Syrian Transitional Military Council: A ‘social media invention’ or much more?
MENASource
by
Matthew Ayton
A man walks past a banner depicting Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in Douma, outside Damascus, Syria, September 17, 2018. REUTERS/Marko Djurica/File Photo
Recent weeks have seen a crescendo of rumors claiming that local, regional, and international support is growing to establish a Syrian Transitional Military Council (TMC). It would allegedly be led by defected Brigadier General Manaf Tlass, whose mandate would be to midwife the war-ravaged nation into a post-Bashar al-Assad future.
The concept of a Syrian TMC has existed for some years. I’ve been told by senior opposition figures that the idea was proposed on at least two previous occasions—2012 and 2016—and that it would be modeled somewhat on the Egyptian experience, following the ousting of Hosni Mubarak in 2011, which saw the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces take the reins of state authority. However, in the case of Syria, forming a TMC has remained a largely comatose idea within diplomatic circles, as the brutality of the fratricidal conflict and the anemic international consensus-building has stifled its materialization.