Because it is a dictatorial regime, the country will continue to be terrorized by rogue militias and gangs of thugs (shabbiha) and this means Syrians will witness more blood-shedding, corruption, looting, and displacement. Revenge will be taken on anyone who opposes Assad inside or outside of Syria.
Assad has already announced victory over his enemies (those who seek freedom, justice and dignity for all Syrians). This imagined victory will only serve to increase his confidence in himself and in the regional equations through which he will believe he has proven that he is the only skilled player in Syria. Having escaped all accountability for the crimes against humanity he has committed against the people so far, he will continue to practice the most severe dictatorship that his warped sense of entitlement and complete lack of conscience can devise. Consequently, the poor Syrian people will have no alternative than to return to being a herd ruled by the Assad family for another hundreds of years.
With Assad as their standard, Syrians will witness an increased lack of morality, values and change in people’s convictions regarding their principles of what is right and wrong. And this in turn will lead to cultural ignorance for many years which has always been one of Assad’s goals because ignorant people are easier to manipulate and control.
The hidden ways of torture and killing will eventually evolve into an open one and the poor will become poorer as the rich supporters of Assad become even richer. On the other hand, if the Assad regime’s survival is due to the military intervention of its allies; they are going to want something in return for the investment they have made and Syria will no longer belong to Syrians at all.
The Russian occupation will prevail and will control military and security sectors. As for the Iranian occupation, it will expand to promote and spread their religious message of Shiite all over Syria. The Assad regime’s survival is a success for the Persian project in the Middle East and reaching that goal will eventually turn Syria into cantons, with sectarian and ethnic domination regionally.
Even if Assad remains, he cannot be the same as he was before the revolution since that regime lost its sovereignty with the first drop of blood that fell from Syrians in Deraa in 2011. He lost his legitimacy internationally when the Syrian people asked for government reform and instead he sent their own army out to silence them with tanks and bullets. Free Syrians have broken the barrier of fear and they are no longer intimidated by his bully boy tactics.
However, on the internal level, if he remains, the arbitrary arrests and the torture will continue and the wall of fear will be rebuilt. The Sunni majority in society will continue to be reduced, and the efforts made to spread the Shiite sect among the Sunnis will be redoubled.
If the Assad regime remains in power it can only offer Syrians under its control more insecurity, more corruption, more brutality, chaos and ignorance and kill any hope for a better future in Syria.
