Middle East - Complications within Complications..

Syria’s bloody civil war, which has killed more than 220,000 people and uprooted millions, began in 2011 as a conflict between Bashar al-Assad’s government and the rebels fighting to overthrow him, with a number of foreign powers backing each side. The emergence of ISIS, a new destabilizing force opposed to both Assad and the rebels, complicated the picture significantly and spread the conflict into neighboring Iraq. Entry of Russian airpower has scrambled a conflict already defined by overlapping and contradictory alliances and rivalries. Shooting down of the Russian jet will in the next few months see a lot of realignment in these alliances, either on their own or forced or created by the powers involved

The chart below,, provides a look at who’s fighting whom in the dizzyingly complex and brutal war.

 

Pull USA, its allies and Russia out of this matrix and see the result:

  It will become all Red

                                                      

  Saudi Arabia vs Iran

  Sunni vs Shi'a