Terrorism, radical Islamist Jihad, Iraq, Iran's growing power, and the Arab-Israeli conflict all beset the West and in each Syria plays a central, threatening role.Barry Rubin's new book The Truth about Syria explains Syria’s regime, interests, policies, and society, as well as how it shows how Arab and Muslim world politics and ideology work.
To survive, Syria's minority-dominated, dictatorial, and economically incompetent government needs radicalism, control over Lebanon, regional instability, anti-Americanism, and using Israel as a scapegoat. The Truth About Syria explains how the country has run; how it attacks U.S. interests; and why the regime is incapable of another type of policy.
Barry Rubin has written and edited 50 books on the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy. He is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal, the world’s largest journal on the region.
With the situation in the Middle East as it is, Professor Rubin's book could not have been released at a better time.
Someone needs to send a copy to Nancy Pelosi.
And if you need a quick rundown of the Syrian basis for their WMD program, I did a post on that using GE, with Syrian WMD sites: the basic list having an image intensive summary of them. You can go from ore to refining to final deployment sites, plus missile storage areas... mind you, Syria never signed the Chemical Weapons Convention and appears to be flaunting the Bioweapons Conventions to boot and in the uranium ore refining business...
ReplyDeleteIsn't it strange? The Syrians are governed by the Alawites who are Shi'a Baathists, and Iraq was governed by the Sunni Baathists. And yet the Shi'a and Sunni are mortal enemies, considering each other to be apostates. Doesn't that little fact highlight *our* troubles, in so far as, we can't effectively combat two groups who are enemies of each other?
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ReplyDeleteMike H. @ 8:58 PM
not strange considering the ME "enemy of my enemy is my friend" code of ethics (choke, gasp).. aside from that, i bleive Iran is supporting both Shia & Sunni insurgents in Iraq, as well as harboring AQ members, not to mention Zawahiri's once upon a time visit to Iran.. also believe it was revealed that several of the 9/11 hijackers traveled via Iran as well..
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