Publication

This publication analyzes key US policy decisions in Syria and their impact on the country since 2011. Key insights include 1) that America’s unwillingness and inability to coordinate foreign support for mainstream revolutionary actors deepened fractures in opposition forces in Syria, something which ultimately benefitted better-organized extremists as the war dragged on; 2) Washington wrongly calculated that the Syrian crisis could be contained to the country, with harmful consequences for US interests; 3) the decision by the US not to strike the Syrian regime for using sarin gas against civilians in August 2013 was critical and costly, and more.