How Syria is Like Spain

For John, BLUF:  The US needs a dose of isolationism.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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A friend of mine♠ wrote and EMailed the following meditation on the civil war in Syria.

As Mark Twain reputedly said (and Niall Ferguson definitely quoted):

"History does not repeat itself, rather, it rhymes."

Or something like that.  I propose a harmonic verse that matches from the past that relates to decision-making vis-a-vis Syria.  The Spanish Civil War, where the dichotomy between the "right" side and the "wrong" side seemed so clear cut and, parenthetically, which is still portrayed as such in many venues today.  Or rather protrayed in one-sided fashion.

Here is the snapshot, a legitimate Republican Government is challenged by a militarist coup led by conservative military officers in league with other conservative and reactionary elements in Spanish society in 1935.  The Spanish version of fascists led by General Francisco Franco.  The Republicans fight to defend "democracy" and the cry arises for other nations of the world to intervene.  The Western Democracies essentially decide not to intervene, the US Congress passes things like the Neutrality Act and instead the Militarists (a better characterization) are aided by Nazis and the Italian Fascists while the Soviet Union aided the Republicans.  Seems a clear case of neglect by the West, right?

Wrong, as idealists flocked to Spain to fight in the international brigades for a romantic cause they learned that the Republican front was a loose alliance of socialists, anarchists, some liberal democratic types, terrorist, and Stalinists masquerading as communists.  Some, like George Orwell, learned the true face of totalitarianism from his erstwhile allies among the Republicans and his experience inspired him to write 1984 and Animal Farm.  Yes, Virginia, Orwell was inspired to write his visions of Utopian horror by "the good guys."  Stalin's purged reached down into the Comintern in Spain as the Soviet cadres flew back to the socialist utopia for a bullet in the head or a trip, with family, to the Gulag "without right of correspondence."

The insight?  Both sides were riddled with agenda driven iconoclasts and criminals, and also included good people caught up in the maelstrom.  Sounds like Syria.  The West sat it out.  Correctly I would say, and then made a real error three years later in Munich.  Syria is not Czechoslovakia and Damascus ain't Munich...its more like Toledo, or Madrid, or Barcelona.  I know I am stepping on some "progressive" toes here, but check out the facts.

Thus endeth the Lesson.

This discussion reminded me of the early chapters of Ken Follett's Winter of the World, which looks at the Spanish Civil War.  Or perhaps Earnest Hemingway's book For Whom the Bell Tolls.

We need to stay out of Syria and their problems.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Retired Navy Officer, former Naval Aviator, PhD in History.