After Iraq, Each Of The Neighbouring Regimes Will Have At Least Two Scenarios:.

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BEIRUT - The fall of Saddam Hussein's Baathist regime - with its symbols erased and the power of global media penetrating even the most conservative homes - has exposed the vulnerability of all the undemocratic systems in the Middle East. Each of Iraq's neighbouring countries will have at least one scenario of a viable democracy and one of dismemberment.

A viable federal democracy in Iraq will be a direct threat to Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, other GCC states and Iran. In Lebanon, Scenario One will have the Christian and Muslim communities reunified under some kind of federal democracy; Scenario Two will mean partition between the Christians and Muslims. Either one will have domino effects on the rest of the Arab World, Syria being a main loser of the US-led war.

A prominent APS source says the undeclared but "obvious demise of the Arab League" does not only mean member regimes are on their own in pursuing continuity, but also "shows the region being not much more than a house of cards". He adds: "The winds of change blowing through the TV screens will be unstoppable. All will be exposed. Transparency will prevail".

A US led war on the regime of Kim Jong Il in North Kroea is a more likely possibility than military action against Iran or Syria as the next target after Iraq. But this may not happen soon, as George W. Bush has to deal with the economy and an election to win in 2004. The source says changes in Iran and Syria will result from the momentum of federal democratisation in Iraq. Even if the US fails in its plan for Iraq, the momentum of Iraq's partition will be strong enough to cause changes within these countries.

Focus On Syria: The Achilles heel of Bashar Al Assad's Baathist regime is a failing Syrian economy combined with a time bomb of rising unemployment. Its loss of cheap Iraqi oil - a 200,000 b/d Saddam carrot taken way - has added to the economic crisis. The regime's political isolation - not only from Arab moderates but from its people - makes it impossible for its economy to get adequate aid. It is in these circumstances that tough US sanctions will hurt the regime and increase its isolation from the people, while it has to deal with Hizbollah and Syrian fighters stuck in Iraq.

Pressure on Damascus has built up steadily since Baghdad fell on April 9. US intent came on April 12 from an interview of a top neo-conservative, Richard Perle, who said: "It would be an act of such foolishness on Syria's part, that it would raise the question of whether Syria could be reasoned with...Our first approach would be to demand that the Syrians terminate that (WMD) threat by turning over anything they have come to possess, and failing that I don't think anyone would rule out the use of any of our full range of capabilities".

On April 13 President Bush said "we believe there are chemical weapons in Syria". On April 14 White House spokesman Ari Fleischer called Syria a "terrorist state" and a "rogue nation" - terms previously applied mainly to Iraq, as well as to Iran and North Korea - and hinted that tough sanctions may be imposed on Syria until it eliminates its WMD capability. On March 25, as US and British forces appeared trapped by Saddam's death squad, the Assad regime made public its wish to see the Americans and their allies defeated in Iraq. During one of the UN Security Council meetings needed for a second resolution for the war, Syrian Foreign Minister Farouq Al Sharaa described the planned US move on Iraq as a "highway robbery"; his American counterpart, Colin Powell, was there to hear the comment loud and clear. None of Assad's aides had anticipated a swift US-led victory to be followed by tough US economic sanctions on Syria.

Syria is particularly vulnerable to either of the two scenarios. Damascus is not in a position to ride out a tight sanctions regime of the kind Iraq faced over the past decade. Domestic instability would break out; observers even project the contours of a Syria partitioned into an "Alawite state", a "Damascus state", an "Aleppo state", and so on. As in Iraq, society in Syria is deeply divided in ethnic and sectarian terms (see RIM in this week's Diplomat).

The alternative scenario is for the Damascus regime to adapt rapidly to the changing circumstances. This would mean, among other things, acceding to a list of US demands which is likely to be similar to expectations expressed by Israeli Premier Ariel Sharon's spokesman Raanan Gissin in a comment on April 15. Thus Syria will be pressured into (a) signing the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which it has so far resisted; (b) withdrawing its troops from Lebanon, where they have been since 1976; (c) disarming Hizbollah, whose anti-Israel activities through South Lebanon continue, and all the Palestinian guerrilla groups that are based in Syria - otherwise Israel would disarm them and thus undermine the regime's credibility in Syria and elsewhere; (d) preventing the entry of Iraqi Baathists and their armed Arab supporters on to its territory, and the handover of all those already in Syria; and (e) moving to a federal democratic system.

There is this joke about the way Saddam's regime crumbled, which mobile phone and e-mail messages in the Arab World now circulate: "Young Assad of Syria sent Bush a message telling him that if the US president wants him to go, he does not have to go through that much trouble. He can just send a text message on his mobile phone".