Bush's cozying up to Syria is puzzling

By JOHN HALL
MEDIA GENERAL NEWS SERVICE
WASHINGTON -- President Bush's upcoming meeting in Jordan with Iraq's prime minister Nouri al-Maliki ought to be one for the books. How the two of them can cozy up toward Syria while it continues as a suspected sponsor of drive-by Lebanese assassinations remains to be seen.
The White House seemed to be working a potential Syrian-Iranian-Iraqi triangle last week to extricate U.S. forces from Iraq.
The diplomatic timing was unfortunate. The Iraqis could not have chosen a worse day to resume diplomatic relations with Syria than last Tuesday.
The assassination of Pierre Gemayel, a top anti-Syrian minister in Lebanon's U.S. backed reform government, was probably the work of Syrian intelligence agents still working inside Lebanon, the Lebanese victims believe. Others have pointed at Iranians, working through their militant Hezbollah movement in southern Lebanon, whose motive is to force the collapse of Lebanon's tottering year-old Cedar Revolution government.
That Iraq's two powerful neighbors would be brazen enough to sponsor this murder with one hand while making peace overtures to the Iraqis with the other isn't surprising. Duplicitous tactics of this variety go back a long time in the Middle East.
Syria broke relations with the Iraqis 24 years ago, accusing it of inciting riots by the banned Muslim Brotherhood. Later, matters worsened when Syria sided with Tehran in the Iran-Iraq war.
Now the Syrians have chosen a critical moment to reopen ties with Baghdad.
Too many excuses
There is always a possibility that the Lebanon assassination was some kind of a move by recalcitrant intelligence officers in Damascus to snuff out any peace overtures toward Washington by moderates. But there have been too many excuses and too many dashed hopes of this kind from the Syrians.
The government of Syria sent its foreign minister, Walid al-Moulalem, to Baghdad and agreed in a flurry of diplomatic activity to restore diplomatic relations. It was all accompanied by thrilling language about Arab flags flying in the skies of Baghdad and Damascus once again.
Read it this way: The flags of the trespassing westerners will be on the ground.
Al-Maliki's hope is to stop the flow of radical Islamic militants over its border into Iraq, which is in the throes of an insurgency. He won the promise of Damascus to accept the presence of U.S.-led troops in Iraq as long as the Iraqi government wants them.
Accepting U.S. troops in Iraq was a meaningless gesture on Syria's part, since the troops will be there no matter what he says. It was rendered mawkish when a few hours later the assassination of Gemayel was announced.
Yet, on the plane returning from the president's trip to Asia, national security director Stephen Hadley was quoted as indicating approval for the Iraq's warming of relations with Iran and Syria. He said it was "important" for the U.S.-backed government in Baghdad to speak directly to leaders in Damascus and Tehran and prod them to play a more positive role in Iraq's security.
Meeting in Jordan
Bush flies into Jordan (Wednedsday) to meet Iraq's al-Maliki. It could be important. It could be damage control. The potential avenue for stabilizing Iraq's borders that both Bush and Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair saw keeps getting closed down by violence.
The motive for Syria's acceptance of American troops in Iraq could prove interesting, however. In a way, the U.S. force is all that stands between Sunni Muslims in Iraq and a bloodbath at the hands of the majority Shiites and the large, growing militias they control, some allied with al-Maliki. To some extent, Damascus, as a Baath party center, could become a counterweight to the Shiites.
But if that is the motive for Syria's decision to play footsy with Iraq, it doesn't get the United States any closer to the exit ramps; it keeps it gridlocked in an interminable shooting war, in which its own commanders can't set the rules of the road.
John Hall is the senior Washington correspondent of Media General News Service.