Tim Anderson: The dirty war on Syria

Washington, regime change and resistance

by Carola and Johannes Irsiegler

Truth always comes to light. Many people might have remembered this wisdom in recent weeks given the results of the Chilcot Commission in the UK. Thirteen years after the beginning of the Iraq war a commission of inquiry concludes that former Prime Minister Blair led the country into a war, which killed hundreds of thousands, most of them civilians, telling lies. It is to be hoped that for his actions Blair has to justify himself in court.
Now, truth comes to light in another war, too: Five years after the outbreak of the war against Syria there is a detailed documentation of the Australian political scientist Tim Anderson unmasking the lies about the dirty war against Syria. Tim Anderson is a senior lecturer in political economy at the University of Sydney. His research is about political developments in Latin America, the Asia-Pacific region and the Middle East. His recent book published in March 2016 “The dirty war on Syria - Washington, regime change and resistance” is now available in German.
Anderson wants to show that what happened in Syria is different from what Western mainstream media have presented us. He follows the principle of audiatur et altera pars: The other side should be heard, too. On the one hand, he sees his documentation as a “resource book” and a “contribution to the history of the Syrian conflict”. This is achieved by carefully and meticulously revising what happened in Syria in reality and beyond a massive disinformation campaign. Anderson argues that in Syria, we face a dirty war of the Western powers and their allies in the region long planned beforehand. The operation aims at balkanising the region, that means creating unstable, internally divided units that rely on US aid. On the other, it aims at preventing an axis of regional states independent of the West. The war is directed against a state, which was predicted a good development; education and health system were freely accessible to all citizens in Syria and had a high level. The president, who has enjoyed and still enjoys a high degree of support in the population, intended to implement political reforms. Furthermore, Syria had no foreign debts.
In addition to the documentary character, Anderson wants to see his book as a “strong defence” of the right of the Syrian people “to determine their own society and political system”, this “position is consistent with international law and human rights principles”. Anderson accuses the West, to negate this right and to resort to its worst traditions: “[…] the ‘imperial prerogative’ for intervention, backed by deep racial prejudice and poor reflection on the histories of their own cultures.”
Anderson relies mainly on Western sources. “I have also used western sources where possible, not because they are more reliable but to avoid any claim that I might have been too reliant on pro-Syrian sources.” At the end of each chapter follows a rich bibliography.
From the beginning, the author presents the war in a wider geopolitical context: For a long time, the United States have been aiming at the creation of a “New Middle East”. He continues to present meticulously what has happened from the outbreak of the war in 2011 until today. He always confronts the reader with deviations in western reporting so that the political agenda of this disinformation is getting clear. For example, many readers may remember the images of dead or injured children in 2013, which were said to be victims of poison gas use in the Syrian East Ghouta Region. Anderson evaluates thirteen reports of this event and concludes that “independent evidence” is inescapable: “chemical weapons had been used in East Ghouta, but the charges against the Syrian Army were fabricated. […] Further, many of the images of sick of dead children were not reliably linked to East Ghouta. […] The weight of evidence shows this to be another ‘false flag’ incident, designed to attract deeper foreign intervention”. However, in our mainstream media the Syrian government is charged with this crime until today!
Anderson also shows a way out as already indicated in the title: the emergence of a stronger Resistance Axis. “There is clear evidence that Washington’s plans, whether for ‘regime change’, or for rendering the state dysfunctional and dismembering the country on sectarian lines, have failed. In its place we are seeing the rise of a stronger Resistance Axis, the core of which has been Iran, Syria, Palestine and Hezbollah, backed by Russia and drawing in Iraq.” Anderson is convinced: “Syria is winning because the Syrian people have backed their army against sectarian provocations, mostly fighting their own battles against NATO and Gulf Monarchy sponsored multi-national terrorism.” The victory of Syria will finally be the end of “Washington’s bloody spree of ‘regime change’ across the region”.
Tim Anderson’s documentation is an important contribution that truth comes to light, that right is enforced and that war is finally stopped. We hope for the oppressed people of Syria that this will happen as soon as possible. Finally, we want to thank to the author Hermann Ploppa who is already known to readers of Current Concerns for the German translation and the publication of this precious book.    •

Anderson, Tim. The dirty war on Syria. Global Research, 2015.
ISBN 978-0-9737147-7-7