Anatoly Karlin dissects the stupid rhetoric on Syria

I can't say I know much about Mr. Karlin other than guessing he is a Russian living in the US.  Always interesting, but this time superb.  His dissection of the rhetoric could be a primer on the subject.  His introduction to the post Game of Homs is dead on,

What striking about Syria is how so many people insist on speaking about it in profoundly moralistic, Manichaean terms. This is complete nonsense, given that its civil war isn’t a showdown between democracy and dictatorship, but an ethnic and religious conflict.

His explanation of what the regime is doing is also worth reading.

The Assad regime 

The rhetoric: He kills his own people! He is the Evil Overlord (TM)! 

The reality: That’s kind of what happens in a civil war. Abraham Lincoln also “killed his own people,” you know. It is obvious why the “regime” fights on: That is what regimes do  – as a general rule of thumb, they’re fond of surviving. The rather more interesting and telling question is: Why do key elements of the population continue to back them?

As far as the Alawites and Christians are concerned, it’s pretty clear: The Sunnis have never been particularly well disposed to them, and the past few years haven’t made them any fonder. The last time the Sunnis revolted in Hama in 1982, one of the slogans of the Muslim Brotherhood was “Christians to Beirut, Alawites to the graveyard.” 

In the game of Homs, you win or you die – and the “you” is in its plural form. No wonder Assad has a solid support base. 

there is more to it and everyone should read it.  Unfortunately, the web being what it is, only folks who have heard of him will notice.  The vast sea of my incurious countrymen will never see it.

Fortunately, other than the Obamanots, few still buy the idea that another war is the ticket.