Nature Abhors a Vacuum: Syria and the Lessons of Power Vacuums

Syrians chant slogans and wave the new Syrian flag as they gather at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, Syria, on Dec. 13, 2024. Leo Correa/AP Photo

Commentary

We’ll begin with the latest developments in Syria, a region that’s seen more than its fair share of turmoil and competing powers. Then, we’ll broaden the lens, examining other examples from history and recent events to see how power vacuums play out in the Middle East and globally and, most importantly, what they mean for national security, global business, and individual lives.

Syria has once again become the center of geopolitical attention. In a stunning 12-day campaign, the regime of Bashar al-Assad collapsed and Assad himself fled to Russia. Rebel groups, particularly Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, rapidly seized control of major cities, including Aleppo, Hama, and Homs, with minimal resistance from the Syrian Arab Army. The government’s ability to resist dissolved almost overnight, leaving Syria in the hands of fragmented factions—though sponsored heavily by Turkey—navigating a complex and uncertain transition.

The Syrian civil war, which raged for nearly 14 years, killed at least half a million people and displaced millions more, including six million refugees who fled to Turkey and Europe. The rapid fall of Assad has upended the strategic calculations of every major player in the region and beyond, including Russia, Iran, Israel, Turkey, and the United States. So what happened? Back at the beginning of the civil war, as part of the “Arab Spring,” the Assad regime was close to collapse. But unlike Mubarak in Egypt who resigned, Assad held on to power and was assisted by Russia re-entering the Middle East, as well as Iran and its semi-military terrorist group Hezbollah in Lebanon, which aided Assad within Syria in the civil war battles.

Basically, the Assad regime has been propped up by these forces. However, largely in the past year, Russia, preoccupied with its war in Ukraine, found itself no longer able to provide the support Assad had previously relied on. Meanwhile, Israel began in September to destroy Hezbollah’s leadership and war-making capacity, and the terrorist group is now a shadow of its former self.

So it seems that the anti-Assad forces, fragmented as they may be, and with Turkey behind them, assessed that the Assad regime had become an empty shell, hiding a vacuum, and seized on the opportunity, with the regime crumbling as a result and its soldiers losing morale and abandoning their posts.

A Historical Pattern

Syria’s story is not unique. The collapse of Assad’s regime is part of a larger pattern we’ve seen across the Middle East and globally when power vacuums emerge.

In Iraq, the 2003 U.S.-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein’s regime but left a significant power vacuum. This allowed insurgent groups to thrive, ultimately giving rise to the ISIS terrorist group. Later, after ISIS was mostly defeated through a strange convergence of interests between the United States and Iran, the Iran regime gained a powerful foothold in controlling Iraqi affairs. One recent piece of evidence to suggest this is the numerous drone attacks on Israel over the past year launched from Iraqi territory.

When Saddam and his murderous regime were around, they kept the Iranian Ayatollahs busy all through the 1980s fighting each other, with a lot less time and bandwidth to consider regional hegemony aspirations. This might have been one reason the United States kept Saddam in power after the Gulf War in 1991.

In Libya, Muammar Gaddafi’s fall in 2011 created a fractured state with rival factions vying for control. International players like Russia and Turkey turned the country into a proxy battleground. Similarly, the end of colonial rule across Africa and the Middle East left many countries without the structures of civil society necessary for stable governance, resulting in years of factionalism and conflict.

It’s important to note that the above two vacuums were created by Western powers led by the United States. One critical lesson to learn is this: When toppling a regime, it’s essential to think beyond the act of removal and consider who—or what—might replace it. This is a question that local powers and international actors must grapple with. Is the replacement truly better aligned with the goals of stability, development, or reform? Or does it risk perpetuating the same, or worse, dangers?

Globally, power vacuums have had equally dramatic consequences. The Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 led to a brutal civil war and the eventual rise of the Taliban. In the Balkans, the collapse of Yugoslavia in the 1990s left a vacuum filled by ethnic conflict and genocide. There are many other recent and distant examples.

Lessons to Consider

When centralized authority collapses, chaos often ensues, inviting intervention by opportunistic actors both local and international. And without careful consideration of the aftermath of regime change, the intended objectives—again whether local or global—can easily backfire, further complicating the situation.

There should also be a distinction drawn between a regime toppled by local forces, with or without external help, and a revolution/regime toppling initiated by outside powers. I’m not suggesting the first is always legitimate, and the second never, just that genuine local leadership and local support from the people of a nation is important for future stability.

It’s an interesting exercise to examine all the various world powers and try to see if there is an open power vacuum, or a hidden one, covered with but a shell, potentially leading to an imminent collapse. There might be a couple of candidates that qualify.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.