RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.frontpagemag.com/how-not-to-think-about-syria/

The rapid demise of the brutal Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria has taken every geopolitical analyst and self-proclaimed Middle East “expert” by storm. Following 53 years of brutal Assad family rule and 13 years of bloody civil war, the Syrian strongman abruptly fled for asylum in Moscow as rebels finalized their encircling of Damascus. In the blink of an eye, one of the two Ba’athist Arab states — along with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq before the U.S.-led 2003 invasion — was no more.

Start with the obvious: Assad was a world-historical tyrant, even by bleak Arab world standards. He led with an iron fist, incarcerating political enemies and siccing his totalitarian security apparatuses on all those whom he deemed a threat. (You can see where Democrats may have gotten some ideas.) Since the Syrian civil war began in 2011, he racked up a death toll of over half a million — the majority civilian noncombatants. He has used chemical weapons against his own people on multiple occasions. He allied with the very worst actors on the world stage, and by the time he fled, his regime had become a satrapy held in joint custody by two rogue states: Russia and Iran.

There are thus many reasons to be ecstatic that Assad, a minority Alawite in a majority-Sunni country, is no more. From a Western geopolitical perspective, it is a clear positive that Russia has lost easy access to Mediterranean ports, and Iran has a gaping hole in its “Shiite crescent” of influence, which, in the not-so-distant past, extended from Iran through Iraq and Syria into Hezbollah-overrun Lebanon. And from a humanitarian perspective, one of the very worst butchers in recent global history has been deposed.

The problem, as is so often the case, is the thorny question of what comes next. And therein lies the rub.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/do-irans-leaders-smell-the-coffee-yet/

You can say a lot of things, most of them unpleasant, about former Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. But you can’t say he didn’t have a nose for coffee.

He knew what was coming once the Syrian rebel fighters took Aleppo, more than 200 miles to the north.

He flew to Moscow the next day, on November 28, begging for Russian military support, but was given the cold shoulder. By the time the Iranian foreign minister visited him in Damascus on December 2, the rebels were moving south toward Hama and Assad knew it was only a matter of time — and not much of it — before they reached Damascus. Assad was so despondent he didn’t even ask the Iranians for help.

We now know that he secretly flew to Moscow in the wee hours of Sunday morning, December 8, after telling his top generals that help was on the way from Russia. He wasn’t going to get Qaddafied by his own people.

Now the question is, will Iran be next?

The regime’s Supreme Leader has undoubtedly already made his escape plans. Some of my Iranian sources believe he’s got a jet gassed and ready, but that could just be wishful thinking on their part.

What’s sure is this: all those surrounding Khamenei and his generals have been wearing adult diapers for the past week. They are terrified that they could be next.