What could be done in Syria

It's not just that, Its the fact that Syria unlike Libya is in a geopolitical position where any action against the state may cause turmoil in Iraq, Iran, and quite possible a Hezbollah attack. Next the Rebels are not very organized and so even if we tried to help we wouldn't know where to begin.

But something amazing and could impact the course of the war, for the first time since it began the Al Assad regime has asked for a cease fire with the rebels just outside Damascus. Either this means that the Al Assad regime is more political stressed then once thought, or they are trying to appear like the good guys to the international community by having a cease fire (Gaddafi even tried the same tactic) but its at the point now that If Al Assad loses Russia they are done. so what happens next is anyone's guess.

Unless the U.S or NATO calls on a no fly zone, the Syrian regime will remain and may become more dependent on Iran. The Regime has also take into accounts of the Libyan civil war and that pissing off the international community means death.

The rebels are simply rebels, there is no unified truth to them except that they want power and they want AL Assad out, we have a false idea that they are freedom fighters, no they just want a change to the status quo at hand. Some might just be generally nice human beings who want basic freedoms, others might be the same people who bomb market districts in Iraq.

No shit.

Pretty much if Al Assad fell, it would turn into political turmoil and someone else would take his place or a new family would have much of the power.

He is backed by the alawite muslims because he is one of them and has given them alot of political power and ties with Russian/Iran, its really the majority sunni who want him out of power. The Christians like him in power simply because the opposition is against Christianity to the extremist side of attacking it out right. What will most likely happen is Al Assad might lose power (if not altogether step down) but the Alawite muslims will have continued power, which may lead to some Iraq like terrorist attacks.

The best thing for Syria is what Syria wants, and Syria has stated it wants Al Assad to go, just like Libya stated it wanted Gaddafi to go (although the Libyan one is more debatable)

There is no way in hell, even if the U.N did a no fly zone would they would never support boots on the ground, they are unwilling to get involved in Syria right now as well as the fact that Syrian gov main power lies actually in the ability to bomb the shit out of the rebel fighters, once you take away the this ability you make it a ground fight. Right now the Army has the advantage as it still has more supplies, more men (although more and more are defecting), higher ranking officers (Al Assad was smart and put the sunni officers who defect to the bottom), and more organization which is another reason why we can't back up the rebels.

By doing nothing and cracking down on Assad, we give the appearance we are not going to take a regime that oppressed its peoples who want change, but by not attacking we give the appearance of well its o.k just don't go committing mass genocide or saying you will....like Gaddafi.

To point of Libya was it was geopolitcal isolated, Gaddafi only had friends in unimportant African states to which the world pays no attention to although they should in upcoming years. Next the Syrian fighters have no real base of operation or a front to move on, thus they are spread thin and everywhere so we can't really have something to back up. Speaking of Cash, Libya has a future in terms of cash and its ability to generate wealth and by wealth i mean Oil, Syria does not. You do make the point the Arm forces remain loyal to Assad although they amount of defections to the rebels has tripled in the last month and the Syrian rebels have manged to capture alot more cities then usually although this comes from the Syrian regime trying to look nice to the people in order to not get a regime change vote/no fly zone which would end them. Also the fact that the rebels are in Damascus is a huge thing, they shouldn't be even close if the regime was in power. Also the Syrian air defense system is far better then the Libya one which would cost even more money to bomb. The best thing the U.S can do is give intelligence and some supplies to the rebels much like we did in Libya, also supplement of weapons.

Why not mass evacuate the civilians if your going to do that.

Putting boots on the ground would be the worst idea of all time, its is far better to train the pro-rebels in Turkey and have them fight it out in Syria, although alot people who where trained in Iraq are coming over to Syria in order to help, although sadly the majorities of these are Islamic extremist. The Alawites may retain power buts if the U.N votes for regime change then Al Assad himself will not.

Until Russia decided to get rid of Al Assad, the U.N will decide to keep him since the U.S has shown it is unwilling to get into another middle eastern crises.

I can't think of anything specific at the moment, but they could just want him as a thorn in the US's foot.
Aside from that, if they shelter him and he is smart enough to manage his nation back to a peaceful state, they could use it as leverage to virtually control his vote in the UN. A puppet nation, in other words.
And Syria could be good for a base. Neither China nor Russia have any significant presences outside of their own borders, in spite of being major military powers. They could use Syria for a base, even if it is in a crappy position to boost their power projection capabilities.

I don't have any links to prove any of this at the moment, they are just off the top of my head.

Russia wants Syria to retain its status quo as it allows them to have more able access to the med sea (Im far to lazy to spell it after the last post) and to have a another friend in the middle east who is not going to go for U.S interest.

I think Assad regime should stay afloat, so many variables however.

My main concerns are transition, power grabs, radicals, pretty much Libya all over again, oh and most importantly Israel left unchecked..

Another intervention by UN or the sort would be totally uncalled for.

Great reply, I agree with 100% on your summary. When I spoke about the money cost in Libya I was related to the NATO mission and the cost of enforcing the no fly zone. I personally dont think Turkey would want to allow training
camps for rebels on their land. Also has anyone thought of allowing Syrians to deal with Syrian issues. All this talk about intervening, I reckon a large number of Syrians want to deal with it their own way.

Finally someone sees it the way I also see it. Thank you. Syria and Israel have always had a cold relationship at best, I wonder what Israel would do, will they try and help the situation or will they intervene in a way that will cause political uproar in the middle east.

Reason its more smarter to to build a refugee camp in Syria, than bringing all the refugees to Greece,turkey and Italy etc.

Is that it saves money,the people can go home when the crisis is over, so we don't have to ship them home.

Other than that Viking Socrates you didn't say anything important.

And aussie don't double post, you can edit your post if you want to write some more

I wouldn't be opposed to Israel arming and training the rebels. It would probably backfire on us later, but, at least the people could defend themselves. Hell, it might normalize relations for one or two years, which would be unheard of for one of our neighbors.

I think we should leave this to the UN and try and keep guns out of this.

Intervention risks solidifying the pro-Assad position. Like the sanctions in Iran makes Ahmadinejad's support stronger. If it came to it I'd support a UN force to intervene, but there's no way in hell I'd support intervention by the US or a US ally. See what this resolution can do first:
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/01/2012131212539291323.html

For crying out loud, not NATO! You'd lose a ton of people to Assad's side if you did that. NATO needs to keep out of middle eastern affairs. If the Arab League acted, fine. But let's see where the UN can take us.
(I'm pro UN reform by the way and getting rid of those damn vetoes, (I doubt it will happen in my lifetime though.))

Well Russians have military interests and the Chinese have economic interests.

I think it's doubtful that any intervention is beneficial. You're talking about NATO intervention in Libya like it was successful.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/26/libya-war-saving-lives-catastrophic-failure

The only success was regime change.

It sounds like they are blaming all deaths on NATO and it's intervention. I don't blame them for vetoing ceasefires and negotiations, Gaddafi deserved no mercy and why would we stop the rebels from overthrowing a dictator. I call it a success we helped the rebels overthrow a dictator and is one less dictator in thew world.

It wasn't our job to decide whether he had mercy or not. The goal was the protection of civilians. The Resolution specifically states:

Both imply the negotiations were necessary to secure a ceasefire and find a solution. And offers of negotiations were flat out rejected (kinda like Taliban offers of handing over bin Laden). The US couldn't give two fucks because they wanted regime change. Civilians? Phhhhhh. Ousting Gaddaffi is more important.

Well, as long as Russia or China thinks that more people should die, nothing is going to happen. So, we can either twiddle our thumbs, or we can help the rebels. One or the other. Besides, guns came into this when Assad decided to use tanks for riot control. I would at least give the rebels a fighting chance than let them be slaughtered.

Well Qatar wants to fund the rebels within Syria and supply them with weapons exactly like they did in Libya.