There seems to be greater commitment in the international community to keep the fighting in Syria from spiraling out of control after major world powers agreed in Munich to a "cessation of hostilities" and to the delivery of immediate aid. But given the situation in Syria, it's not clear what the deal will lead to on the ground. Already, rebel groups in Syria have said they will not stop fighting because they do not believe that Russia will end its bombing campaign in support of the government. Russia, indeed, believes its airstrikes in Aleppo are not included in the deal, nor are attacks against what Moscow calls terrorist targets across Syria. That in itself is a glaring gap, as is the word "cessation" which in other words means a temporary Syrian truce, not a lasting cease-fire. US Secretary of State John Kerry said that the real test of the deal will be whether all the parties involved honor their commitments and implement them, and that ending the five-year civil war will require a plan for a political transition. The Syrian crisis has been allowed to ferment and escalate for five years because some of the parties involved imagined that they could settle it in their favor militarily. As a result, it has grown increasingly complex, steadily reducing the opportunities for a political settlement. Although the conflict began as a popular revolution against a corrupt and tyrannical regime, it quickly evolved into a civil war fueled by regional and international powers bent on settling old scores with the Syrian regime and indifferent to the cause of democracy or the welfare of the Syrian people. So, a peaceful settlement is the only option for all parties, even if the concrete conditions needed to bring such a settlement to fruition do not fully exist yet. That is because there are two opposing alliances each with their particular take on the situation. On one side are supporters of the Bashar Al-Assad regime. This camp maintains that the fall of the regime will enable terrorist groups to seize control of the Syrian state because balances of power on the ground are heavily in favor of these groups and against the moderate opposition. Accordingly, the war against terrorism and support for the Bashar regime are two sides of the same coin and two means to attain the same objective. The opposing alliance maintains that the Bashar regime is a consummately terrorist organization as it has caused the killing and displacement of the Syrian people. Therefore, toppling this regime and removing Bashar Al-Assad are essential preconditions for eradicating other terrorist groups. The two positions are antithetical and have made the Syrian problem intractable. Meanwhile, there are goals more modest than peace, such as the delivery of humanitarian aid to people who desperately need it. The next week may confirm whether Syria's government and opposition forces are ready to provide access denied for so long. Both Kerry and Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov admitted, and repeatedly, that Munich was only progress on paper, aka, not worth the paper it's printed on. The sole hope is that all who are truly dedicated to the welfare of the Syrian people will do all in their power to realize an immediate cease-fire, but after so much killing and devastation, that option does not appear to be immediately available.
