What you read below was first conceived in the final months of 2013.

It polished and released the following year in 2014 in speech format for the National Christian Forensics and Communications Association (NCFCA)…with repeated updates that you will see.

It’s a get-up and go Counterinsurgency strategy to win the Civil War in Syria that was raging at the time.

It’s a wonderful plan, and I still believe that if it were implemented 10 years ago, many things would be different on the world stage today.

What is interesting is that the storied Green Beret Michael G. Vickers proposed the exact same plan to the Obama Administration at the same time I was giving this speech to judges and students at Speech and Debate…

But alas, it was shot down.

But quality is quality, whether it shelfed or not, and the research penned here would form the key basis for my second book I would write the following year, All Men Follow the Strongman: The Forgotten History of the Iraq War.

And so without further ado, I give you my Foreign Policy Opus Magnus:

NO MORE NIGHTMARES: MY DREAM FOR SYRIA

By Richard Barrett

2014 AD

Imagine one night that you wake up to poundings on your door. You wake up and go down stairs where in bursts men swathed in black carrying guns and began tearing through your house. 

Imagine that they take your kids away from you, to a detention center where you children are flogged. After they’re flogged they are repeatedly electrocuted. 

After they’re electrocuted they’re killed.

That is a horrific scenario that no one wants to even think about. But for some people, this story of life under the rule of al Qaeda, is a reality they can’t escape. 

They’re the people of Syria, caught up in the Syrian Civil War. 

You’ve probably heard about the crisis in Syria, and you’ve probably heard names like Bashar al-Assad, Sunni, Shia, and al Qaeda. And probably the more you here, the more confused you are about the genocide happening in this Middle Eastern country. 

This is a topic that I am very passionate about because I’ve known many refugees that have fled from the horror of the Middle East. And today, I’m here to shine light on this horrific conflict, telling you what the Syrian Civil War is about, who the Syrian Civil War affects, and how the United States can stop it.

First, let’s look at what the Syrian Civil War is about. The Syrian Civil War is a conflict to shape the future of Syria and the Middle East, and it is fought by three distinct forces:

• President Bashar al-Assad’s Baathist Forces
• The moderate Free Syrian Army
•  The infamous terrorist organization al Qaeda

Bashar al-Assad rules his country with an ideology known as Baathism. As the documentary “Saddam Hussein and the Third Reich” explains, the Baathist Party is a direct copy of the Nazi and Fascists Parties of WWII fame. What it was like to live in Hitler’s Germany is what it is like to live in Assad’s Syria, with complete control of every citizen’s life, a brutal secret police, and a leadership cult of personality. 

In addition to this, Nonie Darwish explains in her memoir Now They Call Me Infidel that Baathism promotes radical Islam to breed xenophobic hatred of Israel and the United States. 

According to Mike Evans in his book “The Final Move Beyond Iraq,” Assad has been one of biggest sponsors of terrorism, sending radical Shia Militias to kill U.S. troops in the Iraq War, funding and arming the terror organization Hezbollah—an organization  that some consider more dangerous than al Qaeda—whose goal is the destruction of the US and Israel, and supporting the human rights abusing rogue regime Iran.

Cleary Assad is no friend of Syria, and no friend of the world.

In the Arab Springs of 2011, when the Syrian people initiated peaceful protests against the Assad Regime, their pleas for a better future were met by a brutal crackdown. As Max Fisher of the Washington Post explains:

“First, security forces quietly killed activists. Then they started kidnapping, raping, torturing and killing activists and their family members, including a lot of children, dumping their mutilated bodies by the sides of roads. Then troops began simply opening fire on protests. Eventually, civilians started shooting back.”

Let’s meet these civilians shooting back. 

The second group fighting the Syrian Civil War is known as the Free Syrian Army, a rebel group fighting Assad’s government who are dedicated to making Syria a free and prosperous nation. 

Not only do they hate the slavery that is Bashar al-Assad’s Baathist rule, but also the total slavery of al Qaeda’s radical Islam.  

Elizabeth O’Baggy is one of the few reporters who has lived for extended periods of time with Free Syrian Army she reports in the Wall Street Journal that:

 “While traveling with some of these Free Syrian Army battalions, I’ve watched them defend Alawi and Christian villages from government forces and extremist groups. 

“They’ve demonstrated a willingness to submit to civilian authority, working closely with local administrative councils. 

“And they have struggled to ensure that their fight against Assad will pave the way for a flourishing civil society. 

“One local council I visited in a part of Aleppo controlled by the Free Syrian Army was holding weekly forums in which citizens were able to speak freely, and have their concerns addressed directly by local authorities” 

The third group that is fighting the Syrian Civil War is al Qaeda. While there are many sub-factions under this movement, such as Ansar al-Nursa, ISIS and the al Jahbat Brigade, their goal is the same. 

Their vision for Syria is to turn it into a medieval state based upon Sharia Law that they can use as a springboard for attacks on the United States. 

Theirs is a place of slavery where education, freedom, and hope are non-existent. 

CNN tells of Amnesty International’s reports that when Al Qaeda controlled the cities of Aleppo and Raqqa, flogging, torture, and murder were common  punishments for “crimes” such as smoking, possessing a camera, women not wearing the veil, and even for those who just don’t agree. 

CNN reports that one man, whose name remains anonymous, decided to protest this in the only way he could: graffiti. He was captured by al Qaeda forces, and he said: 

 “Every 15 minutes, someone poured water on me, electrocuted me, kicked me, then walked out,” he said. 

But his own pain, he said, he could handle, as his body eventually went numb. It was hearing the pain and the screams of other prisoners he knew that was the hardest. 

“When a person is tortured in front of you, you feel responsible. That’s the hardest. One guy still inside used to call me Dad as I taught him about democracy.”

But what’s more, it’s not just adults their torturing: Amnesty International reports that large amounts of children as young as eight are flogged, tortured and killed daily.

I don’t know if you have ever been affected by this horrific reality. But I have. In working with an organization known as Tucson Refugee Ministries, where I met many families from all across the Middle East that had fled war. 

They came from many nations; Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, and Egypt. 

I’ve played and laughed with little kids from Somalia, named Nagib, Adey and Hadji. I’ve colored with a little girl from Afghanistan named Gizal. 

I’ve known an eight year old, named Miriam, who once asked “Why does there have to be war? I’m from Mosul [Iraq] and there was lots of war and killing there.”

 Her eyes betrayed that she had seen more than any eight year old should. 

I’ve known a man from Egypt, a Coptic Christian named Malik, who told me with tears running down his face of how the government murdered his best friend before his very eyes, and how a Muslim Brotherhood imam threatened to kill his eight year old son named Ki-Ro-Los. 

For me, the oppression and horror that the people of the people of the Middle East experience is real, and nowhere is it more than real today than in Syria. 

When I hear about kids being tortured in secret prisons, I think of my friend the refugees. I know them. 

They’re Adey, They’re Hadji, they’re Gizal, they’re Ki-Ro-Los. 

I see them all. I know them.  

But you know them too. 

They’re your own kids, your own neighbors, your own relatives. 

It’s because they’re just like you and me. 

They’re human beings. 

They are the face of the innocent, and they do not deserve a life like the one they have. Regardless of one’s race, religion, or ethnicity, no innocent should have to fear for their lives like they do. Whether they’re Alawite Shia, Sunni, or Christian, it doesn’t matter. They’re human beings.

And I don’t know about you, but I’m sick of opening up the newspaper every morning and reading stories like this. 

I’m sick of watching the death toll of a nation rise from 2000 to 8000 to 60,000 to 130,000  to 200,000 where it’s at today. 

And since I’ve given this speech at four tournaments, I have had to consistently raise that number and I’m sick of it.

We gotta stop it.

And I’m pleased to tell you that 10,000 years of human history tells us how to do it. 

Which leads me to my third point, how the US can stop the Syrian Civil War. 

The United States must initiate a no-fly zone over Syria, establishing air-superiority to destroy Assad’s air and ground forces. We then must deploy the Green Berets to train, arm, coordinate, and fight alongside the Free Syrian Army. 

Once Assad is defeated, we must then turn on al Qaeda. 

After the fighting is over and the nation is secure, our military and diplomatic forces alike must assist the people of Syria to rebuild their country from the bottom up.

This system has been proven to work throughout history; as Robin Moore notes in his book The Hunt For Bin Laden in October of 2001, the US deployed 120 Green Berets to fight alongside the moderate Northern Alliance against the Taliban. 

Before the Green Berets arrived, the Moderate Northern Alliance was on the brink of collapse, controlling only 10% of Afghanistan and having suffered the loss of their charismatic commander at the hands of a suicide bomber. 

But with the arrival of 120 Green Berets, the Northern Alliance fighters, poor, unequipped, and starving, were galvanized by fighting alongside these motivated and gung-ho Americans, skilled not only in martial prowess, but in diplomatic and leadership skills. 

Together, along with coordinated air power, they killed 31,000 Taliban and al Qaeda fighters in only two months, and broke the back of the Islamist insurgency responsible for the 9/11 attack. 

As retired Marine Bing West chronicles in his book, The Wrong War when America changed from these aggressive and local-population oriented tactics to more conventional unit search and destroy mission that did little to rely on local cooperation, it began to lose the war, leading to the ignominious draw down we see today. 

But it is not only the early days of Afghanistan that these tactics worked. 

As soldier, historian, and first-hand Peter Young notes in his book The Arab Legion, that when in the 1920s the Arab nation of Jordan was on the brink of collapse, it was charismatic British Army Officers who trained and fought alongside the local Arabs that pacified that nation from terrorists and bandits, making it the single most stable, prosperous, and peaceful Arabic nation to date. 

And these are just two of literal countless examples that display the effectiveness of this strategy in building a free and stable nation. 

You know, there’s a third verse to the Star Spangled Banner that not many of us know, but is more apt than ever for us today. It says “Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just”.  

There is no more just cause that to stop dictators and terrorists. 

Everything we stand for stands against this. 

Our way of life stands against this. 

Indeed, our very humanity stands against this. 

We’ve gotta stop it.  

How can you help this cause? “I’m not a Green Beret!” you’re probably thinking! 

I know, I’m not either. 

But we can all do our part, because this is a total war effort.  How can you help this cause? 

You can help this cause, by studying the plight of the innocents of the Middle East. Meet some of the refugees in your community; this is the capital of the Free World, the melting pot. 

They’re here. Talk to them, connect with them, understand  them.  

Research for yourself such counter-insurgency tactics as outlined above, so that you can know and understand what needs to be done when evil threatens the innocent. 

And what’s more, contact your local congressmen and senators, because in our day and age, public pressure is a reality. In fact, we’ve got a congressional election coming.  

I don’t know about you,  but I’m sick of turning on the news and seeing  200,000 dead in Syria. 

I want to turn on the TV and see America and Syria working hand in hand to build a strong, stable, and free Syria! 

That’s my dream, and I do hope you share it with me!

Sincerely,

Richard Barrett

2014, AD

Written Somewhere on the Eastern Seaboard in the Shadow of Democracy…

Sources Cited

Darwish, Nonie. Now They Call Me Infidel: Why I Renounced Jihad for America, Israel, and the War on Terror. New York, NY: Penguin Group, 2006.

Evans, Mike. The Final Move Beyond Iraq: The Final Solution While the World Sleeps. Lake Mary, FL: Strange Communications, 2007.

Moore, Robin. The Hunt for Bin Laden: Task Force Dagger. New York, NY: Random House, 2003. 

O’Bagy, Elizabeth. “On the Front Lines of Syria’s Civil War.” WSJ. August 30, 2013.  https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887324463604579044642794711158. Accessed August 31, 2013.

Saddam and the Third Reich. hosted by David Robb. New York, NY: History Channel, 2005. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfXlMAl29ec.

Walsh, Nick Paton; Razek, Raja; and Tuysuv Gul. “Inside Syrian town living under al Qaeda reign of fear.” CNN. November 6, 2013. http://www.cnn.com/2013/11/05/world/meast/syria-al-qaeda-town-walsh/index.html?iid=article_sidebar. Accessed November 26, 2013. 

West, Bing. The Wrong War: Grit, Strategy, and the Way Out of Afghanistan. New York, NY: Random House, 2011. 

“What are the lyrics to the USA National Anthem, ‘The star-spangled 

banner’?”. Classical Music. April 24, 2021. https://www.classical-music.com/features/articles/the-star-spangledbanner-lyrics/.

Young Peter. The Arab Legion. London, England: Osprey Publishing, Ltd., 1972.