Syria and Game Theory
As the Syrian Civil war enters into its 5th year, Syrian Government backer Russia has become more invested in intensifying its efforts to take more territory and reinforce its current gains by escalating the force, despite the mounting civilian casualties. Russia has been currently been pressing its advantage on Aleppo to try to claim the city against the Syrian rebels, trying to cut off the rebels supplies and prevent the Syrian rebels’ backers from being able to continue to support their defense of the city. Russia is currently trying to strengthen its bargaining power before the next US president takes office. This is despite growing UN condemnation of this area. Because both sides of the Syrian Civil War have publicly expressed that the war cannot be won militarily alone, this proxy war between Russia its allies, and the West and Gulf powers has come to placing itself in a position of greater power for negotiations during the next Syrian ceasefire. From the part of the West, the US and its allies are looking at intensifying support for the Rebels, as well as raising concerns about the possibility that Russia has committed war crimes.
This is related to the theory of Game Theory from class. Currently, both sides are looking at the tradeoffs of different actions. For both sides, the best solution at this point would be for both sides to commit to a ceasefire, which would both allow the Russian government to maintain its current power without receiving extra condemnation, and allow the Syrian rebels to survive and try to recover. However, this demonstrates the Prisoner’s Dilemma, as the expected action of each of the sides is to continue to cause the war to escalate and try to strengthen their sides for the next diplomatic attempt to negotiate a ceasefire. However, the current situation as it stands favors Russia in the short term, since supporting the Syrian government militarily allows the Russian government to strengthen its position in the Middle East as well as assert itself militarily. In contrast, supporting the rebels carries extra danger for the US government, because different rebel networks have less amicable relations with the US government. Therefore, while both sides are currently doing what is best considering what each side believes the other side will do.