[Joint House and Senate Hearing, 119 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
SECURING SYRIA'S TRANSFORMATION BY
DIMINISHING RUSSIA'S INFLUENCE
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND
COOPERATION IN EUROPE
U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINETEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
February 3, 2026
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COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE
U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION
U.S. SENATE
U.S. HOUSE
ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi JOE WILSON, South Carolina Co-
Chairman Chairman
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island STEVE COHEN, Tennessee Ranking
Ranking Member Member
JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama
KATIE BRITT, Alabama EMANUEL CLEAVER II, Missouri
JOHN FETTERMAN, Pennsylvania LLOYD DOGGETT, Texas
RUBEN GALLEGO, Arizona JAKE ELLZEY, Texas
MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota RICHARD HUDSON, North Carolina
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire GREG MURPHY, North Carolina
THOM TILLIS, North Carolina MARC VEASEY, Texas
EXECUTIVE BRANCH
Department of State - to be appointed
Department of Defense - to be appointed
Department of Commerce - to be appointed
C O N T E N T S
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Page
COMMISSIONERS
Hon. Joe Wilson, Co-Chairman, from South Carolina................ 1
Hon. Jeanne Shaheen, from New Hampshire.......................... 9
Hon. Jake Ellzey, from Texas..................................... 12
Hon. Emanuel Cleaver, from Missouri.............................. 16
OTHER MEMBER PRESENT
Hon. Chrissy Houlahan, from Pennsylvania......................... 14
WITNESSES
Anna Borschevskaya, Harold Grinspoon Senior Fellow, The
Washington Institute for Near East Policy...................... 4
Michael Doran, Senior Fellow and Director, Center for Peace and
Security in the Middle East, The Hudson Institute.............. 6
Richard Outzen, Nonresident Senior Fellow, The Atlantic Council.. 7
SECURING SYRIA'S TRANSFORMATION BY DIMINISHING RUSSIA'S INFLUENCE
----------
COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN
EUROPE,
U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION,
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
Tuesday, February 3, 2026.
The hearing was held from 2:33 p.m. to 3:40 p.m., Room 360
Cannon House Office Building, Representative Joe Wilson [R-SC],
Co-Chairman, Commission for Security and Cooperation in Europe,
presiding.
Committee Members Present: Representative Joe Wilson [R-
SC], Co-Chairman; Senator Jeanne Shaheen [D-NH]; Representative
Jake Ellzey [R-TX]; Representative Emanuel Cleaver [D-MO];
Other Member Present: Representative Chrissy Houlahan [D-PA].
Witnesses: Anna Borschevskaya, Harold Grinspoon Senior
Fellow, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy; Michael
Doran, Senior Fellow and Director, Center for Peace and
Security in the Middle East, The Hudson Institute; Richard
Outzen, Nonresident Senior Fellow, The Atlantic Council.
OPENING STATEMENT OF JOE WILSON, CO-CHAIRMAN, U.S. HOUSE, FROM
SOUTH CAROLINA
Co-Chairman Wilson: Grateful to be here with our colleagues
from the Senate, Senator Jeanne Shaheen from New Hampshire.
Grateful we have Chrissy Houlahan from Pennsylvania and
Congressman Jake Ellzey from Texas, so we cover the country.
With that in mind, the hearing today is ``Securing Syria's
Transformation by Diminishing Russia's Influence.'' With that
as the topic, we will begin with opening statements by myself
and Senator Shaheen, and then we will proceed with the
presentation of our witnesses. Each one of our witnesses is
really just very distinguished individuals who are
knowledgeable on what we are facing today and look at the
opportunities that we face today. Then, following your
presentations--the five-minute presentations we will have, so I
am maintaining the time properly, so this is good--then we will
go to questions by each member of the panel.
The fall of the Assad dictatorship was a Berlin Wall moment
for the Middle East. For years, Bashar al-Assad, a murderous
dictator propped up by war criminal Putin and the regime in
Tehran, remained in power only because of their military
intervention. War criminal Putin's airstrikes devastated Syrian
cities, most infamously Aleppo, creating a refugee crisis that
overwhelmed Europe and served as a rehearsal in the mass murder
for war criminal Putin's later destruction of Ukrainian cities
from Bucha to Mariupol.
One year after Assad fled to Moscow, President Trump made
the decision to give Syria a chance and is producing real and
measurable results. Through the leadership of his special envoy
to Syria, Tom Barrack, and under the leadership of President
Ahmed al-Sharaa, Syria is moving to a relationship with the
United States that would have been unimaginable just a few
years ago. For the first time in decades, for the first time
ever, for the first time in 250 years of America and 8,000
years of Syria, there has been a Syrian president visiting the
White House.
I particularly have a keen interest. November a year ago,
the Assad dictatorship identified me as an enemy of the State.
Three weeks later, he fled to Moscow. Then, eight months later,
Senator Jeanne Shaheen took me to Assad's office in Damascus to
be with the new president. What a change in history, the
ultimate change.
I have seen the transformation firsthand. Last August,
traveling with Senator Jeanne Shaheen and Ambassador Barrack,
the envoy that the president has named as Ambassador to
Turkiye, to be envoy to Syria, we met with President al-Sharaa,
senior ministers, and religious leaders. Since then, I have met
with President al-Sharaa twice, in New York and Washington. I
have also hosted the Syrian foreign minister, finance minister,
central bank Governor, and economic minister in my office. A
highlight for me, in New York, I got to introduce the president
to Marco Rubio, our secretary of State. What a rare
opportunity.
The direction is unmistakable. President al-Sharaa wants to
work with the United States. Under his leadership, Syria has
joined the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS and is now working
directly with the U.S. military in joint operations against
this terrorist threat. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps
and Hezbollah have withdrawn from Syria. Syria is no longer
threatening Lebanon, and for the first time in decades is
engaged in direct negotiations with Israel. Syria is also open
for business to American companies creating jobs in Syria and
America.
None of this would have happened without President Trump's
historic decision to engage with the new Syrian leadership,
lift sanctions, and pursue a stable and unified Syrian State. I
was grateful to lead the bipartisan effort in Congress with
Senator Shaheen to repeal the Caesar Act, and I am hopeful that
remaining sanctions, including Syria's designation as a State
sponsor of terrorism, will soon be lifted.
The fall of Assad presents another historic opportunity.
That is the focus of this hearing: Removing war criminal
Putin's bases from Syria. Despite Assad's fall, war criminal
Putin still maintains two major military bases in Syria: The
Khmeimim Base near Latakia and Tartus Naval Base on the
Mediterranean. These bases are war criminal Putin's only
official military outposts outside of the former Soviet Union
and serve as a critical platform for projecting Russian power
well beyond Syrian borders. From these facilities as a transit,
Russia sustains logistics, command and control, and force
projection that enables the Wagner Group operations across
Africa and helps prop up the authoritarian regimes of Central
Africa, often at the expense of U.S. and allied interests, and
really just enslaving the people.
President al-Sharaa has already taken meaningful steps to
limit their presence. His government has suspended all pre-2025
agreements with war criminal Putin, including those governing
the bases, and placed them under review. Russian forces now
face strict limits on movement, patrols outside their base
perimeters require Syrian approval, off-duty personnel are
restricted from nearby towns, and Russian naval vessels at
times have been denied access to Tartus. Syria has also
canceled a 2019 contract allowing a Russian company to manage
the commercial port at Tartus. Just last week, war criminal
Putin fully withdrew from all bases and outposts outside of
Syria's coastal region, including the Qamishli Airport in the
northeast.
Let us all be clear: Removing war criminal Putin's forces
from Syria should be done, and it may take time and create
security negotiations, but it is achievable. In every single
meeting that many of us have had with Syrian government
leaders, we have pushed for the full removal of war criminal
Putin's bases from Syria, as well as ending the Assad
dictatorship's recognition of the Russian occupation of
Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which actually are integral parts
of the Republic of Georgia.
In our discussions with President al-Sharaa and Foreign
Minister Shaibani, I found a clear willingness to expel Russian
forces if the United States can provide the right support and
protection. Foreign Minister Shaibani told me bluntly, despite
the new Syrian authorities' engagement in realpolitik with
Moscow, the Syrian people, who suffered from years of Russian
airpower devastating Aleppo, will never be friends of Moscow.
This view is shared by our NATO ally Turkiye. Last year,
Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told me directly that Turkiye
supports the removal of war criminal Putin's bases from Syria.
An increased military presence by Turkiye in northern Syria
naturally puts the Russian presence under pressure and on path
for total removal, which is dangerously close to the vital
American NATO base of Incirlik.
However, Syria will not take the final step of removing
Russia without credible military and economic alternatives.
Much of the defense infrastructure still relies on Russian
equipment, which Moscow continues to exploit for leverage.
Russian compounds that pressure by working through remnants of
the former regime, including Assad's cousin Rami Makhlouf, who
regularly broadcasts from Moscow promising renewed Russian
backing. Russia also maintains ties to former officers and
regime elements concentrated on the Syrian coast.
Against this backdrop, sadly, President al-Sharaa last week
explored in talks in Moscow whether war criminal Putin could
provide increased economic and military assistance, including
rebuilding the Syrian army, in exchange for allowing war
criminal Putin's bases to stay. To our Syrian friends: This
would be insanity. Syrians of all people should know that war
criminal Putin cannot be trusted to live up to agreements.
I am confident that closer engagement between President
Trump and Syria will naturally diminish Russian influence. With
strong U.S. leadership and close coordination with our NATO
ally Turkiye, we can provide Syria with the assurances it
need[s] to break from Russia entirely and to negotiate a
durable understanding between Turkiye and Israel, one that
protects Israel's security while advancing America's strategic
objective of removing Russia from Syria.
Unfortunately, not all regional actors understand the
urgency of removing Russia. Sadly, some in Israel prefer a weak
and divided Syria, and view an extended Russian presence as a
buffer against Turkiye. I believe this is suicidal for Israel.
We should work to, in partnership with Turkiye, a NATO ally,
and other regional allies and partners, and welcome long-term
but limited Turkish military and economic presence in Syria.
The correct balance of security guarantees would give Syria the
confidence it needs to remove war criminal Putin's footprint,
and this will only be possible if Israel and Turkey--Turkiye--
deescalate and reach a detente in Syria.
I am encouraged that President Trump and Special Envoy Tom
Barrack are doing exactly that--engaging both sides, lowering
tensions, and working toward a pragmatic understanding that
assuages Israeli security concerns while advancing American
strategic interests in removing war criminal Putin from Syria
once and all.
I am grateful to welcome Dr. Anna Borschevskaya of the
Washington Institute for Near East Policy; Dr. Michael Doran of
the very respected Hudson Institute; and Dr. Richard Outzen of
the Atlantic Council.
We will now proceed with comments by our very esteemed
member of the U.S. Senate, Senator Jeanne Shaheen.
Senator Shaheen: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I am
between votes in the Senate, so I am just going to agree with
your opening statement and look forward to the very important
remarks from our witnesses.
Thank you all for being here.
Co-Chairman Wilson: With this, we will now proceed directly
with Dr. Borschevskaya.
TESTIMONY OF ANNA BORSCHEVSKAYA, HAROLD GRINSPOON SENIOR
FELLOW, THE WASHINGTON INSTITUTE FOR NEAR EAST POLICY
Dr. Borschevskaya: Chairman Wilson, honorable members,
thank you for the opportunity to testify today. I am the
daughter of Jewish refuseniks. Many families like mine were
living with anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union. For us, America
was a ray of light, a light that shone through the Iron
Curtain. Even as a child, I knew that America was different.
Vladimir Putin's message to us for over two decades has been
that there is no democracy in America, that Russia is no
different from the United States. Even as a child, I knew that
could not be true.
Given where I came from, it is a particular honor for me to
testify, to speak in front of this legislative body. You play
such an important role in elevating human rights.
With your permission, I am submitting my written testimony
that I am going to summarize.
We are here today to discuss Russia in Syria. I am here
specifically to talk about why it is so important for us to get
Syria right. Of course, I am no longer a child, so I know that
the issues before us are highly complex. But as we talk about
Syria, I am a reminder that America's unique purpose and
position in the world is still to shine that light.
We are now one year into the fall of Assad, and I think we
can all agree that the outcome is not quite what many of us had
hoped. Russia's position in Syria temporarily weakened with the
fall of Assad, but this brief window may now be closing.
Assad's fall itself was not the turning point for Russian
influence in Syria many in the West thought it might be.
There are things we can do to counter Russia's influence
there, and I would like to preface those with three key points.
First, Russia is reconsolidating influence in Syria as it plays
the long game. Second, there is no indication that Damascus
will abandon Russia. Third, it is not too late to take concrete
action.
Syria is a vital link between the Middle East and Europe,
and we all understand why. Failure to counter Russia in Syria
will harm U.S. strategic interests and perhaps for a long time.
Syria has always been heavily dependent on Moscow. Not only
has Assad's fall failed to change that, but Russia is looking
to deepen those connections. I am talking about military,
economic, and diplomatic dependence, and to some extent even
cultural ties. I give examples of each one in my submitted
written testimony.
As I said, while many were hoping for a different result,
there is no indication that Damascus is moving away from
Russia. In fact, we now know that Sharaa negotiated a secret
deal to keep Russia's foothold in Syria if they abandoned
Assad. Russia and Syria need each other, although it is clear
that Syria needs Russia more. Leaders may come and go in both
countries, but Russia's long game is to hold onto power and
influence there.
For years, American policymakers said that Russia cannot
profit from war crimes in Syria, but Russia is already
profiting from war crimes in Syria. Russia is well-positioned
for a resurgence in Syria if nothing changes. In short, despite
our hopes, Russia remains part of the problem in Syria, not a
solution.
Let me conclude by outlining what the United States can do
about this.
First, we need to reexamine what our engagement in Syria
looks like. When we think about Syria, we automatically think
of military involvement. Instead, we should be focusing on
expanding economic, diplomatic, and cultural ties. We need to
broaden the scope of our engagement. I think earlier calls for
a full-time Syrian envoy, for instance, are wise. If Syria is
now heading to a status to be at least a pseudo-U.S. ally, why
would we treat it differently than we treat other countries?
I suggest we need to bolster our ties with Syria for a
whole host of other reasons, and among those is helping Syria
strengthen guardrails to help restrain Russian involvement and
to give the Syrian government additional reasons to limit its
dependence. For instance, we can bolster the role of Ukrainians
in Syria and all across the Middle East. That would help add
other alternatives to Russian wheat and weaponry, among others.
These are the kinds of measures we can take all across the
Middle East and North Africa to serve as a counterweight to
Russia's likely resurgence in this region.
Russia's presence in Syria does not exist in a vacuum. The
U.S. cannot and should not cede that space to Russia.
Thank you.
Co-Chairman Wilson: [Off mic.]
TESTIMONY OF MICHAEL DORAN, SENIOR FELLOW AND DIRECTOR, CENTER
FOR PEACE AND SECURITY IN THE MIDDLE EAST, THE HUDSON INSTITUTE
Mr. Doran: [Off mic]--agree with you, Chairman Wilson, but
I do not want to miss this opportunity to speak for five
minutes. I have never--I have never missed an opportunity to
speak.
I would like to make five points. The first one is that
since I began following Syria in 2005, when I was the senior
director in the White House for the National Security Council,
I noted that the United States has a tendency to--not to see
Syria, to ignore Syria. This is sort of deep in our nature as
Americans. When I was in the White House, we sent up to the--to
the National Security Council about every four or five months
the same memo for a decision, and we never, ever got a
decision. We would change the memo each time by describing the
events that had taken place between the last time we sent the
memo up and the last time we did not get a decision. When our
Syria director left, the joke in the office was that we would
replace--we were asking who should we replace him with, and the
joke was we would just replace him with a copy machine.
The experience has taught me since then that this was not
something peculiar to the Bush administration; it is really
just in our nature, because the--because Syria during the cold
war was in the Russian or the Soviet sphere of influence. We do
not have a major four-star asset there like oil, and so we tend
just not to see it.
What has happened is that this tendency of us not to have a
Syria policy has conspired with the geography and the interests
of our adversaries to make it the place where they contest our
position in the--in the Middle East. We saw that dramatically
during the Obama administration when the Iranians and Russians
allied to prop up the Assad regime, and they engaged in a major
intervention in Syria, and we did not contest them. The results
for us were very--were very damaging. They sent--they sent
millions of people--of refugees out of the country. Of course,
they went to Europe. The Russians and the Iranians weaponized
the refugees, and they created tensions in Europe for our
allies.
Something else there happened as well, which is that both
the Turks and the Israelis were forced to accommodate the
Russians on their doorstep in Syria. We felt that dramatically
when the Russians went into Ukraine and suddenly Washington
turned to our allies--not just to the Turks or the Israelis,
but also to the Saudis and others--and demanded that they line
up with us against the Russians, and they found that our Middle
Eastern allies were reluctant to take as hard a line against
Russia as we were because we had--our policy had forced them to
accommodate the Russians in the past. I think we need to really
remember that experience when we are--when we are thinking
about the Russians--the Russians now because we are--if we are
not--if we are not careful we will--we will forget the role
that this country plays for Russia. It is absolutely crucial to
the whole Russian position in the Mediterranean and, Chairman
Wilson, as you said, in Africa.
The Russian Mediterranean fleet is based in Crimea, in
Sevastopol. The Russians do not have a Mediterranean fleet
without the port at Tartus. It is from Tartus that they moved
on to Libya, and it is from Libya that they extended their
influence into Africa.
I think if we want to--if international politics today is
the United States versus China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea--
that is the way I see it--then we want to--we want to expel the
Russians from the Middle East, as we did at the end of the cold
war. The place to do that, really, is in Syria.
The problem we have in Syria today, the difficulty of doing
that, is the needs--the tremendous needs of the--of the Sharaa
government. The Russians have things to offer them, including
arms, including infrastructure, and so on. We also have the
tremendous tension between the Turks and the Israelis. I think
that we have to see that the--our ability to expel the Russians
from Syria in the end is going to be dependent on our ability
to strike a balance between the Turks and the--the Turks and
the Israelis, and this is going to take a very sustained
commitment on our part. I do--as you, Chairman Wilson, believe-
I think this is absolutely possible, but it takes sustained
commitment at the highest level.
Thank you.
Co-Chairman Wilson: [Off mic.]
TESTIMONY OF RICHARD OUTZEN, NONRESIDENT SENIOR FELLOW, THE
ATLANTIC COUNCIL
Mr. Outzen: Chairman Wilson, distinguished members, it is a
great honor to be here with you. My experience with the Syria
problem set goes back in one sense about 10 years, when I
started working Syria policy as a uniformed as a U.S. Army
member, and then later at State Department, but really back to
1990 when I was first deployed to the Middle East. It is a
wicked problem set.
It is a fragmented country, and there has been a lot going
on. The last 18 months have been particularly momentous. Of the
various frames or lenses that we can apply to Syria and have
been trying to apply for the last ten years, the geopolitical
really comes to the forefront now.
My own views on Syria have been shaped by my experiences in
the military--deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq, also
negotiations with the Turks and the Israelis and other folks in
the Middle East trying to get a workable set of security
arrangements and a working, really, U.S. alliance. In my view,
what happened right about the time I came into Army service in
1989 and 1990--it is not my fault; I am not saying that--we had
a very workable regional system, and then we stopped making it
work. A lot of that was because of overly ideological and
overly ambitious, but really because of poor policy processes,
in my view, in Washington.
Some of those things have come around now to the point
where we actually have the ability to sew together again, to
wicker together, the overlapping interests of many of our
allies in the Gulf; in Turkiye; with a little bit delicate
work, as Mike was saying, with Israel as well. That really
requires that we not rely on the go-to that we have done in
Washington for so long with Syria, which is pressure, coercion,
and trying to minimize their scope of maneuver. We need to work
more through engagement and through incentives.
I did recently complete a doctorate looking at the record
of U.S. coercion in the Middle East but globally as well, and
the results are not great. I am not saying we should not
coerce; there are truly bad actors in the international system
that need a poke in the eye and a pinch in the wallet, and that
kind of coercion has its place. However, the logic that needs
to be applied, especially in stabilizing countries, is one of
engagement and one of incentives, because that is the better
way for us to actually shape outcomes. When we try to coerce
and destabilize, and especially a fledgling government like
what we are doing to some extent or have been--and again, I
praise the work to get the Caesar sanctions lifted. There are
still voices in Washington calling for essentially a
fragmenting and a coercing and a punitive approach to Syria.
Well, the empirical record of how that has worked out since
1990 is not great. It is especially ridiculous in Africa--that
is a whole `nother conversation for another time--but also in
the Middle East. The way that these sanctions should be used
and the coercion in general should be used is by exception,
with an off-ramp, and always with incentives so that things get
lighter as the cooperation gets better. In my view, that is
exactly the situation we have in Syria now.
People are right to have their concerns about Ahmad al-
Sharaa. His background is checkered to say the least, and he
may well have American blood on his hands. That is nothing that
should be taken lightly. However, you cannot kill all the
terrorists. I think that is another lesson that we have taken
away from the history of the United States' engagement in
Afghanistan, Iraq, and the other places I served. The best path
is when you get aggrieved communities that have relied on
terrorism to follow a political path and a political process.
Witness what we have seen just in the last--well, really
since January-February of last year with reconciliation not
just of HTS and, to some extent, the Alawite regions in Syria,
but also now with the YPG and the SDF, which, of course, is
highly concerning in Washington that we not abandon the Kurds.
The way to not abandon the Kurds is not to abandon Damascus.
The best way to do that is to remain engaged and to provide
pathways to regional roles for Turkiye, for the Gulf, and for
others, and not to give in to the voices that say we cannot
trust this, this man is untrustworthy, and we need to treat
them as if they are all still jihadists running the country.
In that regard, both for Senator Shaheen and Congressman
Wilson, I want to really praise the efforts that you have done
personally in terms of making sure that it is responsible and
engaged U.S. policy that takes the fore.
I want to also add that I think in a sense this shift in
U.S. policy is a test case for what I would consider to be sort
of a Trump doctrine. The Trump doctrine is in place of long-
term occupations, military actions--not that there is not a
room for that--but there should be an economic logic that
dictates stabilization in some of these places. Syria is a test
case. If, in fact, by enticing and engaging our allies like
Turkiye and the Gulf to come in, and also Japan and others, we
can get economic investment and economic stabilization and
reconstruction going, we start a virtuous cycle that actually
lowers the tension among the different Syrian groups, but also
among our occasionally fractious allies. I watch with great
concern, but also great support, and--as we go through this
experiment-it is really important that we do not fall back to
the default of just punish and coerce.
With that, I just want to say it is--the geopolitical
moment is propitious for Washington. We are wise enough to
avoid some of the patterns that we followed in the last 20, 25
years. I think let us remember where we were two years ago,
three years ago, with the butcher Assad best buds with the war
criminal Putin. [Off mic]--this ends in a way that is very much
commensurate with U.S. interests.
Thank you.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Thank you very much, Doctor.
We are so grateful that Senator Shaheen is here between
votes, and we really appreciate her energy.
Thank you. Senator, would you please proceed?
STATEMENT OF JEANNE SHAHEEN, U.S. SENATE, FROM NEW HAMPSHIRE
Senator Shaheen: Well, thank you very much for giving me
the opportunity to go before I have to go back to vote.
My question really follows up on your testimony, Dr.
Outzen, because I was proud to have worked on the repeal of the
Caesar sanctions. Congressman Wilson talked about that effort
in his opening remarks. I think it has been successful. As I am
sure most of you know, there is an effort now by some to call
for sanctions to be reimposed. I think there are real
questions, as you point out, about what that might mean. Can
you and others speak to what the risk is of reimposing
sanctions now, and what that would mean about driving Syria
into the hands of Vladimir Putin and the Russians at a time
when we particularly want to see investment flowing from other
countries in the Middle East and the West to help them rebuild?
Mr. Outzen: Thank you for the question. It is an excellent
question. The empirical record shows that countries that we
sanction and try to coerce, if they are strong enough, will
bandwagon and will hedge against us, and try to find other
patrons. That is how Russia has a back door to get in here. I
am actually maybe a little more optimistic than Anna, but Anna
is more knowledgeable than I am on this issue, about the
residual Russian presence now. I think the overwhelming
sentiment among Syrians, those I know at least, is that the
Russians do not have a real place in the new Syria, or at
least, at best, a marginal place. The way we can change that is
if we convince Turkiye, who might be under the target of some
of the sanctions if they are imposed, as they have been
discussed, and other potential investors. If we scare them off,
then they are going to look for Chinese money and for Russian
managerial or military support.
The second empirical finding in the study of U.S. coercion
is that, again, when you take a country that is already sort of
fractured and then you further undercut the sole basis for
centralized power and the restoration of State legitimacy and
sovereignty that we have right now, which is Ahmed al-Sharaa,
love him or hate him, what you do is you induce huge new
variables that lead to centripetal forces and then renewed
violence. We could look at a cycle of sanctions, reimposition,
with the naive thought that we can actually get what we want
and compliance out of it, that then leads to new cycles of
violence and a newly fragmented Syria as we had for over 15
years. That is what I would see as the risk, Senator.
Senator Shaheen: Well, thank you very much.
Thank you all. Thank you to the members of the Commission
for allowing me to go first so I can go back and vote.
Co-Chairman Wilson: A wonderful situation, you need to be
aware, bipartisan, bicameral. This Commission is working
together. We have even extraordinary staff, so this is good. We
appreciate them.
We have been joined by Congressman Emanuel Cleaver, all the
way from Missouri. Thank you for being here today too. What a--
it is bipartisan. As we are here, and I will be held in five
minutes too. With this, Dr. Outzen and Dr. Doran, both of you
emphasize that improved understanding between Turkey and Israel
is a prerequisite for pushing war criminal Putin out of Syria.
However, when I was in Israel last year, some of the leadership
there expressed opposition to a Turkish presence in northern
Syria and indicated a preference for Russia maintaining as a
counterweight to anchor a NATO ally. Which is startling to me
that that would ever occur. In your view, what can policymakers
encourage Israel to reconsider this approach and instead
explore coordination with Turkey, aimed at reducing the Russian
footprint in Syria?
Dr. Outzen and then Dr. Doran.
Mr. Outzen: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I had the pleasure to
serve as a military attache in Israel for three years, and then
also with something referred to as the Dayton mission, working
with Palestinian security forces. I take the security of Israel
very seriously. I have many friends in the IDF. I disagree with
them on some of the takes that they have had on Syria, because,
frankly, many of the security establishment and the strategic
thinkers in Israel have seen a fractured, weak Syria as
preferable to having a strong Syria allied with Turkiye. That
is not everybody in Israel, though. There are folks now that
are realizing, and I have heard this outreach from some folks
in the think tank world talking with Israeli counterparts, who
say, you know, this is too important. We realize that we do not
like the Turks right now, and they do not like us, but they are
a NATO ally, and they are on very good terms with the Trump
administration. We know there has to be a modus vivendi.
I think one of the biggest temptations, if you will, for
Jerusalem to say, well, maybe we should keep it broken, was,
one, there was this dual specter of both continued fighting
between the SDF and the Damascus regime, and the thought that
al-Sharaa's government, the Syrian transitional government,
might engage in wholesale slaughter or atrocities against the
Kurds if and when that part of the country is reunited. Well,
what we have seen since early January is actually a very
delicate negotiation. There is some military activity with some
loss of lives on both sides, and also still a lot of fear and a
lot of anxiety remaining. Also, the offering by Ahmad al-
Sharaa's government of the best deal the Kurds of Syria have
ever had from a Syrian government-that is amazing. It is a
strong reason for both Israel and Turkiye to take notice and
say, actually, these forces that are pulling the country apart
are not as strong as the forces that are bringing them back
together, and on reasonable terms.
I think a dialogue, which obviously we have been trying
to----I think the efforts of the special envoys, I think Tom
Barrack, but also Steve Witkoff, have been involved with trying
to talk to the Netanyahu folks and say, look, there has got to
be a way that you can do this in a way that's consistent with
the Trump administration's priorities and policy. I think that
needs to be reinforced. I think that the security dialog
between Israel and the United States, especially U.S. CENTCOM,
which has been so strong as they face the Iranian threat, we
need to find a way to also bring together security figures from
Israel and Turkiye and say, look, regional security is United
States security. We cannot have you guys seeing each other as
targets and as enemies if we are part of the same umbrella.
Really, leadership within the alliance is what I think both
countries need to see now, and Syria is ground zero for it.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Thank you very much. Dr. Doran.
Mr. Doran: Thank you. I could not agree more with what Rich
just said. I think American leadership in pulling the Turks and
the Israelis together and encouraging them--almost forcing them
to talk to each other, is, I think, the starting point for
solving this problem. In my discussions with Turks and
Israelis, I am struck by the tremendous gulf between them. They
do not--they no longer have the kind of regular contacts with
each other. Of course, they do have the--they do have intel-to-
intel relations and so on, but a kind of regularized
interaction across the board in the government is no longer
there. The expertise on either side is weak about the other,
but more than that, the world views are starkly discordant.
When the Turks look at Syria, they want Syria to be France.
Meaning they want--you know, the French football team has
Africans, and Moroccans, and Algerians, but they all--they all
stand up and pledge allegiance to France and sing the French--
the French anthem at the games. The Turks want Syria to be
unified, and they want all ethnic groups in Syria to be seen as
Syrians. They do not care if there is a Kurdish general or a
Druze general in the army, but they want them to be--they want
them to be Syrians. This is both from a pragmatic point of
view, because they do not want a Turkish or a PKK autonomous
statelet on their border. It is also deeply ingrained in
Turks--in the way that they see their own country and how they
think the world should be organized.
The Israelis, when they look at--and, the Turks fear that
the Israelis want to crack Syria up and keep it fragmented.
This is happening when the--at a moment when the Turks are
seeing competition with Israel elsewhere, places like
Somaliland and so forth. They are increasingly seeing the
Israelis as a rival. The Israelis, when they look at Turkey,
see an ideological Islamist power which they fear is going to
take over the vacuum left by the retreating Iran. They see the
government in Damascus as an Islamist power that wants to
destroy them, and that is also hostile--is hostile to them, the
Israelis, in the same way that it is hostile to the non-Muslim
minorities, or heterodox Muslim minorities, in Syria.
I think the greatest fear of the Israelis, more than the
ideological onslaught of the Islamist against--against Israel
and the Syrian minorities, is that Syria will become a Turkish
military base, and a front--the front lines in an effort to
annihilate Israel. I think we have a major role to play here in
getting the two sides to come to an accommodation. I think it
is possible to turn Syria into a buffer State, or to help it
emerge as a buffer State, much as Jordan is a buffer State
between Iraq and Israel. As I said to you in my--earlier in my
testimony, this really requires commitment from the White House
and a lot of serious work to bring the two together so that
they get to know each other better, and learn that they--that,
as I believe, they can actually live together in the same
neighborhood without friction.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Dr. Doran, thank you. Indeed, they have
in the past, so hopefully that can be restored. With that in
mind also, I would like to introduce for the record a statement
from the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy supporting the
Holding Accountable Russian Mercenaries Act 2.0. The reason for
that is that war criminal Putin is recruiting troops in Syria
to be used as human fodder to join the 1.2 million other troops
that--Russians--that he sacrificed.
With that, we now proceed to Congressman Ellzey.
STATEMENT OF JAKE ELLZEY, U.S. HOUSE, FROM TEXAS
Representative Ellzey: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you
all for being here today.
Anne, I am going to start with you. How do we get Syria to
move away from--I mean, economic stability is a foundation for
how a government--their stability. How we get Syria to stop
using Russian wheat and oil? How do we involve Ukraine? How do
we involve the United States for a stable food and energy
supply?
Dr. Borschevskaya: Thank you very much. I think we can
start by facilitating, starting conversations, starting to see
how we can move forward on exactly that. How can we--what can
the United States do, perhaps through U.S. businesses? What, in
practical terms, can the United States provide to facilitate
Ukrainian wheat, other types of Ukrainian goods? Let us not
forget that much of Russian wheat that Russia sells is actually
stolen from Ukraine to begin with, and Ukrainians are our best
allies. They know Russia. They know Russian military. They know
how Russian businesses work. They have so many reasons to serve
as a counterweight to Russia. I think the best way to do this
is to start conversations. Again, I think at the highest
levels, as Michael had mentioned in his earlier remarks.
The point is that Syria needs our attention. We need to
prioritize it. We need to understand why we need to do this,
that this is in our own long-term strategic interest. We also,
I think, need to understand that this is going to be incredibly
challenging, that there are going to be many questions for
businesses that come into Syria when there is so little
physical infrastructure in terms of how to conduct financial
transactions. I think we need to have conversations with the
Syrian government as well about how to facilitate that. I think
it starts with American engagement at all levels and really
prioritizing this issue.
Representative Ellzey: Thank you for that. Of course, as we
have discussed, the war in Ukraine is both a genocide and an
imperial action; that is an attempt, and actually have been
successful, in stealing 25 percent of the world's wheat supply
from the Ukrainians, as well as--the goal is to get their gas
fields as well. This is--this is, that that genocide that they
are conducting there is about money and power, as it is
everywhere else, including Africa, that they go to. We do not
have time to address all those things, but getting them out of
Syria is absolutely a priority.
Colonel and Doctor, I have got a question about President
al-Sharaa. You know, he fought against us in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Colonel, I am sure he was in Afghanistan--in Iraq,
when you were. Can he be trusted? As you well know, the
Israelis referred to him by his nom de guerre al-Julani. It is
a--Syria has a lot of different ethnic groups, and we have
already seen two of those get attacked from the nominal
government as it is. Is he playing both sides against the
middle, in allowing, yet condemning, these attacks on the Druze
and on the SDF? Can he be trusted?
We will start with you, Colonel.
Mr. Outzen: As my favorite president used to say, trust but
verify, right? I do not think actually trust comes into play
when we are talking about the Middle East much at all. Somebody
who has his background should not be trusted in the absolute
sense. However, we should trust what we see as observed
behaviors. What we saw as the observed behavior with nom de
guerre Julani, Ahmed al-Sharaa, is that after spending time, I
believe, at Camp Bucca in Iraq, in a U.S. prison facility for
having attacked against U.S. forces and Iraqi forces, he came
to Syria. Very shortly thereafter joined with al-Qaida in
Syria, which then became ISIS over time. He broke with both of
these groups because he started to focus both what he was
saying internally, and the people who have known him and
academically studied him for a long time, he said, my jihad is
the Syrian jihad. My jihad is the jihad against Assad. Now,
does that forgive him for all his past acts of aggression and
enmity? No, but it is an important step in an evolution.
Representative Ellzey: Well, while it is restrained to
Syria, can he be trusted to protect those ethnic groups within
Syria, now that he is in charge?
Mr. Outzen: I would say that it is not so much whether we
should trust his intentions, but his ability to control his
forces. Because many of the people that he has working with
him, especially the ones that were with him in Idlib, are what
we would consider to be jihadists. The quickest way to
strengthen and protect the people--the Druze in Suwayda, the
Kurds in the northeast, and even the Alawites, who were the
oppressors, in many ways, of the Syrian people, at least the
leadership was drawn from the Alawites--the quickest way to
protect all of them is to institutionalize and reform the
Syrian military.
That comes with a stabilized State. Frankly, it probably
comes with the U.S. providing oversight, whether that is U.S.
forces or some sort of a contract mechanism, to insist on
reforms so that the sort of people that have been responsible
for atrocities fighting on that side are weeded out quickly
and, if they are not Syrians, are sent out of the country. Then
we can trust. We have to verify, and we have to go through this
reform process. We cannot take our hands off the wheel.
Representative Ellzey: Well, I am curious--my time has
expired--but I wonder what that kind of a mechanism is. Because
there is a whole bunch of folks behind you that are shaking
their heads whenever asked if he can be trusted or not. I am
concerned about it too, specifically what that mechanism is.
What--how do we force them to protect those groups?
Thank you for the answer. It is a great answer.
Chairman, I yield back.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Thank you very much, Congressman Jake
Ellzey.
We now proceed to Congresswoman Chrissy Houlahan.
STATEMENT OF CHRISSY HOULAHAN, U.S. HOUSE, FROM PENNSYLVANIA
Representative Houlahan: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you
all for your testimony today.
Mr. Doran, you mentioned that international politics now in
the U.S. is us versus Russia, us versus China, and us versus
Iran. Dr. Outzen, you also mentioned that your thesis, your
doctorate, apparently, is on applying less pressure and
coercion on Syria and rather engaging them instead. My question
has to do with the fact that the current administration has
suggested that our oldest allies in Europe should operate with
more independence from the United States. I guess what I am
trying to find out is how we can do all of these things, which
is to address whether or not--how to be more aggressively
inclusive with Syria-while also not necessarily engaging our
allies in that outreach? What has NATO been doing, if anything?
If you all would be helpful in filling in the blanks there.
What more could the United States be doing that would be
the opposite of sanctions? Because it seems like sanctions are
your collective definition of coercion. You mentioned, Doctor,
that you might have forces-I do not know if you meant forces on
the ground or what you meant-to be that kind of helpful force.
I am looking for meat on the bones of what it is that you are
actually talking about when you say that we cannot coerce, but
we need to cooperate more with Syria. Also, at the same time,
our administration is turning its--itself away from the allies
that might actually help us execute on that.
Mr. Doran: Thank you. I think the European allies, in this
scenario, are going to play a secondary role, and NATO as well.
Simply because of their capabilities and their history in this
part of the world. There has been a pretty clear distinction
since the Suez crisis that Europeans take care of European
security and the United States and its Middle Eastern allies
take care of Middle Eastern security. The key countries are
Turkey and Israel, because the United States is pulling back
somewhat from the--from the Middle East. I do not think we are
leaving the Middle East, but we want to be less engaged
militarily on the ground. I think that has been true of every
president since President Bush. There has been this inclination
to pull back.
If we still have interests in the region but we are pulling
back militarily, then logically all we have to rely on are our
regional allies. The two most capable allies in this case are
the Turks and the Israelis. The problem is that the friction
between them is so significant right now that it could--it
could actually end up destabilizing Syria, and offering, as
Chairman Wilson said, an opportunity for our adversaries to use
the destabilization against us. I think there is the--with
regard to the Islamists, extremists that are surrounding
Sharaa, this is the--this is the biggest problem I think, more
than whatever he has in his heart. He has a cadre of people
around him who are quite happy to go out and slaughter
minorities. They need to be kept on a short leash. There need
to be trained up other forces that can provide security in
those areas that are not influenced by them.
I think the key partner here is the Turks. They are the--
they are the--they are the arm of NATO into Syria. They have
the capability of building those kinds of forces. Given the
tensions now between the Israelis and the Turks, and the fears
that the Israelis have that the Turks might use this to create
forward basing against Israel, that is precisely the area in
which I think we need the greatest intervention in the shortest
amount of time, to come up with formula that will not provoke
the worst fears of the Israelis but will allow the Turks to
actually play a mediating role on the ground in Syria. Building
up security forces that are NATO-compatible, and not under the
control of Islamist extremists.
Mr. Outzen: On my research into coercion, it is not that I
do not think we should ever coerce. We have given Syria a
massive dose of coercion for about the last 15 years. I just do
not think that is the right tool right now. Now you want to
keep your powder dry. There may be certain things that we
should have a snapback or the ability to reimpose if things go
off the rails. When you are talking about a stabilizing
country, should not lead with that. What do we lead with? I can
think of, especially based on my time in Afghanistan, multiple
situations where we had actually done a pretty good job. Kabul
had 24 hours of electricity for the first time, female
education, girls in schools. A lot of progress was made in
stabilizing. Now, that was a bigger challenge in the sense that
it was a much bigger country. We ended up not seeing that
through past the 20 years.
We also did not have the kind of proximate help from
countries like Turkiye, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia that are
willing to pour resources, money, and so forth, into the
economic development of Syria. What I would like to see is the
U.S. embassy open as quickly as possible. I would like to see a
major U.S. intelligence operation cooperating and
collaborating. I would like to see CENTCOM there. I would also
say that security sector reform is incredibly important. I
think that we talked a little bit about that with the previous
question. We have countries like Turkiye that can do the
shooter training, so to speak. That will go in and do your
platoon-level, your tactical training, and things like that.
What the United States does that nobody else does as well is
security sector reform.
We have a small number of companies in the private sector,
and I am not talking about the kind that go in and, again, are
doing shooting courses and the physical security. I am talking
about how to run a ministry of defense, how to do a budget, how
to make sure that you are doing your intake procedures and your
human resources procedures so that you are filtering out people
with extremist tendencies. We have those skills. We have those
companies. There were over 70 companies within the first week
that the U.S.--this is a friend at the U.S. Chamber told me--
that once the U.S. Chamber restarted a Syria program, 70
companies signed up in the first week. There is a massive
appetite. A lot of it is in energy, defense, construction, but
massive appetite for U.S. private sector to get involved with
Syria. I think that is what we should be looking at:
Incentivizing and helping to guide the reconstruction and
security.
Representative Houlahan: I appreciate the answers, and I
have many more questions, but I have definitely run out of
time.
I yield.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Thank you very much, Congresswoman
Crissy Houlahan, of Pennsylvania. We can get back to your
question, another.
We are really grateful to have Congressman Emanuel Cleaver
of Missouri.
STATEMENT OF EMANUEL CLEAVER, U.S. HOUSE, FROM MISSOURI
Representative Cleaver: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to follow through on the discussion you were
just having. I happen to agree with you. That is why I have
been trying to find out how active USAID is in Syria, if, in
fact, it is. Clearly that would be the U.S.' soft diplomacy,
and maybe even give us a stronger hand in the future of Syria.
Do you have any information about USAID, or anything?
Mr. Doran: I do not think any of us do. Do you? No, we are
USAID knowledge-free zone here.
Representative Cleaver: [Laughs.] Yes. Well, it is all over
the world, because I have been able--I have been hunting it
down, and I have not gotten any answer. Which is a concern. I
just--
Mr. Outzen: If I can throw in just one comment, based on my
time in Afghanistan. We had a massive USAID presence. Because
of the sort of tentative security situation, in many cases we
could not get out to check on the projects. That was a--you had
power stations and schools that were built in remote provinces
that the USAID folks--and this is all laid out in the Special
Inspector General's Report for Afghanistan. That model of how
to help reconstruction and stabilization had its pathologies.
Of course, under the current administration, there has been
a major reform of how we do foreign assistance. I have to
admit, I am not certain, since we do not have, to my knowledge,
an embassy up and running--fully running in Damascus; I am not
sure we have a mission set up yet for the--and I believe USAID
has been resubordinated under a different bureau of the State
Department. I do think there needs to be a lot of thought given
to that, and I think there is a role. Obviously, I emphasize
private sector in my view. There has to be some guiding hand
and some rationalization coming from State Department and the
aid agencies as well.
Representative Cleaver: Yes. I agree with that. I am a big
believer in USAID. I have seen it in action around the world.
It is one of the things that I think we may have pulled back
on, to our detriment. What other ways--or are there other
ways--for either of you--either of the three of you--for the
U.S. to be more engaged in Syria? What do we need to do? We
need a larger footprint, economically, militarily; what do we
need?
Dr. Borschevskaya: Oh, I would absolutely agree we need a
larger footprint, and I agree with both--both what Mike and
Richard have said. I mean, the fact that the U.S. embassy is
not up and running is a problem, because the Russian embassy is
still operating in Damascus. It is still open, to my knowledge.
I think, you know, I mentioned that we need to reexamine how we
look at our engagement with Syria. We need to broaden our
definition of that engagement. That should not--that should not
be only military, but it should include economic, diplomatic,
and certainly cultural. Russia, for its part, has a long
history of cultural engagement in Syria, with intermarriages
and Russian language instruction. I think more--the more
people, full-time staff we have on the ground, the more
information we have, the more we have the ability to shape the
outcome.
Mr. Doran: If I can add one specific idea, Congressman. The
discussions with our Turkish friends, there's an organization,
an industrial organization, called TOBB, the Turk Odalar ve
Borsalar Birligi. It is basically a large chamber of commerce-
type organization. They have a plan right now to go into
northern--mostly on the northern side of Turkiye, and establish
industrial zones. They're looking for a signal from the United
States that we think this is a good idea. They have lots of
companies that want to go in. By the way, one of the things
they would do is take Syrians--because there have been four
million Syrians living in Turkiye during most of the war. Some
of them have gone back. They want to take some of these Syrians
with skills, with their own businesses already in Turkiye, and
incentivize them to go back to Syria and start a virtuous cycle
of job creation and prosperity in those regions. I think the
U.S., to the extent that we can do this through State
Department or Commerce, and incentivize our companies to jump
in on that, to build these industrial zones, would be a
tremendous way to have an engine for reconstruction.
Representative Cleaver: Thank you. Chairman Wilson has
great power, strength, and vision. He will be able to do all
the things you just mentioned. [Laughter.]
Co-Chairman Wilson: Hear, hear. Thank you.
Representative Cleaver: I yield back.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Thank you so much, Congressman Cleaver.
We now--I am really grateful that Congresswoman Houlahan
has a question. Then I will have a final question. Again, what
you are presenting is so important for the people of Syria. We
want them to have opportunity. What a benefit it would be to
all of the Middle East. Congresswoman.
Representative Houlahan: This is for Ms. Borchevskaya. I
was wondering if, with your knowledge of the region and your
knowledge of the history of the region, you might be able to
prognosticate what might happen. What are you seeing for the
future of Syria, and the role and influence of Russia? What can
we, the United States, do to counter that? If there is a
historical analogy or something that is in the past that looks
a lot like this, what would it be?
Dr. Borschevskaya: Sure. My concern is that--because Russia
is playing the long game in Syria, they are taking their time--
my concern is that we will not--we will not sustain this effort
to prioritize Syria, to engage with Syria, and Russia will take
advantage of that. In the military realm in particular, Syria
will have a very hard time weaning itself off of Russian
military hardware, in the absence of other alternatives. This
is such a deep dependence for which it is--from a very
practical level, Syria has no other alternatives. Thus far,
this government in Damascus is being very pragmatic. Remember,
the Russian forces bombed al-Sharaa, but they had no qualms
making a deal. Putin welcomed Sharaa twice in Moscow.
I worry also that if we do not provide other guardrails for
the Syrian government, for alternatives in other fields--like
printing Syrian currency, economic engagement--Russia's ability
also to talk to conflicting sides within Syria and present
itself as a mediator. I worry that over time Russia will take
over. Perhaps that is why I am a little bit more cautious in
terms of my outlook on Syria, and in terms of Russia's position
there. I think our best strategy is to also play the long game
and to recognize that this is going to take a long time. We
need a sustained effort. We need to do what the Russians do. We
need to prioritize this country. If we are able to do that--we
were able to do that during the cold war--then I--then I think
we do have a chance. I worry that we will not sustain this
effort.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Thank you very much, Congressman
Houlahan.
A final question from me for Dr. Doran and Colonel Outzen.
Since February 2022, Russian forces have suffered nearly 1.2
million casualties in Ukraine, more losses than any other major
power in any war since World War II. Its economy is actually
less than two-thirds of the Baltic republics in Poland, just
those four countries. Just two-thirds. I wish Congressman
Ellzey was here; it is also less than Texas. With a small
economy, which I believe can be collapsing with international
sanctions being enforced, we know that these are the factors
that led to the collapse of the Assad dictatorship in 2024, and
the Soviet Union in 1990. How does the war in Ukraine continue
to affect Russian operations in Syria? Also, it is misleading,
but there is online advertising by Russian recruiters to bring
Syrians to die on the battlefield in Ukraine. And they are
transiting through the Russian bases. Again, reminding us how
bad this is and what a tradition Putin has. We know he sent his
troops into Ukraine with their dress uniforms because they were
going to be welcomed by the Ukrainians. In fact, he was
sacrificing young Russians to die for his power.
This week, I will be introducing a bipartisan Holding
Accountable Russian Mercenaries Act that will designate the
successors of the Wagner Group as a foreign terrorist
organization. Are you aware of these reports? If accurate, what
implications do they have for assessing the strategic
importance of the Russian Syrian bases? How can we work with
our Syrian friends to--for the best of the people of Syria? Dr.
Doran.
Mr. Doran: Thank you. I think it is vitally important that
we understand the strategic connection between--from the
Russian point of view--between Ukraine and Syria. If the
Russians do not succeed in Ukraine, if they fail in Ukraine,
then Russia is no longer an empire. It becomes a--it becomes
something closer to being a Russian ethnic nation-State.
Ukraine is really the key element that allows it to function as
an empire. It is through Ukraine, through Crimea, that it has
access onto the Mediterranean. As I mentioned in my opening
remarks, there is a bridge--a naval bridge from Crimea to
Syria. We should see this as Vladimir Putin does, as a complex,
and work in both areas simultaneously.
Having said that, we do also have to be very much aware of
the fact that the Sharaa project in Damascus is very, very
fragile, and it could go wrong in many--in many ways. I think
Sharaa himself is fearful that the Russians may become a
destabilizing force. He has made a clear distinction between
the Iranians and the Russians. He defines Iran as an absolute
enemy, and he will not have any--any thought of negotiations
with the Iranians about their position in the country, but not
so with--not so with Russia. As Anna mentioned, he is dependent
on the Russians for equipment. That is not just, you know, hard
military equipment. Just radars that you need to run a normal--
a normal airport. It is all Russian--it is all Russian
equipment, so there is the fear of destabilization. There is
the desire for aid on infrastructure, also military equipment.
If I could say one issue--one point on a different subject
before I close. I just want to emphasize, in terms of the
importance of finding a modus vivendi between the Turks and the
Israelis, how important the Druze question is in the south. The
Israelis want some kind of guarantee for the well-being of the
Druze, who suffered a horrible slaughter at the hands of
Sharaa's extremist security forces just a few months ago. Their
fears about the Druze are legitimate. They are very well--they
are very well-established. They also--they also intersect with
Israel's concerns about threats on their own border to Israel.
From the Turkish point of view, the Turks look at this, and
they see a desire on the part of Israel to fragment Syria. I
think that is another area where the United States really has
to put in sustained--sustained diplomacy to find a formula that
will assuage the Israelis and also convince the Turks that this
is not an effort to fragment the whole country.
Thank you.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Thank you very much, Dr. Doran. Now,
Colonel Outzen.
Mr. Outzen: Sir, the Russians are opportunistic. They will
look for any hole in any polity, in any State in the region.
They will worm their way in. They will try to break it apart,
and hollow it out, and maximize their own influence. They have
done this in Georgia. They have done it in parts of Ukraine.
They have done it in Belarus, and they did it in Syria. We made
a huge mistake, in my view--the United States did--in
overestimating their staying power and their strength. For--you
know, I remember, going back to 2013, 2014, 2015, when there
was bipartisan support to do something stronger--more strongly
to support the Syrian opposition. We bought this idea that, oh,
the Russians will never let it happen, and their air defense is
too strong. The Iranians will never let it happen. Well, the
Syrian people suffered for 10 years because of that
overestimate. I think we should avoid making that same mistake
in the case of Ukraine.
Now, we also cannot count on the Russians giving up anytime
soon. What they have shown is that even with an economy smaller
than that of Texas, they are willing to squeeze every little
bit out of their people to keep fighting these wars. It is a
very strong combination of deterrence, strengthening our
allies--and that means, in my view, Ukraine, which we have done
a pretty good job, I think, after a bad start, of helping
Ukraine. My view is we should do more. We also have to see
Syria as an analogous position to that. If Syria is left on its
own, if we do not--and I am not saying write blank checks to
Al-Sharaa or anybody else. I have my own doubts about the man.
Through engagement and through strengthening the Syrian State,
and nesting it in with our regional allies, we will leave no
room for the Russians to do what they have previously done in
Syria, and what they continue to try to do in Ukraine. Then we
will have sewn together a very strong regional network of
alliances that restores American credibility. That is the
direction I think we need to take it.
Co-Chairman Wilson: Well, thank each of our witnesses for
being here today. I am grateful for our colleagues, and again,
I hope people notice. I am so grateful for the staff here too.
The Commission for the Organization of Security and Cooperation
in Europe, it is very bipartisan and very bicameral, because we
want the best for the American people and we want the best, in
this hearing, for the people of Syria and for the Middle East.
With that, we are adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:40 p.m., the hearing ended.]
[all]
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