How Will Syria’s War End?

Micahel O'Hanlon, Washington Post: How will Syria’s war end? Other civil wars suggest an answer.

Of four possible paths, one is clearly the best.

Syria’s civil war seems unstoppable. In four years, it has killed 250,000, displaced half the country’s pre-war population of 23 million, and given birth to the Islamic State, which promises to conquer the region and inspire lone-wolf terrorist attacks throughout the Western world.

The Obama administration has managed to keep the United States from a third major conflict in the broader Middle East, but its Syria policy has otherwise struggled. President Bashar al-Assad did not, as expected, tumble from power as his money ran out and his army collapsed. Efforts to create a moderate military opposition have generally failed. The Geneva peace process, intended to fashion a new coalition government, has gone nowhere. The new American-Turkish plan to create a safe zone in northern Syria may not amount to much, given the lack of available forces to establish and protect it. And even with a settlement, who will keep the peace in a country where the Syrian army has so much blood on its hands, the Islamic State and the al-Qaeda affiliate known as al-Nusra are so extreme in their ideology, and the moderate opposition is so weak and fractured?

WNU Editor: I was one of those who thought the war was going to end 2 years ago .... and with a rebel win. The rise of the Islamic State and Al Qaeda linked groups like al-Nusra has changed the dynamics on the ground .... it got countries like Iran and groups like Hezbollah actively involved in the war ... and now Russia. Partition is probably the ideal out come of this conflict .... but it will not be possible as long as the Islamic State is still involved in the fight .... and since they are well entrenched, I do not see this war ending in the next few years.