The Syria Analysis Thread

10 posts

Niccolo and Donkey
Pure politicking and optics. By drawing the FSA in, they completely remove the USA from the equation. If not, the FSA gets destroyed. Much of its leadership has already been killed this past month.

As for the offensive, yes it's slow, but everyone said that there would be no lightning gains in the first phase.
Fitz

World | Sat Oct 24, 2015 6:12am EDT
Related: World, Syria

Battle cuts Syrian government-held road to Aleppo: monitor

BEIRUT

The main supply route into government-held areas of Aleppo has been cut by fierce fighting between Syrian government forces and Islamic State, a group that monitors the civil war said on Saturday.

Islamic State fighters launched an attack on a road southeast of the northern city on Friday morning, initially detonating two car bombs, according to the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Observatory, which reports on the Syrian war using a network of sources on the ground, said several dozen combatants from both sides had been killed.

Islamic State members, speaking to Reuters via internet from inside Syria, said their group had taken control of the road southeast of Aleppo -- Syria's most populous city and commercial hub before the war broke out in 2011.

There was no mention of the battle on Syrian state media, which reported that government forces had seized control of the village of al-Jaboul in a nearby area. Syrian officials could not immediately reached for comment.

Aleppo is divided into a western section controlled by the government, and an eastern section held by insurgents.

The attack by Islamic State on the road appears to be a response to the government advance towards the Kweiras air base, where Syrian troops are besieged by Islamic State fighters.

The government ground offensive is backed by allied militia and Russian air strikes.

A separate ground offensive is also targeting Syrian rebel groups to the south and southwest of Aleppo and government forces have captured a number of villages in that area.

Niccolo and Donkey
Niccolo and Donkey
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President Camacho
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/u-s-deploy-special-operations-forces-syria-official-n454506

U.S. to Deploy Special Operations Forces in Syria: Officials

A senior administration official confirmed that President Barack Obama has authorized a contingent of less than 50 special operations forces to deploy into northern Syria.

....

The move will be described as a "shift" but not a "change" :tard2: in U.S. strategy against ISIS, another senior U.S. official told NBC News. The official said the special operations forces will be stationed in northern Syria and work alongside groups with a "proven track record" of fighting ISIS.
Fitz
Month of Russian air strikes on Syria kill nearly 600: monitor

BEIRUT
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Civilians inspect a site hit by what activists said were air strikes carried out by the Russian air force on Reef al-Mohandeseen area in the western countryside of Aleppo, Syria October 21, 2015.

Reuters/Hosam Katan

Russian air strikes on Syria have killed nearly 600 people, a third of them civilians, since Moscow started its aerial campaign a month ago, a group monitoring the war said on Thursday.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which collects information from a network of sources on the ground, said the Russian strikes had killed 185 civilians and 410 fighters from various insurgent groups.

Russia has said it is targeting Islamic State fighters and other jihadists in Syria and has denied its bombing has resulted in civilian casualties.


Niccolo and Donkey

More progress south of Aleppo....Jaysh al-Islam getting rocked by Hezbollah.

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Fitz
ISIS Seizes City of Mheen in Central Syria

Takeover Gives ISIS Path to Attack Christian Towns

by Jason Ditz, November 01, 2015

ISIS forces today captured the central Syrian city of Mheen, an oasis about 20 km east of the highway connecting Damascus to the key city of Homs. The takeover is by far the farthest west ISIS has pushed inside Syria so far.

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The ISIS attack began with a pair of suicide car bombings , and left about 50 casualties among government soldiers. ISIS took the city relatively quickly, and fighting continues on the outskirts, as ISIS pushed on moving against the Christian towns nearby .

Indications are that ISIS is moving northwest, which could mean they’ll eventually challenge for control over the city of Homs itself. This would be another huge loss for the Syrian government, and would effectively cut off metro Damascus from the government’s coastal possessions.

ISIS made its first cautious inroads into the Homs Province back in spring, and with the takeover of Mheen they seem to control a broad section of the province, including the key city of Tadmur and most of the area near the own capital city of Raqqa.
Niccolo and Donkey
Fitz

They took a checkpoint staffed by a few guys after a ceasefire was broken. There were no SAA in the town itself and reinforcements were brought to Sadad, which repulsed ISIS thereafter.
Niccolo and Donkey

Erdogan has warned the Kurds not to cross the Euphrates and cut supply lines to ISIS. The Turks have been bombing the Kurds for four days now to prevent this.

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