Only months after its invasion of Iraq, the US concluded it was very well positioned -- and Syria very well cornered between US occupation in the east, the Israeli occupation in the west, the Jordanian, Palestinian and Egyptian peace accords with Israel in the south and the Turkish NATO member in the north - - to pressure Syria into submission.
On December 12, 2003 the Congress passed into law the "Syria Accountability Act," the main purpose of which was to disarm Syria and deprive it of all its defensive means and "resistance" allies, long before the eruption of the ongoing current conflict in Syria.
The act demanded the withdrawal of the Syrian forces from Lebanon, ignoring the fact they were there upon the official request and blessings of Lebanon and the US themselves and the Arab League to secure Lebanon and help it recover after the civil war.
Their withdrawal has become indispensable only after the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, in the hope the invasion will dictate a peace treaty to Lebanon, which would have left Syria a peace pariah among the Arab immediate "neighbors" of Israel. No surprise then the Syria -- Iran alliance was formalized in March that year with a series of bilateral agreements. The US invasion of Iraq in 2003 only accelerated their strategic cooperation.
More importantly, the act banned Syria's engagement "in the research, development, acquisition, production, transfer or deployment" of "weapons of mass destruction," "biological, chemical or nuclear weapons" and "medium and long range surface -- to - surface ballistic missiles," of course without any reference to Israel's acquisition of the same and more.
Egypt's signing of its "peace" treaty with Israel in 1979 deprived Syria of its regional strategic Arab partner in the 1973 war and the collapse of the former Soviet Union deprived it of its international one a decade later, leaving the country off balance.
To strike a defensive alternative "strategic balance" with Israel has become the overriding strategic goal of Syria. No Arab substitute has been available. The revolution in Iran in the same year came as a God -- sent breakthrough. The Syria -- Iran alliance was cemented ever since. Dismantling this alliance has become the overriding US -- Israeli strategic priority as well.
Until Syria finds an Arab strategic defense alternative to Iran or until the United States decides to mediate unbiased peace making between Syria and Israel, the bilateral Syrian -- Iranian alliance will endure, unless Washington decides to repeat in Syria its failed invasion of Iraq, which all indications render a mission impossible.
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