the line from moscow to headlines. on the eve of the egyptian presidential runoff as the country's highest court dissolved parliament and allows mubarak's next prime minister to continue his election challenge the release have sparked fears the country is sliding back into a dictatorship and. the u.s. steps up deadly drone attacks on pakistani territory leading to calls for an investigation into their legality amid claims innocent civilians are being killed in strikes officially targeting terrorists. also syria's government says there may be more suicide bomb attacks in the country's capital warning follows the arrest of

a man with ties to an al qaeda linked group. and the syrian conflict is now the springboard for strong debate in cross talk with peter the about that's just ahead . sigrid laboratory to mccurry was able to build the world's most sophisticated robot which on fortunately doesn't give a darn about anything tunes mission to teach creation why it should care about humans and. this is why you should care only on the dog calm. you.

alone and welcome across town peter lavelle violence in syria is now officially called a civil war this is probably cold comfort for the syrian people as western powers decide the fate of this war torn country what remains to be seen is whether the syrian civil war one call for the entire region. to cross-talk serious serious situation i'm joined by brian becker in washington is the national coordinator of the answer coalition in norman we have joshua landis he is director of the center of middle east studies and associate professor of middle eastern studies at the university of oklahoma and in istanbul we cross that. he is general manager of the sichuan news agency or at crossfire grows in effect gentlemen i mean you can jump in anytime you want brian back in washington it's called the civil war now now this war will end with winners and losers who will they be well let's start peter by making clear that the united states government

the western powers england france the former colonizers of the middle east have actually promoted civil war they promoted civil war because their go in the case of syria as it was in libya as it was in iraq is the old. thro the existing independent government now syria unlike libya unlike iraq has a different set of political and social contours clearly the syrian government has a mass popular base the opposition also has a base of mass proportions in the case of syria they are being assisted internationally by russia and by china in the case of the opposition they're being supported by the united states britain france and the client regimes the gulf states saudi arabia qatar turkey and so you see a civil war but it civil war with international dimensions in the international situation will of course have a direct impact on the outcome i believe that there is going to be protracted

conflict i think the syrian government is fighting to the finish and their allies russia in this case recognize that if they were to be overthrown the united states would create in syria a proxy client regime as they have in iraq and as they have in libya ok if i go to you and i ask the question who would be the winners and losers when considering what we just heard here only the syrian people lose. the syrian people and this is it is said because. of the crisis but all of the more than more than ten thousand people killed so this is you know to see. is the name. in my view the civil war all of this unfortunately and people. for four or four months and from the from the from header you know the person who i am afraid

that implored internally and explode because there are countries with the crisis in the first. to lebanon which is all the experience. we can gain because. well it looks like it looks i'm going to fire for the entire region joshua if i can go to you it seems to me that it's very simplistic in western media if assad goes it's all over well not overt the civil war that will end the civil war just because assad leaves and i don't think he will go ahead no it won't no it's not going to end the civil war what we're seeing is is a sectarian civil war twelve percent alawite it's at the top of syrian society the sixty five percent arab sunni at the bottom there not the bottom they're wealthy

but they haven't had power and they're going to overthrow this alawite regime i believe and we've seen the same thing happen when the colonial powers france and britain left the region in the second world war they left minorities in charge in all the eleven thousand states and what's happened in the post colonial era is that the minorities have been thrown out of power the maronites in lebanon the sunnis in iraq the the jews in palestine of course have been able to become a majority and they've solved their problem by by becoming the majority in gathering jews from around the world and of course pushing out muslim palestinians but the alawite so the last minority that rules and that's the heritage of the french colonial period the sunni muslims are going to overthrow them i believe in what's going to be a protracted war because it's becoming a proxy war as your your guests have have mentioned and so it's going to be a long struggle and i'm joshua thank you for the great history here liz very important let's take

a look at some of the recent events in syria. am syria has descended into civil war and all means including force should be used under international supervision to help restore peace this is the take on the situation in syria voiced recently by friends french foreign minister for abuse said he would propose that the un security council vote on a resolution giving un members amended to intervene in syria possibly as part of a military operation william hague disagreed with his french counterpart claiming britain should not intervene in syria is the situation there is far from critical clearly we're not we're not looking for any foreign military intervention and i think we should not think about this in terms of. another libya at odds with the higgs believe that the world will not see the libyan scenario in syria u.n. observers were physically heard in the country they were attacked with stones metal rods and gunfire that broke them from

a rebel held town and raised civilians were feared trapped by god trailing syria became infamous why it was inducted in the un's list of shame countries named for their physical and sexual abuse of children in allentown like this we're not taking sides in this conflict the only side we're on is the side of the syrian people women men and children who are suffering in syria. by blaming we're not saving lives so let's stop this game please because it ain't a game a number of world leaders claim syria is and if we're. really serious foreign minister however said the civil war was an unrealistic description of the conflict between them it's labeled the civil war or not it is hard to deny terrorism and revenge killing kidnappings and ransom mornings and attacks in state institutions as well as the destruction of public and private property in the country and they

you deny for crosstalk moscow. and i go back to istanbul i mean one of the interesting things is the libyan scenario never was point it was supposed to happen for libya and now people are talking about it in terms of syria there's no such thing as intervention lite i mean we hear people talk about intervention a lot of voices in turkey i mean if there's an intervention it's going to be fall out like we saw in libya which libya wasn't supposed to happen in the first place as i pointed out in my view. and turkey of course doesn't like all. but what is lacking. is is turkey involved arming the opposition in syria today. turkey turkey doesn't take off usually but there are people more civilians and some

soldiers or militias coming and going out from the warders but turkey doesn't accept that they're arming militias i mean it is very difficult to find a settlement because there is a. difference of opinion within syria in terms of people and the international community so this is this is the sad aspect of the syrian crisis in libya at least there was a consensus to help people being massacred there but since there are some falls on this constance's now especially the russian government there is no reason to if i could go to brian there's a lot of consensus in the west ok about ending the regime in damascus is calling for regime change really escalating the violence. well that's what really what's behind the violence i mean the preponderance of foreigners was with the syrian

government if it hadn't been for the outside interference the arming of the opposition the promotion of civil war by the by the united states britain france and their clients in the region this would not have evolved to this point was it inevitable that there would be a sectarian conflict as joshua it seems to seems to ponder there i think the united states and britain and france are honoring change path they recognize the vulnerabilities in different societies if they're if they're divided based on religion or ethno sectarian divide those divisions are then utilized in order to break up the country we see in the case of in the case of iraq that's precisely what what the united states the united states did in the case of yugoslavia it was an inevitable that you would break apart it was picked apart by foreign powers that had their own agenda in the case of syria the united states britain and france are in the are in the quest that we colonizing of a different kind of colonization but of colonization nonetheless of the entire or

oil rich geo strategically important region the period the people of syria are are sort of pawns in somebody else's geo strategic chess board and that's why this civil war is happening ok josh is this. a colonial project i mean to echo what we just heard. well if we want to look at the geostrategic dimension at the end of the second world war the united states. understood that it had defeated hitler by denying him oil and his panzers and his air force came to a stop and that oil was going to come out of the persian gulf for the united states in preparing for the third world war wanted to make sure that it had sewed up the persian gulf now iran is trying to push america out of the first gulf syria is iran's ally russia china have important interests with iran and syria they see syria not so much as important in and of itself but as a marker it's

a canary in the mine shaft if syria falls you know the world in the west is going to turn on iran and they want regime change in iran even more than they wanted in syria and in many western analysts of course are asking for regime change in syria so that they can carry out regime change in iran it will weaken iran that's the i mean just you know i'm sorry but it was only a few weeks. ago or a few months ago everyone is talking about the democratic forces of syria what happened to that well the united states wants to use this sunni revolt and the arab spring in order to change the regime in syria because it will help the united states it will bring in theory it could rain syria out all right now i don't mean russia are going to go to a short break and after the show is going to continue our discussion on syrian state. and. what.

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and you can. start. to. welcome back across town clearly both remind you we're talking about the civil war in syria. and you can. start. ok brian you want to jump in right before the break or i was kind of echoing something that you know i think is kind of interesting it's missing from the discourse is that we all these democratic forces in syria are rising up against a great tyrant but i that whole thing has dropped out of the media why. well i

think it hasn't completely dropped out in the western media but we have to understand the function of characterizing the struggle as a struggle between democratic forces and an autocratic government it's part of the script of demonization of those governments that are targeted for destruction by western powers and so the demonisation propaganda machine was in full swing so in every case when the united states or britain or france the former colonizers of the middle east decide to intervene to overthrow a government they assigned their mission a noble cause to defend democracy to defend freedom to protect civilians they never say we're coming in to brutally exploit and dominate and take your land labor and resources and use you as a bargaining chip in the global struggle against others they never say it like that because nobody would support that ok. now i would not accept that because it is that our international players having the role and special interests in the region but never forget that twenty countries twenty two

from our arab league said that it would be good for the regime change for the people of syria because this did not stop the american french or russian plans to change the regime but it's time to. people who are protesting so what would happen if that happens in any part of the countries so for instance when i look at. when we. look at the way you look at brain that's a good example. where. is the intervention of sea intervention anybody say that you know how can anybody say that the government of the united states actually cares about the lives of the people they killed hundreds of thousands in iraq they just bombed led me into smithereens they're intervening in syria the whole idea that they the united states care about the lives of arabs is just

nonsense or about democracy they support saudi saudi dictatorship ok yes how can you really hurt people if you are in saudi arabia. you should also you should know me to forget that the operations. and then you had to prove so this is very important this is. them and leave that's a figure that in theory and. ok josh you want to jump in there the interesting thing yesterday question the interesting thing is that it once the no fly zone resolution was passed by the united nations when we come came to libya that's where the real death and destruction started go ahead josh. yeah no there is there is no doubt that there was a structural problem here and that is that this the syrian regime has been very brutal in order to maintain itself and powers kept the police state now you can argue whether a police state is the right state in

a country that isn't very it doesn't have strong national cohesion but it has been brutal and the syrian people have been revolting against it because it's failed economically they're very poor they're unemployed and it is brutal so we can't deny that the question is that in this regime change america and other countries begin to forget about the humanitarian issue and sanctions are very destructive tool and you begin to get this proxy war which then turns it into a grinding civil war and that's the danger the danger is that this process gets locked into a civil war that will hurt the syrians and russians do they say look at america hasn't brought democracy to afghanistan to iraq to any these places it's brought chaos and islamic fanaticism and so russia take some comfort i think in countering the democracy argument by saying this isn't democracy this is chaos and there is an element of truth to that because the talabani came to power after america it waged a bloody proxy war in afghanistan and empowered the islamic fundamentalists and

we're in this mess today because of a situation very much like what's happening in syria today and that's the danger is that we end up with an afghanistan type scenario in syria because of this proxy war and each side funding. one side in this is going to sway me go back to istanbul here what's going to happen to these minorities ok you know because if we do have this outcome where the regime falls the minorities that are protected by that and they support the regime here they just going to you know move out and you know find a home somewhere else i mean what you know what i'm getting at here is you know what i'm getting at here this is going to we could see ethnic cleansing. this is a really big challenge for for the international community and therefore the opposition in syria opposition yet is not able to convince people especially from the minorities from the yellow eyesore from the christians that they could guarantee their freedoms and their marketing clients so this is one of the basic

principles of the regime's existing existence or vegeta missy but there is also another concern that in most we are in the early ninety's because of the international interaction and international differences we lost more than two hundred thousand people in mostly air so i mean yes it is very difficult to shelve the crisis but what is ultimately. so this is i think i think i think this is brian. go ahead go ahead jump in i think i think the example of yugoslavia by your guest in turkey is turned upside down yugoslavia was a multinational country that lived in relative peace between the nationalities for a long time until the soviet union collapsed and then western powers noticing knowing that it was vulnerable because it was multinational started arming and

financing different groups based on nationality and creating the conditions for civil war in bosnia and then at the end nato went in and dropped twenty three thousand bombs and missiles on serbia for three months until they could break away kosovo and recolonize that is that something good is that something is that the kind of action that we want for syria of course not of course what happens in syria i'm not defending every element of the assad government far from it what our government functions internally matters a great deal to the people in the country and there can be lots of legitimate grievances which there are i'm talking about what the western powers have in their up their sleeve in terms of their agenda and why they're promoting civil war that's right josh if i go to you and i think brian brings up a really good point reserve a very good point what's next ok because it seems to me that the west will change this regime forcibly ok they're really good they have a habit of doing it but they never seem to figure out what to do after they've done it are they going to do any better this time. it's very difficult you know i see it

quite differently than brian in the sense that a yugoslavia turn into a mass not because the west forced it to become a mass but because tito had kept a tight lid on a multi-ethnic mess and when it came off the place exploded and we're seeing something similar throughout the eleventh when the ottoman empire was destroyed. creating nation states with one ethnicity inside is very difficult and turkey is a prime example turkey at the turkey and of totally ethnically cleansed it's christians there were about six of all of anatoly was christian turkey in some ways is able to devolve towards democracy today because of that ethnic cleansing that's the danger the jewish state israel jews from out throughout the middle east were ethnically cleansed and they beat up the palestinians in order to grab a hunk of territory so they've been successful but it's been a great price now syria in some ways is still no was dark it's got to have everything it's this multi-ethnic multi confessional society that hasn't figured

out how to get along so the dangers of real revenge possible ethnic cleansing are there and you can't divide it like yugoslavia into separate states and alawite state or druze state a kurdish state an arab state it's too small it's too mixed up so this is where the challenge for the international community comes is how to save lives and not to allow that kind of revenge killing to take if i go back to istanbul let me know long they're going to run but i was going i was going to say the longer this civil war goes on the one likely there's going to be jeffersonian democrats running around later the international community. is a myth you have different you have regional interests in the case of turkey they have their own regional ambitions in the case of saudi arabia got tired kuwait they're functioning basically as clients and proxies of western powers and the western powers and especially the united states which sometimes uses nato and sometimes acts unilaterally have a grander design for the middle east and that's. what's going on if you if we can't

separate the internal and domestic and legitimate struggles of people against democratic governments and exempt from the global picture where western powers the most powerful militaries in the world are intervening to break up or overthrow governments or partition countries then we just don't see the big picture ok if i go back to istanbul i mean what is the endgame here because you know we've heard on this program already if we go to afghanistan iraq we have libya i mean all are just in tatters right now ok is can we expect the same thing for syria all in the name of democracy or these other lofty ideas. yeah i wish i could say to the game. really depressing situation but. my friends that the rest of the involvement in this is un is not is not helpful i

mean looking to looking to. other cases but i ask them what is the what is ultimately the alternative is dictatorship are the people in this syria. you know their country is this they need to be ruled by. or if i could ask all of my guests here i mean why should the west eighty one side arming one side i mean there is the west by choosing a side is perpetuating a civil war josh if i go to you you have the last word of the program go ahead. well this is a big challenge for syrians not to allow the outside powers to dictate what happens they have to take control and the opposition in syria is very fragmented their big challenge right now is to become unified and to make their interests dominant otherwise this will just go on for a very long time and it will end up in destroying syria as neighboring countries

have been destroyed so this is really up to the syrians to become unified which is a very hard task ahead very hard task and i thank you very much gentlemen for being on the program many thanks indeed to my guests in washington norman and in istanbul and thanks to our viewers for watching us here see you next time and remember. you. want to.

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