Battles & Wars › Modern conflicts
Syrian civil war
March 2011 – December 2024· War· Middle East & Africa
Well documentedSolid records, physical evidence or scientific consensus.
A war that grew from 2011 protests against President Bashar al-Assad into a many-sided conflict drawing in Russia, Iran, Turkey and the US.
See it on the Battles & Wars map →What happened
In March 2011, during the Arab Spring, Syrians protested Assad's rule; security forces fired on them, and the uprising became an armed rebellion. Rebels, jihadists including ISIS, and Kurdish-led forces fought the government and each other. Iran and Hezbollah, then Russian air power from 2015, saved Assad; the US backed Kurdish-led forces against ISIS; Turkey backed rebels. Estimates of the dead range from about 500,000 to over 600,000. In December 2024 rebels led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham took Damascus; Assad fled to Moscow.
Why it matters
It displaced about half of Syria's prewar population of 22 million, drove the 2015 refugee wave into Europe, revived chemical warfare, and made Russia a Middle East military power again.
How we know
UN commissions of inquiry, chemical-weapons investigations by the OPCW, death tolls from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and other monitors, UN refugee figures, and the smuggled 'Caesar' photos of dead detainees.
Still debated
Exact death tolls are uncertain, and the fate of more than 100,000 people who vanished into Assad's prisons is still being investigated after his fall.
Inside this (1)
Connections (2)
▸Islamic State (ISIS) territorial 'caliphate' seized territory during Syrian civil warWell documented
The connection
Syria's chaos gave the Iraqi group a haven. In 2013 it moved into rebel-held areas, broke with al-Qaeda, and turned on other rebels. From its Syrian capital, Raqqa, it swept back into Iraq in 2014. Its brutality also shifted the war, as the US-led coalition and Kurdish forces focused on fighting ISIS rather than Assad.
When and how
Eastern Syria, 2013–2019. Raqqa fell to ISIS in early 2014 and to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in October 2017; its last village, Baghuz, fell in March 2019.
How we know
Coalition and UN records, territorial maps by conflict monitors, and the group's own announcements; the US-led campaign published its strike data.
Debates and open questions
Assad's government was accused of avoiding ISIS early on, and of freeing jihadist prisoners in 2011, to make the rebels look extremist; how deliberate this was is disputed.
▸Syrian civil war saw renewed use of Poison gasWell documented
The connection
Despite the international ban, Syria's government used sarin nerve agent and chlorine against rebel-held areas. The worst attack, in Ghouta near Damascus on August 21, 2013, killed hundreds; estimates range from about 280 to over 1,400. Under a US–Russian deal Syria gave up its declared stockpile, but attacks continued, prompting US strikes in 2017 and 2018.
When and how
Ghouta (2013, sarin), Khan Shaykhun (2017, sarin) and Douma (2018, chlorine); ISIS also used mustard gas. Syria joined the Chemical Weapons Convention in 2013.
How we know
UN inspectors confirmed sarin at Ghouta; later joint UN–OPCW and OPCW investigations attributed several attacks, including Khan Shaykhun, to Syrian government forces.
Debates and open questions
Assad's government and Russia denied responsibility, blamed rebels, and rejected the OPCW's 2023 finding that Syrian forces struck Douma. Whether Assad declared all his chemical stocks is still being checked after his fall.