The Syria Analysis Thread

Niccolo and Donkey Sunday 28 Jul 2013

Mike Angocachi Longface SweetLeftFoot

I think that Longface and SweetLeftFoot are in agreement with the view I hold that manifestations of extremist Sunni radicalism in the form of al-Qaida or other groups can all be traced back to Afghanistan 1979 and the structure set up by Brzezinski between the CIA-Pak ISI-Saudis-MI6 which saw the Mujahideen spring up and be financed by Saudi-controlled Islamic charities. It's a network that is easily exportable and allows for destabilization of targeted regimes.

SweetLeftFoot Sunday 28 Jul 2013

I'd agree with that for sure.

Using Muslims to pressure Russia's "soft underbelly" or China's western flanks is a strategy that can be used for decades to come too.

Niccolo and Donkey Monday 29 Jul 2013

SweetLeftFoot Angocachi Longface President Camacho Stubby

Government forces take control of strategic Homs neighbourhood

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Syrian government forces patrol in the Khaldiyeh neighbourhood of the central city of Homs on Sunday. Government forces retook the largest rebel-held district of the city, activists and state media said.

BEIRUT—Syrian government forces seized control of a key neighbourhood of Homs on Monday, activists and state media said, delivering a blow to besieged opposition fighters in the city once dubbed “the capital of the revolution .”

Rebels had retreated from around 95 per cent of the neighbourhood of Khaldiyeh by midday Monday after a morning air raid that was followed by bombardment with surface-to-surface missiles and mortars, activists said. Syrian state television went further and said government forces had “restored security and stability” to the area.

The fall of the neighbourhood, in rebel hands for more than a year, marks a strategic loss for the opposition, slicing in two the remaining besieged pocket of rebel-controlled territory in the city. It also builds on a steady string of government gains in central and southern Syria, where the tide seems to have turned in favour of President Bashar Assad’s forces, which have been bolstered by militants from Iran and Lebanon’s Shiite Hezbollah movement.

Government troops made inroads into the neighbourhood over the weekend. They took the 13th-century Khalid ibn al-Walid Mosque on Saturday, and the building’s sacred shrine was severely damaged in the fighting.

The offensive has taken a devastating toll, levelling large areas. Photographs of Syrian troops moving into Khaldiyeh showed the level of devastation as soldiers picked their way through battered streets piled with rubble. An aerial image distributed Monday by activists, who said it was taken over Khaldiyeh by a downed surveillance aircraft, showed flattened buildings on the deserted streets.

Standing in the wreckage, a reporter for pro-Syrian government Iranian television channel al-Alam interviewed army soldiers. “Our will is strong, and we are determined to chase them to the end of the world,” one said.

The government launched a new offensive to squeeze out pockets of resistance in Homs a month ago after seizing the nearby border town of Qusair , cutting rebel supply lines to the central Syrian city that has been a bastion of opposition to Assad’s rule. In addition to the symbolic significance, controlling Homs would help the government secure a clean sweep of territory from the coastal ports of Latakia and Tartus to the capital, Damascus.[/qutoe]

Mike Wednesday 31 Jul 2013

Minor aside -- US senator Rand Paul speaks against sending arms to Syria this last Friday:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/embed/2xjc-ToK7AQ

In related news, Rand also introduced an amendment to end the $1.5 billion aid package sent to Egypt each year. His proposal was defeated today, but at least it got a vote.

Niccolo and Donkey Wednesday 31 Jul 2013

A soldier loyal to the Assad regime stands in front of the damaged Khaled Ibn al-Walid mosque. Syrian government forces captured the 13th-century mosque on Saturday

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A Syrian government tank rolls in the al-Khalidiya district

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Destroyed buildings on a deserted street in the besieged city

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Syrian government forces patrol in the al-Khalidiya neighbourhood

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An aerial view of destruction in the al-Khalidiya neighbourhood

Niccolo and Donkey Wednesday 31 Jul 2013

Destroyed buildings surround the Khalid Ibn al-Walid mosque

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Syrian army soldiers patrol in the streets of al-Khalidiya

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Smoke rises near the Khalid Ibn al-Walid mosque

Vuk Thursday 1 Aug 2013

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/embed/4GQRf1auUMc

Mike Thursday 1 Aug 2013

^Holy shit!

Google (possible mis)translation of video title and description:

From Aljazeera (see another video at site):

Deadly explosions hit Syria's Homs

Forty people killed and 160 people wounded in blasts in city's district of Wadi al-Dhahab, Syrian Observatory says.

Forty people were killed and at least 160 people were wounded in explosions at a weapons cache in the central Syrian city of Homs, an activist group opposed to President Bashar al-Assad said.

The blast occurred in the south-eastern district of Wadi al-Dhahab on Thursday, which the army has taken over, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The group has a network of sources in the opposition and state security forces.

The Observatory said the casualties were soldiers and civilians and that some of the wounded were in a critical condition.

Activists told Al Jazeera that the explosions were a result of rebel shelling of the Wadi al-Dahab area. One activist said the blasts were "massive" and were heard from kilometres away. He could not confirm the target was the city's arms depot.

Niccolo and Donkey Friday 2 Aug 2013

Angocachi Longface SweetLeftFoot

Here's another great piece by M K Bhadrakumar. Read the whole article, it's not that long. Here's the best part :

Whereas the Russian focus will be on paving the way for a political track leading to a level playing field in the presidential election due in Syria in 2014, the US-Saudi-Israeli problem with that is, Assad's prospects of winning in that election and ruling Syria with greater legitimacy than ever before are excellent as things stand today.

The fact remains that for a very substantial section of the Syrian people, Assad stands between them and the deluge that is enveloping the Muslim Middle East.

Enter Bandar. The forte of the Saudi prince lies in finessing Salafist fighters as instruments of regional policy, something that fits in with the broader US's geo-strategies as well in the so-called Greater Middle East (including Afghanistan and Central Asia).

The Saudi-backed coup in Egypt reinforces the US-Saudi axis in Syria. The interim government in Cairo has reverted to the full-throttle collaboration with the Israeli security establishment characteristic of the Hosni Mubarak era, which is something that pleases Washington. Most important, Riyadh and Cairo have given a big hand to kick-starting the stalled Middle East peace talks, which is a significant contribution to the US's desperate need to be seen as a benevolent mediator.

Over and above, the sidelining of Qatar has removed a maverick while the puncturing of Turkey's pretensions as the leader of the Arab people ensures that the US-Saudi axis has a better control over the conduct of the covert war in Syria.

A slap in the face
Most certainly, Bandar's intention was to fathom the mood in Moscow at a juncture when US-Russia ties are poised to take a tumble over the case of the ex-CIA whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Simply put, there is a high probability of the Syrian conflict taking a new geopolitical dimension by locking in big power rivalry. The influential US senator John McCain said Thursday that Moscow's decision on Snowden is "a slap in the face of all Americans". He said in a statement,

Now is the time to fundamentally rethink our relationship with Putin's Russia. We need to deal with the Russia that is, not the Russia we might wish for. We cannot allow today's action [on Snowden] by Putin to stand without serious repercussions. Today's action by Putin's Russia should finally strip away the illusions that many Americans have had about Russia in the past few years. We have long needed to take a more realistic approach to our relations with Russia, and I hope today we finally start.

Meanwhile, Russian media reported intercepts of message addressed to "jihadists" from North Caucasus to look to join the holy war in Russia rather than proceed to Syria, and to "prepare for the so-called Olympics Games in Sochi [February 2014]."

Don Johnson Friday 2 Aug 2013

CIA 'running arms smuggling team in Benghazi when consulate was attacked'

The CIA has been subjecting operatives to monthly polygraph tests in an attempt to suppress details of a US arms smuggling operation in Benghazi that was ongoing when its ambassador was killed by a mob in the city last year, according to reports.

Up to 35 CIA operatives were working in the city during the attack last September on the US consulate that resulted in the death of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans, according to CNN .

The circumstances of the attack are a subject of deep division in the US with some Congressional leaders pressing for a wide-ranging investigation into suspicions that the government has withheld details of its activities in the Libyan city.

The television network said that a CIA team was working in an annex near the consulate on a project to supply missiles from Libyan armouries to Syrian rebels.

Sources said that more Americans were hurt in the assault spearheaded by suspected Islamic radicals than had been previously reported. CIA chiefs were actively working to ensure the real nature of its operations in the city did not get out.

So only the losses suffered by the State Department in the city had been reported to Congress.

"Since January, some CIA operatives involved in the agency's missions in Libya, have been subjected to frequent, even monthly polygraph examinations, according to a source with deep inside knowledge of the agency's workings," CNN reported.

The Syria Analysis Thread

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