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I have no problems believing he is as described: Michael Weiss, Pro-Israel Neocon

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Why you put your trust in skanks is beyond me.

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You think Libya is doing great since the US bombed it?

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No, going off a list of his publications - which I provided

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We are now two days into Russia’s air campaign against anti-regime forces in Syria and both Moscow and the West are rushing to spin the narrative.

The frantic attempt from both sides to shape public opinion has been truly amazing to behold and the sheer amount of coverage speaks to what we said on Thursday about just how important the conflict really is for the Mid-East balance of power.

For the US, portraying Russian airstrikes as supportive of a murderous regime and as an imminent threat to civilians is key, as it allows Washington to explain away the fact that the US and its allies haven’t coordinated their efforts with Moscow. Take the following from CNN for instance, who reports that Russia has made a “strategic blunder” and that by opening an air campaign, Russia risks raising the spectre of the Soviet-Afghan war in the minds of potential jihadists who will supposedly rush into Syria to join the fight. [According to CNN]:

There is no ambiguity now about Russia's current tactics in Syria -- they are seeking to take over the airspace in the region and be the agenda-setting force on the ground, several senior administration officials told CNN.

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"Yesterday's demarche to the U.S. by Russian officials in Baghdad was clear in its intent," one senior administration official said. "Make sure you don't have anyone around ISIS targets and get out of the air."

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And while U.S. officials have no plans to cede Russia any ground, they also said it appears that Russian President Vladimir Putin made a dramatic chess move that the Russians have not thought through -- one official even called it a "strategic blunder."

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Had the Russians been clear that they are providing support in Syria to prevent Syrian President Bashar al-Assad regime's collapse -- a scenario that would benefit ISIS -- they might have gotten some credit on the world stage.

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But their very first strikes in the region hit CIA-backed anti-Assad

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rebel forces

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Arizona Republican John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Thursday on CNN's "New Day." And U.S. officials note that every bomb against a non-ISIS Sunni target puts them more in bed with Iran and Hezbollah, which are Shiite. U.S. allies in the Persian Gulf warn that this could set off a huge sectarian conflict

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and that the deeper the Russians get into this, the harder officials believe it will be to get a diplomatic process with the Saudis and others restarted.

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"It is going to be hugely tempting for the Saudis to start financing their guys again,"

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another senior administration official said. "Syria will be a magnet for every jihadi, who will rush to fight the Russians, just like they did in Afghanistan.

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The problem is while this will cause problems for the Russians, it will also mean trouble for the Gulf, when the jihadists come home."

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"The Russians can't be stupid," another senior administration official said. "This is going to be wildly expensive. And they can't hold out long. They know in the end there is no future for the guy (Assad) because the whole reason they had to come in is because Assad and his forces were extremely vulnerable. So we are hoping they will come to their senses, stabilize the situation and then we can agree on the Assad piece."

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Now obviously, there are too many absurd statements there to count

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but note (again) that Russia has never hid its support for Assad. When Charlie Rose told Putin on national US television that some people believe Russia is in Syria to help Assad, Putin said, quote, “well, you’re right.” On top of that, it’s glaringly obvious to anyone who knows anything about the global balance of power that Russia is there to support Assad and it's ridiculous for anyone to suggest that Putin isn't aware of the fact that by supporting the regime, Russia falls squarely on the side of Iran and Hezbollah. It’s also glaringly obvious that ISIS isn’t the only extremist group fighting for control of the country and the notion that the US has now finally managed to identify the “good guys” in Syria after failing to get it right for four years and that now evil Russia is deliberately targeting those good guys simply because they’re the good guys is laughable to the point that one wonders if CNN and others pushed back on being compelled to spin it that way. Additionally, it’s a little late for the US to be concerned about someone inadvertently creating a theatre that in the minds of jihadis will serve as the stage for humanity’s final battle. If Washington was worried about that they might have avoided getting involved in Syria in the first place and they definitely would have avoided training the soldiers who would go on to join the very group that’s perpetuating that idea.

And then here’s WSJ:

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The White House challenged Russia’s claim that the airstrikes were targeting Islamic State militants, saying Thursday that Moscow was carrying out “indiscriminate military operations” in areas where the group isn't operating. A White House official also dismissed the possibility that Russia had inadvertently bombed non-Islamic State areas. U.S. officials say the Russian military bombed one area primarily held by rebels backed by the Central Intelligence Agency and allied spy services.

Contrary to claims by the Russian Ministry of Defense, none of the areas that were hit have a known Islamic State presence. At least two of the rebel factions attacked by the Russians—Tajamu Al-Ezzeh and the Central Division—have received weapons including advanced antitank missiles and funding from the U.S. and its allies, according to rebel

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leaders.

The arc that the Russian airstrikes followed begins around the town of Jisr al-Shughour in northern Idlib province near the Turkish border and adjacent to an agricultural area known as the Ghab Plain. It cuts through the central Syrian cities of Hama and Homs and ends at the Lebanese border.



Alawites—the regime’s base of support—are concentrated west of the arc in an area that includes Latakia province. Everything east is dominated by the country’s Sunni majority, to which most of those fighting the regime belong.

A series of tit-for-tat massacres during the more than four-year conflict have solidified this sectarian fault line.

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Yes, the “sectarian fault line” has been solidified and that is a hallmark of Western intervention in the Mid-East. Syria is no different.

And BBC:

Members of the US-led coalition against Islamic State have called on Russia to cease air strikes they say are hitting the Syrian opposition and civilians.

In a joint statement on Friday, the US, UK, Turkey and other coalition members said Russian strikes would "only fuel more extremism".

And best of all there's Al-Jazeera (which is of course owned by Qatar), who takes it up another notch by suggesting that Russia is now intentionally killing civilians:

Russia accused of striking civilian targets in Syria. Activists say warplanes are targeting civilians in areas under control of Western-backed rebels, a claim Russia denies.

For their part, Bloomberg did the American public a favor by laying out the real story, albeit in an article that carries the title "US, Allies Demand Russia Stop Attacks On Syrian Opposition":

Russian forces are targeting only Islamic State, al-Qaeda affiliated Nusra Front and other terrorist groups, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Thursday in New York. The Free Syrian Army, a U.S-backed rebel group, was not among the targets and it should have a role in the political process in Syria, he added.

“The goal is terrorism,” he said. “And we are not supporting anyone against their own people.”

Assad’s government has been fighting alongside Iranian reinforcements to secure a corridor from the coastal province of Latakia, home to Assad’s Alawite minority, stretching to the capital Damascus, according to Reva Bhalla, vice president for analysis at Stratfor, a geopolitical intelligence and advisory firm based in Austin, Texas. The government has accused Qatar and Saudi Arabia of backing “terror groups,” and dismissed the criticism.

“They’re hopping mad in Saudi Arabia, the U.S. And Qatar because of their defeat and the victory of Russia and Syria and the unraveling of the fact that the U.S. and its allies are not serious about fighting” Islamic State, Syrian lawmaker Sharif Shehadeh said by phone from Damascus. “Those who claim to be concerned about the Syrian people are the ones slaughtering the Syrian people through the terrorists.”

There you go. That last passage pretty much says it all.

Meanwhile, the Russian propaganda machine is also in high gear as The Kremlin is jumping at the opportunity to portray Putin as the man who saved the world when no one else was willing to. Here's Bloomberg again:

Vladimir Putin may have caught the U.S. and its allies off guard by striking Syria, but his propaganda machine was ready.

“A hundred dead terrorists,” a news presenter on Russia’s No. 2 network announced early Thursday, just hours after the bombing of what Putin has called “evil-doers” began. She then cut to a correspondent in Syria who lauded the precision of the strikes as aerial footage of the attacks supplied by the Defense Ministry aired.

Over on Channel 1, the most-watched station, a parade of politicians, analysts and religious leaders -- both Christian and Muslim -- rolled by justifying the use of force on both legal and moral grounds.

“This is more than just military strikes against Islamic State,” said the editor of National Defense magazine, Igor Korotchenko, after parliament unanimously authorized the use of force. “We are protecting the values of humanity and taking a stand against the most extreme forms of obscurantism and terror.”

What's amusing there is that as overstated as it is, that [Russian] narrative is actually closer to the truth than what's being fed to the public by the Western media.

In any event, the important thing here is to cut through all of this and extract the bits that help to tell the story of what's actually taking place in Syria. As we detailed on Thursday, this is effectively a Mid-East coup by Russia and Iran wherein Tehran will replace Riyadh as the regional power broker and Moscow will supplant Washington as the superpower puppet master. And on that note, we close with another excerpt from the WSJ piece cited above:

Iran’s Foreign Ministry welcomed Russia’s military intervention in Syria on Thursday, saying it was the right step to fight terrorism and a move toward bringing stability to the region.

“Fighting terrorism effectively requires a strong and serious will and has to be based on cooperation with the governments of Iraq and Syria,” Marzieh Afkham, spokeswoman for the ministry, said according to Iranian media reports.

Ibrahim al-Amin, a Lebanese commentator and newspaper editor close to Hezbollah and Iran, said Moscow essentially provided a green light for a counteroffensive against rebels across the political spectrum.

“From our side, we can no longer ignore the decision of the axis of resistance, backed by Russia, to not only prevent Assad’s fall but to also weaken all his foes. All his foes without any distinction,” wrote Mr. Amin in the Lebanese daily Al-Akhbar on Thursday.

“We must benefit from Russian support to launch tough and decisive battles in several places in Syria,” he added.

Before the latest Russian intervention, Iran played a pivotal role propping-up pro-regime militias made up largely of Alawites and Shiites. It has orchestrated thousands of Shiite fighters mainly from Lebanon and Iraq with Hezbollah being in the lead.

But thousands of rebels regrouped in several enclaves north of Homs, in towns like al-Rastan and Talbiseh. Russian jets hit both civilian and military targets in these two towns and five surrounding villages, said Rashid al-Hourani, a Syrian army officer from the area who defected to the rebels in 2012.

He said the airstrikes were followed with a barrage of artillery fire from several nearby positions where pro-regime Alawite and Shiite militias, including an Iran-backed group known as the Ridha Brigade, have been massing over the past few days.

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So to sum up: you agree you didn't answer my questions because they were beneath you, and yet you whine if I pass on one of your (really naive and obviously leading) questions.

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Oh right, I forgot that someone who criticises Putin or the Soviet Union is obviously a 'pro-Israel neocon' - lol.

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So, you want the US to bomb Assad in a strategy that you admit clearly doesn't make things better?

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an author - one who spends EVERY article criticizing Russia, and criticizing ONLY Russia - the author is one who clearly has an agenda.

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an author - one who spends EVERY article criticizing Russia, and criticizing ONLY Russia - the author is one who clearly has an agenda.

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Originally posted by THGRRI:

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an author - one who spends EVERY article criticizing Russia, and criticizing ONLY Russia - the author is one who clearly has an agenda.

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Sounds like Sig and 1kiki going on and on about America does it not. Like many of us here have said. They have an agenda. It's nice to see them admit that only criticizing the same country all the time is prof of an agenda.

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:
This belongs on the shelf, along with "The separatists in Ukraine are shelling themselves"

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You're usually so careful about your "sources"!

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Originally posted by kpo:

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:
This belongs on the shelf, along with "The separatists in Ukraine are shelling themselves"

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Still trying to convince everyone that I said a quote that you made up, Sig? Pretty desperate.

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You're usually so careful about your "sources"!

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Well I won't post videos from neo-Nazi sites like you, that's for sure.


It's not personal. It's just war.

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So to sum up: you agree you didn't answer my questions because they were beneath you, and yet you whine if I pass on one of your (really naive and obviously leading) questions.- G

If I'm "leading" you anywhere, it's to think about your own assumptions and draw conclusions from them. Which you steadfastly refuse to do. Think, that is. Well, it's your loss. It seems that you're comfortable having someone do you thinking for you.
-SIGNY

You have proven over and over you have no idea what my assumptions are. In fact, you make them up for me or presume the most negative ones so you can - what have I said before? - "fake argue against something or someone." You are about as fake as they come.-GSTRING

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Only an idiot thinks there are actual answers and solutions in the ME. The political landscape shifts as much as the sands of the desert (omg what great metaphor). You're pretty much screwed whatever you do if you are there.

And now Russia thinks they will find answers - good luck to them. Probably more sad Russian mothers is what they'll get, mostly. They learned as little from Afghanistan as we did.

"Most visitors who die in the desert die no more than a mile from a well traveled road... They believe they can walk a short distance off the road and then when they look back the way looks unfamiliar... because the sands continually change, and then they are lost for all eternity."

"Entering a bathroom isn't like leaving it." - Arab proverb
meaning: it's easier to get yourself into something than out.

"The hand in water isn’t like the hand in fire." - Arab proverb
meaning: Easier said than done; used to criticize someone removed from the situation at hand who is telling those involved how to deal with it.

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Washington (CNN)Secretary of State John Kerry has raised the possibility of a no-fly zone in Syria to protect civilians even as President Barack Obama has consistently rejected the idea, several administration officials told CNN.

Officials said Kerry has asked his staff to further develop the idea and raised the issue at a National Security Council meeting last week, where Obama discussed the U.S. strategy for stemming the bloody civil war in Syria with his top advisers.

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Russian Warships Launch 26 Cruise Missiles At ISIS Targets

On Monday evening, we detailed the Russian hardware being used in Moscow’s campaign to rout anti-regime forces and restore the government of Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

As we noted in our preface to that feature, “watching Russia effectively humiliate the West by bragging day in and day out is nothing if it’s not amusing, and indeed the leaked diplomatic cable from 2006 which outlines Washington’s intent to effectively start a civil war in Syria leaves one completely uninclined to be at all sympathetic to the ridiculous situation the US and its allies have found themselves in.”

That, along with the fact that Western nations like France are not only unwilling to admit that the West's participation in Syria has been an outright disaster, but are now set to "correct" a refugee crisis by bombing the very place from which the refugees are fleeing leaves us inclined to highlight the following video (out today from the Russian Defense Ministry) that shows what happens when a military superpower decides that because an existing aerial campaign has become akin to shooting fish in a barrel, it might be time to do some sea-based target practice on a few Nike-wearing, black flag-waving jihadists…

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
There's plenty more of our conversation still to cut and paste moron.


Good. Feel free to waste your time. My job here is done.

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The senior Gulf official said he now feared what he called a "Grozny-style" scorched-earth approach by Russia towards Syria, laying waste to whole areas that opposed the government.

Coupled with the prospect of new and more powerful weapons flowing to the rebels, the indications are that Syria's war is about to get a whole lot worse.

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and now the US, EU, Saudi, and Turkish military are forced to contemplate that fact that Russians have cruise missiles that can hit targets 10 times farther way than formerly advertised.

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and now the US, EU, Saudi, and Turkish military are forced to contemplate that fact that Russians have cruise missiles that can hit targets 10 times farther way than formerly advertised.

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Originally posted by kpo:

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and now the US, EU, Saudi, and Turkish military are forced to contemplate that fact that Russians have cruise missiles that can hit targets 10 times farther way than formerly advertised.

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Or spectacularly miss them, as reports are suggesting - http://edition.cnn.com/2015/10/08/politics/russian-missiles-syria-land
ed-iran/index.html

It's not personal. It's just war.

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Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu: Mr President, acting on your decision, since the 30th, we have been carrying out missions to strike ISIS, Jabhat al-Nusra, and other terrorist groups present on Syrian territory. Since September 30, we have conducted strikes against 112 targets. We are increasing our strikes’ intensiveness. Our various intelligence and reconnaissance forces have been working intensively over these last two days and have identified a large number of ISIS targets: command posts, ammunition depots, military hardware, and training camps for their fighters. Vessels from our Caspian Fleet joined our aviation in attacking these targets this morning.

Four warships launched 26 Kalibr cruise missiles against 11 targets. Our target monitoring data shows that all targets were destroyed and civilian facilities were not damaged in the strikes. These strikes’ results demonstrate the high effectiveness of our missiles launched from a big distance of nearly 1,500 kilometres.

This morning, 23 attack aircraft also continued their strikes against insurgent positions. Since September 30, we have destroyed 19 command posts, 12 ammunition depots, 71 pieces of military hardware, and six explosives production workshops producing explosives for car bombs and so on. We are continuing our operations according to plan.

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Mr Shoigu, we know how complicated anti-terrorist operations of this kind are. It is still too early to assess the results, but what has been accomplished so far is certainly very positive. The Defence Ministry’s work overall, and the work of the experts at General Staff and our officers and service personnel in the field deserve a high assessment. Special thanks should go to the pilots at work in Syria, of course, and as this experience with using high-precision weapons shows, to the Caspian Fleet seamen.

The fact that these strikes were carried out using high-precision weapons launched from the Caspian Sea’s waters, around 1,500 kilometres away, and all of the planned targets were destroyed is evidence of our defence industry’s good preparation and the service personnel’s good professional skills.

At the same time, we realise that conflicts of this kind must end in a political settlement.

I discussed this matter just this morning with the Russian Foreign Minister. During my recent visit to Paris, the President of France, Mr Hollande, voiced an interesting idea that he thought is worth a try, namely, to have President Assad’s government troops join forces with the Free Syrian Army. True, we do not know yet where this army is and who heads it, but if we take the view that these people are part of the healthy opposition, if it were possible to have them join in the fight against terrorist organisations such as ISIS, Jabhat al-Nusra and others, this would help pave the way to a future political settlement in Syria.

The Foreign Ministry will continue these efforts, given that we are in contact with practically all of the opposition forces, but I ask you too to support the Foreign Ministry’s efforts through your partnership channels. That is my first point.

Second, we must continue working with our foreign partners, because without their participation, without the participation of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the United States, Iran, Iraq and other neighbouring countries, this work has little chance of being organised as it should.

In this respect, I have a question: What is the situation with work between our defence experts and their US and Turkish partners to coordinate things or at least keep each other informed?

Sergei Shoigu: We have organised contact with our Turkish partners. We now have direct communication between the Turkish army’s central command post and our National Defence Control Centre to organise our operations along the Turkish border so as to avoid incidents involving violation of airspace.

We held a videoconference with our American colleagues and began examining matters regarding ways to ensure our joint work and security in this territory. We have examined the document the Pentagon sent us, and today will discuss the fact that we are ready to approve this document and start work accordingly.

Next, we invited all of the military attaches yesterday and proposed to them, our colleagues, all who are involved in this work in one way or another, to provide us information on targets, if they have such information of course, so that we can work more effectively against ISIS’ camps and units.

We are waiting for our colleagues’ answers today and we hope they will inform us of the targets they may have. Of course, we should take further steps to organise this work and continue it in systemic fashion because no matter how we look at the situation, without each other’s support it will not be possible to complete this task. Past experience shows this to be the case.

Our colleagues have been working on these tasks [identifying and neutralizing ISIS] over the last year, but sadly, we have yet to see visible results.

Vladimir Putin: It is fair enough if they say they know the situation better because they have been conducting operations in this territory (on an unlawful basis, as I have said) for more than a year now, but if they are there and know the situation better, let them share with us information on the targets they have identified over this time, and we will work them through.

As for our next steps, as we agreed, it will be synchronised with the Syrian army’s operations on the ground. Our Aerospace Forces will provide effective support for the Syrian army’s offensive.

Sergei Shoigu: Mr President, this work has been planned. We briefed you on the first plans and stages and will keep you updated on the missions’ results.

Vladimir Putin: Good.

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I agree SIG the russians have pissed them all off. It's what's going on, on the Arab streets that counts the most and it isn't looking good for russia. THUGR

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In a July interview, The Patriarch of Antioch, Moran Mor Ignatius Aphrem II, called on the West to “stop arming and supporting terrorist groups that are destroying our countries and massacring our people.” The Syrian Christian leader added that “state institutions need to be strengthened and stabilised. Instead, what we see is their forced dismemberment being fuelled from the outside.”

The Patriarch also recounted a meeting he had with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad:

Along with bishops of his church he recently had talks with President Assad of Syria. “President Assad urged us to do everything in our hands to prevent Christians from leaving Syria. 'I know you are suffering,' he said, 'but please don't leave this land, which has been your home for thousands of years, even before Islam came.' He said that Christians will also be needed when the time comes to rebuild this devastated country.”

He said the majority of Syrian citizens support Assad's government and have always supported it.

“We recognise legitimate rulers and pray for them, as the New Testament teaches us. We also see that on the other side there is no democratic opposition, only extremist groups. Above all, we see that in the past few years, these groups have been basing their actions on an ideology that comes from the outside, brought here by preachers of hatred who have come from and are backed by Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt. These groups receive arms through Turkey too, as the media have shown us.”

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Originally posted by G:

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
So, you want Isis to win?

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It's one of Kiki's go-to moves when she can't win an argument - ask a stupid question.

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You know, Signy - and this is just a sideways observation -

I remember when Pakistan was emerging as a highly educated technological society. It was starting to take its place on the world stage, and far outpacing India despite its size and relative lack of resources. I remember it because my Pakistani friend - a PhD in biophysics at the time - was emblematic of Pakistan's entry into the modern world - though a practicing Muslim she was cosmopolitan and highly educated, from a family of international scholars.

As far as I can tell 'what happened' to derail Pakistan was nothing more or less than the growth of madrassas, substituting religious rhetoric and righteous intolerance for knowledge and reason (similar to the US right-wing today, eta - who think that 'intelligent design' should be taught AS SCIENCE; that societal understanding only requires girls should be 'slut-shamed' - but not boys; and that the only information anyone needs to know about the biology and health of reproduction is just say no .... but I digress ...).

As Pakistani scientific education levels fell, so did competitive capability, leading to poverty and even more religious extremism, in a positive feedback loop.

Now, I don't support international capitalism and the corrosive system of profits it imposes. OTOH I don't think insular religious extremism is a good, or even the only, alternative.

So, 'what happened' to Pakistan was a sea change of ideas. Fomented, nurtured and supported by Saudi money for sure, but now it has a life of its own. Would those ideas fade away if they suddenly were separated from the power structure that supports them? I don't know.

Similarly, I'm not sure that Wahhabist terrorism would be washed away in one action. eta - It started out as a synthetic movement, fostered by the Saudis and aided by the US, but by now it may have grown deep roots.- KIKI

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:

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SIG
religions .... there's decades of idiocy fostered there (and here) and it will take a few generations to reverse that trend.

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The U.S. dropped 50 tons of ammo to al Qaida

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Not three weeks ago, the USA administration was saying that they only managed to train 4 or 5 "moderate rebels" (to the tune of $500 million). Now, those 4-5 rebels are able to receive tons of weapons???

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Those were two separate programs, one by the CIA and one by the Pentagon.

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:

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The U.S. dropped 50 tons of ammo to al Qaida

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Fixed it for you.

Not three weeks ago, the USA administration was saying that they only managed to train 4 or 5 "moderate rebels" (to the tune of $500 million). Now, those 4-5 rebels are able to receive tons of weapons??? Didn't you even think to ask how that could be, and who was ACTUALLY getting the weapons?


(Of course not!)

This is like the jihadists, the "mujahideen" in Afghanistan, being morphed into "freedom fighters" with nobody noticing. Pretty soon you'll be cheering on al Qaida, and you won't even notice that either.

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No, the U.S. dropped 50 tons of ammo to the Syrian rebels fighting an oppressive regime. For a communist/socialist you sure do side with a lot of tyrants. You know, cruel oppressive rulers.

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"The U.S. dropped 50 tons of ammo to al Qaida".

Fixed it for you.

Not three weeks ago, the USA administration was saying that they only managed to train 4 or 5 "moderate rebels" (to the tune of $500 million). Now, those 4-5 rebels are able to receive tons of weapons??? Didn't you even think to ask how that could be, and who was ACTUALLY getting the weapons?

(Of course not!)

This is like the jihadists, the "mujahideen" in Afghanistan, being morphed into "freedom fighters" with nobody noticing. Pretty soon you'll be cheering on al Qaida, and you won't even notice that either.-SIGNY

No, the U.S. dropped 50 tons of ammo to the Syrian rebels fighting an oppressive regime. For a communist/socialist you sure do side with a lot of tyrants. You know, cruel oppressive rulers. -IDIOT

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