Why did Muslim-majority Syria & Afghanistan fall

ABOUT two weeks ago, Syrian rebel groups captured Damascus, ending more than half a century of rule by Hafez al-Assad and his son Bashar al-Assad, whose regime was long supported by Russia and Iran. Similarly, in mid-August 2021, Taliban insurgents toppled Ashraf Ghani’s government, bringing a sudden end to two decades of US-backed administration in Afghanistan.

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The collapse of both regimes was strikingly swift — just 11 days in Syria and only 10 days in Afghanistan — catching many by surprise. These sudden downfalls marked the fall of two Muslim-majority countries in Asia within a span of just three years. What unfolded in these nations? What forces drove such rapid regime collapses?

Global powers played a decisive role in both cases, not only in sustaining the governments, but also inadvertently contributing to their collapses. In Syria, Assad’s government heavily relied on military, political and diplomatic backing from Russia and Iran.

Russia’s war in Ukraine, coupled with the escalating Israel-Iran tensions, forced both Russia and Iran to divert attention away from Syria. As rebels intensified their offensive last month, Russia’s focus on Ukraine limited its ability to respond effectively.

Similarly, Iran’s support for Assad weakened amid rising tensions with Israel. Iran’s allied militias suffered significant losses, reducing their operational capacity in Syria. Since 2013, Hezbollah had deployed thousands of fighters to aid Assad but later shifted many to southern Lebanon due to increased Israeli pressure, diminishing its military presence in Syria.

In Afghanistan, the US withdrawal strategy and direct talks with the Taliban sidelined the Republic, eroding its political legitimacy and military strength, paving the way for the government’s swift collapse in August 2021. Following the US-Taliban Doha Agreement in February 2020, US military support to the Afghan forces dropped sharply, with airstrikes falling by 78 per cent — from 7,243 in 2019 to 1,631 in 2020 — nearly half occurring just before the agreement. The loss of US air support enabled the Taliban to encircle major cities in the country.

These downfalls were not solely driven by the influence of global major powers. Both countries had long grappled with state fragility marked by protracted conflicts, pervasive corruption, expanding illicit economies and overly centralised, exclusionary governments.

Despite the differences in their political systems, both governments were exclusionary and highly centralised. The Assad regime, led by a minority Alawite-dominated government, an offshoot of Shia Islam, was predominantly secular but deeply authoritarian. It maintained a highly centralised, militaristic structure, marked by systemic brutality, repression, entrenched nepotism and sectarian favouritism. These oppressive policies fuelled persistent religious-based militant opposition, ultimately contributing to the regime’s fall.

Afghanistan, as a fragile state, has long suffered from the authoritarian, exclusionary and centralised nature of governance. Every ruler who centralised power by excluding others has paved his own demise, with Ghani being the most recent example. While Ghani did not employ brutality and repression in his governance like Assad did, he overly centralised power and pursued exclusionary policies, keeping a tight, close circle and relying on a narrow support base.

While the Doha Agreement arguably triggered the state’s collapse, Ghani’s exclusionary governance approach exacerbated the structural weaknesses that ultimately led to his government's downfall.

Widespread, systematic corruption in both cases inevitably contributed to their collapse. In Syria, corruption existed at both the political ‘macro’ and administrative ‘micro’ levels. Transparency International’s 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index placed Syria at rank 178 out of 180 countries, indicating that the civil war further exacerbated the country's already severe corruption problem. The broader ineptitude, brutality and systematic corruption within the army and other public institutions fuelled the government's downfall.

Similarly, in Afghanistan, years of corruption at every level of the state, partly supported by the international community, severely undermined the government. Transparency International’s 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index placed Afghanistan at rank 173 out of 180 countries — relatively better than Syria, but still near the bottom. The Afghan government’s high degree of centralisation, coupled with its endemic corruption and struggle to attain legitimacy, were the long-term contributors to its eventual collapse.

While differing in form, nature and magnitude, both countries have suffered severely from rising illicit economies, which intensified their state fragility.

In Syria, this fragility was exacerbated as the economy collapsed due to international sanctions imposed on Assad’s regime. Struggling economically, the Assad regime turned to covertly produce and traffic Captagon, a highly addictive drug, to sustain its operations. Generating an estimated $5 billion annually from the drug trade, the regime emerged as the first narco-state in West Asia and one of the largest globally.

In contrast, Afghanistan’s state was not directly involved in the drug trade. However, the insurgent Taliban relied heavily on taxing opium cultivation and trafficking as a vital revenue source, generating up to almost half a billion dollars annually. While this amount was significantly smaller than the income Captagon provided to Assad’s regime, it proved sufficient to finance the Taliban’s military operations against the Afghan government, ultimately contributing to the state's collapse.

While Afghanistan remains mired in instability and a humanitarian crisis under the Taliban rule, Syria’s future is uncertain. The prospects for lasting unity among various rebel allies are unclear, raising questions about the country's long-term stability. Although Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leaders claim the group has rebranded itself, it is too early to draw a conclusion. The Taliban had also shown early signs of change, but they ultimately proved to be misleading.

The region’s geopolitical complexity, shaped by conflicting interests among Russia, Iran, Turkey, the US and others, further complicates any path toward peace. Both conflicts underscore the interconnected nature of global politics, insurgency dynamics and military strategies, highlighting how regional crises resonate far beyond their immediate borders.

(The writer is Research Fellow, Centre for International Conflict Analysis & Management Radboud University, Netherlands)