CIA activities in Syria

According to Copeland, the CIA attempted to "police" the July 1947 Syrian parliamentary election, which was marred by fraud, sectarianism, and interference by neighboring Iraq and Transjordan.

"[6] At Keeley's behest, Copeland wrote, Meade "systematically developed a friendship with Za'im ... suggested to him the idea of a coup d'état, advised him how to go about it, and guided him through the intricate preparations in laying the groundwork for it.

Shortly before the coup, Za'im tried to win Western sympathy by producing a list of individuals, including Keeley, that were supposedly "communist assassination targets," but US officials were skeptical.

In The Game Player, Copeland provided new details on the American assistance to Za'im's plan, expounding that Meade identified specific installations that had to be captured to ensure the coup's success.

"[8] Douglas Little notes that US assistant secretary of state George C. McGhee visited Damascus in March, "ostensibly to discuss resettling Palestinian refugees but possibly to authorize US support for Za'im.

[12] National Security Council member Wilbur Crane Eveland, CIA official Archibald Roosevelt, and Michail Bey Ilyan, former Syrian minister, met in Damascus on 1 July 1956 to discuss a US-backed 'anti-communist' takeover of the country.

The frontier posts with Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon would also be captured in order to seal Syria's borders until the radio stations announced that a new government had taken over under Colonel Kabbani, who would place armored units at key positions throughout Damascus.

Once control had been established, Ilyan would inform the civilians he'd selected that they were to form a new government, but in order to avoid leaks none of them would be told until just a week before the coup.

[15] Although Secretary of State John Foster Dulles publicly opposed a coup, privately he had consulted with the CIA and recommended the plan to President Eisenhower.

Secretary of State John Foster Dulles suggested that the US sought to invoke the "Eisenhower Doctrine" of retaliating against provocations, and this intention was later confirmed in a military report.

These targets were: Abdel Hamid al-Sarraj, head of military intelligence; Afif al-Bizri, army chief of staff; and Khalid Bakdash, leader of the Syrian Communist Party—all figures who had gained politically from exposure of "the American plot".

[24] Details about this conspiracy were revealed by a "Working Group Report" uncovered in 2003 among the papers of British Defence Minister Duncan Sandys: Once a political decision is reached to proceed with internal disturbances in Syria, CIA is prepared, and SIS [MI6] will attempt, to mount minor sabotage and coup de main incidents within Syria, working through contacts with individuals.The two services should consult, as appropriate, to avoid any overlapping or interference with each other's activities...

Incidents should not be concentrated in Damascus; the operation should not be overdone; and to the extent possible care should be taken to avoid causing key leaders of the Syrian regime to take additional personal protection measures.In the "Preferred Plan" drafted by the Working Group Report, the US and UK intelligence agencies would fund a "Free Syria Committee" and supply weapons to paramilitary groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood.

[27] The "Preferred Plan" was aborted after renewed diplomatic engagement by Saudi Arabia and Iraq, followed by direct military support to Syria from Egypt, made a regional war seem unlikely.

They subsequently offered German intelligence officials the opportunity to submit questions for Zammar, and asked Germany to overlook Syria's human rights abuses because of cooperation in the War on Terror.

[39] Following the raid, the New York Times revealed the existence of a secret 2004 military order authorizing actions by the CIA and the Special Forces in 15–20 countries, including Syria.

Assad was in danger of being overthrown until the 2015 Russian military intervention in Syria changed the course of the war, causing a split within the Obama administration between officials like CIA Director John O. Brennan and Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter—who advocated "doubling down" on the program—and opponents including White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough and Secretary of State John Kerry—who expressed doubts that escalating the CIA's role could achieve meaningful results without forcing "an asymmetric response by Russia."

On 14 October 2016, against the backdrop of the siege of "rebel-held sections" of the city of Aleppo by Russian and Syrian aircraft, Obama was presented by his National Security Council with a "Plan B" to "deliver truck-mounted antiaircraft weapons that could help rebel units but would be difficult for a terrorist group to conceal and use against civilian aircraft"; Obama declined to make a decision on the matter, raising the prospect "that tens of thousands of CIA-backed fighters will search for more-reliable allies, and that the United States will lose leverage over regional partners that until now have refrained from delivering more-dangerous arms to Assad's opponents."

Following Russia's intervention, top US officials began emphasizing "the fight against the Islamic State [ISIL], rather than against the Assad government," but supporters of the CIA program "disagree with this rationale, saying that the Islamic State can't be eradicated until a new government emerges capable of controlling the terrorist group's territory in Raqqa and elsewhere," and that "the [Free Syrian Army] remains the only vehicle to pursue those goals."

"[49] After the Defense Department's overt $500 million effort to train thousands of Syrians to fight ISIL was revealed to have produced only "four or five" active combatants as of September 2015, largely because the vast majority of potential recruits considered Assad their main enemy—an admission that prompted widespread congressional derision—the US military began airdrops of lethal equipment to established rebel organizations; reports soon emerged of "CIA-armed units and Pentagon-armed ones" battling each other.

"[53] During an interview with The Wall Street Journal in July 2017 President Donald Trump claimed many of the CIA-supplied weapons ended up in the hands of "Al Qaeda", which often fought alongside the CIA-backed rebels.

[54] In December 2018, US President Donald Trump announced that US troops involved in the fight against the Islamic State (ISIS) in northeast Syria would be withdrawn imminently.

Some experts proposed that President Trump could mitigate the damage of his withdrawal of US military forces from Syria by using the CIA's Special Activities Center.