Syrious Change - The Assad Regime Falls

The fall of the despot Bashar Assad has opened new risks and opportunities in the Middle East.

The Detroit News: Jubilation and gunfire as Syrians celebrate end of Assad family's half-century rule

This change, after a 50-year dictatorship passed down from father to son, opens both syrious opportunities and lots of syrious risks.

The big winner - Turkey - who backed the Sunni rebels against the Alawite Assad regime and its Hezbollah, Iranian and Russian Backers. Turkey gets to expand its sphere of influence, and pushes Iran and Russia away from one of its borders.

The big losers - Russia, Hezbollah and Iran.

Russia: Syria was Russia's greatest remaining client state, and that Russia could not preserve the regime, having most of its resources tied up in its ill-chosen war in Ukraine demonstrates Russian weakness to the world.  Expect lesser client states to take note. Russia also loses its warm-water port at Tartus in Syria which is a major blow to Russian maritime strategy, such as it is.

Iran: Iran loses a close ally in the region and a easy transit route to get weapons and support to its client Hezbollah in Lebanon. A stronger Sunni Turkey is a threat to Shiite Iran as both rivals contend to try and lead the Muslim world. 

Hezbollah: Hezbollah loses an easy line of communication to its patron and controller Iran. Hezbollah having been the major puppet force of Iran in propping up the Assad regime weakened itself by its choice to launch a war with Israel that saw its command and control networks neutralized, it's forces being beaten and being on the verge of defeat until Biden, Macron, et al imposed a ceasefire on Israel. It's war with Israel distracted it from propping up the Syrian regime which fell after rebels were heavily supported by Turkey.

The possible winners:  Israel and Lebanon - The Assads kept in power as an Alawite minority in the Sunni nation of Syria by doing the typical dictator move - blame everything bad on the Jews and Israel rather than themselves.  

Israel: A new regime that may be interested in peaceful relations with its neighbors instead of supporting terrorism and continually threatening war would be a very good thing for Israel, reducing tensions on its borders and further hampering Hezbollah from getting support and supplies via an overland route from Iran. 

Lebanon:  Syria heavily supported Hezbollah in Lebanon, preventing the Lebanese from controlling their own destiny. This change may give the rather fragmented and weak Lebanese state a chance to reclaim its control over its own territory and end Syrian and Iranian supported Hezbollah domination.

Or, Syrian could fall apart into civil war with instability and a foothold for the Islamic State and Al Qaeda that would be very bad for all its neighbors, including Israel, Lebanon and Jordan, and indeed the world as Al Qaeda likes to get around.

Time will tell but it will take time before this shakes out and we see who assumes control, who influences them, and what their stance will be on the world stage.  Interesting times indeed, and the maps sure have been all flag-y and arrow-y recently.