Why Syrian President Assad Is Poised To Stay In Power

With Help From Tehran And Moscow, and Inaction by the U.S., Assad Is Poised To Stay -- Jonathan Spyer, The Tablet

Thanks to outside forces waging a proxy battle in Syria, 2013 has become a year of attrition rather than endgames

As the Syrian civil war grinds on toward its fourth year, no end appears in sight. It is the greatest disaster in the Levant in a generation: More than 115,000 people have died. Around 2 million refugees have departed the country—for Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, and beyond—while untold more who have left their homes remain in Syria, seeking with increasing desperation to put themselves and their families out of reach of the guns.

But while the war appears far from ending, its direction and likely outcome have shifted significantly in the past year. At the beginning of this year, the Assad regime looked beleaguered, with an end-game fast approaching. Rebel groups had entered the main cities, and Aleppo, the “capital of the north,” was largely in rebel hands. The battle for Damascus seemed about to begin as Assad’s foes pushed into the city’s eastern suburbs.

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My Comment: An excellent analysis on what is the present state of the Syrian civil war. Bottom line .... Assad's international allies continue to support him .... and the U.S. (with much of the West) has now disappeared from the scene.