The suffering of Syria's civilians, caught between the government's barrel bombs and chemical weapons and religious fanatics' beheadings and mass killings, shocked the world. Yet despite international law and political commitments proclaiming a responsibility to protect civilians from mass atrocities, world actors stood aside as Syria burned. Again and again, neighboring states, global powers, and the United Nations opted for half-measures or made counterproductive choices that caused even more harm.
Alex J. Bellamy provides a forensic account of the world's failure to protect Syrian civilians from mass atrocities. Drawing on interviews with key players, documents from the United Nations and other international organizations, and sources from the Middle East and beyond, he traces the missteps of the international response to Syria's civil war. Bellamy systematically examines the various peace processes and the reasons they failed, highlighting potential alternative paths that could have been taken. He details how and why key actors prioritized their own national interest, geopolitical standing, regional stability, local rivalries, counterterrorism goals, or domestic politics-anything other than the welfare of Syrians. Some governments settled on unrealistic strategies founded on misguided assumptions while others pursued naked ambition; the United Nations descended into irrelevance and even complicity. Shedding new light on the decisions that led to a vast calamity, Syria Betrayed also draws out lessons for more effective responses to future civil conflicts.
The suffering of Syria's civilians, caught between the government's barrel bombs and chemical weapons and religious fanatics' beheadings and mass killings, shocked the world. Yet despite international law and political commitments proclaiming a responsibility to protect civilians from mass atrocities, world actors stood aside as Syria burned. Again and again, neighboring states, global powers, and the United Nations opted for half-measures or made counterproductive choices that caused even more harm.
Alex J. Bellamy provides a forensic account of the world's failure to protect Syrian civilians from mass atrocities. Drawing on interviews with key players, documents from the United Nations and other international organizations, and sources from the Middle East and beyond, he traces the missteps of the international response to Syria's civil war. Bellamy systematically examines the various peace processes and the reasons they failed, highlighting potential alternative paths that could have been taken. He details how and why key actors prioritized their own national interest, geopolitical standing, regional stability, local rivalries, counterterrorism goals, or domestic politics-anything other than the welfare of Syrians. Some governments settled on unrealistic strategies founded on misguided assumptions while others pursued naked ambition; the United Nations descended into irrelevance and even complicity. Shedding new light on the decisions that led to a vast calamity, Syria Betrayed also draws out lessons for more effective responses to future civil conflicts.
Acknowledgments
List of Terms and Abbreviations
Prologue: Humanity’s Orphans
1. Arab Spring
2. Regional Solutions?
3. Last Chance for Peace
4. Syrian Winter
5. Red Line
6. Death and Diplomacy
7. Rise of the Caliphate
8. Between Barrel Bombs and Beheadings
9. Exodus
10. Russian Intervention
11. Meltdown of Humanity
12. Russia’s Endgame
13. De-escalation Dominoes
14. Northern Fires
15. “No Military Solutions” and Other Zombies
Epilogue: System Failure
Notes
Index
Alex J. Bellamy is professor of peace and conflict studies and director of the Asia Pacific Centre for the Responsibility to Protect at the University of Queensland, Australia. He is the author of World Peace (And How We Can Achieve It) (2019) and coauthor of Responsibility to Protect: Promise to Practice (2018), among other books.
In this masterful work, Alex J. Bellamy guides us expertly through
the bewildering array of forces and factions in Syria’s civil war.
He explains how domestic, regional, and international players made
matters worse while jockeying to advance their own interests.
Finally, he helps us understand how Syrians themselves were abused,
abandoned, and ultimately betrayed.
*Allan Rock, president emeritus of the University of Ottawa and
former Canadian ambassador to the United Nations*
Alex J. Bellamy, champion of the concept of the “responsibility to
protect,” takes a hard look at why powerful actors did not protect
hundreds of thousands of Syrians who perished during the civil war.
His sober conclusion: the war was so deadly because some actors
were unwilling to compromise and would do anything to win, and
because of the ‘core fact’ that the fate of Syria’s people was no
one’s consistent priority. Detailed, well-written, and thoroughly
referenced case studies of key events and actors make Syria
Betrayed essential reading for everyone who is interested in the
Syrian civil war and its implications for the future.
*Taylor B. Seybolt, author of Humanitarian Military
Intervention: The Conditions for Success and Failure*
This book is a sweeping, descriptive account of a case that even
today is still active and ongoing. Bellamy provides a well-written
narrative portrayal of the complexities of politics at multiple
levels and the impact of global powers’ failures on the lives of
civilians.
*Melissa Labonte, author of Human Rights and Humanitarian Norms,
Strategic Framing, and Intervention: Lessons for the Responsibility
to Protect*
The book provides humbling, crushing, and essential reading.
*International Affairs*
Highly relevant for peace scholars, activists, and
professionals.
*International Peacekeeping*
Does a valuable job of assembling and analysing the international
community’s failures over a decade of egregious violence and
violations of international law.
*Times Literary Supplement*
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