U.S. Still at Work on No-Fly Zone Despite Rise of Al Qaeda in Syria

It's important to recall that several months ago there were reports in the press predicting that an American-led no-fly zone was in the works for parts of Syria and might be up and running as soon as summer's end. Lest we forget, Thom Shanker, reporting from Tel Aviv, has a story headlined "Syrian War Shapes Trip by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff" about Joint Chiefs head Martin Dempsey's junket to the Middle East:

The chairman, Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, said his talks in Jordan would include an assessment of whether American surveillance aircraft or collaboration on other border-control techniques could help the Jordanians, whose country is the emergency home to tens of thousands of Syrian refugees — and, increasingly, a route for black-market weapons transported both ways across the Syrian frontier. 

Syria has accused Jordan of acting as a transit point for weapons supplied to Syrian rebels, an accusation Jordan has denied. In recent days, the Jordanian authorities have detained suspected smugglers, including Syrians, accused of attempting to bring antitank missiles, surface-to-air missiles, assault rifles and other arms from Syria into Jordan — possibly part of an attempt by jihadists in Syria to foment unrest in Jordan as well. 

The Pentagon already has deployed air-defense missile batteries in Jordan, along with crewed F-16s to train alongside the Jordanian Air Force in patrolling Jordan’s border and airspace. A few hundred American military planners, including communications experts and logisticians, also are in Jordan.

American war plans roll along according to schedule. The only wrinkle has been the ascension over the last six months of Al Qaeda linked jihadis. They now constitute the main rebel fighting force in Syria. That's why Free Syrian Army General Salim Idris's "me too" photo op in Bashar al-Assad's Alawite home territory of Latakia province smacks of desperation. The push to occupy villages in Latakia was reported last week as being an ISIS initiative. Idris wants to show his paymasters that he's on the job.

Since Al Qaeda and its affiliates are the sworn enemy of the United States, a foe that we have been locked in existential battle with for over a decade, one that has reconfigured our society into a surveillance state and justified wholesale spying on the homeland, you would think that the ascension of Al Qaeda jihadis as the dominant opposition military force in Syria controlling swaths of territory and its resources would prompt the Obama administration to immediately sue for peace with the Syrian government. But you would think wrong. The only change made by the U.S. so far is a rhetorical one. Whereas before it ignored the presence of jihadis, now it is acknowledging the threat they pose, particularly to Syria's chemical weapons stockpile, and using it as a justification to continue its military planning for control of Syria. General Dempsey laments the rise of radical Islamists while at the same time rationalizing coordination with them:

“I am very concerned about the radical element of the opposition, and I am concerned about the potential that extremist ideologies will hijack what started out to be a popular movement to overthrow an oppressive regime,” he said. 

He acknowledged that radical militias, which assumed an ascendant role in the civil war about six months ago, remained a powerful force with some of the best fighters on the rebel side. But in the last six months, he said, the United States has increased its ability to identify moderate opposition leaders, and to begin communicating with them in substantive ways. 

Even so, he acknowledged that battlefield necessity may require radical and moderate militias to cooperate for tactical gains against the Assad government — a convergence that would complicate American and allied policy making.

“It doesn’t surprise me that from time to time they collaborate with each other,” he said. “What we have to be alert for are opportunities to convince the more moderate aspects of the opposition that Syria will be a far better place if the moderate opposition dominates in the end game.”

C.J. Chivers and Eric Schmitt have a story this morning, "Arms Shipments Seen From Sudan to Syria Rebels," outlining an arms pipeline to rebels that flows from Sudan via Ukrainian commercial air transport to Turkey thanks to funds supplied by Qatar. Sudan denies involvement because it receives military and technical assistance from Iran and China, stalwart allies of the Syrian government.