December 12, 2025
Few places display the cost of civil war as starkly as Syria. On my first visit back since serving as the American ambassador from 1998 to 2001, the country is barely recognizable. The large, Sunni suburbs of Damascus are devastated, as are the Sunni cities of Aleppo, Homs and Hama. In eastern Ghouta, where chemical bombs fell on Syrian families and children, I saw buildings leveled and heaps of rubble.
