December 27, 2024: Until 1945 the only way you could visit Syria was by visiting whatever empire or independent state currently ruled Syria as one of their holdings. At the same time Syria is the location of one of the oldest civilizations in the world. About 12,000 years ago Syria was one the first regions to develop agriculture, keeping and breeding domestic animals as well as tool making and use of those tools to construct structures and useful items like plows, wheeled carts and chariots to defend all its new assets. While Syria was very productive and the home of inventors it was, until the 20th century, always a component of some other empire or independent state.

Syria first appeared in about 6,200 BC as a neighbor adjacent to the Yarmukian culture in what is now Lebanon and Syria. About 3,200 years ago Syria was part of the region occupied by the Arameans. This was a collection of Semitic groups that founded towns and spread new technology throughout Syria and adjacent regions. Some 2,000 years ago Arameans founded Aram-Damascus, a city that survived until 732 BC when the Assyrian Empire destroyed it. It took several centuries for another Damascus to appear, and Alexander the Great conquered this resurrected Damascus in 323 BC. Two hundred fifty years later the Romans showed up and took charge of Damascus.

With the Romans in charge, Syria became a part of the Roman Empire and thrived because of it. The Romans brought peace and prosperity. Rome was the second, after Greece, European power to rule Syria. In 602 the Persians, from modern day Iran, showed up and displaced the Romans for a while. Persians and Greek Byzantines fought over Syria in the early 600s until Moslems, a new imperial force, showed up and conquered Syria in 636. The Moslem empire, or Caliphate controlled Syria until the Mongols showed up in 1400 and conquered everything in sight. Then the Mongols left because there was not enough grasslands to feed the horses that kept their mobile army going.

The Turks took their place and held on until 1918 when they were ousted by the British and French armies. This was part of World War I, where the Turks sided with the German losers of that war. After that imperial Turkey became the Turkish Republic in the early 1920s. The Turks had lost control of Syria and much else to the European allies. France controlled Syria through the 20s and 30s until World War II broke out in 1939. The war reached Syria in 1941 as a pro-allied French faction and the British took Syria and ruled it until 1945 when Syria finally became independent.

Before that could happen there was a confrontation between French and British troops over the French efforts to stay in Syria and willingness to kill armed Syrians trying to get the French to leave. The appearance of British troops convinced the French to leave and the Syrians rule themselves

The new Syrian government was part of the Arab coalition that fought and lost in an effort to prevent Israel from being founded in 1948. That defeat led to an angry Syrian Colonel staging the first coup in Arab history. This was followed, in less than a year, with another coup and a series of Syrian dictators that lasted until 2024. From 1970 t0 2024 Syria was ruled by two generations of the Assad family.

Then, in 2024 there were unexpected changes. At the center of these changes was Abu Mohammad al-Golani, a former Islamic terrorist commander who was now leading HTS or Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham. Golani made a lightning fast advance from Idlib province in the northwest to the city of Aleppo and then down to the Iraqi border. The Assad clan was flown to Russia as the Russians sought to contact Golani and negotiate keeping their naval base of Taurus and nearby air base on the Syrian coast. Not wanting to take chances the Russians evacuated their ships, personnel and aircraft.

At the same time the United States doubled the number of troops in Syria. Now there are two thousand American soldiers scattered in several bases on the Iraq border with Syria helping the Kurds keep surviving ISIS terrorists from causing trouble.

Israel also took advantage of the chaos in Syria to destroy over 80 percent of the Assad government's aircraft, armored vehicles, artillery and military equipment Israel wanted to keep out of terrorist hands, notably HTS. Israeli forces expanded the territory they held around the Golan Heights, even occupying Mount Hermon, the highest peak in the area and an excellent site for monitoring the surrounding area using cameras, electronic monitoring equipment, and troops with binoculars and night-vision optics so the surveillance can be round the clock.

Another complication is that many of the 700,000 Syrian Druze asked to join the 170,000 Israeli Druze. The Druze have done well in Israel, where they also serve in the military. Accepting the Syrian Druze would involve annexing a Syrian province near the current Israeli border. Israel has expanded its borders in the past because of wars and to provide more buffer zones in the event of a future attack on Israel itself.

HTS quickly seized Syria in December 2024, because HTS leader Golani realized that the Assad government only controlled Syria in theory. Cash subsidies from Iran and Russia had diminished or disappeared in the last few years and without money the government could not pay the troops or police. The economy is a mess, so the troops and police tolerate long delays in being paid until, in December 2024 the Syrian military simply stopped being soldiers. There was nothing to stop Golani and his gunmen from quickly overrunning Syria and that’s what they did. Now everyone in the region and distant places like the United States and Russia wait to see what happens next.

Former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad says, from his exile in Russia, that is ready to return to Syria and take back control of his country. That isn’t going to happen because Assad has no support in Syria or anywhere else.

Turkey has told its 3.6 million Syrian refugees that it is safe to return home now. Some of these refugees entered Syria and their experiences will influence if any more refugees return. Turkey would like all of the refugees to leave as it costs the Turks a lot of money to support that many refugees. A large number of the Syrian refugees have learned to speak Turkish or English, and informally established businesses or went to work for existing Turkish firms. Because of these enterprising refugees, many may not return to Syria.

While the Turks are glad to see the Assads gone and peace in Syria, they still fear the Kurds in northeast Syria. The Kurds occupy 40 percent of Syria. The Turks believe that the Syrian Kurds are secretly plotting with the Turkish and Iraqi Kurds to establish a long dreamed of Kurdistan. Only the paranoid Turks believe that. The Kurds are content to just find a peaceful place to live, be it in Syria, Turkey, Iraq or Iran. The Turks continue to attack Turkish Kurds, accusing them of being terrorists. Some of them are, but usually in self-defense against Turkish violence.