The Battle for Syria: International Rivalry in the New Middle East

The Battle for Syria: International Rivalry in the New Middle East

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  • Create Date：2021-10-30 07:52:53
  • Update Date：2025-09-06
  • Status：finish
  • Author：Christopher Phillips
  • ISBN：0300249918
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Summary

An unprecedented analysis of the crucial but underexplored roles the United States and other nations have played in shaping Syria’s ongoing civil war

“One of the best informed and non-partisan accounts of the Syrian tragedy yet published。”—Patrick Cockburn， Independent

Syria’s brutal， long-lasting civil war is widely viewed as a domestic contest that began in 2011 and only later drew foreign nations into the fray。 But in this book Christopher Phillips shows the crucial roles that were played by the United States， Russia， Iran， Saudi Arabia， Turkey， and Qatar in Syria’s war right from the start。 Phillips untangles the international influences on the tragic conflict and illuminates the West’s strategy against ISIS， the decline of U。S。 power in the region， and much more。

Originally published in 2016， the book has been updated with two new chapters。 
 

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Reviews

Edmund ，

A good book and very well researched， but very academic and highly detailed which made it a slight slog to get through。 Would not recommend to those looking for a high level overview of the conflict。

Steffi ，

Probably THE best book on the conflict in Syria （it was recommend by Patrick Cockburn so I checked it out）。 And best means in the context of books on Syria primarily bipartisan。 It's also very concise and analytical and 'dense'。 It took quite some time to work my way through this。 If I had to recommend books on Syria， it would be this one and Joseph Daher's book 'Syria after the uprisings' which provided a more materialist analysis - a rare find in the shitty genre of international politics。 Tha Probably THE best book on the conflict in Syria （it was recommend by Patrick Cockburn so I checked it out）。 And best means in the context of books on Syria primarily bipartisan。 It's also very concise and analytical and 'dense'。 It took quite some time to work my way through this。 If I had to recommend books on Syria， it would be this one and Joseph Daher's book 'Syria after the uprisings' which provided a more materialist analysis - a rare find in the shitty genre of international politics。 That's it， the rest you'll have to get from various articles and think pieces and then try to subtract the biases。 As there are no journalists on the ground and every faction knows a thing or two about media warfare， you need to really invest a lot of effort in making sense of this conflict。 I am still struggling but slowly getting there。 انشالله So I won't go into any details for obvious reasons but I appreciated the chapter on the wider regional context， especially how the 2003 invasion in Iraq set in motion dynamics （e。g。， pro-Iran government in Iraq and rising sectarianism， creation of ISIS， Kurdish nationalism） provide an important background to the conflict in Syria。 Obviously， the coming to power of Putin and Erdogan in the first decade of the 21st century are very critical pieces in this puzzle as are internal developments in Qatar and Saudi Arabia， especially vis-a-vis the Arab Spring and all actors' collective experience of the regime change in Libya （which many - including the opposition - mistook as a blueprint for Syria while for the West it served as an important lesson not to get engaged militarily - these miscalculations of US intent had significant consequences for the conflict）。One question I have been asking myself a lot is how exactly we have gotten to this point - essentially destroying a whole country for nothing。 I have been reading 'analyses' from the early days of the now ten-year conflict and the book stresses that a driving factor behind this 'war that everybody lost' was the lack of institutional knowledge about and ties with Syria among the key actors。 For instance， in 2009， the State Department's Syria desk had one staff。 While the US had decades of ties and intelligence of Egypt。 This also resulted in the US mistakenly comparing Syria with Egypt despite these being totally different regimes with totally different US leverage。Similarly， among Turkey's 135 Ministry of Foreign Affairs middle east staff， only six spoke Arabic。 Saudi Arabia and Qatar also had a very limited understanding of the workings of the Syrian state （often based on flawed narratives produced by exile communities） and had zero experience in pulling off a proxy war （Qatar had some recent but useless experience from Libya and thought that Syria would be somehow similar despite the contexts being structurally totally incomparable）。 And so on。It seems that the more accurate analysis that came from Western Ambassadors in Damascus at the time - who cautioned against regime change as they knew this wouldn't happen - was largely ignored。 BTW there was an interesting think piece in Foreign Affairs last week by the then-US Ambassador in Damascus Robert Ford， advising the new Administration on abandoning the failed approach （。。。）。 2021 is an opportunity to end this war （and others such as Yemen） and start urgently rebuilding （。。。）。 I read somewhere that the level of economic collapse in Syria is greater than Germany and Japan after 1945。 The costs of war are so unimaginable - reconstruction costs estimates for Syria range from somewhere around USD 500 billion to USD 1 trillion but as Afghanistan and Iraq have shown， rebuilding physical infrastructure is the smallest challenge compared to rebuilding society （。。。）。 يلا 。。。more

Reference

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hathitrust digital library https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/ls?q1=The Battle for Syria: International Rivalry in the New Middle East&field1=ocr&a=srchls&ft=ft&lmt=ft

The British Library https://bll01.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/search?query=any,contains,The Battle for Syria: International Rivalry in the New Middle East&tab=LibraryCatalog&search_scope=Not_BL_Suppress&vid=44BL_INST:BLL01&lang=en&offset=0