Quoted in Business Insider’s article, our Senior Fellow Suleyman Ozeren shared his views about the post-Assad defense and security posture in Syria, the prospect of rebuilding a new army, Turkey’s potential key role in the process, and the regional governments’ approach and engagement with Al-Sharaa and his HTS’ rule in Syria.
“While Turkey may play an important role in providing military hardware, it is unlikely to fully become the primary supplier of the new Syrian Army,” Ozeren said. “With Western reluctance to arm HTS’s military and Turkey’s limited capacity, Syria will likely need to diversify its sources of heavy weaponry, potentially increasing its dependence on Gulf Cooperation Council countries” — Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. These countries share an interest in countering Iran’s influence.
“Turkey will likely pursue defense and security agreements with Syria while carefully navigating its relationships with Arab states to avoid diplomatic isolation,” Ozeren added. “However, creating an army is very much different than supporting or creating a proxy force which could risk long-term instability in the region.”
“Ultimately, the question remains whether Turkey has the capacity to provide the necessary training and hardware to establish a fully functioning standard army in Syria,” Ozeren said. “The experiences in Libya and with the [Syria National Army opposition group] do not provide a definitive answer to this challenge.”
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