The Baath regime of Syria had a close relationship with Moscow and received its diplomatic and military assistance during the Cold War. As an Arab nationalist regime and a non-member of the Eastern Bloc, the Baath intention can be considered as pragmatic in terms of approaching to Moscow just to strengthen Syrian military and economic capabilities and gaining diplomatic protection against the Western Bloc. Nevertheless, such material perspectives ignore the whole picture in which non-material factors also played a key role in Soviet-Baath relations. In this context, this article questions to what extent Soviet-Baath relationship can be considered as pragmatic between the 1940s and 1980s and aims to evaluate this relationship with neo-Gramscian hegemony. This theoretical preference is significant, because the nature of neo-Gramscian hegemony enables to see both material and non-material aspects of consensual Soviet-Baath relationship with a necessary focus on material capabilities, institutions, and ideas. In order to answer its question, the article analyzes several primary and secondary resources to form this qualitative research and concludes that the Soviet and Baath regimes enjoyed hegemonic relations that cannot be viewed as a purely pragmatic, rather, the ideational, institutional, and material dimensions of their relationship need to be considered as a whole.
The Soviet and Baath regimes enjoyed a consensual relationship between the 1940s and the 1980s. The nature of this relationship was shaped both by the need for an alliance in a period of Cold War bipolarity and by shared common ideological worldviews such as anti-imperialism and socialism. These relations were not free from pragmatism to a certain extent, as the degree of commitment to socialism and Pan-Arabism within the Baath Party sometimes fluctuated. Nevertheless, the generally close relationship between Syria and the USSR cannot be seen as a purely pragmatic strategy; rather, this relationship's ideational, institutional, and material dimensions must be considered as a whole. In this context, this article examines Soviet-Syrian relations from the perspective of neo-Gramscian hegemony to develop a framework for understanding these three key factors behind this alliance.
Sovyet ve Baas rejimleri 1940’lardan ve 1980’lere kadar rızaya dayalı bir hegemonik ilişki yaşadılar. Bu ilişkinin doğası, hem Soğuk Savaş’ın yarattığı iki kutuplu dönemde ittifak kurma gerekliliği hem de anti-emperyalizm ve sosyalizm gibi paylaşılan ortak ideolojik dünya görüşleri tarafından şekillendirildi. Baas Partisi içinde sosyalizme ve pan-Arabizme bağlılık düzeyi bazen dalgalansa da, bu ilişkiler genel olarak pragmatizmden bağımsız değildi. Ancak, Suriye ile SSCB arasındaki yakın ilişkileri yalnızca pragmatik bir strateji olarak görmekten ziyade bu ilişkinin düşünsel, kurumsal ve maddi boyutlarının bir bütün olarak ele alınması gerekmektedir. Bu bağlamda, bu makale, Sovyetler Birliği-Suriye ilişkilerini bu ittifakın arkasındaki bu üç temel faktörü de anlayarak bir çerçeve geliştirmek için neo-Gramşiyan hegemonya perspektifinden incelemeyi amaçlamaktadır.