Decline – Division – Withdrawal!

This declaration must be considered through reflection on three basic aspects: its interpretations, its objectives, and how national forces should act towards it.

Firstly: Interpretation
The crux of the US decision lies in the growing and accelerating crisis of the entire global capitalist system, in the system of international relations built on political unipolarity, unequal exchange, and economic neoliberalism. This crisis has produced a continuous decline that clearly emerged with the beginning of the current millennium, leading to a zero balance state with the rising powers that can be dated since the first Russian-Chinese use of veto for Syria and that entered the stage of shifting in favour of the rising powers, since the direct military intervention for fighting terrorism at the end of September 2015.
The continuous decline has produced division within the ruling elite of the United States, and even in the ruling elites of the states of capitalist core in general. This is an objective trend characteristic of a fixed law, namely: any declining power must suffer from division over the fateful options it has to take. One evident translation of this decline is the enormous division and floundering within the US administration, but the most important and profound characteristic of this decline is what we have talked about repeatedly on the split between a fascist trend and a rational one.
This very split, with the continued decline and lack of access to exits, resulted in the decision to withdraw from Syria, as well as to the partial withdrawal from Afghanistan, and before that the withdrawal from Iraq in 2011 and then the partial return under the pretext of fighting terrorism – a more fragile and considerably less effective return compared to the occupation of the year 2003.

Secondly: objectives and possibilities.
Withdrawal is an irreversible destiny, under the state of decline and division, but its timing and proportion, that is, whether it would be full or partial, immediate or phased, is the matter that should be closely examined and accelerated. Also, the timing that is meant to minimize losses.

However, the timing, as it has been clear since the announcement of the withdrawal, envisages reaching an all-out conflict between the various components of the entire region. At the core of this is an attempt to sow discord within the Astana's trio, which came to be much larger than a temporary gathering concerned only with the joint conduct of two regional powers and an international power toward the Syrian situation, but turned into a precursor of a new regional-international system, belonging in depth to the new system of international relations, which is still in the phase of formation on the ruins of the unipolar world.

Thirdly: What is to be done?
Regardless of whether the Americans kept their promise and implemented their withdrawal in a full and rapid manner, or procrastinated, the Syrian patriots have to push for the implementation of the withdrawal. The main entry to this consists in the following two essential points:

- Involve the Syrian political components present in East Euphrates in a real and effective manner into the political process with its various items and its constitutional entry, and push for the implementation of UNSC resolution 2254 through working with those international powers who have the will to implement the resolution and make maximum use of Astana process and Sochi decisions in this regard

- The Syrian army is the only one authorized to recover the areas occupied by USA, and these areas should be restored in such a way that guarantees and preserves the dignity of people east of the Euphrates.

Kassioun Editorial, Issue No 893, December 24, 2018