By Bilal Y. Saab – How do we assess the global terrorism threat in today’s world? One can make a case that the threat of spectacular, 9/11-like terrorism has decreased because several terrorist masterminds and senior operators including Al Qaeda chief Osama Bin Laden have been killed or captured. But on the other hand, the threat of low-to-mid-intensity terrorism seems to be on the increase because Al Qaeda has re-emerged in hot spots in the Levant and Africa. Has the...
By Bilal Y. Saab – It is often said that the battlefield is the most honest place on earth. While the Syrian political opposition is trying to get its act together, it is still fragmented and it could take a while before unity is achieved. Those fighting “in the trenches” – the rebels operating under the Free Syrian Army umbrella – are likely to be more directly involved in shaping the future of the post-Assad order than its divided politicians....
By Bilal Y. Saab – Despite the fact that things are getting worse in Syria, U.S. and Western appetite for military intervention is still non-existent. Is it time for Plan B then? Plan B is the containment and management of the Syrian civil war. I know, easier said than done, right? The policy was tried in Iraq, the only difference however is that there were American boots on the ground in Iraq to implement the policy and obviously there are...
By Bilal Y. Saab – I was reading Kerry M. Kartchner’s 1992 book Negotiating START on the plane from Washington to Birmingham, and a topic for an interview came to mind. Kartchner discusses how the United States and the Soviet Union had different understandings of strategic stability, which resulted in different approaches to arms control. American nuclear strategists traditionally viewed overall stability as a combination of first-strike stability (first-strike incentives were removed) and arms race stability (no introduction of destabilizing weapons to...
By Bilal Y. Saab – The incident of the downed Turkish jet by Syria’s military a couple of weeks ago continues to raise important questions. I think we have yet to fully uncover the real security and political implications of that event. Furthermore, despite increasing news reports and (perhaps because of) official statements by Damascus and Ankara, we are still not 100% sure what really happened, given the almost opposite narratives by the Syrian and Turkish authorities. My suspicion has...
By Bilal Y. Saab – Ken Pollack needs no introduction. One of my favorite analysts of the Middle East, a good friend, and a former colleague, Ken is a Senior Fellow at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings (formerly the Center’s Director). Ken’s government experience includes stints at the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Council, focusing on the Persian Gulf. I sat down with Ken last week to discuss security affairs in the Middle East...
By Bilal Y. Saab – The Syrian conflict took a turn to the worse after Syria shot down a Turkish F-4 Phantom fighter jet on June 22. Here is what we know so far: * Turkey has confirmed that the jet did cross into Syrian airspace. * Syria has confirmed that it did shoot down the jet. * The pilot and electronic warfare operator have not been recovered yet. * The jet in question was an RF-4, a...
By Bilal Y. Saab – The situation in Syria is rapidly deteriorating and sectarian violence has reached alarming levels. Al-Qaeda’s likely involvement in Syria is another factor that has occupied the minds of U.S. policymakers and affected their planning. Many have rightly predicted that escalation and descent into total, Iraq-style chaos was inevitable. The Syrian people are still on their own in this war against the killing machine of Syrian president Bashar Assad. But the rebels are starting to get some help from neighboring countries in the form of money, training,...
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