(MENAFN- Alghad Newspaper) The significance of the recent report by the US Rand Corporation titled "Alternative Futures for Syria" exceeds being published by one of the most important US think tanks - an organization are associated with the US Department of Defense, and that its authors are some of the most important experts in the field of intelligence and security, who are well aware of the determinants of the US foreign policy and priorities in the region - as the report reveals the true shifts in the vision of the US administration of what is happening in Syria, which when finalized and publicized will seem like a coup in their stance on the Syrian regime.
The report addresses the four scenarios projected for the future of Syria: Firstly Prolonged Conflict, resulting in sectarian and ethnically fragmented statelets - Alawite, Islamic and Kurdish. Secondly the Regime "Victory" over the opposition, which will be to the advantage of Iran and Hezbollah, primarily. Thirdly Regime Collapse, which will be to the advantage of al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (IS), and may lead to massacres and civil and regional wars. Fourthly Negotiated Settlements, which is the best regional options, communities across the board runs the country until elections are held and an agreement on the political rules of the game and its dimensions.
These scenarios are not new, but the significance here is that this paper was based on a workshop held in December 2013, before the current war on IS, which experts say served the Syrian regime completely, weakened the opposition, and changed the value of each scenario and possibilities, even restructured the perspective of American interests.
Experts acknowledge that the most likely scenario before the strikes was protracted conflict, but with the recent months, it has become the second scenario - relative victory for the Syrian regime with weak opposition, disintegration and internal conflicts among its ranks - but the collapse of the regime and the peaceful settlement are the least likely to happen.
The surprise revealed by the experts is that the Syrian regime's victory is no longer the worst case scenario from the US's perspective, while the collapse of the regime is the worst-case scenario from the US and Western perspectives, although - as the document admits - was favored by the parties against him!
As such, al-Assad is no longer the main concern for the US administration, but IS and Jabha al-Nusra, and experts believe that the Syrian regime's victory, relatively speaking, would help contain these organizations and weaken them, but what is more, it will help to "a long-term counterterrorism relationship with a "post-victory" Assad regime would help the United States and the West reduce the threat of militant Salafi-jihadist attacks in Europe and the United States".
This result that has been passed between the lines is one of the most serious of the findings of those experts affiliated with the US Department of Defense, and I think is the most realistic in relation to the US foreign policy, and is the logical consequence of what the current administration is doing in the war on IS without laying out targets and parallel operations against the Syrian regime.
This and that intersect with rhetoric in the letter sent by US President Barack Obama to Leader of the Iranian Revolution. However, there are still attempts to "deny that" within the official US diplomats' discourse; as a state similar to schizophrenia between what the US administration is doing on the ground and that claimed in its political and media discourse!
Will it succeed? I suspect things are out of the wishes of the US administration; the Sunni tragedy in Iraq and Syria will remain a key factor in changing the calculations, as long as there is international and regional complicity, and an Arab and political coma when it comes to the suffering of millions of people in this region.
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