And next, Syria?

[CrabbedOne]

Coming for some time.

 

[CrabbedOne]

...
But I predict that if Western forces don’t stay in northeastern Syria to keep the peace after the Islamic State is cleared out, in conjunction with a clear political plan to secure an autonomous region of Syria for the Kurds, there will be chaos, infighting among the various factions of the SDF, and the risk that either Assad or Turkey attacks the area to secure their own interests.

Where does this leave us? Whether or not the West should have done more militarily, the only way it could have done more without causing more problems for Syrians and Westerners alike, it seems to me, would have been to put our own troops on the ground and strap in for a multiyear counterinsurgency campaign. However, those who make that argument must show that there would have been U.S. public support for such a move either in 2011 or 2013 — and it seems to me that there was not.

Of course, there are the zealots among the liberal interventionists who go beyond strategic arguments and see the world in binary and absolute moral terms. They think that the West bears moral guilt for the omission of not stopping other people’s atrocities. I think this is nonsense. Assad, Moscow, and Tehran are squarely responsible for the humanitarian atrocities in Syria, not the United States or the West. Furthermore, the West does not bear moral responsibility for fixing the broken, corrupt, and dysfunctional politics of those Middle Eastern states whose leaders invited rebellion against them in 2011 — but once you’ve toppled a regime for humanitarian reasons, that’s the thankless job you’re stuck with.
...

Article suggests interventionists should either be prepared to take complete ownership or butt out.

I'd add the whole liberal interventionist program was a product of a temporary unipolar world and is actually revealed as being stupidly dangerous by the Syrian situation. Military action is mostly for breaking things and killing people often with unpredictable outcomes when good choices have been exhausted. It should be used with great care not for missionary work.

And bear in mind here we "strapped in" for decade long boot heavy interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq with no good strategic results. In fact the latter had almost the reverse effect intended in terms or advantage over Revolutionary Iran. The Taliban backed by Pakistan is resurgent in Afghanistan. AQ is doing rather nicely up there as well and has at least two rather successful franchises in Syria and Yemen. IS bounced back up in Iraq despite AQI's strategic defeat and probably will again. It's not much to show for trillions of US tax dollars and enormous distractions from serious business like revived great power rivalry with the actually very dangerous Russians.

And then there is the KSA mired in Yemen while it's proxies in Syria get a hiding. It does make you consider the lightweight Russian-Iranian intervention as well. Not anywhere near as lavish a project as our occupations but did obey Pottery Barn rules. The Russians are digging in on the Med and don't look to be going anywhere. The revolutionary Iranians in particular set out to own what Assad's corrupt neoliberalism had broken. It's now got to roughly the same stage as the US cakewalking into Baghdad with all sorts of nasty complications.

 

[GrowbagUK]

Ex FBI agent has an interesting 60 video series regarding the broader strategic operation in which Syria is embroiled based on leaked emails, Seymour Hersh and other Pulitzer prize journalists:

George Webb

 

[CrabbedOne]

Damascus largely untouched and functioning rather normally. Aleppo buggered.

 

[CrabbedOne]

On Bloomberg Putin's Winning Streak Will Be Hard to Extend

...
In Syria, Putin helped President Bashar al-Assad to victory in Aleppo, redrawing the balance of forces and minimizing U.S. influence. As a result, Middle Eastern powers, including U.S. allies, have come to see him as an important player in the region for the first time since the Soviet Union's demise. Saudi Arabia has done a deal with Russia on oil output cuts -- something that would have seemed impossible just three years ago.

And Putin didn't have to pay much for his new clout. Russia has only lost 25 people in Syria and spent between $2.5 million and $4 million a day, a manageable amount compared to Russia's $51 billion defense budget for this year. In fact, despite much that is said about Russian war crimes and brutality, data from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights show that the Russian intervention has not increased the Syrian war's death toll this year. In the 11 months through November, 46,442 people were killed, as against 55,219 in 2015 and 73,447 in 2014.
...

My bold, for all the US anger directed at Russia most (60% according to Airwars) of the folk their Air killed are probably combatants. Regime activities have always accounted for more dead. Russia has brought a superior level of planning that probably directs regime resources more to military targets than random acts of state terror typical of the Baath. It should not be forgotten the rather well armed rebels have often killed regime forces in larger numbers than vice versa. Civilian casualties are mostly inflicted by the regime but remain a minority with women and children heavily under represented in the dead. This is a pretty typically horrible civil war not a "holocaust".

 

[Casually Red]

On Bloomberg Putin's Winning Streak Will Be Hard to Extend
My bold, for all the US anger directed at Russia most (60% according to Airwars) of the folk their Air killed are probably combatants. Regime activities have always accounted for more dead. Russia has brought a superior level of planning that probably directs regime resources more to military targets than random acts of state terror typical of the Baath. It should not be forgotten the rather well armed rebels have often killed regime forces in larger numbers than vice versa. Civilian casualties are mostly inflicted by the regime but remain a minority with women and children heavily under represented in the dead. This is a pretty typically horrible civil war not a "holocaust".

US and British anger is in direct correlation to their proxies being rendered ineffective and the political scene changing to the point were neither of them are even invited to the peace talks . That's what the anger is about, nothing else .
Leftists hopping up and down on their behalf ..on boris johnsons direct urging for example..are just another proxy .

 

[Casually Red]

On Chatham House Most Syrian Christians Aren’t Backing Assad (or the Rebels)
A position probably shared by a plurality of Syrians.

It's a load of bollocks. State inspired bollocks. The Syrian Christian leadership has been barred from entry to the uk . No doubt to uphold this state inspired narrative . Why on earth else would these people be barred from entry ? What risk do they conceivably pose to the united kingdom. While Saudi funded hate preachers are regularly permitted entry ?

Britain BANS heroic bishops: Persecuted Christian leaders from war zones refused entry

Thankfully there was room at the inn over here . The EUs sanctions on basic medical supplies are killing way more Syrians than daesh

Clerical Whispers: Syrian religious leaders visit Ireland to appeal for help to end war

This is like the murderous Iraq sanctions all over again . Total silence on this ..atrocity...from the lefties .

 

[butchersapron]

It's a load of bollocks. State inspired bollocks. The Syrian Christian leadership has been barred from entry to the uk . No doubt to uphold this state inspired narrative . Why on earth else would these people be barred from entry ? What risk do they conceivably pose to the united kingdom. While Saudi funded hate preachers are regularly permitted entry ?

Britain BANS heroic bishops: Persecuted Christian leaders from war zones refused entry

Thankfully there was room at the inn over here . The EUs sanctions on basic medical supplies are killing way more Syrians than daesh

Clerical Whispers: Syrian religious leaders visit Ireland to appeal for help to end war

This is like the murderous Iraq sanctions all over again . Total silence on this ..atrocity...from the lefties .

Apart from it being one archbishop of one the smaller christian religions in Syria and not at all "The Syrian Christian leadership". But what do facts matter against a series of actual interviews carried out with real life syrian christians? Esp when there's a simple line to sell. As for state propganda, the idea that the british state is seeking the downfall of the regime and is seeking to construct a narrative to help this is utter nonsense. It's only military actions in Syria are targeted precisely against those fighting the regime - and not a single one, not one, against the regime. Just to repeat all military actions have been against the enemies of the regime. Utter fantasy land stuff from you.

And the regime and russians and their jihadis have killed more than ISIS and the rebels combined many times over yet you are rabid in your support of them - don't bother playing that game.

 

[CrabbedOne]

...

And the regime and russians and their jihadis have killed more than ISIS and the rebels combined many times over yet you are rabid in your support of them - don't bother playing that game.

"Many times" would be an exaggeration.

This isn't the impression given by our MSM of course but all the NGO figures I've seen on deaths in Syria have combatant deaths at about 70% of the total. A typical ratio of combatant to civilian deaths in civil wars. The rebels are responsible for more than half of the combatants killed; actually in terms of slaughtering fellow Syrians they are doing rather well. By some recent counts they've killed well over 100K+ regime fighters; mostly pitiful half starved conscripts. Looking at how the fighting has gone, the generally poor performance of the SAA and the regime's increasingly desperate press ganging of Syrian youth this is an entirely plausible breakdown.

An example from Al Jaz:

Of the remaining civilian deaths the regime is probably responsible for most of them with perhaps as few as 10% being the work of the rebels and IS. The hard earned Baathist reputation for military brutality is deserved but we have to take these figures with a pinch of salt as the NGOs can be assumed to be biased.

However the fact is the rebels while very well equipped and often eager to bombard civilians in areas of regime control simply lack the air power and heavy artillery to slaughter on the same scale in retaliation so they are plausible. If this wasn't the case the death toll would likely be much higher. When the rebels have had access to heavy rocket artillery to retaliate with as they did in the later stages of the East Aleppo siege regime civilian casualties at times were rather high.

This is a rather different profile to the first phase of the peculiarly savage Iraq insurgency where most of casualties were civilians slaughtered by paramilitaries. I fear something like that may be next up in Syria as thanks to the carnage inflicted on it the regime really lacks the manpower to ever suppress that ruthless kind of terrorist warfare and rebellion has a broad popular base in places.

 

[CrabbedOne]

There are only meant to be a couple of hundred IS fighters holding al Bab. About 70 civilians were reported killed in Turkish airstrikes as well.

 

[GrowbagUK]

And the regime and russians and their jihadis have killed more than ISIS and the rebels combined many times over yet you are rabid in your support of them - don't bother playing that game.

Uhm lets use some facts shall we?
Casualties of the Syrian Civil War - Wikipedia


I would call it a failed coup d'etat leading to opportunistic invasion and occupation to be honest.

Where are FSA - the so-called legitimate "rebels" for instance? They petered out in 2013 and the NATO terrorists took up the mantle.

 

[teqniq]

Enough with the Nato terrorist bullshit please. unless you can provide evidence to back up your laughable claim which I seriously doubt. The jihadist types are mainly financed by wealthy patrons from Saudi, Qatar and Turkey, that's when they are not financing themselves by extortion looting and ransoms etc; and don't think to point out that Turkey is a Nato member, we all know it shouldn't be really but the US who mostly call the shots on these things see them as a bulwark against Iranian ambitions and influence in the region.

 

[GrowbagUK]

Enough with the Nato terrorist bullshit please. unless you can provide evidence to back up your laughable claim which I seriously doubt.

US Senate passes bill to authorise arms and training for Syrian rebels

 

[teqniq]

Yes I know this already so you are indulging in semantics. You call then terrorists (funnily enough what the regime and the Russians call them too) whilst others call them rebels.

 

[butchersapron]

Yes I know this already so you are indulging in semantics. You call then terrorists (funnily enough what the regime and the Russians call them too) whilst others call them rebels.

He's not even read that short news piece, so doesn't know who it's talking about. He just saw the title. And using rather tight definitions of FSA there are at least 80 brigades that are still in the field. Many more using far looser boundaries.

 

[GrowbagUK]

The jihadist types are mainly financed by wealthy patrons from Saudi, Qatar and Turkey

...
and armed and trained by NATO. I refer you to the above you tube video series for further evidence of US collusion with Muslim Brotherhood (Qatar) via leaked emails and Pulitzer prize journalists...

 

[Cosmic]

One mans terrorist and all that...

tbh...given the track record of the "coalition" in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Egypt and Syria since Stormin' Norman's "Desert Storm". I am most definitely NOT a big fan of the military conquests of NATO countries in that period, and as much as NATO supporters may object, I don't think describing them as being terrorists is that far off the mark, in fact I would say that it was right on the money.

Does that mean that I am a supporter of "the regime" which appears to be the fashionable msm newspeak term for the Syrian government? An Assad sympathiser? Not necessarily, however, it also doesn't mean that I'll be buying the blatantly one sided "it's the Russians wot dun it" full on propaganda juggernaut either.

 

[GrowbagUK]

He's not even read that short news piece, so doesn't know who it's talking about. He just saw the title. And using rather tight definitions of FSA there are at least 80 brigades that are still in the field. Many more using far looser boundaries.

~100,000 Syrian rebel casualties and they are still a relevant threat? I don't think so....thats why we saw the desperate chemical weapon cries (Ghouta 2013) and the subsequent calls of more bombing for humanitarian causes from our own parliament.
The Western media has been desperately continuing to paint the illusion of popular support for the uprising.

 

[teqniq]

'and armed and trained by NATO' and yet you provide no evidence save for a youtube channel by one George Webb who quite frankly looks to be a bit of a conspiracy nut. 'US collusion with Muslim Brotherhood' lol. Somehow I find that vanishingly unlikely.

 

[Pickman's model]

the subsequent calls of more bombing for humanitarian causes in our own parliament.

Tempting tho it is I am not sure I could advocate bombs in parliament even for humanitarian causes

 

[butchersapron]

I think this thread is worse than the Trump one now.

 

[HoratioCuthbert]

Courtesy of Yassin Al Haj Saleh who shared this on his FB 2 hours ago, apparently the writer also recently referred to Assadist left as "Pavlovian Left" ha!
To “leftist” admirers of Assad’s Syria

But neither jihadi intrusion nor the shortcomings of the self-proclaimed representatives of the Syrian revolution, nor any argument used to justify the unjustifiable, can invalidate two fundamental facts: that the Syrians had a thousand reasons to revolt, and that they did so with exceptional courage, under conditions of near-universal indifference, countering the ruling clan’s limitless terror, Iran’s imperial ambitions and, since September 2015, a US-approved Russian military intervention that has already killed several thousand civilians.

 

[HoratioCuthbert]

One mans terrorist and all that...

tbh...given the track record of the "coalition" in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Egypt and Syria since Stormin' Norman's "Desert Storm". I am most definitely NOT a big fan of the military conquests of NATO countries in that period, and as much as NATO supporters may object, I don't think describing them as being terrorists is that far off the mark, in fact I would say that it was right on the money.

Does that mean that I am a supporter of "the regime" which appears to be the fashionable msm newspeak term for the Syrian government? An Assad sympathiser? Not necessarily, however, it also doesn't mean that I'll be buying the blatantly one sided "it's the Russians wot dun it" full on propaganda juggernaut either.

It's a fucking regime whether MSM uses that term or not.

 

[HoratioCuthbert]

Anyway, Merry Christmas bad thread.

 

[Cosmic]

It's a fucking regime whether MSM uses that term or not.

Okaaaay...well I wasn't questioning whether the Syrian government was a regime or not, just on the loaded way in which the term is used. The US government is also a "regime", but not referred to as one. Authoritarian governments that happen to be on our side are still referred to as "governments" with "government forces".

 

[CrabbedOne]

On Syria Comment The Fifth Legion: A New Auxiliary Force

...
How far the Fifth Legion will come to play a real and important role in the battlefield remains to be seen. The provincial governor of Latakia- Ibrahim Khidr al-Salim- seems particularly keen to have people enlist in the Fifth Legion, involving state administrative bodies in the process. He has even reportedly directed Latakia institutions and foundations to cancel work contracts of male workers in Latakia between 18 and 50 years old from other provinces if they do not join the Fifth Legion. This ultimatum is not to be applied if the worker has been exempted from the Syrian army for reasons such as health. The authenticity of documents circulated with regards to this matter appears to have been subsequently confirmed by postings such as this one on teachers in Latakia joining the Fifth Legion. This may indicate that recruitment efforts into the Fifth Legion have not been as successful as the regime might have hoped. Indeed, it is possible the Fifth Legion will end up going the way of Liwa Dir’ al-Sahel: much hype initially but then fading into obscurity and becoming of little or no operational significance. In any case, there is no doubt of the ongoing manpower problems facing the regime, despite the confident offensive-minded mentality in light of the Aleppo victory.

 

[Cosmic]

 

[CrabbedOne]

On K24 Erdogan vows not to allow Kurdish state in Syria

...
In a public speech in Istanbul, Erdogan justified his army’s incursion into Syria, specifying the presence of Turkish troops there was to ensure “the true owners” of the land come back and settle.

“They want to found a new state in northern Syria,” Erdogan said. “Let this be known; we will not allow the creation of such a state.”

The Turkish President added there were also attempts at creating a state in eastern Turkey, in remarks carried by the private-owned Dogan news agency.

None of the Kurdish parties in Syria, including the ruling Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its opposition the Kurdish National Council (ENKS), demand secession.

Though both rival sides strongly advocate different degrees of autonomy and self-governance for the Kurds and other minority groups in the north, there already exists a functioning self-declared autonomous region named Federation of Northern Syria – Rojava.

Turkey’s leaders have previously called Rojava a “terror corridor.”
...

The view from Ankara: a Terror Corridor next door created by US CAS!

 

[CrabbedOne]

I doubt 42% of Syrians ever supported the revolt. Revolt support was always patchy and only solid in some provinces. Though a majority early on in the Arab Spring may have favoured drastic reforms as Bashar's neoliberal efforts enriched few and spread a great deal of economic misery.

Successful revolutions usually are not majoritarian affairs anyway but are built round a revolutionary vanguard that drags the population along at gun point. They often don't end up as the bulk of folk who start them intended.

 

[CrabbedOne]

Highly likely.