Second Critical Analysis on "Syria's Endgame" by Michael J. Totten

Second Critical Analysis on “Syria’s Endgame” by Michael J. Totten

            “Syria’s Endgame” by Michael J. Totten explains that Syria’s civil war is dangerous and has the potential to get out of hand, that it is different than any of the other feuds in the Middle East, that it also has a huge affect on America and that Syria is already unstable without war. There are many details that Totten includes to support his main idea. One thing that Totten includes is a comparison of Syria’s civil war to other Middle Eastern feuds to send the message that the civil war is different and more extreme than all of the others An example of this is when after he describes feuds in the Middle East, like the one between Palestine and Israel, as a lead to his article, he says: “The civil war in Syria, though, is different. It is an existential fight to the death. It’s a real war with a real body count that already exceeds the butcher’s bill from the Bosnian war.” This shows that the civil war is not like other feuds and that it is rather, in Totten’s words, “real”. Another thing that Totten included were quotes from famous writers and previous work to emphasize on the idea that Syria is already unstable. For example, the first line in the article is: “ ‘We Arabs,’ the late Lebanese historian Kamal Salibi once said to me in Beirut, ‘are not a warring people. We are feuding people.” This develops his idea of conflict in Syria even more. Another example was: “ ‘what is the US worried about? That Syria will become a sponsor of terrorism? ... That it will be a repressive dictatorship that jails and murders thousands of people? Syria is already all of those things.’” A third thing that Totten does, to prove his point that the war is very dangerous and had the potential of getting out of hand, he describes both sides of the war and then explains how the country will become unstable after war. For example, “ Jabhat al-Nusra is not a part of the Free Syrian Army. They’re separate organizations… The FSA and Jabhat al-Nusra are currently fighting shoulder-to-shoulder but the alliance is temporary. They’ll fight each other when Assad falls.” Totten also uses the points of views of politicians as well as civilians to further strengthen his point. Two of the pages of the article were dedicated to the ideas and point of view of Samy Gamayel, the son of former Lebanese President and now part of Parliament, to show the political state that Syria would be in after the war and the strategies that the US can take to help turn the country into a democracy. Totten’s support works to inform readers about the dangerous state that Syria is in; his support helps very much to convince the reader that there is potential harm from the war and that an external force is needed to fix things up. His evidence strengthens and emphasizes positively on his point of view.

            Totten wants the reader to think that Syria’s civil war is very dangerous and that it is only getting worse but especially to make the reader feel that the war has a personal affect on them so that they can take action in the form of words to do what they can to stop the war. There are many craft moves that Totten utilizes that motivate readers to do this. One writing craft was using sophisticated vocabulary but using specifically selected vocabulary. For example, “, when Assad’s own armed forces massacred peaceful protestors”. By using descriptive word like armed, massacred and peaceful, Totten creates an image in the reader’s mind that Assad’s armed forces fought innocent civilians of no harm to death. Although it may be true, Totten’s specific selection of words is especially convincing and energizes the reader to take action. Strong vocabulary has a strong affect on how you read a text, being descriptive can especially prove a specific point. Another writing craft that Totten uses is one that is very similar to envisioning possibility. Because most of his ideas talk about what might happen in the future for Syria, Totten has to use envisioning possibility as an advantage to prove that Syria’s future is unstable. For example, “…The war could have been finished by now.” And “Members and supporters of the Free Syrian Army will be jailed, murdered, and tortured to death if they lose.” Again, although most of his ideas are realistic and some–what true, he improvises and uses history to envision possibility. The craft works because readers will read it and will have no thought of it or doubt and immediately believe that it’s true. Also, there is a deeper craft within envisioning possibility, itself, that allows the reader to think of how great, and in this case terrible things could be. Could is a strong word because we never know what will happen but a greater likelihood of something happening pushes us to act or to pull away. Totten wants his reader to act, to work to stop the terrible things from happening. A third craft that is also utilized by Totten is the use of short sentences. For example, “The first option really isn’t an option.” These types of sentences are straight forward, to the point and don’t create doubt, there’s no question about it. It has an affect on the reader that also forces them to say to themselves that what the author said is true.

             This text was very convincing and truthfully after doing this critical analysis, I’ve realized how powerful Totten’s writing was on the reader. Because of the evidence that Totten includes to support his claim and the craft moves that he utilized, my thinking was very effectively shaped and led to my own thesis statement for my foreword. There’s not much else that I want to learn, I’ve read a lot about Syria in my research and Totten’s writing was very detailed and straightforward.