Partition is necessary to sort out the ethnic conflict in Syria, but only if done right

Syria was never a country whose 14 provinces and eight main communities were voluntarily bonded together by secularism and tolerance. Not surprisingly the six-year civil war became violently sectarian and ethnic. At ceasefire talks on May 4 in Astana, Kazakhstan, Russia proposed four “de-escalation zones” with Iran, Turkey, and itself serving as guarantors. Yes, partition is necessary. But having three nations that greatly abet the strife serve as enforcers will not produce peace. An impartial plan must be formulated and implemented.

Since 1971, under father Hafez al-Assad and son Bashar, Syria has been ruled by Alawites comprising 13% of the population. Through oppressive rule, they and their Shia partners engendered among Sunnis, 74% of the population, a desire to extract retribution. Christians, Druze, Jews and Yezidis found a degree of security by bending to the Alawite leadership’s wishes, but thereby came to be seen as complicit. After the civil war broke out in March 2011, the Syrian president’s security agents increased imprisonment, torture and execution of dissidents. His air force launched barrel and hose bombs and chemical attacks on civilians.

Bashar al-Assad’s international partners became entwined in this ethno-sectarianism. Russia deploys its aerial firepower to reinforce the Alawites, most notoriously by bombing hospitals in Sunni areas. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards and proxies including Iraqi Shia militia and Lebanese Hezbollah purge captured towns of Sunni Arabs and Kurds. The regime’s foes fight back in religious and ethnic factions, too. The self-proclaimed Islamic State and Al-Qaeda affiliates are backed by Sunni financiers and fighters from the Persian Gulf states and the Caucasus. The Free Syrian Army counts on financing and weapons sourced from Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Syrian Kurds, reliant on United States and European Union resources, work to carve out their country.

Within the current battlefield, the United States and its European Union partners have been more distant players, supplying funds and armaments to anti-Assad rebels while occasionally bombing Syrian government and Islamist terrorist bases. Washington and its European partners see only limited gains – transient victory over Sunni terrorism within a single country, hope of preventing instability spreading to neighbouring nations and reduction of refugee flows to the West.

Syria already has been de facto partitioned by the opposing forces of the civil war. No political leadership represents the many domestic factions, and none could control the territory militarily and politically, or run a national administration. Moreover, there is no currently-envisaged governing coalition that would be acceptable to the major international players. Consequently for Syria, the solution must be multilateral negotiations leading to separation into geographically-discreet, self-governing regions based on communal affiliations. Indeed, partition was first attempted under the League of Nations French Mandate of 1923-1946.

The Sunni Arab majority should hold the central and northern provinces or governorates of Homs (Hims), Hama, Idlib, Aleppo (Halab), Raqqa and Deir ez Zor (Dayr az-Zawr). Kurds could control the northeastern province of Hasaka. Alawites and Shias could retain the Mediterranean coastal provinces of Latakia and Tartus. Christians, Druze and the few remaining Jews can regain safety and security by sharing the southwestern and southern governorates of Rif Dimashq, which surrounds Damascus, Quneitra (Qunaitra), Daraa (Dar‘a) and Suwayda along the borders with Lebanon, Israel and Jordan. Yezidis could gain a small enclave in Hasaka along the Syria-Iraq border. Each community could then rebuild its society and economy.

Population transfers are necessary, such as Kurds from Aleppo to Hasaka and Alawites from Damascus to Tartus, for separation to be achieved. But a bloodbath similar to what accompanied the partition of British India can be prevented if Russian President Vladimir Putin’s proposal that Russian, Iranian and Turkish forces act as enforcers is rejected – because they already have shown themselves to be brutally partisan. Russia’s scheme would even bar the United States-led international coalition from safeguarding anti-Assad forces and civilians or Israel from protecting itself within Syria. Coalition aircraft and troops are not permitted into the de-escalation zones, even though Russian forces already there as monitors have not stopped the fighting. Worse, Assad and the Islamists have reached a deal under which those terrorists are being relocated from the regime’s areas like Damascus to provinces held by moderate rebels.The United States and the European Union should push for a more viable plan rather than permit Moscow, Tehran and Ankara to stage a covert takeover of Syria, which would certainly result in the decimation of Sunni opponents of Assad, Christians, Druz, Jews, Yezidis and Kurds.

Semi-autonomous or fully-autonomous divisions do bring the potential for future problems. Assad and his regime, despite war crimes, may go unpunished. But leadership change in Syria could be part of the deal. When they met on April 12, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov conceded that Russia is not staking everything on Assad, and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson acknowledged that the United States would accept the Syrian dictator’s departure occurring in an orderly way. The Sunni heartland may not completely eliminate radical Islam from its midst. But the United States and the European Union could work with West Asian countries to move swiftly at the first signs of resurgence and prevent Syria from being overrun again by terror groups. Kurds may seek to expand their Syrian autonomous region by supporting secessionist rebels in eastern Turkey, northern Iraq and northwestern Iran. But they could be convinced that so doing would lead to dire retaliation. Druze, Christians and Jews would still face discrimination, but could reach security, economic and cultural agreements with Israel and the West to reduce need for interaction with former oppressors.

Major and regional powers will not stop trying to influence the ethno-sectarian regions. Russia and Iran may retain naval and air bases among the Alawites, but their overland and overflight access can be blocked by the Sunni and Kurdish regions. Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Emirates could shape the societies of Sunni Syria. Turkey and the Kurds are unlikely to end their cross-border altercations. But such challenges would be continuation of ones currently in place, yet on a lesser scale because no foreign nation will have sway over the entirety of the Syrian landscape. Moreover Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey could be warned that using their Syrian spheres of influence to stir trouble in the region, generally or to harm Israel specifically, would be firmly met by economic, political and military responses from the United States and the European Union.

Partition may not the ideal outcome for Syria’s crisis, but is necessary and can be done correctly.

This article first appeared on Yale Global Online.