In my view, the month of December is quite nostalgic: it firstly backtracks you down your

memory lane at the year that has gone by, and when you are done weeping, it fills your heart
with excitement for the next twelve-month session. But that is not all to it. It has also marked
certain prominent events in the history of the world of which one in relevance to my current
topic is the murder of Roman emperor Publius Septimius Geta, who was a co-emperor along
with his brother Marcus Aurelius Antoninus aka Caracalla. But the two did not have much love
in common to rule together their father`s empire and hence one sinister day Geta was invited
over to a reconciliatory talk by his brother Caracalla to come without guards which was basically
a trap and Geta got murdered by a Praetorian Guard which was Roman Army`s unit consisting of
elite soldiers. So the menacing day was 19th December. Wait?! Murder on 19th December, by an
elite soldier? Something sounds familiar; Russian ambassador Andrei Karlov too was gunned
down by a Turkish elite Police officer Mevlut Mert Altintas on 19th December this very year
when the ambassador was attending an art exhibition in Ankara unaccompanied by his guards. It
all happened when Russia and Turkey are rapproaching each other after an year of bottlenecks
when Turkey had shot down a Russian war plane, Sukhoi Su-24, in 2015 that had not only costed
the jet but the pilot`s life too. Now I do not mean to say Turkey lured the Russian ambassador
into a trap and got him killed, even Russian President Vladimir Putin has rejected this notion of
holding Turkey responsible for the murder and says it is a deliberate attempt to derail the friendly
talks between Russia and Turkey. However, that was a security collapse.
Nonetheless, following the murder, analytical gurus cleared their throats to have their say on the
tragic incident and how it would shape the war in Syria. I too felt an itch to speak up because I
was feeling too provocative to utter my analysis I had been building days before this deadly
attack over the slain Russian ambassador in Ankara. So in my analysis, of course you can
disagree, the Syrian war which is purposefully dubbed as Syrian Civil War is although a new war
if we speak in terms of country, but based on an outdated strategy that was previously used in
Iraq and Libya- make rebels, fund them, make them fight with government, report brutal stories
about the tyrannical rule, voice your concerns over the issue and finally bring them some
democracy. The architects of this war or the military strategists were too ignorant of the fact that
Syria is neither Iraq nor Libya and hence failed to come up with some new war-winning tactics.
Same strategy cannot be applied everywhere. There was no ally to save Saddam Hussain or
Muammar Gaddafi, but Bashar-Ul-Assad, he has got an ex-super power on his back who has
successfully foiled this strategy and turned the tide of war against the perpetrators who are now
employing more of psywar as their conventional warfare is proving futile. The assassination of
the Russian ambassador was nothing out of the blue but the impact of the ongoing psywar
against Russia and Syria which has manifested itself in the shape of certain social media
accounts of survivors in Aleppo who kept on sending updates to report the atrocities
committed by Russia and Syria. The notable account out of these many was by the name of
Bana Alabed, @AlabedBana, a verified Twitter account of a 7 years old girl, managed by
mom. This account was created on September 24, 2016 and continuously reported about the
people who were bombed by Russia, till the Aleppo was liberated on December 22 by the
combined forces of Putin and Assad which is when the account suspended its activity- the day
when rebels and intelligence operatives were completely kicked out of Aleppo. Nevertheless, the
objectives of this psywar were to attract global denunciation and undermine Aleppo`s liberation.
The Turkish Police officer was affected by this propaganda who carried out the murder. He was
reported to have said Don`t forget Syria! Don`t forget Aleppo! ...Until our towns are safe, you
won`t enjoy security either. Everyone who is involved in this will pay a price. Rather, it was

not only him who had fallen victim to this psychological war but majority of the world too who
showed their satisfaction when the Russian ambassador was killed. For instance, Dr Elham
Badar, a Qatari journalist and board member of Al Jazeera took to Twitter to outburst Russia
deserves the worst; killing its envoy seems a humane response to Russian barbarism in Syria.
American journalist Gersh Kuntzman also wrote Assassination of Russian Ambassador Andrei
Karlov was not terrorism, but retribution for Vladimir Putins war crimes. It was the general
mood and response all over the world whosoever was brainwashed by the propaganda or was
furthering this mindset.
To sum it up, the main purpose of shedding light on all these developments was to discourage the
speculation inside Pakistan about sending our military to this war. Pakistan does not need to be a
part of this staged drama. Everyone knows who is doing what and on what side. If still, Pakistan
opts to send in its troops, I wonder who would we be fighting for and against? Most probably
fighting a third war for Uncle Sam, I mean UN and for global peace. This would not only hurt
our relations with Syria but Russia too who has been recently inching towards Pakistan for good
relations. We should not forget how the Soviet-Afghan War and War on Terror has harmed
Pakistan. Soviet-Afghan War gave us refugees, Kalashinkov culture, black marketers, drug
dealers and smugglers, whereas War on Terror caused us loss of numerous precious lives,
infrastructure, peace and a weak economy. Hence, by being party to this war in Syria, we would
only bring more extremism, terrorism and unrest to Pakistan at the time when we actually need
to say no more to do more, prioritize our own national interests and focus on them,
specifically the success of CPEC and defense of our own homeland against the umpteen enemies
lurking inside and outside our borders.
Jawad Ali Khan.