emphasizing its localized nature.
HTS desires the establishment of an “Islamic state” inside Syria, but al-Jolani has tried to stress that the group’s agenda remained strictly focused domestically. However, the group is still deeply authoritarian and adheres to a strict form of Islamism. How this manifests itself moving forward—and how the group will react if Syrians reject the creation of an “Islamic state” inside Syria—remains to be seen.
Second is the risk of a reignited proxy conflict inside Syria. Russia, Iran, and Tehran’s regional partners are still consumed by other concerns, though they will likely try to maintain an element of influence inside post-Assad Syria. Arab autocracies across the region—particularly in the Gulf—will be eager to prevent the emergence of a democratic Syria, fearing that it could encourage mobilization across the region and steer developments in a direction at odds with their own respective interests.
Turkey—which supported the HTS offensive against Assad—is now attacking Kurdish groups in Syria, whom the United States partnered with to fight ISIS, but Ankara views as terrorists.
Israel, too, has already intervened in Syria, immediately invading the country through the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights to establish a “buffer zone” in place of the demilitarized buffer zone that was created in a 1974 agreement between Syria and Israel. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who also claimed the fall of Assad was a direct result of Israel’s actions against Hezbollah and Iran—stated the agreement was void after the fall of the regime. Further Israeli military action in Syria is not hard to imagine.
The United States has no interest in involvement in another ruinous proxy war in Syria. American interests at stake in Syria are limited. Washington should embrace a pragmatic, hands-off approach. This requires removing American troops from Syria and disavowing further military action inside the country, provided its new government abjures anti-American terrorism.
The United States currently has an estimated 900 troops deployed in Syria, leftover from the Obama administration, with the official mission of combatting ISIS. However, as former US Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford noted, the “real (but unstated) reason the US is there is to block Iran from using a road coming from Iraq into Syria.” Despite plans by Donald Trump to withdraw troops from Syria during his first administration in the wake of the destruction of the ISIS caliphate, America’s military presence remained, thanks—in part—to efforts by the Pentagon to sabotage a withdrawal. Unsuccessful, Trump then argued the remaining US military presence in Syria was oriented toward oil, claiming, “We’re out of Syria, other than we kept the oil. I kept the oil.” Yet, US troops were left in Syria, and we did not “keep the oil.”
Such policy incoherence has persisted under the Biden administration, which has maintained America’s military presence in Syria, despite these troops coming under increased attack as a result of America’s support for Israel’s wars in Gaza and Lebanon. Over the past 14 months, these troops have been sitting ducks for reprisal attacks from Iran-backed groups in the region. US troops in Syria and Iraq have been attacked in excess of 180 times over the past 14 months, many suffering traumatic brain injuries—as recently as this week—and three killed at the Al-Tanf military base on the Jordanian-Syrian border in January.
Withdrawing US troops immediately from Syria is of the utmost importance. American military personnel are in Syria without legal authorization or a clear and achievable mission. They represent a remnant of a failed and counterproductive global war on terror and serve as a dangerous tripwire for war with Tehran. Maintaining a US military presence in Syria is not only strategic malpractice but a direct affront to the lives of American troops. It’s time to bring them home.
Washington should also avoid trying to micromanage Syrian politics. Thankfully, the incoming Trump administration appears to recognize the peril here. Discussing events in Syria, President-elect Donald Trump stated, “The United States should have nothing to do with it. This is not our fight. Let it play out. Do not get involved.”
Vice President-elect JD Vance echoed this sentiment, claiming “this is not our fight and we should stay out of it,” and that “time will tell” whether groups such as HTS have indeed moderated.
Revolutions often have unintended and far-reaching consequences, and the pragmatic approach outlined by Trump and Vance should guide US policy toward Syria in the months ahead.
The United States should establish arms-length relations with whoever emerges as the head of the Syrian state. But provided the new government does not target Americans, our involvement should end there. As anywhere, Washington’s Syria policy should be restricted to a level commensurate with the (limited) US interests at stake.