Why Nuclear Syria is Scarier than Khrushchev.

The former Soviet Union engaged The United States in a One-Half Century nuclear stare-down known as The Cold War. People genuinely believed millions would die from these two powers engaging in nuclear conflict. The Cuban Missile Crises may have been humanity’s closest call yet. Suffice it to say, nothing attracts attention and leads to fear and consternation like a truly strong dictator threatening to visit thermonuclear holocaust on your neck of the woods.

But what happens when those same very dangerous weapons leave the hands of grave and serious people? Suppose a potentially unstable and weak leader attempts to lean on these weapons as a crutch to support a tenuous hold on autocratic power. While indulging in this potentially unpleasant scenario, keep in mind that President Kennedy and First Secretary Kruschev had a good, firm grip on each of their nations’ nuclear arsenals and still almost traded launches.

Tensions have recently escalated between Syria and Israel. The Israelis have spent part of this week bombing targets in the remote reaches of the Syrian Desert. The Israeli Defense Force has maintained a poker face, US Forces claim Israel intended to destroy a cache of weapons belonging to Hezbollah, and predictably, the Syrians are complaining to the UN that Israel has flagrantly violated their sovereignty.

The story became more interesting, as reports surfaced that North Korea might have sold the Syrians nuclear materials that they no longer wish to weaponize. This would take the entire unstable equilibrium surrounding the contested Golan Heights to a new level of brinksmanship. This would require us to give serious thought to just which leader would be in charge of keeping a Syrian Dr. Strangelove on a tight, safe tether.

Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad currently presides over the despotism known as Syria. His resume seems to be paper-thin. His older brother had originally been selected to start “winning” Syrian “elections” once their father, Hafez Al-Assad embarked upon the afterlife. Al-Assad's greatest political responsibility, prior to becoming President, was to head up The Syrian Computer Society. This lack of any professional seasoning, not the despotic Ba’ath Party he leads, nor the contemptible nut-jobs in Iran and in Lebanon that he allies himself with, offers the greatest cause for worry if Bashar Al-Assad ever got his eager hands on a bona fide nuclear missile.

P.J. O’Rourke once suggested in jest that we reelect Jimmy Carter President. He quipped that Carter was so addled that he may very well sit on the nuclear button. P.J. facetiously theorized that this possibility would scare the Russians into pacifism. That joke doesn’t seem as funny now.

While the entire nation of Syria may hate the infidel even more, now that I’ve compared their President to James Earl Carter, my concern is that Bashar Al-Assad could be well over his head in managing a nuclear arsenal. Other regional powers, such as Iran’s believer in The Hidden Imam, would offer him several unsolicited suggestions as to who he could test those weapons out on.

Iran probably wouldn’t engage Israel in a peer-to-peer throw weight competition, but they would have no objections if someone else held the eraser that wiped Israel off the map. Al-Assad may not be malevolent enough to start that type of slaughter on his own initiative, but then again, a lot of the terrible things that Syria has recently done in Lebanon have not been entirely Bashar Al-Assad’s call. Hezbollah may well exercise as much executive power over Syria’s government as Syria’s anointed Chief Executive.

Adding this all up leaves us a potentially ugly situation. Syria may have acquired a certain quantity of nuclear weapon components from North Korea’s going out of business sale. Israel has recently begun to engage them in low-intensity combat, consisting of air raids against a variety of military installations with strong ties to the Iranian Terrorist Organization Hezbollah. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad may or may not have enough power to compel the actions of his own military personnel and Iran could see a benefit of using AL-Assad’s nation as a cat’s-paw to strike Israel.

The nuclearization of unsteady, despotic states, engaged in millennium-old warfare, against hated foes, may pose a greater threat to human welfare than the nuclear arsenals of the former Soviet Union or the current Chinese People’s Liberation Army ever did. The Soviets had a clear chain of command to control their lethality; the Syrians may not have anything close to that ability.