This is the cruel irony of history: the man with bloodstained hands who fled Syria on Sunday, December 8, after spending a quarter century at the helm of the country, shattering his people and crushing his country, was not destined for power. Born in Damascus in 1965, the second son of President Hafez al-Assad and his wife Anissa Makhlouf, Bashar al-Assad was destined to become an ophthalmologist. After an uneventful childhood and a medical degree, the young man, described at the time as modest and hard-working, went to London to specialize in ophthalmology. His father's succession was reserved for the eldest sibling: Bassel. He was the opposite of Bashar: a loudmouth, famous for his horse-riding skills and his success with women.

But his death in a car accident in January 1994 changed all that. The London student, more interested in new technologies than politics, was suddenly called back home. He would be the heir to the "Lion of Damascus" (Assad in Arabic means lion), who came to power in a coup d'état in 1970. After fast-track military training, which saw him rise from the rank of captain to colonel in three years, and cutting his teeth in Lebanon, the Syrian regime's backyard, the 30-year-old was ready to succeed his father, who died on June 10, 2000.

Exactly one month later, Bashar al-Assad was elected President of Syria by referendum. He immediately explained to the official press that it wasn't necessary to put his photo on the front page every day. He multiplied public appearances, without a bodyguard, and appeared in restaurants in the old town with his charming young wife, Asma al-Akhras, a former financial analyst from a large Homs family whom he had met on the banks of the Thames. Unlike his late father, an autocrat with an icy, stiff style, famous for his hours-long speeches to visitors, the young Assad cultivated the image of a benevolent despot, attentive to the needs of his fellow citizens.

The intelligentsia began to believe. Hundreds of political prisoners were released and discussion forums sprang up all over the country. They dreamed aloud of democracy and civil society, of loosening the grip of the Ba'ath, the single party, a mix of Arab nationalist catchphrases and socialist precepts. The good "Doctor Bashar" was also keen to modernize the state apparatus and the economy, bled dry after 30 years of forced dirigisme. He even set about bringing the dreaded Moukhabarat intelligence services into line, whose arbitrariness made all Syrians shudder. "Bashar al-Assad is a remarkable young man, with great plans for opening up [the country]," predicted Britain's Patrick Seale, Hafez al-Assad's official biographer.

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