[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 12]
[House]
[Pages 16381-16383]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       SYRIAN DISPLACEMENT CRISIS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 2015, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today as the Syrian displacement 
crisis has consumed seven nations in the Middle East, among them 
Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, obviously, and Syria itself, and has spawned 
the largest refugee crisis Europe has faced since World War II.
  The scope of the damage is incredible. This protracted conflict has 
decimated Syria's infrastructure and has already taken the lives of 
over 250,000 civilians, has displaced over 4 million people, and has 
subjected tens upon thousands of children in that nation to Assad's 
horrific barrel bombs. Most everyone who remains in Syria endures power 
and water cuts, the threat of shelling, galloping inflation, and 
rampant speculation about: What will happen next? Who will help us, the 
innocents?
  With roads often subject to ambush, freedom to travel has been 
heavily curtailed. Checkpoints and concrete blast barriers have become 
accepted adornments of daily life. Institutions such as schools, 
hospitals, and offices remain open in government-held areas, though 
many schools have become shelters for the legions of war injured and 
homeless. Truly, it is grim. Often, classes are held in double shifts 
to make room for the extra students. This is everyday life in Syria.
  Five years into the conflict that has ravaged this once-modern 
nation, more than half of the Syrian population is displaced, with over 
4 million refugees in neighboring countries and tens of thousands 
moving toward Europe. We see this on television every evening.
  My hometown of Toledo has taken in 8 weary Syrian families--refugees 
who have now again found hope in the liberty that America offers--but 
fewer than 2,000 Syrians have come to the United States, though the war 
has displaced more than 12 million since 2011. The free world simply 
cannot allow this savage slaughter and dislocation to continue.
  We ask ourselves: Where is the leadership for resolution?

                              {time}  1715

  Now, in addition to daily airstrikes against civilians by the Syrian 
Government violating international humanitarian law, Russian warplanes 
are striking medical facilities and residential areas in non-ISIL areas 
where rebel forces are fighting to overthrow the Assad regime while 
Russia publicly proclaims its aim of eliminating ISIL targets.
  I brought a map to the floor here that essentially shows most of 
Syria, who holds it. If one looks at these red dots here, the Russian 
planes are mainly bombing in the rebel-held areas, not in the ISIL-held 
areas. So we see a complex situation that has developed on the ground.
  As Putin moves with defiance to maintain the Syrian dictatorship, his 
actions simply must be checked because it tells us that, in the future, 
there will be more slaughter with what remains if those moderate forces 
are not allowed to survive.
  Since Russia began airstrikes at the end of September, at least 127 
civilians, including 36 children and 34 women, have been killed by 
Russian airstrikes, according to the opposition Syrian Observatory for 
Human Rights.
  For the sake of liberty in Syria, in Europe, and around the world, 
America, NATO, the Transatlantic Alliance, and our allies in the Middle 
East must lead the region to peaceful settlement.
  I happen to represent a region in America where Syrian Americans have 
lived for over a century. I can't even explain to you how they feel 
about the total destruction of their homeland, its artifacts, and its 
history. I am not even able to contain it in words here.
  They came to see me last week, and they asked if I would read some of 
their words into the Record, which I promised I would do this evening. 
They want the American people and the world to know:

       The biggest killer of civilians in Syria is the Assad 
     regime's use of barrel bombs. Packed with TNT and shrapnel, 
     these dumb bombs have no target and are just dropped from 
     helicopters on civilian neighborhoods. These bombs cause 
     massive destruction and casualties. Thousands upon thousands 
     of children have been killed and injured by these helicopter 
     flights.

  And they said to me: Congresswoman, if you can say one thing to the 
Congress and to those in Washington who can make a difference, please 
tell them to disrupt and stop these helicopter flyovers. So the barrel 
bombs aren't coming out of the F-16s obviously flying over Syria, but 
they are coming from helicopters that the Assad regime is dispatching 
across that country.

       The most important step that can be done to save lives 
     would be the imposition of a no-fly zone. A no-fly zone will 
     turn the tide of war, and bring down the regime of terror and 
     force Assad to negotiate his exit.

  We know there is resistance to that, but the world community must 
meet this latest test in order to secure a better life for the people 
that remain in Syria, those who may wish to return, and, obviously, the 
millions that have fled and are in refugee camps throughout that region 
and now as far as Western Europe.
  I would urge the President of our country to consider the appointment 
of a special envoy without portfolio for Syrian peace to work full-time 
to bring all relevant nations together to resolve this unfolding 
tragedy and aim at a civil military strategy for transition and 
settlement.
  I include for the Record Anthony Cordesman's writings.

 [From the Center for Strategic & International Studies, Oct. 1, 2015]

  The Long War in Syria: The Trees, the Forest, and All the King's Men

                       (By Anthony H. Cordesman)

       Cliches are cliches, but sometimes it really is hard to see 
     the forest for the trees. In the case of Syria, the ``trees'' 
     include the UN debate between Obama and Putin over Syria and 
     the fight against Islamic extremism, Russia's sudden military 
     intervention in Syria, the failure of the U.S. training and 
     assist missions in both Syria and Iraq, and the developing 
     scandal in USCENTCOM over exaggerated claims of success for 
     the U.S.-led air campaign in Syria and Iraq.
       The most important ``tree,'' however, is trying to 
     negotiate an end to the fighting from the outside, as if 
     Assad was the key issue and as if it would be possible for 
     some diplomatic elite or mix of power brokers to bring Syria 
     back to some state of stability if only Assad would agree to 
     leave and the United States and Russia could agree on how to 
     approach the negotiations.


            Focusing on the Trees When the Forest is Burning

       The problem is that the ``forest'' is dying, burning, and 
     occupied by four broad sets of fighters that have little 
     reason to cooperate with any UN-led negotiating effort, 
     outside agreement over Assad--with or without U.S. and 
     Russian cooperation.
       To shift from one cliche to another, Syria presents far 
     more problems than Humpty Dumpty. ``All the king's horses and 
     all the

[[Page 16382]]

     king's men'' couldn't put Syria back together by negotiating 
     a solution from the outside even if there was one King 
     instead of a divided mix of the United States, Russia, Iran, 
     Turkey, Iraq, the other states surrounding Syria, the Arabian 
     Gulf states, Egypt, and France and the other interested 
     European powers.
       It shouldn't take a child's nursery rhyme to point out the 
     obvious--although it is one whose origins may date back to 
     England's civil wars and first appeared in print shortly 
     after it became fully clear that there was no way English 
     could ever bring the 13 colonies back under its control. To 
     begin with, there is no equivalent of Humpty.


   Putting Four Humptys Together with No King and No Unity Among the 
                               King's Men

       The problem is not simply ISIS or Assad. ISIS is one of the 
     four ``Humptys'' in a shattered Syria, but ISIS controls only 
     a limited part of Syria's population even in the east. ISIS 
     occupies both parts of Syria and Iraq. It continues to 
     systematically purge any religious and ideological dissent 
     while neither government in Damascus or the government in 
     Baghdad have shown any clear ability to gain support from a 
     major portion of the Sunnis in the area that ISIS controls.
       So far, neither the forces of the Syrian or Iraqi 
     government have had much military success against ISIS, and 
     U.S. claims that Iraq has regained some 35% of the territory 
     it lost to ISIS are little more than dishonest spin. They are 
     based on the maximum line of ISIS advance before any fighting 
     took place and before ISIS established any level of 
     governance or control. They include vast areas of unpopulated 
     desert: areas where no one controls anything because no one 
     is there.


                               The Kurds

       The second Humpty consists of the Syrian Kurds--who have 
     gone from a partially disenfranchised minority to the 
     equivalent of a mini-state in the north and east of Syria, 
     and have been the only real U.S. military train and assist 
     success. They have no reason to support Assad or any of those 
     who support Assad. They too are divided, and some have ties 
     to Turkish Kurds, some to Iraqi Kurds, some to both, and some 
     are independent.
       At the same time, they have no clear economic viability as 
     a state, face growing water problems, and would need to grab 
     a significant part of Syria's limited oil and gas resources 
     in the East to be viable unless they somehow united in a 
     broader Kurdish entity--one that included Turkish and/or 
     Iraqi Kurds and would be likely to create a new set of 
     regional conflicts.
       Furthermore, these Administration claims and maps that talk 
     about liberating 35% of the area that ISIS occupied ignore 
     the fact that control of much of the disputed populated areas 
     in Anbar remains undecided, and that it was the Iraqi Kurds 
     which not only recovered much of the lost populated areas 
     that did matter, but grabbed a large additional part of 
     Iraq--including Kirkuk and its oil fields--and created a 
     whole new dimension of the Kurdish problem and its tensions 
     with Iraq's Arab and the Turks while the corrupt government 
     in the Kurdish zone of Iraq has divided and threated to 
     create a new round of internal power struggles.


                        The Other Sunni Fighters

       The third Humpty consists of an uncertain coalition of 
     other Sunni fighters. They control--or are fighting for 
     control--in many of the most populated areas in Syria. There 
     are no reliable unclassified estimates of the number, 
     strength, and ideological character of these factions but 
     there are well over 20 groups--and some estimates go well 
     over 30.
       Some, like the Al Nusra Front--one of the most successful 
     in military terms--are linked to Al Qaeda. Others are less 
     radical Islamist factions, but are scarcely secular or 
     moderate, also have no ties to the hollow outside efforts to 
     create moderate governments in exile, and are being backed by 
     Arab states like Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. The small 
     groups being given limited support with U.S. weapons and 
     Special Forces assistance are at best petty and uncertain 
     players.
       This is also a group of fighters that is fighting the pro-
     Assad forces in what is increasingly becoming a wasteland. 
     The fighting on the ground, Assad's barrel bombs and the 
     threat of poison gas, deliberate isolation and efforts to 
     starve out rebel held areas have created one of them most 
     serious humanitarian disasters in any one country in modern 
     history.
       Many of the more than 4 million Syrian refugees that had 
     left Syria lived in the area where this fight takes place. 
     The same is true of the well over 7 million internally 
     displaced persons (IDPs) that no long have a real home, job, 
     business, or access to key services like health and 
     education.
       Many of the more than 250,000 Syrian civilian dead, and at 
     least 500,000 seriously wounded are the product of this 
     fighting--although it is important to note that the UN ceased 
     to be able to make meaningful casualty estimates well over 
     half a year ago, and the estimates of refugees and IDPs have 
     ceased to increase because (a) there no longer is a basis for 
     guesstimating the increase, and (b) many of the remainder are 
     simply too poor to leave.
       To go back to cliche number one, this is the area where the 
     forest has now been burning for some four years. This was one 
     of the most populated and developed parts of Syria. It is an 
     area where Syria's already poor economy probably now has a 
     GDP around 20% of what it was in 2011 and has no clear basis 
     for recovery. It is an area where no top down negotiation 
     between Assad or his backers and any outside faction can 
     begin to put even one Humpty back together again.


                          The Assad Faction(s)

       The fourth version of Humpty is the group of factions and 
     fighters supporting Assad. It is important to note that this 
     is not a unified group. No one has given most of those in the 
     area Assad control a choice as to who controls them. The 
     majority of the population is Sunni and other non-Alawites. 
     The Alawites are not Shi'ite, and are a gnostic religious 
     group that may have political ties to Iran and the Hezbollah, 
     but Alawites are not Muslims in the normal sense of the term.
       There are no reliable data on Syria's population. The CIA 
     estimates, however, that some 17-18 million people remain in 
     Syria, it estimates that 87% are Muslim (official; includes 
     74% Sunni 74% and 13% that are a mix of Alawi, Ismaili, and 
     Shia). Some 10% are Christian (includes Orthodox, Uniate, and 
     Nestorian), and the final 3% are Druze and some small number 
     of Jews who remain in Damascus and Aleppo).
       If one looks at the maps of Syria's sectarian and ethnic 
     divisions before the fighting, they are also distributed into 
     a series of small enclaves, many near the coast. They have no 
     clear ``region,'' and it is far from clear how many of the 
     Sunnis in the regular Syrian forces, the real Shi'ites and 
     other minorities in Syria, or the more secular Sunni 
     businesspersons and civilians would support either Assad or 
     any mix of Assad supporters if they had a choice.
       It is also important to note that the World Bank rated the 
     Assad regime as having some of the worst governance in the 
     world before the uprising began in 2011. It was also rated as 
     deeply corrupt. Transparency International rated it as the 
     159th most corrupt country in the world--out of 175--in 2014. 
     The Arab and UN development reports warned that the younger 
     Assad was no better in moving the country towards real 
     economic development than his father, and that the massive 
     population increase in Syria had created a ``youth bulge'' 
     for which there were often no real jobs.
       The Syrian GDP per capita was at best around $5,100 even in 
     Purchasing Power Parity P terms in 2011 before the upheavals 
     began--and ranked a dismal 165th in the world. It now may 
     average half that level. Some 33% of the population is 0-14 
     years of age; 14% is 15-24, and over 500,000 young Syrian men 
     and women now reach job age each year in a country where 
     direct (ignoring disguised) unemployment is estimated to be 
     33-35%, and the poverty level was well over 12% before the 
     fighting started.


             A Time for Honesty, Transparency, and Realism

       One cannot ignore trees, anymore than one can ignore the 
     forest. The failure of U.S. policy and military efforts, 
     Russian and Iranian support of Assad and major Russian 
     military intervention, and the conflicting ways in which 
     other states intervene will all make things worse. The impact 
     of religious warfare and extremism, and failed Syrian 
     secularism, are even more serious problems.
       It is time, however, to stop focusing on either ISIS or 
     Assad, to pretend that Syrian ``moderates'' are strong enough 
     to either affect the security situation or negotiate for 
     Syria's real fighters, and act as if a shattered nation could 
     be united by some top down negotiation between groups that 
     hate each other and have no competence in dealing with the 
     economic, social, and governance challenges Syria now faces.
       The first step in solving a problem is to honestly assess 
     it. No negotiation can work that does not deal with grim 
     realities and divisions created by years of fighting. No 
     amount of U.S. and Russian intervention and argument can 
     bring security or stability. No UN effort at conventional 
     negotiation can survive encounter with reality, and no effort 
     of any kind that does not address the sheer scale of Syrian 
     recovery and reconstruction.

  Ms. KAPTUR. Anthony Cordesman, probably one of the most respected 
thinkers on this subject, ends a very significant analysis of the 
situation in Syria and greater Europe with this admonition. He tells 
America: ``We face a moment of facing up to honesty, transparency, and 
realism.''
  And he tells us, ``One cannot ignore trees anymore than one can 
ignore the forest,'' related to Syria. ``The failure of U.S. policy and 
military efforts, Russian and Iranian support of Assad and major 
Russian military intervention, and the conflicting ways in which other 
states intervene will all make matters worse. The impact of religious 
warfare and extremism, and failed Syrian secularism, are even more 
serious problems.
  ``It is time, however, to stop focusing on either ISIS or Assad, to 
pretend that Syrian `moderates' are strong enough to either affect the 
security situation or negotiate for Syria's real

[[Page 16383]]

fighters, and act as if a shattered nation could be united by some top-
down negotiation between groups that hate each other and have no 
competence in dealing with the economic, social, and governance 
challenges Syria now faces.
  ``The first step in solving a problem is to honestly assess it. No 
negotiation can work that does not deal with grim realities and 
divisions created by years of fighting. No amount of U.S. and Russian 
intervention and argument can bring security or stability. No U.N. 
effort at conventional negotiation can survive encounter with reality, 
and no effort of any kind that does not address the sheer scale of 
Syrian recovery and reconstruction'' can work.
  I commend his writings to my colleagues and the major studies that 
have been done this year by the Center for Strategic and International 
Studies as providing a glimmer of the road that we must walk toward.
  I want to just thank my colleagues for the opportunity to place this 
in the Record tonight.
  I want to thank the Syrian Americans that live in northern Ohio for 
their patriotic citizenship and their deep concern about what more the 
United States of America could do to bring resolution to this deeply 
troubling conflict in Syria that has precipitated such unrest, not just 
through that region but, indeed, to all of greater Europe.
  I yield back the remainder of my time.

                          ____________________