Printable View
Kifah, 10, killed w/his family by regime shelling on Aleppo. Before dying, he wrote,"Your attempts are in vain, a revolutionary never dies."
Russia's gov't-sponsored Vesti airs a clip of @GenFlynn, saying that the U.S. "crossed Russia's red line in #Syria, should work w/ Russia."
The 'problem' here is this: Lavrov is 'right' in so far that it's not Russians that are flying these murderous air strikes on Eastern Aleppo. Since two times hitting Assadists during the latest JAF offensive on Weastern Aleppo, Russians are meanwhile rarely approaching even that side of the city.Quote:
Originally Posted by OUTLAW 09
'But', it's foremost Assadist helicopters from as-Safira that are flying them - and they're dropping those 'barrel' bombs, at least each 10th of which is filled with chlorine gas.
So, that cynical a-hole is using this to claim 'there are no air strikes on Aleppo' - because Russians are not flying them.
Kids in #EastGhouta returned to their school to collect the books after #AssadPutin destroyed it, injuring them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pW7leEqq9i8#…
Here an excellent article on how not only the Assadists and the IRGC, but also the USA, Jordan and Turkey are re-shaping the revolution in Syria, and creating themselves the proxies they prefer to have:
Foreign Backers and the Marginalization of the Free Syrian Army
The following paragraph is of particular interest, then it's one of rare opportunities where the importance and influence of (democratically elected) local council is pointed out. Precisely this is why the regime and the IRGC concentrated on destroying (i.e. forcing into negotiations and then a withdrawal) this pocket first - while entirely ignoring the Daesh-held pocket nearby, just for example:Quote:
#'During the summer of 2016, the Syrian regime scored two strategic victories over opposition forces: it took control of Daraya, a suburb of Damascus, and imposed a siege on Aleppo. On both these fronts, major factions of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) were conspicuous by their absence.#Since mid-2015, most non-jihadist rebel factions have been marginalized in the fight against the regime, not so much because the FSA no longer exists, as sometimes claimed, but because their backers ask them to deescalate the fight against Assad forces to be able to focus on other enemies instead. This marginalization has two consequences. First, it has made Assad and his allies confident enough in their capacity to militarily defeat the rebellion that they felt no need to seriously take part in political negotiations or abide by negotiated truces. Second, it has left the jihadist and Salafist factions of the rebellion practically alone on the battlefields, granting them near monopoly over the revolutionary discourse.
...
While the strategy of selecting factions to pull away from the battlefield so that they could fight jihadists had proved to be a failure, the alternative strategy was to impose nationwide truces with the regime. On two occasions, a Russian-American deal was reached to impose a truce on belligerent forces. While the truce of February-March 2016 led to a reduction of fighting for over a month, the one in September 2016 was never effectively implemented.#The Assad regime and Russia clearly had no intention of respecting their engagements and saw the truces simply as a way to gain time and to test the determination of the rebellion and its supposed allies. For the regime, truces are not a first step towards a#political negotiation but rather a step towards the complete surrender of rebels, as was the case for local truces in Damascus and Homs.
...
While almost all of the opposition forces rallied to the principle of a political solution and de-escalation with the regime, Jabhat al-Nusra/Fateh al-Sham reclaims the revolutionary discourse and presents itself as the only force striving for the definitive fall of the Assad regime. Those accepting compromise with Assad were called defeatists, if not traitors. The failure of the truces proved the jihadists right. The regime had no intention to respect them and diplomacy has not could not save Aleppo. Only the military action led by Jabhat Fateh al-Sham in August was successful in breaking the siege. During the regime’s major offensive in Aleppo since April 2016, Jabhat al-Nusra/Fateh al-Sham seems to be the only force capable of facing Assad forces. Within FSA factions, morale was at its lowest. During the so-called truce of spring 2016, Jabhat al-Nusra recruited fighters by the hundreds, mainly among die-hard FSA fighters who were convinced not by the ideology of the group but rather by its will to fight.#
...
Note the US-Jordanian reaction to this development:Quote:
Daraya is a town in the suburbs of Damascus which served as a model for the Syrian revolutionary movement. Despite years of siege and intense shelling, it kept strong social and civil activities, and was a rare case where the local council maintained control over the armed groups. This model of political-military cooperation with locally rooted factions is still serving as an example to revolutionary forces striving for autonomy from Islamist factions and foreign agendas. #The Battle of Daraya continued until the end of August when the regime’s Republican Guards finally forced the last rebels and civilians out of the town.
Which means that this is just another piece of evidence that there is no trace of interest by Oblabla's administration to 'spread freedom and democracy' in Syria.Quote:
In the meantime, the tens of thousands of fighters from the “Southern-Front” were not allowed by their backers to attack the regime, even though they stand only 30km away from Daraya. Even months after the end of the truce, the MOC-backed factions were not allowed to engage battle with the regime and had to concentrate on clearing the Jordanian borders of small ISIS-affiliated factions.
...
Logical consequence:
Bottom line: there is 'still' - and despite all posible, and imaginable efforts from all involved parties - FSyA, and a lot of it. It is still so large and so important, that because its foreign backers ordered it not to fight, insurgents are losing the war.Quote:
...
In 2016, two coups by FSA fighters against their own leaders took place in two of the most important factions in the south: Liwa Shabab alSunna in August and Jabhat Thuwar Souriya in September. In early August, Ahmad alAuda, the leader of Liwa Shabab al-Sunna in Bosra al-Sham, was deposed by fighters of the brigade and some civilians. A few days later, the MOC quickly reacted and had factions of the “Southern-Front” attack the group’s headquarters in Bosra al-Sham to put Ahmad al-Auda back in his position.18 An FSA fighter told the author that “everyone hates Ahmad al-Auda, but the MOC wants him there. He is not a revolutionary. He is the slave of the MOC”.
#In the north, criticisms of “Euphrates Shield” operations are rising. The FSA is trying to convince itself that a second phase of these operations consists of taking back Aleppo from Assad. But they are under fierce criticism from other factions, mainly jihadists, who are excluded from the Turkish-backed operation, and who feel left alone on the fronts of Aleppo and Hama. Despite the successes of the operation against ISIS and Kurdish forces, many rebels are wondering whether it is really a priority to take Tel Rifaat or al-Bab, when Aleppo is besieged. An FSA faction from Idlib withdrew from the “Euphrates Shield” operation, according to their statement, because of the situation on the fronts against the regime.22 Several FSA fighters who took part in the first days of the operation went back to their local brigades to protect their community from the regime.
...
However, because of interests of its foreign backers, and in this scenario, there is no place for a sincere (as naive as this might sound) movement of Syrians longing to remove the Assad regime.
I will be backing out of posting to the Syrian as well as the Ukrainian threads because in both the killing just keeps on going on as the core problem with the Russian non linear warfare is...it has never been fully countered by either NATO and the US and under Trump it will continue to be potentially a supportive proRussian positon taken by Trump thus making the current global problems even worse.....
SWJ had a recent article on the success or failure of the Russian non linear warfare with the two key cornerstones of 1) cyber warfare and 2) informational warfare....
HATE to admit it and many might not like this... we the US and the entire West have lost and lost badly.....
Russian cyber warfare is still going strong and not a single pushback by the US has occurred and NOW we have a "cyber arms race" and we are even losing that....and that informational warfare using fake news sites....social media trolling companies aided by the Russian government and a Russian state sponsored global disinformation/propaganda media network...being funded for 1B USDs per year and going strong with no pushback by any Western country....WELL they have actually won there with the massive upsurge in "populist" parties culminating in the election of a US "populist" that is proRussian leaning...and who firmly believes as do Russian oligarchs in the concept called "kleptocracy".....and potentially a number of NATO countries also swinging towards "populist leaders/parties" and proRussian leaning leaders being recently elected in Estonia, Bulgaria and Moldavia...
Nothing has changed in eastern Ukraine and in Syria where we the US are now fully complicit in supporting a genocidal dictator and Trump's bromance partner Putin and Trump states a number of times he would support both against IS driving 100,000 well trained and experienced FSA fighters straight in to the arms of JFS ....
We now hear about US Muslim Registries and banning of immigrants from "supposedly terrorist nations" and those that voted for Trump..."see" radical Muslims on every street corner and behind every bush/tree..AND Sharia law literally taking over the entire US State/Federal Court system..and the racist and anti Muslim rhetoric just keeps climbing in the US driving sadly towards an eventual "clash of civilizations" that both IS and AQ have predicted and wanted....
We are sadly now in the "Post Truth Era" and no amount of trying to keep people informed about areas of the world that have sadly become part of this "Post Truth Era" that MSM is failing to fully and completely inform the reading public about is another reason to slowly back away....
One can lead a horse to the pool of "truth" but you cannot make that horse understand that it is the "truth" in this "Post Truth Era"....
The killing still goes on in eastern Ukraine and Syria and just posting that which everyone knows never will change appears to me to be just a exercise in futility and a waste of time...
Interestingly the sheer number of Reads (over 570,000 since 2015 on Syria AND the over more than 400,000 on Ukraine in the same timeframe) over the last year or two indicate to me that some do want to be kept informed even if of another political opinion, but in the end just being informed does not change FP and with this new coming Trump FP....I am thoroughly happy to be getting my German Passport on 4 Jan which is another reason to back away...as I personally feel then that a former US citizen now future German does not have the right to critique the US...
I had thought after Rwanda and Srebrenica genocide had been beaten back into the ground .....it has not...I thought after the Wall fell the issue of changing international borders using force had stopped...it has not and after roughly 15 years of war against AQ and IS we still have not learned a single lesson on how to deal with them other than more killing....and until we learn those lessons that are literally in our faces.... that we must honestly address AQ and IS directly....the killing will continue for the next several decades.
Trump or no Trump....
So it is time to move on....the photo that haunts me from my time in VN was the little nude girl running from napalm and two ... 8 and 10 year old Vietnamese boys killed in my ambush who even though while 8 and 10 both carried VC ID cards and two old rusty US ,45 pistols AND the picture of the little Syrian girl injured from an air strike with an oxygen mask who died later not even achieving the age of 1...sad that the world has never seemed to learn...
If the US FP cannot stand up...lead and provide answers any more...that is a simple declaration of bankruptcy...a bankruptcy of morale values...civil and humans rights....end of story...
Time to move on..... if someone would have told me that I would be ending my life time in a country that will be pushing back on European populism ie fascism with a smile in the coming years I would have called them crazy....
Amazing to watch US citizens using Nazi salutes during Trump rallies and yesterday in DC......this is not the America that I defended from enemies near and far.....
Die geschundenen Kinder #Aleppo's auf Seite 1 der @BILD.
Nicht alle vergessen euch!
Last formal postings depicting the complexity of Syria that no MSM journalist outside of four very good ME SME's have been writing about YET somehow never gets paid attention to in DC..........AND it depicts the range of problems that the Trump administration will actually either encounter and fail to resolve and or make the problem even worse...
The @UN confirmed today: The last six months (#CoH period) doubled the besieged people in #Syria.
From 500.000 to 1 MILLION now.
BreakingNews
Entire #EastGhouta suspends school (of 100.000+ school children) due to nonstop #AssadPutin massacres among children.
A short summary of what you missed in #Syria TODAY so far.
Terrorism by #AssadPutin, all across the country.
Another video of the massive fleet.
Tu-154 and a fighter escort, I found it on @flightradar24.
Came from Rus.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISrkFW8b4NI#…
The sky over #Idlib right now.
The "Russian world" is coming for your.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7I5LoyeMNU#…
NewsMap
#EuphratesShield troops captured Sheikh Nasser from YPG forces which moved west of #Manbij despite promising to move east.
Chlorine gas canister used in an alleged chemical attack in Syria came from a Jordanian company
Russian Syrian Express.....
Coming from Latakia Syria flag, Gen. Authority For Maritime Transport SYRIAMAR vessel Laodicea transits Bosphorus en route to Sevastopol
Can perfectly understand your sentiments, Outlaw. Just monitoring these conflicts is turning into one, big permanent and disgusting frustration...Quote:
Originally Posted by OUTLAW 09
I've experienced the same while monitoring Assadist and Russian air strikes - with help of all available sources, on take-off-by-take-off and (as far as possible to reconstruct) bombing-by-bombing basis - over the last five weeks.
Here a short summary of related conclusions: Syrian Regime Bombs Eastern Aleppo While Russia Focuses Its Bloody Strikes Elsewhere
Quote:
Air strikes have resumed in war-torn eastern Aleppo. But exactly who is bombing who?
Boosters of Russia and Syrian president Bashar Al Assad’s regime — and even Iranian news agencies — tend to attribute the majority of the air strikes to Russia. Western journalists, various NGOs and even diplomats make the same mistake, and blame Russian air strikes for most of the devastation and civilian deaths in eastern Aleppo.
They’re all equally wrong. Yes, Russia is bombing the Hell out of Syria. But its forces are mostly targeting rebel- and civilian-controlled areas outside of Aleppo. And the Russians are not hitting Islamic militants, as they claim.
Meanwhile, the aerial slaughter in Aleppo is the fault of Al Assad’s own air force.
...
A rainbow of colours - a spread of nationalities - this is the Syrian Arab Army
Russia smuggles jet fuel to Syria through the #EU waters
http://uatoday.tv/news/russia-smuggl...s-811188.html#
Exclusive: Russian tankers defy EU ban to smuggle jet fuel to Syria - sources
http://reut.rs/2gihNjH
"Ships visited Cypriot and Greek ports before delivering fuel to Syria."
Assad CW attacks just keep on..and the WEST says nothing...
Video: Helicopter dropping bomb containing toxic gas on Eastern Aleppo
http://syria.liveuamap.com/en/2016/2...taining-toxic#
… pic.twitter.com/bH7fhjhsal
Eliot HigginsQuote:
Originally Posted by OUTLAW 09
✔
@EliotHiggins
So, who call tell me what's really interesting about this chlorine cylinder used in a CW attack in Aleppo?
http://youtu.be/PiDntC_E0SY
Eliot Higgins
✔
@EliotHiggins
@Mr_Ghostly @HamishDBG I think the metal stripes would have held the fuze/detonator/charge
@EliotHiggins It wasn't packed into a barrel bomb but itself was made into a bomb with a retrofit kit. Absolutely CW by design.
The #Assad regime has further improved its munitions designed to drop chlorine gas in #Syria:
After6 days bombing city with all available weapon incl.CHLORIN GAS
Day 7 registered without gas
Day 8 GAS again!
CrowBat....what do you think of this FSA analysis by Charles Lister via Brookings.....Quote:
Originally Posted by CrowBat
Must read report from @Charles_Lister on the complicated history of the Free Syrian Army
https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content...rian_army.pdf#
…
I tend to agree with most of it, especially in regards of statements like this one (p24):Quote:
Originally Posted by OUTLAW 09
Quote:
The FSA could potentially have become an effective, single and centralized armed organization, but to have done so would have required substantially more and singularly coordinated support than it received. That it took the U.S. an entire year to acknowledge the value of providing even non-lethal assistance to the FSA reveals a significant misjudgment of the situation that resulted in the loss of a potentially invaluable opportunity. A more determined U.S. effort to coordinate a substantial program of support to the moderate opposition would not have to have been about regime change.
BTW, Lister, Weiss... me etc. are not the only with such opinions. See here:
It’s Time to Stop Abandoning the Syrian Opposition
IMAGE of Green Chlorine gas released by #Assad/#Putin helicopter over besieged E. #Aleppo civilians #Syria #RussiaQuote:
Originally Posted by OUTLAW 09
Russia propaganda news Sputnik -@OPCW to examine chemical weapons samples (they & #Assad drop? #Syria Rebels don`t have helicopters)#Aleppo