The Hezbollah spokesman, presumably with a straight face maintained the weapons were both old and unusable. Perhaps the speaker's words were lost in translation from Arabic to Arabic and thus appeared garbled in the Kuwaiti paper, Al-Rai. Or, with equal probability, Syria has designated South Lebanon as the approved dump for ancient, decrepit, and broken warlike stores.
Showing their usual propensity for either ambiguity or an inherent inability to keep the stories straight, the Syrian Foreign Ministry continued to deny the reports of a Scud transfer. Instead, the ForMin trotted out the usual counter-allegation: The Israelis are making it all up in order to roil the otherwise peaceful waters of the Mideast and justify their upcoming invasion of peace loving Hezbollahstan.
Showing the fundamentally peaceful inclination of Hezbollah, the Al-Rai piece went on to quote the Man From Hezbollah as saying, "Our organization has many surface-to-surface missiles spread all across Lebanon..." Ah, yes, the old just-in-case gambit.
While there may be individuals in the IDF and government of Israel who may be itching for a rematch to avenge the bloody nose given the Israelis by an unexpectedly competent and well handled Hezbollah force, it is not likely that Israel is in a search for more ways to complicate their already tenuous position. War may be forced upon the country as it was with Operation Cast Lead, but the Israelis aren't looking to provoke one.
It is quite true that Syria has not been showing a great desire to cooperate with either Israel or the US in a quest for a settlement of either regional or bilateral nature. The rejection by Syria of a bid by Israel to establish a trilateral mechanism in the Golan Heights in order to address points of friction is a very recent sign of Syria's harder version of its long standing hard line policy.
Given the rejectionist posture of Syria at the Arab League meeting last month, the rejection is no surprise. Neither is the shipment of Scuds to Hezbollah.
Both the US and Israel have made the customary statements of viewing-with-alarm and warning of the Grave Consequences. In the rhetorical exchanges both sides have played according to long established protocols. The script written so many years back has been followed with verisimilitude. So far, so good as even Hezbollah has sounded almost statesmanlike given its past oratory.
More important than the "who" and "what" in play here is the basic question of "why?"
There are three possibilities.
The first is Bashir al-Assad didn't know what the boys in the backroom were up to. That is possible but unlikely in the extreme. Assad, fils has a firm grasp on all the levers of power and rogue actions would be firmly squashed--as with a bomb under the underling's car when he leaves a party.
The second is Bashir has gone a little funny in the brain housing group. While not impossible a sudden loss of reason on the part of the tightly wrapped man is on the same order of probability as the arrival of a "death star" from the Oort Cloud.
The third alternative is Bashir is torqued off. He is royally hacked over being ignored in the Mideast "Peace Process." As a consequence, the Syrian leader ordered a typically Syrian exercise in subtlety. Sending a few Scuds to Hezbollahstan can be seen as a shouted, "Pay attention to me! I am a major player. The major player. I can make trouble. Or, I can make trouble go away."
Much, if not most of Syria's foreign policy including its "strategic relationship" with Iran can be seen as motivated by the strong desire of Assad, which is universally shared by his government and military, to regain the Golan Heights and, as a matter of slightly lesser importance, exercise operational dominance in Lebanon. These are the pillars of Syrian policy as they have been since the betrayal of Syria by Egypt during the Yom Kippur War twenty-seven years ago.
The most important lesson drawn by Assad, pere and passed on to Assad, fils was the unreliability of allies, even one as supposedly ideologically compatible as Egypt seemed to be in the days of Anwar Sadat. Allies may be useful but, when push comes to shove, any ally will look to its own fortune first.
The linkage between secularist Syria and the mullahocracy of Iran has little, if any, ideological or political foundation. It is an alliance of narrowly defined self-interest on the part of both countries. Services, cash, and support may flow between the mullahs and the Baathist, but there is no further basis than those pragmatic considerations. This implies the alliance is even more fragile than that which died on the battlefields of the Yom Kippur War.
The real goal of Syria in contracting its alliance with Iran was and is to get the US to take Syria seriously, to put an emphasis on pressing Israel to relinquish the Golan, on acknowledging the reality that Syria, not Egypt, not Saudi Arabia, and certainly not the "Palestinians" is the key player in the region. That the gambit has failed to achieve its end is not the fault of the Syrians.
Damascus has played its cards quite well, even putting their own soil at risk to benefit the Iranians. The failure has occurred because American policymakers under both the W. Bush and Obama administrations have been all too willing to be diverted by appearances or spurious events and not see through to the crux of affairs.
The W. Bush administration was unwilling to concede the fact that Lebanon is a geographic expression to a far, far greater degree than it is a functioning nation-state, let alone an authentic democracy. In the long, dark, and bloody years after "Black September," the only force which was able to impose a measure of stability on Lebanon was Syria. When Syria was either devalued in this role or prevented from playing it, chaos ensued.
Damascus considers Lebanon to be in its sole bailiwick. If possible Syria will exercise operational dominance directly but with a a relatively lowered visibility (but always heavy hand.) If prevented from direct intervention Damascus is willing and able to operate through a proxy. This is what is being done with Hezbollah. In point of fact, Hezbollah is the government of Lebanon in all but name.
The danger comes when the proxy becomes strong enough to ignore its patron. This tipping point is coming in Lebanon and Assad knows it. The Scud shipment is a means of postponing the day when Hezbollah tries an end run to Tehran directly.
More infuriating to Syria has been the focus on "Palestine" and the "Palestinians" exhibited by every administration from Clinton to Obama. Being both Arab and a one time sponsor of assorted "Palestinian" groups, the Syrian regime knows quite well that no deal can be made with the zanies of the Palestinian Authority let alone the flat out crazies of Hamas. If for no other reason than the combination of the weight of history and fear of the Islamist jihadists, no figure in the PA can make a deal with Israel on any terms which might prove acceptable to the Israelis and, quite literally, keep on breathing.
Syria knows itself to be a rational actor. In comparison to the PA and Hamas, this position is irrefutable. In Damascus there has been nothing but mystification over the resolute American refusal to see that by solving the Golan Heights question much progress toward a comprehensive peace settlement can be achieved. It is (correctly) thought in Damascus that the Israelis will need to be leaned on heavily if they are ever to disgorge the Golan to its rightful owners. Only the Americans could conceivably apply the requisite diplomatic muscle.
Having watched the Obama administration fruitlessly apply pressure to Israel over settlements in Jerusalem, the Assad regime must be asking itself just what it would take to get Washington to get off the "Palestinian" horse and try something real. If the Americans are going to use pressure, propose their own peace agreement, why shouldn't they focus on the doable? And, what will it take to get the Obama people to see that the Golan is the real center of gravity and not East Jerusalem?
The Scuds to Hezbollah can be seen in this light. The offensive missiles are simply an attention getting device. A way of waking the Obama administration to realities Mideast style. As with their earlier gambits like the Iranian connection any failure will be attributable solely to the blindness of the Americans. On the up side the Scud transfer is a low risk approach. It does nothing to perturb the balance of either military or political power in the region. At the same time it does grab the eye.
Are you watching, Mr Obama? Ms Clinton? Somebody? Anybody??
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