A Student At The College Of William And Mary - 1256 Words

I am writing to you today as a student at the College of William and Mary. I am in an International Security class and recently we studied the events occurring in Syria. As you are well aware, the situation in Syria has been dramatically deteriorating in recent months with the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the recent entrance of Russia into the conflict. Syria, meanwhile, has been in the midst of a ravaging civil war since the early spring of 2011. Currently, the government of Syria is led by President Bashar al-Assad, a member of the Syrian Ba’ath Party, a branch of the same Ba’ath Party that Saddam Hussein was also a member of. This similarity may lead some to think that Syria will end up like Iraq, with a†¦show more content†¦This led to various sectarian strifes among the countries in the Middle East. Since Russia started bombing, they have mostly targeted anti-Assad rebels, rather than ISIL which they stated they were bombing. I propose to include Russia in the current coalition, led by the United States, which also include Australia, Bahrain, Canada, France, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom. There will have to be negotiations in order to get Russia to cooperate so they do not go rogue and bomb targets that are supported by the West and other countries in the coalition. By having Russia in the coalition and working with the United States, there will be a greater oversight of their operations and more transparency among the nations. This will help with making strategic attacks so ISIL can be degraded and destroyed and also so the Assad regime will finally relinquish power to a democratic government. There also must be targeted strikes upon ISIL’s main sources of income: oil reserves. Although this may harm potential future capabilities of Syria or Iraq to drill for oil, it will severely disrupt the income of ISIL so that they will not be able to buy the reso urces necessary to fight against the governments and to maintain the territory which it has already conquered. Next, in order to quell