The overthrow of the Assad regime in December 2024 by the armed Syrian opposition, led by Hayat Tharir al-Sham (HTS) forces, has led to a dramatic upheaval in the Middle East, culminating in the regional defeat of Iran and the end of the Syrian civil war, to the great benefit of the Syrian people. But the overthrow also achieved objectives which three US administrations sought to accomplish since 2011: end or reform the Assad regime; defeat of the Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist movement spawned by the civil war; expulsion of Iranian and Iranian backed forces; and the possibility of a decent future for the Syrian people, including some six million refugees.
Yet US Syria policy during that period was characterized by shifts not only between but within administrations and misjudgments that do not speak well of policy formulation in complex “third world” conflicts. In short, much luck contributed to the so far positive outcome, along with two critical policy elements that remained consistent throughout Syria’s civil war: refusal to accept Assad’s regime, and military engagement.
Early Obama: Overthrow Assad
The Obama administration in 2011 treated Syria as another “Arab Spring” state ripe for overthrow of its authoritarian government, as with Yemen, Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya. The administration, along with Turkiye and various Arab states (Israel with minor exceptions initially opted not to engage), began providing weapons to the opposition. Nevertheless, the US could not coordinate support with the other states arming Syrian fighters, nor bring opposition forces together under one command umbrella. That, and the shift towards hard-line Islamic factions within the Sunni Arab armed opposition, limited the Obama administration’s enthusiasm for the endeavor. Meanwhile, the US, Russia, Turkiye, European and Arab states gathered repeatedly to seek a diplomatic solution, without notable success.
Later Obama: Second Thoughts, And Priority Fighting ISIS
President Obama’s lagging interest in Syria became apparent when he opted not to use force when Assad crossed an Obama “red line” using chemical weapons against civilians. Rather, the president advanced a diplomatic approach partnering with the Russians through the OPCW (Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons) and the UN Security Council. Predictably, neither the Russians nor the Assad regime lived up to their commitments, and chemical weapons were again soon used against the population. Moreover, by eschewing military action the Obama administration signaled that force against Assad was off the table, calling into serious question his entire Syria approach.
This became manifest with two other developments. First was the rise of the Islamic State (ISIS), an offshoot of Al Qaeda in Iraq but based in northeast Syria initially. After it seized much of Iraq in mid-2014, the Obama administration recommitted forces there. But then in late 2014 US forces intervened in Kobane, Syria, to support Syrian Kurds, led by the YPG, the Syrian wing of the Turkish insurgent-terrorist organization PKK, fighting off ISIS. This soon became the primary US military and at times administration priority in Syria, as it sought to shift training of opposition forces to the fight against ISIS, not Assad. Nevertheless, US military support to opposition forces continued - in the southwest close to Israel, and in the southeast at the al Tanf base, severing a major route between Iran and Damascus.
Despite the lack of international coordination, by 2015 Assad’s forces even with Iranian IRGC and Lebanese Hezbollah support were hard pressed, with the country’s second city, Aleppo falling into opposition hands. That led IRGC commander Qasim Suleymani to appeal to Putin to intervene militarily. (Russia had a base in Syria, and a defense agreement with Damascus, but heretofore had only supported Assad diplomatically and with weapons and money.) That Russian direct intervention slowly turned the tide, with Aleppo recaptured in 2016.
Nevertheless, opposition forces in the northwest were supported by Turkish military interventions in 2016 and 2018, and by indirect Turkish support in Idlib, in the far northwest, controlled by HTS (formally the al Nusra group) an al Qaeda offshoot that renounced international terrorism to fight Assad. Also in Idlib were three million displaced Syrians, ready to flee into Turkiye, and possibly as in 2015, into the EU as well, destabilizing both, if Idlib fell to Assad. And in the northeast the YPG (renamed SDF or Syrian Democratic Forces), with significant US military presence, had cleansed the region east and north of the Euphrates of ISIS. By that time the SDF was moving to a hundred thousand strong Kurd-Sunni Arab force. While not officially part of the armed opposition to Assad, the SDF effectively denied the northeast and its oil and agricultural riches to Damascus, further pressuring Assad.
But the rise of the SDF with US support infuriated Ankara, well aware of SDF/YPG’s roots in the Turkish Kurdish PKK, which had been waging a terrorist campaign against Ankara since 1984. Turkiye thus increased its direct military presence in Syria, against Assad, its original objective, but then to combat new threats—ISIS and the SDF. Meanwhile, as Iran’s IRGC and Hezbollah in Syria deployed long range rockets along its southern border, Israel began bombing Iranian and proxy forces, further complicating the Syrian military picture.
With the conflict thus partially frozen, but leaning towards an Assad victory, efforts for a compromise diplomatic solution gained traction. In December 2015 Secretary Kerry and Russian foreign minister Lavrov backed UNSC Resolution 2254, calling for reconciliation among Syrian factions, a country wide ceasefire, and an inclusive constitutional commission to prepare a new constitution followed by elections. While 2254 did not call for Assad’s removal, it advocated a huge change in his government’s behavior. Predictably, Assad opposed its implementation and opted for a military solution. By the end of the Obama administration, with the support of Iran and usually Russia, Assad looked unstoppable.
Trump: Continuity, Then Comprehensive Strategy
The Trump administration more by default than intent continued the “sunk costs” of the late Obama administration: robust anti-ISIS operations, now primarily in Syria; and token embrace of Kerry’s UNSCR 2254. But in mid-2018, with the appointment of Mike Pompeo as Secretary of State, policy changed. It now was not just defeating ISIS and ending the civil war, but expulsion of all Iranian and Iranian-backed foreign forces. With a new team and a comprehensive strategy, Pompeo shifted the policy on Syria. Renewed chemical weapons attacks by the Assad regime, Russian Wagner forces attacking across the Euphrates, and Moscow’s failure to deliver on a ceasefire deal in the southwest worked out by Putin and Trump in 2017 all encouraged this shift in policy. But most importantly, Pompeo saw the biggest regional threat to be Iran and its proxies’ march through the region, with Syria as their strategic center.
There was already international diplomatic and economic pressure on the Assad regime. Despite erratic American leadership on the Syrian crisis, the international community supported a tough position on the Assad regime, reflected in UNSCR 2254’s call for a restructured, democratic Syrian government. The Arab League had suspended Syria’s participation, while almost all-important states had frozen diplomatic relations. On the economic front, the US and the EU had imposed sanctions on Syria’s leadership and prevailed upon the UN and World Bank to avoid investments or stabilization and reconstruction assistance. Given the destruction of many of Syria’s towns and cities due to indiscriminate Russian bombing and the Syrian government’s all-out assaults on civilians, the country needed up to $400 billion in reconstruction, with little hope of obtaining it without supporting UNSCR 2254.
The administration also envisioned a potential military stalemate after years of internal fighting, by coordinating the Turkish presence, Israeli air operations, and the US operations in northeast Syria and at al Tanf in the south. Along with remaining opposition forces, especially HTS and the SDF, the US could mobilize power, if not sufficient to overthrow Assad, then to halt his advance. (Together, Turkey, the US, and opposition and SDF controlled 30 percent of Syria, including almost all its oil fields and much of its arable land.)
With considerable effort, first to halt Assad’s assault on Idlib in September of 2018, and then to keep the Turks from outright war against the SDF, the US managed to freeze the conflict. That was the administration’s Plan “B,” essentially to deny Assad a win. Still the real prize was Plan “A,” to leverage the frozen conflict to compel Assad and his allies to accept UNSCR 2254. Yet as the US did not deal with either Assad or the Iranians, that meant negotiating with the Russians.
Pompeo thus championed a new effort with the Russians, offering a “step by step” approach whereby if Assad took steps the US (and most of the international community) wanted, e.g. moving Iranians out, accepting permanent ceasefires, participating in the UN run constitutional convention, and cooperating with the OPCW, then the US and the international community would gradually lift sanctions, bring Syria back into the international community, and eventually withdraw foreign (i.e., US, Turkish, and Israeli) forces.
The Russians were interested, and limited steps were taken, including the US authorizing demining activities in return for Assad allowing an inaugural meeting of the UN-run constitutional committee. Most promising, President Putin in May 2019 invited Pompeo to pitch the step-by-step plan to him in Sochi. In the end, however, the Russians either decided the US was not offering enough, or they could not convince Assad. Assad after all had another powerful sponsor, Iran, who wanted no concessions (particularly anything limiting its Syria presence). Moreover, Assad apparently thought that any concessions to the opposition would fatefully undercut his authority, while believing that his neighbors would eventually accept him. The Russians told American interlocutors that Assad was so weak that any compromise solution could unravel his regime. Repeated American flip-flops on Syria in both administrations also did not encourage Russia and Assad to take Washington seriously.
Four years later, however, it’s clear that the Russian gamble did not pay off. The deal the Trump administration offered would have allowed continued Russian influence, free use of their bases, and a valuable Arab ally in return for reasonable, humanitarian steps by the Assad regime to reconcile with their own population.
Biden: More Hesitation, But Default Trump
Biden’s Syria policy was opaque, and downplayed compared to the previous administrations. The Biden team ended the Russian negotiations, did not appoint a high level Syria envoy, and stressed initially only humanitarian aid delivery and fighting ISIS. It also took a more tolerant approach to the Assad regime, attempting to relax or waive some sanctions in response to the 2023 earthquake as well as to send electricity and gas through Syria for needy Lebanon. Fortunately, the major elements of the Trump approach remained in place, despite back and forth about alternatives.
The administration was ambiguous on Arab efforts led by the UAE to reconcile with Assad in the hope he would in response reduce dependency on Teheran. In 2021 Secretary Blinken stressed US opposition to them. Nevertheless, two Arab foreign ministers told this author that other administration officials appeared more supportive. The policy was so unclear that the Senate and House Foreign Relations/Foreign Affairs leaders sent a bipartisan letter to President Biden on January 11, 2022 asking for a tougher line against both Assad and the Arab outreach to him, and a senior briefing on what the administration’s Syria policy actually was. Eventually Arab states invited Syria to again join Arab League meetings in 2023 and 2024, but Jordanian efforts to obtain Syrian concessions on refugee return, stopping the captagon drug trade, and limiting Iran’s role in Syria, were for naught. Assad’s refusal to compromise, and continued American sanctions, blocked significant Arab investment and trade. Likewise, an effort by Turkiye, seeking the return of the three million Syrian refugees, to deal with Assad collapsed when the obstinate Syrian leader demanded Turkish troops leave Syria as a precondition.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration supported the OPCW investigation of Damascus, and the UN Syria envoy’s quixotic efforts to implement UNSCR 2254. It facilitated Israeli operations, supported the ceasefires between Assad and allies and the Turks, HTS, and other opposition elements, and kept US troops on. The role of Congress was also important; first in strongly supporting the US military presence; then in the face of some administration hesitation, renewing the flagship “Caesar” sanctions in late 2024. What the administration did not do was seek a “Plan A,” thereby leaving talks on a possible comprehensive outcome to the UN and the Arabs, neither of which went anywhere.
But this American “continue the freeze,” however unambitious, even contradictorily executed, did the trick, Assad was left without military options to win back much of his country, was ever more economically pressed, and ever more reliant on his patrons Moscow and Teheran to keep him afloat.
Then circumstances intervened to undercut their support; the Israeli late 2024 campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon led to withdrawal of much of its Syria contingent, while Iran, fearing Israeli and occasional US strikes on its proxies, also cut back its forces in Syria. Thus in December, when HTS with some Turkish support, led an attack on Aleppo, the Syrian army quickly collapsed. Russian contacts assured the author that their military was ready to intervene against HTS, but that “there was no infantry” to hold them back.
Conclusion
The Trump administration now has to develop its own Syria strategy, based on the totally changed situation. It faces serious issues, from its posture towards HTS to the future of the SDF, but all in the context of inheriting a success, as all the US Syria goals of 2011-24 have been met: civil war ended; Assad gone; Iran and proxies out; ISIS suppressed. With the exception of Mike Pompeo’s tenure, three successive administrations have shown little competence in shaping Syria policy, aside from identifying basic policy goals that were in Washington’s interest. If nothing else, this record demonstrates that, in this rough realpolitik world, America can often have its way through its mere military, economic and diplomatic weight, however tactically inept its execution.
James Jeffrey retired from the Foreign Service in 2012 after a 37-year tenure with the rank of career ambassador, and assignments including Deputy National Security Advisor, and Ambassador to Iraq, Turkey and Albania.
