HOULA, SYRIA AND SELF-SERVING INTERNATIONAL GEOPOLITICS (I)

Houla was just a name that had figured up in some war reports from the Syrian rebel hotbeds until May 25, 2012, when it shocked like a mighty explosion with the barbaric act of planned execution of more that 100 in this Homs town of three villages. Though Bashar al-Assad denied today any hand of the Syrian regime, there cannot be any other alternative explanation to the butchery but the direct involvement of the Syrian forces. According to a report in the British daily, ‘The Guardian’, the satellite photographs taken by the US show presence of artillery impact craters in the area.

10 seconds into a clip on the Houla massacre, I was not able to go any further. Even those 10 seconds left me so haunted that the whole evening was swept away. United Nations says of all the massacred, 32 were children below 10 years of age. The bodies were so mutilated that such an act of monstrosity cannot be expected from any animal in the human form.

Houla is not the first case. Such planned executions have been happening to extend the iron grip of the dictatorial regimes throughout the world, throughout the history. The differential now is that such stories are reaching across the world, with all the visual proof and imagery.  

But nothing seems to be working on the fear cultivating despots and on the international community to act in an impartial way.

The current run of the civilian massacre in Syria began on March 18, 2011 after the anti-regime protests of March 15, 2011 in Damascus. Since then, over 15,000 civilians have been killed by the regime forces. But the international community is yet to find a ‘worthwhile’ reason to intervene in Syria. Assad’s audacity is certainly emboldened by this lame attitude as well as by the tacit support of two powerful but autocratic countries run with despotic mindset – Russia and China.

The international geopolitics in cases like Syria has been clearly tilted in the favor of interests of the rich countries. When countries-in-question serve any purpose, the ground is manufactured to intervene even if it can never be proved like the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Let’s see some major countries that have seen international intervention to effect the regime change or to extend protection against the neighbourhood hostility:

Kuwait – oil rich country

Iraq – oil rich country

Libya – oil rich country

Afghanistan –though not an oil rich country, it was more of a question of US prestige than war on terror

All these countries except Afghanistan were rich in the singular and the most important commodity that shaped the modern world – oil – and the global ‘powers’ didn’t hesitate in imposing full blown wars when the regimes in these countries turned their back on the US and other western countries. (Though, they were comfortably ignorant of the atrocities when the dictators were friendly allies!)

Iran is the centre point of possibly the next oil war in the garb of nuclear weapons (an oil rich country – see, they already have a reason thus!).

Afghanistan, with poor oil supply, in all probability, looks doomed now. International forces are to leave the country by 2014 even if the Taliban is resurgent and getting stronger. US was after Osama bin-Laden and he is killed, so no more validity to remain there – after avenging the humiliation to the US pride in the form of 9/11 attacks.

What exposes the hollow principles of the international geopolitical ‘policies’ is the continued belligerence of many rogue countries including Syria.

Continued..

©/IPR: Santosh Chaubey - http://severallyalone.blogspot.com/