Created for 2017. The previous thread from September-December 2016 had 2683 posts and 64.2k views:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ad.php?t=24539
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Created for 2017. The previous thread from September-December 2016 had 2683 posts and 64.2k views:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ad.php?t=24539
Damascus: #Russia|n TV shows #Assad regime & #Hezbollah attacks on #Wadi_Barada. #Hezbollah fighter is laughing.
Fighting is still ongoing as of 31 DEC and still no real ceasefire in place...just like the Ukraine Minsk 2 ceasefire is working with ongoing attacks there today and actually everyday...
UNSC set to applaud the so called ceasefire agreement which really is not a ceasefire agreement as long as Assad and Iran keep right on attacking.....
AND that so called Turkish Russian ceasefire...just like Minsk 2 ceasefire..constantly violated by both Russia and her allies.....
Local activists reported at least 10 airstrikes targeted west Aleppo countryside today in day two of #Ceasefire
MORE deliberate air strikes on schools AGAIN....
SCHOOLS=AIR STRIKES=CEASEFIRE....makes sense to anyone other than Assad...Iran...Turkey and Putin????????
Russian SOF in Syria.....
At the start of the video we see them driving down to Joureen from Slinfah
https://youtu.be/WSjKXDQQBVg
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=35.611831&...2332&z=16&m=b#
RuSOF driving past an empty cluster rocket warhead on Jabal al Akrad @ 1:04 https://youtu.be/WSjKXDQQBVg?t=1m4s#… http://wikimapia.org/#lat=35.683871&...950&z=17&m=b#…
Syria #Russia'n Special Forces are now in northern #Hama's Ghab plain
Damascus: New #Assad airstrikes and heavy artillery shelling on #Wadi_Barada.
There are no #JFS fighters in #Wadi_Barada. They have left the valley in 2015.
Russia’s #Hmeimem military operations centre: "#JFS is excluded from the #ceasefire. We can attack them everywhere."
Russia’s #Hmeimem military operations centre: "#Assad regime attacks against #Wadi_Barada don't violate the #ceasefire." #Damascus
What about Ghouta? JaI signed the agreement, regime still attacking.
Russian ceasefires are always "fragile". But why does the media play along and pretend they exist?
Six airstrikes on #WadiBarada right now, seems they stopped the attacks yesterday only bcz of the storm and weather
And the West was once again naive enough to praise #Russia's mock @UN resolution.
Some people never learn, it seems ...
Ceasefire, Russian way.
1 day after @UN PR stunt, #Russian jets resume air strikes on schools&civilians across #Syria.
"You cease, we fire."
E. Qalamoun: BM-21 Grad makes a surprise appearance in a Forces of the Martyr Ahmad Abdo convoy. Neither Ahmad Abdo or Usud al-Sharqiya
#Latakia: #Russia|n airstrikes on Jabal al-Akrad in Northern #Latakia.
Duplicated post
Chechen military police in #Aleppo
WHAT Russian Turkish ceasefire....AND the UNSC says what again??????
Heavy regime shelling in nearly all rebel areas.
Assad/#Russia|n airstrikes in:
- Western #Aleppo
- Northern & Western #Hama
- Northern #Latakia
- #Wadi_Barada
Russian SOF Syrian combat videos.....
Russian ССО ВС РФ (SSO) squad operator Roger in #Syria. The dude with Hezbollah insignia.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hl9cIlFggp4#
Full frontal of Плохой (Bad), commander of covert #Russian ССО ВС РФ (SSO) squad in #Syria
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1k4iGRxmSpo#
Interesting comment reference the crashed Syrian bound Russian TU-154...
Aviation expert asks why the Russian Defence Ministry's Tu-154 was far more damaged than planes in similar c-stances (Link is in Russian):http://www.newizv.ru/society/2016-12...s-tu-154.html#
In Aleppo, airstrikes by regime/Russia hit Atareb, Brigade 46, Icarda, and several villages in the southern countryside
As expected, 'cease-fire, Russian style': good for Steinmeyer and similar dummies, who can now say, 'there's a cease-fire, and it's only a lil bit violated'...
BTW, the VKS was flying nearly two times as many sorties a day during the last few days of 2016, than the average for most of the year...
Kind of undermines the public statements by both Russia and Turkey that they are the guarantors of the so called "ceasefire"....
Same exact Russian sleight of hand as with the Ukrainian Minsk 2 ceasefire that they have never implemented a single point of the 11 points ....and still average 30-55 attacks a day on UAF positions
FSA Liwa Shuhuda al-Qaryatayn | banner seen on technical fighting #ISIS along with other groups #EasternQalamoun:
https://youtu.be/n7s5y4-J72A
Reference the crashed TU-154....heading to Aleppo...
This is the second indicator that just might be the core indicator of an onboard explosion of some type......
Debris being pulled out is indicating far far more damage that is normal for a stalled crash.....
Official #Tu154 salvage operation is over. Not a single seat has been recovered. Very few intact bodies recovered.
Slow stalls at lower altitudes and a slow crash into the sea should be producing far more intact bodies....but an explosion even at low altitudes would explain this....
There was a single comment posted immediately after the crash that there had been a small device planted next to the gears of one of the engines...
Picture of eastern #Aleppo today, published by the Russian Army.
No words, just disgust.
In 2016 Regime lost 10 Major Generals, 75 Brig. Generals, 71 Colonels & 35 Lieutenant Colonels (documented names).
http://www.syrianfreearmy.net/showthread.php?t=20782#
Western #Aleppo after the "liberation" of the east.
Nouri al-Maliki: Hashd al-Shaabi may go to Syria if necessary
http://v.aa.com.tr/719062
All Syrian rebels groups refuse to begin so called "peace talks" due to the continued Assad attacks on them WHICH was suppose to stop under the Russian Turkish so called ceasefire.....
REMEMBER Turkey and Russia both claimed to be the guarantors of the ceasefire plan....
Russian Syrian Express....
AnotherDayAnotherRopucha The first Ropucha to pass through the Turkish Straits in 2017 is [drum roll] Alexander Shabalin.
BUT WAIT...Russian MoD announced they would be now leaving Syria....not sending more in....
BМФ #ВФ aux fleet cargo vessel Dvinitsa-50 observed in Novorossiysk next to Russia flag tanker Tigran Martirosyan
Key point for US media: A lie is not an alternative point of view– Lithuania combats Russia propaganda
http://nyti.ms/2iDtBgi
When the Trump voiced concept of FP (meaning tweeting with no thoughts and knowledge) especially for the ME....Iran...Russia becomes the standard we are all in serious trouble....REMEMBER his new spokesperson stated that "all major Trump announcements will be made by Twitter"....we just saw it today with his NK/China tweet.....
Declaration by Thwar alSham and the Army of the Mujahideen as reply to #Moscow, to clarify that they didnt join the national reconciliation.
So did Russia and Turkey lie about who actually joined the ceasefire????
Russian Army Publishes Pictures of Aleppo Ruins:
https://themoscowtimes.com/articles/...o-ruins-56716#
Images leave little doubt as to the hellish nature of existence during the final days inside this anti-Assad enclave.
Jan 2, 2017 — 20:09
REMEMBER it was actually the Russian Syrian Ambassador in Damascus in a public interview who stated..."Assad has no plans to attack Aleppo...that is nothing but rebel propaganda"....
Russian EOD spent their time largely destroying Russian munitions not IEDs planted by the rebels...Quote:
The Russian Ministry of Defense has published sobering images of eastern Aleppo after what they describe as its “liberation.”
The pictures show Russian military engineers and de-miners working in an abandoned city. Singed shells of cars, collapsed multiple story buildings, and a collection of rockets, mortars and mines leave little doubt as to the hellish nature of existence during the final days inside this anti-Assad enclave.
It was reported that 80,000 people remained trapped in these districts during the last days of intense bombardment in November and early December
The city was finally taken by Russian-backed forces in the second week of December.
According to the U.N., over 400,000 people died in Aleppo during the 5 years and 9 months of fighting.#At least 463 civilians, and 62 children, were killed in the eastern districts since mid-November alone, says the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Russian military support, firepower and planning were central in Assad’s assault on the city. For much of the battle, the Russian authorities, and sympathetic news stations, asserted that only "terrorists and their sympathizers" remained behind in the eastern part of the city. This was disputed by other regional powers, including Turkey.
There have been reports of war crimes on both sides, but particularly by advancing regime forces. The U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon highlighted “credible” cases of over 80 alleged executions of civilians by regime forces in the hours and days after rebel forces left the city. The evidence the U.N. claimed to have suggested that they were killed using handguns.
Both Russia and the Assad regime have denied the executions.
Russia repeating the same exact tactics they used on Aleppo now on Idlib...their next target as declared by Assad....
Heavy #Russian overnight air strikes on civilian infrastructure in #Idlib city.
Ongoing right now
The #Russian air force conducts air strikes south west of #Aleppo as we speak.
Russian/regime jets continue bombing rebels in Idlib, Rif Dimashq on 4th day of ceasefire. #Isis meanwhile, continues to advance in Homs
Russia Today is stepping up it's propaganda and disinformation against Germany using their media outlet based in Germany.....
Auch dieser „virale“ @RT_Deutsch-#Propaganda-Versuch zu Syrien lässt sich problemlos widerlegen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFciy1IhYkU#…
IT actually appears that a single German MSM media outlet BILD is the only German media outlet actively confronting Russian disinformation and propaganda...every single German propaganda/disinformation article that RT and Sputnik publish is actively countered by BILD......
THIS is exactly how one pushes back on active Russian info warfare....
The German neo right party AfD has shown a proRussian side in their statements supporting Crimea/Putin and support for Assad
They claim when confronted about this ad...it is a single case....they are lying to cover it up....this type of ad has appeared in a number of German locations...
Right now AfD is tracking at 12% nationwide...will weaken CDU/CSU but not derail Merkel....
WadiBarada: massive airstrike on Ain Al-Fijah. Area of ~400 m targeted & main water facility supplying #Damascus nearly hit (again).
Air strikes on the #Barada village which #Russia says is not part of the nationwide ceasefire.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgoE1jiI2EA#…
Russian AF and Turkish AF flying now joints attacks on al Bab....USAF still flying attacks for Kurdish YPG/PKK....how much more convoluted can this get now...enter Trump on 20 JAN and it will get interesting in a hurry....
As #Turkey & #Russia perform intense air & artillery strikes on #ISIS-held al-Bab, more & more pix emerge,similar to what we saw in #Aleppo.
Syria's armed opposition ceases all consideration of attending #Astana peace negotiations due to regime's consistent ceasefire violations:
THIS is a "calling out of Turkey and Russia as they signed up to be guarantors" and have not done a single thing except state things are going well considering.....
AND the UNSC.....lost in space and shopping somewhere inside New York city...AND they signed up to support this so called ceasefire....
According to @snhr, the #Assad regime & #Russia were responsible for 75% of civilian deaths in #Syria in 2016.
(12,703 of 16,913 total)
Hardline clerics are piling pressure on Ahrar al-Sham to merge with JFS & others - leaking internal advocates & publicly calling for unity:
Charles Lister @Charles_Lister
I'm told by Ahrar al-Sham insiders that opponents of a JFS merger are being threatened w their lives unless they change their position.
According to one of those [leadership] sources, JFS is actively trying to "force" the merger, but "it still won't happen."
An apparent US drone strike killed several senior JFS/AQ figures in #Idlib today, inc. Abu Omar al-Turkistani; a lead figure in unity talks.
SO is the US actively trying to derail any unity talks??????
Kyle W. Orton @KyleWOrton
The last two major speeches from #IS leaders have singled #Turkey out as the primary target because of Ankara's war against #IS.
When #IS's caliph, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, last spoke, on 2 NOV 2016, he said #Turkey was a "priority for your jihad"
https://goo.gl/fLC5UN
Foreign Policy @ForeignPolicy
The arc of history is long, but it won't ever judge Obama's Syria policy kindly.
http://atfp.co/2hBkW0w
ISW @TheStudyofWar Jan 1
US interests in #Syria include preventing expansion of Iranian/Russian sphere of influence -
Syria #Assad's SyriaTel Mobile communications back in eastern #Aleppo & #Raqqa after 3 years
Hacking warning......
How smartphones can be turned into spying devices with a simple app available on the net.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/past-six-d...vie-g9r5s7rgn#
Woman killed, 3 civilians including a child injured, in #Russian air strikes on #KhanShaykhun, #Idlib province.
What the heck is this........Egypt now out of control..???????
Egyptian anchor non-sarcastically announces a US-UK-Iran-Turkey-ISIS-Hezbollah-Hamas-JS conspiracy vs Egypt security
But political settlement comes with some big catches
by BENEDETTA ARGENTIERI
In early November 2016, Syrian regime officials were clear. “Once Aleppo is retaken, there is going to be a turn in the war,” a source said on the sidelines of a conference organized by the British Syrian Society at Damascus University.
“President Bashar Al Assad is ready to start a peace process throughout the country,” the source continued.
The turning point for Al Assad came in September 2015, when Moscow decisively boosted its support of the Syrian regime. Without Russians troops, Al Assad would have lost the country.
Now it’s the opposite. Now he’s winning the war.
But to actually bring Syrian territory back under full state control, Al Assad must embark on some kind of political reunification process. It’s already beginning.
On Dec. 23, 2016, the Syrian Arab Army retook Aleppo. A week later, Moscow and Damascus brokered a new, albeit fragile, ceasefire with rebel forces. Russian president Vladimir Putin was even able to convince Turkey and Iran to back the ceasefire.
Russia claimed the ceasefire was part of the reconciliation process.
While Syrian and Russian forces advanced and recaptured swathes of the country, the Ministry of National Reconciliation — established in 2012 — worked behind the scenes to hash out compromises and end the fighting in some neighborhoods.
“There can’t be peace without a political solution,” Elia Samman, a political advisor to Minister of National Reconciliation Ali Haider — who is also the leader of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party — told War Is Boring.
The SSNP, which has also branches in both Lebanon and Palestine, was established in 1932. Historically right-wing — although in 1967 the party made an ideological shift toward the left — the SSNP is secular and advocates for a unified Syria. The group fought in Lebanon during that country’s civil war.
In fact, the first female suicide bomber in the region was affiliated with the SSNP. Sixteen-year-old Sana’a Mehaidli blew herself up among Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon in 1985, killing two people.
According to Samman, in 2011 the party took to the streets in Syria with the anti-Al Assad protestors — although some critics claim that’s a lie. When violence broke out, the SSNP decided to back the regime and the much-hated Ba’ath party. No fewer than 6,000 SSNP fighters have fought on the side of the Syrian regime.
Nonetheless, most of the SSNP’s detractors believe the group is a regime puppet. “They do nothing without the regime’s permission,” one informed source said on condition of anonymity. People are still getting arrested, some disappeared. The reconciliation ministry has forced young men to enlist in regime forces.
Yes, the minister is an opposition leader. But the ministry’s bureaucrats are all from the regime’s dominant Ba’ath Party. “This reconciliation process is a farce,” the source said.
The ministry’s description of the reconciliation process is, well, different — needless to say. “Since I started working in the ministry, I’ve had at least four attempts on my life by terrorists who didn’t want us to succeed,” Haider said at the Damascus conference.
The reconciliation ministry claims to have worked with two million people inside of Syria — and likes to tout examples of its self-described “success.”
One is the town of Qudsaya, which the Syrian army recaptured in mid-October 2016 following a five-year siege. The neighborhood is a 20-minute drive from the center of Damascus. Several checkpoints control the uphill road that leads into the neighborhood.
Although granted permission by the Defense Ministry to visit, War Is Boring was refused entry at the last checkpoint. Soldiers claimed there were security problems. In fact, it’s likely the refusal was the result of some internal power struggle.
As part of the reconciliation process, some moderate and secular rebels man checkpoints alongside the Syrian police. According to the ministry, this arrangement gets sorted out on a local basis. As military pressure intensifies on a neighborhood, special envoys from the ministry work to forge a local peace agreement.
As leverage, the ministry offers to restore electricity and water services. In Modamayeh in the Damascus suburbs, the reconciliation deal included the promise that “the city will become like paradise after the settlement and will be serviced with everything,” according to the regime.
“In normal circumstances the process for the fighters is divided into three parts,” Samman explained. The first step is for combatants to stop fighting. Then the regime offers offer amnesty to secular rebels who aren’t under suspicion of committing war crimes. Islamist fighters supposedly get safe passage to Idlib.
In recent years, the regime has extended 50,000 pardons, according to Samman. On a few occasions rebels have begun working alongside Al Assad’s police and army. They also get a government stipend of $50 a month.
Displaced civilians from reconciled communities must go through a background check, after which the regime allows them to return to their homes.
The real problem is for men between the ages of 18 and 25. Since 2011, the Syrian government has extended the standard, two-year military conscription to five years. A stop-loss policy is also in place — preventing, on an emergency basis, conscripts from leaving military service.
The only way to avoid military service is to enroll in a school or university. Education in Syria is free, technically — but space in any given institution is limited. As a result, young men with money rush to register at one of Syria’s private schools. Thousands more young men simply leave the country to avoid conscription.
The regime gives young men six months to sort out their education status — after which they’re subject to arrest if they don’t enlist.
One of the most controversial aspects of the reconciliation process is the safe passage to Idlib that the Syrian government claims to offer to Islamist rebels. Safe passage was the brainchild of U.N. Special Envoy to Syria Staffan De Mistura, who originally fought to get Al Nusra fighters in Aleppo a way out of the city. “I am ready to physically accompany you,” De Mistura said on Oct. 6, 2016.
The regime decided to extend the same invitation to all rebels in Aleppo — and indeed, even organized several convoys of green school buses. Idlib became a sort of haven for Islamic fighters. Many others fled Aleppo for nearby Turkey.
“They can either going to Idlib and be killed later or fight and be killed now,” Fares Shehabi, Aleppo representative in Syria’s parliament, told War Is Boring during the regime’s siege of the city in the fall of 2016.
In Aleppo a Syrian general, a Russian general and a local sheikh jointly oversee the reconciliation process. Before the end of the fighting, the regime compelled all the civilians in East Aleppo to go to Jebrin, just outside the city. The government transformed empty hangars into security centers where Syrian intelligence agencies and the army ran background checks on everybody.
Some people were arrested. Several men got drafted into the military.
In parallel with the regime’s main efforts, Russia has been running its own, allegedly more aggressive, reconciliation process. While the Syrian government claims to have closed 76 reconciliation deals in four years, the Russian government says its own tally is much greater.
“The total number of inhabited areas, the leaders of which had signed reconciliation agreements, remained 1077,” the latest Russian informational bulletin claimed. “The number of ceasefire application forms signed with leaders of armed groups remained 94.”
Experts in Damascus said they are skeptical of the number, although none dared challenge the statistics in public.
But even Samman admitted that reconciliation is, at best, a band-aid. A permanent peace requires changes to the Syrian constitution, he said. “Otherwise in two years’ time, we will have a new conflict.”
Still, Samman said he’s confident Al Assad’s regime will negotiate any fundamental legal changes from a position of strength. “On the political level, nobody has a chance of beating Assad and the Baath Party,” Samman said. “After winning the war, he will be a national hero.”
Let's just see where one is to begin with this so called article....
1. there is no "current ceasefire that is actually working"...was just a distraction to allow Assad and Iran using Russian support to continue fighting
2. to believe Assad with the current level of troops which are largely Iranian ...Iraqi Shia militias and Hezbollah can recapture the entire country is an outright farce of a myth
3. even if Assad took the cities all the country through which the LOCs to each of those towns would be rebel controlled and open game for a true guerrilla war that would last decades
4. the country is so destroyed as well as the critical infrastructure and agriculture it would take BILLIONS to reconstruct BILLIONS ehich neither Iran and or Putin have to spend on Syria when they need every dime they have themselves....
5. Assad and his merry band will eventually be charged with war crimes under ICC and if they ever stepped foot in a Western country they would be arrested...
6. so exactly how is FSA then to reconcile with Assad....actually never.....
The two core issues removal of Assad a genocidal dictator and a one sided Constitution is not discussed in this article.....
Why did you WikiLeaks withhold key Russian documents in the Syria files?
http://gizmodo.com/wikileaks-may-hav...om-1786445992#
Damascus: Rebels have repelled all #Assad regime attacks on #Wadi_Barada and killed many pro-#Assad forces today.
BTW...there is not a single JFS and are IS in this town.....
The #Wadi_Barada rebels are tough fighters.
Latakia: #Russia|n airstrikes on Jabal al-Akrad in Northern #Latakia this evening.
Palmyra: #ISIS has repelled another #Assad regime attempt to recapture #Sharifah village. Heavy fighting at #Tiyas Airbase. #Homs
Idlib: Heavy #US airstrikes on #JFS Headquarters near #Sarmada in #Idlib Province today. Many were killed.
Damascus: #Russia|n TV shows #Assad regime attacks on #Wadi_Barada during the "#ceasefire".
Idlib: Rebels shelling #Fuah and #Kefraya with Grad rockets after nonstop #ceasefire violations by the #Assad regime.
Hama: #Assad airstrikes have destroyed a mosque in Northern #Hama today.
Russian Syria Express.....
Russian Navy Ropucha class landing ship Aleksandr Shabalin 110 southbound on the bosphorus, heading towards Syria.
Note that I didn't post this article because I necessarily agreed with it...
RE:
1. It seemed to me that the latest abortive ceasefire was never adhered to by either Damascus or Teheran, despite their supposed inclusion, and that this was merely a political stunt by Ankara and Moscow to embarrass the United States.
2. Agreed. In hindsight, the only faction capable of conquering Sunni Arab Syria and perhaps all of Syria, was Daesh. I say this strictly from the perspective of organization and resources (Iraqi manpower, eastern Syrian oil and gas), as Daesh's ideology was its own undoing. Now, I can't see any one faction succeeding, although there is a coalition of sorts between the secular or moderate Sunni Arabs and the Islamist ones, on the basis of oppression by Alawites and Shias on the one hand, and Kurds on the other. I doubt that the opposition will be able to mobilize enough undecided Christians and Druze, or turn those on Assad's side...
3. Also agreed. Assad couldn't hold both the cities and lock down the borders to prevent supplies aiding a rural insurgency.
4. Remember the "Pottery Barn rule"? I hope that Russia and Iran have been contributing to a reconstruction fund...
5. Which is why if he steps down, he will be offered asylum in Iran most likely.
6. There is no one capable of imposing a ceasefire in Syria in order for truth and reconciliation to begin, and certainly neither Iran nor Russia want to deal with the truth of the matter that Assad is dependent upon foreign support...
Azor.....seems we agreed across the board for a change....hope your slide into the New Year was great.
Here is the kicker....Russia has a standard battle tactic whether in eastern Ukraine or Syria......get the other side to talk and talk and talk and then get them into a ceasefire which usually they tend to try to hold to in order then to not be accused by Russia and often the US of violating the so called ceasefire.......
We see that right now in eastern Ukraine where Russia claimed a Christmas ceasefire BUT the attacks have been massive and often and the UAF has been attempting to hold to it...
The same thing for the FSA right now...for the first three days the FSA held strictly to the Russian/Turkish ceasefire while within hours Assad with support from Hezbollah and RuAF started immediately to attack FSA positions.
IF and this is a big IF...if Russia and Turkey were truly interested in holding the ceasefire.....both could simply bomb Hezbollah and Assad positons a few times and you would see a sudden stop of the attacks....
BUT here is the next kicker...Russian and Assad positions are the same...they both are interested in destroying FSA regardless of how sweetly Russia talks at the UN about peace in Syria....
REMEMBER it was the Russian Damascus Ambassador who before the Assad attack on Aleppo publicly stated in a major interview that Assad would not be attacking Aleppo and then surprise surprise Russian bombed and attacked as much as Assad Aleppo....
I call this Russian tactic....simply "the talking attack".........
From a great social media open source analysis group....bellingcat......
Wadi Barada – What Happened to Damascus’s Water? via @bellingcat
https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena...ascuss-water/#