SyriaU.S. diplomats call for "targeted military air strikes" against Assad's government

Published 17 June 2016

More than fifty U.S. diplomats have circulated an internal memo to fellow Department of State employees, criticizing the administration’s policies in Syria and calling for air strikes against President Bashar al-Assad’s government forces. The “dissent channel cable” was signed by fifty-one mid-to high-level State Department officials involved in advising on Syria policy. The document calls for “targeted military air strikes” against Assad’s government.

More than fifty U.S. diplomats have circulated an internal memo to fellow Department of State employees, criticizing the administration’s policies in Syria and calling for air strikes against President Bashar al-Assad’s government forces.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the “dissent channel cable” was signed by fifty-one mid-to high-level State Department officials involved in advising on Syria policy. The document calls for “targeted military air strikes” against Assad’s government.

The document says that American policy has been “overwhelmed” by the unrelenting violence in Syria. It calls for “a judicious use of stand-off and air weapons, which would undergird and drive a more focused and hard-nosed U.S.-led diplomatic process.”

The New York Times reports that during the Vietnam War, the State Department set up the channel as a way for employees who had disagreements with policies to register their protest with the secretary of state and other top officials, without fear of reprisal. Dissent cables are not that unusual, but the number of signatures on this document, fifty-one, is large, if not unprecedented.

The dissent memo says that the Assad government’s continuing violations of the partial cease-fire, known as a cessation of hostilities, is dooming efforts to broker a political settlement because Assad feels no pressure to negotiate with the moderate opposition or other factions fighting him. The government’s barrel bombing of civilians, it said, is the “root cause of the instability that continues to grip Syria and the broader region.”

“The moral rationale for taking steps to end the deaths and suffering in Syria, after five years of brutal war, is evident and unquestionable,” the memo said. “The status quo in Syria will continue to present increasingly dire, if not disastrous, humanitarian, diplomatic and terrorism-related challenges.”

The memo notes that American air strikes against Assad regime targets will likely increase tensions with Russia, but says that these tensions are already rising because Russia, working on behalf of the Assad regime, is continuing its military operations against U.S.-backed Syrian rebel forces – the very forces with which Assad was supposed to negotiate.

The cessation of hostilities agreement did not include the Islamist groups al-Nusra Front and ISIS, meaning that attacks on these groups are allowed. The Assad forces and the forces of Assad’s supporters – Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah – have continued their pre-agreement strategy of concentrating their attacks on the U.S.-backed moderate Syrian rebels, because they see these rebels as a greater threat to the Assad regime than the Islamists.

The memo notes that those who signed it were not “advocating for a slippery slope that ends in a military confrontation with Russia,” but rather a credible threat of military action to force Assad to negotiate in earnest.

The State Department officials argued that military action against Assad would help the fight against ISIS because it would strengthen moderate Sunnis, who are necessary allies against the group.

Robert Ford, a former ambassador to Syria, told the Times that “Many people working on Syria for the State Department have long urged a tougher policy with the Assad government as a means of facilitating arrival at a negotiated political deal to set up a new Syrian government.”

Ford, who is now a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, resigned from the Foreign Service in 2014 out of frustration with the administration’s hands-off policy toward the conflict.

“There is an enormous frustration in the bureaucracy about Syria policy,” said Andrew Tabler, a Syria expert at the Washington Institute for Near Eastern Policy, told the Times. “What’s brought this to a head now is the real downturn in the negotiations, not just between the U.S. and Russia, but between Assad and the opposition.”