Featured War In Syria Watching The Wolfowitz Doctrine Go Down In Flames

NATO Threatens To Send In Troops After Russia Stations Ground "Battalion" In Syria

As the propaganda “war” between East and West intensifies ahead of what might ultimately transform into an actual war in the skies above Syria, the world is transfixed with the scope of Russia’s week-old military campaign in support of the Assad regime.

Thanks to the fact that the West selected Islamic militants as its anti-Assad weapon of choice, Putin gets to pitch the entire effort as a “war on terror” which means The Kremlin effectively has a license to brag and sure enough, slickly-produced ISIS videos of beheadings have now been definitively replaced by slickly-produced videos of Russian warships launching cruise missiles at terrorist targets.

In short, Moscow is on a roll both militarily (of course that’s not difficult when you’re a superpower playing against a couple of JV militias) and perceptually, which makes it possible to continually ratchet up the pressure on anti-regime forces as the global applause only seems to grow with each incremental escalation much to chagrin of both the Pentagon and Washington’s Mid-East allies and as we said earlier this week, "a very likely course of events is that despite Russia's denials, the Pentagon will use the gambit of a Russian ground campaign, credible or not, to get permission from Congress to send a 'small', at first, then bigger ground force of US troops in Syria to, you guessed it, 'fight ISIS', but really to do everything to prevent Russian troops from taking over key strategic positions."

On Thursday we get the latest set of headlines from Syria, starting with NATO asserting that Russia has a ground battalion at the ready supported by tanks. Here’s Reuters:

Continue . . . http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-...ssia-stations-ground-battalion-and-nato-threa

European Publishers Pretend that Obama Is Right and Putin Is Wrong

Eric Zuesse

A typical example is Christophe Leclercq’s Euractiv website, news for Europeans. (Leclercq “was EU Commission official with DG Competition (coordinator for Information Society). Before that, he was a management consultant with McKinsey.”)

On Thursday October 8th, his euractiv bannered, “NATO says will defend Turkey against Russian airspace violations” — a headline that suggests perhaps World War III will be sparked by Russia’s military campaign against the Sunni extremists in Syria, and that Russia had therefore better stop it right now. This article opened: “NATO said today (8 October) it was prepared to send troops to Turkey to defend its ally after violations of Turkish airspace by Russian jets bombing Syria, and Britain scolded Moscow for escalating a civil war that has already killed 250,000 people” (as if all of those 250,000 were killed by Assad’s forces instead of by the ones that America/NATO is backing). Turkey has, in fact, beensupporting the Islamists — Sunnis who demand that sharia law be imposed on Syria — and NATO is supposedly (according to this article) threatening to send “troops” into Turkey in order to stop Russia’s military campaign against that jihad. But nowhere in the article itself is any evidence provided to back up that allegation of NATO’s considering “to send troops to Turkey.” Instead, the article is sheer scaremongering in order to get the site’s sucker-readers to demand that Russia stop so as to avoid ‘provoking’ a nuclear conflict with the good guys: NATO. NATO is presented as the peace-advocate, Russia (which had nothing to do with starting this war) as being the war-monger. “‘There has to be a political solution, a transition,’ [NATO Secretary-General Jens] Stoltenberg said.” (As if NATO and Turkey should determine Syria’s leader, not the Syrian public, whom all polls show would win a democratic election in a landslide. The hypocrisy of the Western press is blatant. Even Obama’s constant allegations that Assad was responsible for the August 2013 sarin gas attack are blatant lies: whereas Obama might have been behind that attack, Assad couldn’t even possibly have been. The rocket had been fired from the U.S.&Turkey-controlled area.)

Continue . . . http://www.washingtonsblog.com/

 

Greenwald: Obama Cannot Simply Apologize For Committing War Crimes

Journalist Glenn Greenwald slammed the president in a CNN interview Wednesday, for delivering a lame apology to the Doctors Without Borders organisation, following the US airstrike on their hospital in Afghanistan.



“Doctors Without Borders, the organization that has run this hospital for five years, has made very clear that they’re not most interested in hearing apologies or claims of mistake or collateral damage,” Greenwald urged.

“They want only one thing, and that is an independent, impartial investigation to find out what really happened here, who made the decision to bomb this hospital and what it is that they knew.” the reporter added.

“Unfortunately the U.S. government, even through today as President Obama is apologizing, has made clear that they will refuse to cooperate with that kind of investigation because they say they’re investigating themselves.” Greenwald noted.

The journalist penned a piece this week documenting how the official explanation behind the airstrike on the hospital has radically shifted from mistake to justification.

Greenwald explains how the airstrike wasn’t an accident at all, and that the U.S. military intentionally targeted the hospital, with the Pentagon claiming Afghan authorities called in the airstrike.

Greewald has also slammed the mainstream media, particularly CNN and the New York Times, for “shameful” reporting on the airstrike.

Continue . . . http://www.prisonplanet.com/greenwald-obama-cannot-simply-apologize-for-committing-war-crimes.html

Hope you got a chance to view the video before it was taken down.

 

ISIS Seizes Villages North of Aleppo City

BEIRUT—ISIS extremists seized several villages from rival insurgents north of Aleppo city Friday, in a surprise attack that came despite intensive Russian airstrikes that Moscow insists are targeting the extremist group, activists said.

Iranian state media reported that a senior commander in Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guard was killed by the ISIS group on the outskirts of Aleppo city, but it was not immediately clear whether Gen. Hossein Hamedani’s death was related to the new ISIS offensive.

An Iranian state television report said he was killed while “carrying out an advisory mission.” It didn’t provide any further details. The official IRNA news agency read a statement by the Guard in which it blamed ISIS for his death.

The new developments come amid a wave of Russian airstrikes that have targeted insurgents fighting to topple President Bashar Assad, and a ground offensive by the Syrian army in the country’s central region.

Moscow says it is targeting mainly Islamic State militants, but U.S. officials and Syrian rebels have said the strikes have hit mainstream rebels for the most part and are designed to shore up Assad’s embattled government and troops.

Continue . . . http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/1874680-isis-seizes-villages-north-of-aleppo-city/

Mainstream rebels? Must be the new mainstream code for Islamic extremists backed by Saudi Arabia the CIA and the State Dept.

http://www.baptistboard.com/threads/unmasking-isis.96000/

 

Russian Air Force destroys 29 ISIS camps in Syria in 24 hours

Russian warplanes in Syria have bombed 29 terrorist field camps and other facilities of the militant group Islamic State in the past 24 hours, the Russian Defense Ministry reported.

“Our aviation group over the past day has destroyed two militant command centers, 29 field camps, 23 fortified facilities and several troop positions with military hardware,” ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said Saturday.



The Russian Air Force conducted 64 sorties and hit a total of 55 targets, he said.

He added that the Russian effort has “considerably degraded” the strength of the terrorist forces in Syria.

Continue . . . https://www.rt.com/news/318193-russian-military-syria-isis/

 

Blast Shakes Ankara Just in Time to Justify NATO Incursion into Syria

October 10, 2015 (Tony Cartalucci - LD) - A massive blast has killed at least 30 and injured over 100 more in NATO-member Turkey's capital of Ankara. The blast appears to have targeted the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) who was holding a peace rally at the moment of the explosion.

CNN would report in their article, "30 killed in bombing near main train station in Turkey's capital," that:

At least one powerful bomb hit near the main train station in the Turkish capital Saturday morning, killing 30 people,authorities said, making it the deadliest attack in Ankara in recent memory.

It would also claim that:

Continue . . . http://landdestroyer.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/blast-shakes-ankara-just-in-time-to.html

A Decisive Shift In The Power Balance Has Occurred

Paul Craig Roberts

The world is beginning to realize that a seachange in world affairs occured on September 28 when President Putin of Russia stated in his UN speech that Russia can no longer tolerate Washington’s vicious, stupid, and failed policies that have unleashed chaos, which is engulfing the Middle East and now Europe. Two days later, Russia took over the military situation in Syria and began the destruction of the Islamic State forces.

Perhaps among Obama’s advisors there are a few who are not drowning in hubris and can
understand this seachange. Sputnik news reports that some high-level security advisors to Obama have advised him to withdraw US military forces from Syria and give up his plan to overthrow Assad. They advised Obama to cooperate with Russia in order to stop the refugee flow that is overwhelming Washington’s vassals in Europe. The influx of unwanted peoples is making Europeans aware of the high cost of enabling US foreign policy. Advisors have told Obama that the idiocy of the neoconservatives’ policies threaten Washington’s empire in Europe.

Continue . . . http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2015/10/10/decisive-shift-power-balance-occurred-paul-craig-roberts/

 

NATO ready to defend Turkey amid 'troubling escalation' of Russia in Syria

BRUSSELS – NATO secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said alliance defense ministers on Thursday will consider the implications for NATO's own security of the "troubling escalation of Russian military activities" in Syria.

He said NATO is ready to deploy forces, if needed, to defend alliance member Turkey.

Continue . . . http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/1...tcmp=ob_article_sidebar_video&intcmp=obinsite

Good ole Fox News always ready to help start another war. But wait, in another Fox News report . . .

EXCLUSIVE: Russian jets 'intercept' US predator drones over Syria, officials say

Russian fighter jets shadowed U.S. predator drones on at least three separate occasions high above Syria since the start of Russia’s air campaign last week, according to two U.S. officials briefed on this latest intelligence from the region.

Meanwhile, U.S. Navy Captain Jeff Davis told reporters a U.S. aircraft flying over Syria had to be rerouted to avoid a Russian fighter jet at least once.

“We have taken action to maintain safe separation,” Davis said, adding that the U.S. aircraft "changed path a little bit." He did not disclose which type of U.S. aircraft was involved.

U.S. officials tell Fox News the drone encounters took place over ISIS-controlled Syria, including its de facto headquarters in Raqqa, as well as along the Turkish-Syrian border near Korbani. Another occurred in the northwest, near the highly contested city of Aleppo.

“The first time it happened, we thought the Russians got lucky. Then it happened two more times,” said one official.

The U.S. military's MQ-1 Predator drone is not a stealth aircraft.

"It is easy to see a predator on radar," said one official.

The Russians have not attempted to shoot down any of the U.S. drones, but instead have flown "intercept tracks," a doctrinal term meaning the Russians flew close enough to make their presence felt, according to one official.

< snip >


Over the past weekend, Turkey claims that Russia on two separate occasions violated its airspace. Despite Turkish pressure on NATO and top US government officials calling the action "unprofessional" and a "provocation" two senior US military officials downplayed the incident.

"The Russians flew along the border and we still don't know for sure what happened."

Continue . . . http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/1...-us-predator-drones-over-syria-officials-say/

The question, if US military officials don't know for sure what happened with the Russian jets on Turkey's border why is Fox News trying to make it sound like it was a premeditated act?

Sounds to me like Turkey is using the same tactics to get Russia and the US going at each other that the Ukrainian coup government used.

Looking up some old threads for "context".

https://www.baptistboard.com/threads/the-fake-war-on-isis-us-and-turkey-escalate-in-syria.95405/

https://www.baptistboard.com/threads/the-eurasian-big-bang.95274/#post-2160425

https://www.baptistboard.com/threads/us-ned-ignores-saudi-barbarism.95138/

https://www.baptistboard.com/threads/marketing-the-‘russian-threat’.94964/

Ukraine and the Apocalyptic Risk of Propagandized Ignorance

This book may very well be the best written one I’ve read this year. It puts all the relevant facts — those I knew and many I didn’t — together concisely and with perfect organization. It does it with an informed worldview. It leaves me nothing to complain about at all, which is almost unheard of in my book reviews. I find it refreshing to encounter writers so well-informed who also grasp the significance of their information.

Cover-up: Feds change “official story” on syria after pentagon linked to isis

https://www.baptistboard.com/threads/cover-up-feds-change-“official-story”-on-syria-after-pentagon-linked-to-isis.94300/

Show Me The Proof.

If anyone here who has been claiming Russia has invaded Ukraine without provocation can provide solid evidence that it is indeed the case please do it here.

Snears jeers and smears are not solid evidence.

https://www.baptistboard.com/threads/show-me-the-proof.86902/

 

Syrian army, Russian jets drive back rebels in fiercest clashes for days: monitor


Syrian army and allied forces supported by Russian warplanes made further advances as they pressed an offensive against insurgents on Monday, in the fiercest clashes for nearly a week, a monitor said.

Russian jets carried out at least 30 air strikes on the town of Kafr Nabuda in Hama province in western Syria, and hundreds of shells hit the area as the Syrian army and Hezbollah fighters seized part of it, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad have in the past few days recaptured territory close to the government's coastal heartland in the west thanks to Russia's intervention, reversing rebel advances made earlier this year.

Moscow says its air campaign targets Islamic State, but most of the strikes have hit rival insurgent groups fighting against Assad, some of which are supported by the United States.

Continue . . . http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/12/us-mideast-crisis-syria-russia-idUSKCN0S60RT20151012


The Syrian Observatory For Human Rights said . . . click the link or go back to post #14 -15.

Rami Abdul Rahman is the mainstream media's "go to" propagandist when it comes to Syria.

 

Obama Defends The Failure Of His Syria Policy Before A Belligerent 60 Minutes

Yesterday, in a comprehensive take down of Obama's handling of the second Syrian proxy war in three years (which is not over yet), we summarized events as follows: "The Tragic Ending To Obama's Bay Of Pigs: CIA Hands Over Syria To Russia."

The facts, which are largely undisputed, confirm this: having achieved no progress "against ISIS", the stated goal of US intervention in Syria, and no progress in kicking Assad out of office and starting the Qatar has pipeline to Europe, the real goal of US intervention in Syria, the top democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, said that Obama "is debating the merits of taking further action or whether they are better off letting Putin hang himself."

By "hanging himself", the democrat meant handing Syria over to the Kremlin on a silver platter after just a few short weeks of Russian military intervention in Syria which has crushed US supply routes to ISIS and other CIA-sponsored rebel groups, and once again - just like in 2013 - put a premature end to US attempts to overthrow yet another head of state.

Fast forward to today when in what may have been the most awkward 60 Minutes interview for Obama before the US nation, Steve Kroft asked Obama about Trump, about Hillary, but it was Obama's take on the US loss in (and of) Syria and the Russian gains there, and everywhere else, that demonstrated two things.

The first is just how marginalized the US has suddenly become in the global arena, with an impotent and insolvent Europe behind its back for moral if no other support, opposing a suddenly ascendant Russian axis in the middle-east, one which has China's backing, especially in the aftermath of the quite demonstrative US implementation of the TPP which is meant first and foremost to offset China's rising trade influence in the region.

The second is the extent of Obama's delusion, or perhaps it was merely his spin relying on the naivete of the US public when it comes to foreign affairs, about the above mentioned snubbing of a superpower that until recently nobody dared to challenge unilaterally in the global arena.

The full exchange is presented below. We still can't decide if Kroft's at times near-aggressive belligerence toward the president was actually genuine, or as revealed previously especially in the case of the 2011 60 Minutes interview of Julian Assange, the host was directly instructed by the administration on how to approach the topics at hand, and to make Obama squirm on purpose, so as to make the loss more palatable to the people of America.

Continue . . . http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-...ailure-his-syria-policy-beligerent-60-minutes

 

Glad you like this thread so far. Stay tuned there's lots more to come.

The U.S. Government Supplied ISIS’ Iconic Pickup Trucks

U.S. counter-terror officials have launched an investigation into how ISIS got so many of those identical Toyota pickup trucks which they use in their convoys.

They don’t have to look very far …

The Spectator reported last year:

The [Toyota] Hilux [pics] is light, fast, manoeuvrable and all but indestructible (‘bomb-proof’ might not, in this instance, be a happy usage). The weapons experts Jane’s claimed for the Hilux a similar significance to the longbows of Agincourt or the Huey choppers of Nam. A US Army Ranger said the Toyota sure ‘kicks the hell out of a Humvee’ (referring to the clumsy and over-sized High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle made by AM General).

Continue . . . http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/10/the-u-s-government-supplied-isis-iconic-pickup-trucks.html

U.S. PARTNERS WITH KURDISH WAR CRIMINALS IN FIGHT TVERTHROW AL-ASSAD

The U.S. has green lighted sending weapons to a new group, the Democratic Forces of Syria. The group includes the Kurdish YPG militia.

It is not clear how this latest plan will work out considering the YPG’s pan-ethnic stance. It claims to protect all the communities in the region, including “Salafi-jihadi organizations that are trying to impose an Islamic state on Syria,” according to Global Security.

DIA documents from 2012 reveal the U.S. wants to establish a Wahhabist principality in Syria, so the inclusion of Salafi-jihadi organizations in the new coalition is likely not a problem.

Even more problematic is the fact the YPG has cooperated with the Syrian government.

Jason Ditz writes:

US military officials were quoted saying they were going to provide “fresh weapons” to the new faction, and get them to attack Raqqa, the capital of the ISIS caliphate. The rebels have expressed confidence that they could capture the city in “less than two months” if given enough weaponry, though most US efforts to arm rebels have ended up with ISIS coming out even stronger at the end, and with a bunch of new US-made weapons.

The YPG, a Kurdish acronym for the People’s Defense Units, is accused of engaging in war crimes, specifically ethnic cleansing. This brings into question its stated objective of protecting all communities in the region.

Continue . . . http://www.infowars.com/u-s-partners-with-kurdish-war-criminals-in-fight-to-overthrow-al-assad/

US Senate Hearing Discusses Using Refugees as Human Shields in Syria

October 12, 2015 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - A recentUS Senate hearing regarding Russia's ongoing air campaign in Syria plumbed dark depths when it was actually proposed by retired US Army General John M. Keane that "free zones" be established for armed militants, and populated with refugees to deter Russian attacks. In essence, General Keane's plan is to use refugees as human shields, and leverage any attack on this established "free zone" as a means of manipulating public opinion.

The US Strategy Until Now

The recent multinational anti-terror operation led by Russia at the request of the Syrian government has dealt the United States and its narrative regarding its own military intervention in Syria a severe blow.

It has become abundantly clear that not only has the United States been arming and funding extremists inside of Syria, including groups operating in tandem with listed terrorist organizations like Al Qaeda's Al Nusra Front, it also appears that the US has feigned its campaign against the so-called "Islamic State" (ISIS/ISIL).

While the US now poses as determined to "defeat" ISIS in Syria, just last year talking points circulatedabout instead "containing" the terrorist organization within Syria - essentially letting it ravage the country, degrade the fighting capacity of the Syrian government and hopefully, lead to the collapse of Damascus.

Within the pages of the Brookings Institution - a corporate-financier funded think-tank whose policymakers have helped engineer much of America's plans now playing out on the global stage - was a report titled, "The Big Questions on ISIS." It stated:

Continue . . . http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2015/10/us-senate-hearing-discusses-using.html#more

 

Putin Calls US, Allies "Oatmeal Heads" On Syria

To be sure, there are a lot of absurd things about what Washington has done and is currently doing in Syria.

There’s the support for Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, for instance, who has used ISIS as an excuse to wage war on his own people. Then there are the various efforts to arm and train a hodgepodge of different anti-regime rebel groups (with more embarrassing results each and every time). And just yesterday we learned that the best idea the Pentagon can come up with now is to literally paradrop “50 tons” of ammo on pallets into the middle of the desert and hope the “right” people pick it up.

Of course when it comes to absurd outcomes in Syria, it’s difficult to top the fact that at some point - and you don’t have to go full-conspiracy theory to believe this anymore - either the West or else Qatar and Saudi Arabia provided some type of assistance to ISIS, which then proceeded to metamorphose into white basketball shoe-wearing, black flag-waving, sword-wielding desert bandits hell bent on establishing a medieval caliphate.

Having said all of that, things took an even more surreal turn late last month when, after Russia stormed in via Latakia and started bombing anti-regime targets, Washington was forced to claim that somehow, Moscow’s efforts would be detrimental to the war on terror.

To be sure, there really wasn’t much else the US could say. After all, you can’t simply come out and say “well, we need to keep ISIS around actually and we’d much rather them then Putin and Assad, so no, we’re not going to help the Russians fight terror.” The only possible spin to avoid blowing the whole charade up was to claim that somehow, The Kremlin is helping terrorists by killing them (and not in the whole 72 virgins kind of way).

Now as we’ve said before, Putin is there (along with Iran) to shore up Assad. There’s no question about that and Moscow hasn’t been shy about saying it. But at the end of the day, when you are trying to wipe out your friend’s enemies and some of those enemies are terrorists, well then, you are fighting a war on terror by default and that’s not good for terrorists by definition. By denying this, the US is effectively arguing against a tautology which is never a good idea, and we’re running out of ways to describe the ridiculousness of it.

Fortunately, Vladimir Putin is not running out of colorful descriptors.

Here’s Bloomberg with some amusing excerpts from a speech he gave at an annual conference organized by VTB Capital in Moscow on Tuesday:

Continue . . . http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-13/putin-calls-us-allies-oatmeal-heads-syria

 

MOSCOW’S EMBASSY ROCKETED AFTER U.S. ARMED AL-NUSRA CALLS FOR KILLING RUSSIANS

"An eye for an eye," the al-Nusra statement declared

AFP reports claim the rockets were fired by “Islamist rebels” from the eastern edge of the capital.

Around 300 people were outside the embassy demonstrating in support of Russia’s effort to bolster the al-Assad government and target jihadi and other U.S. and Saudi proxies.

No deaths or injuries were reported.

The attack followed a call by al-Nusra to kill Russians. The jihadi terrorist organization collaborates with and receives arms from U.S. “vetted” groups in Syria.

“If the Russian army kills the people of Syria, then kill their people. And if they kill our soldiers, then kill their soldiers. An eye for an eye,” declared Abu Mohamed al-Jolani, the head of al-Nusra in Syria.

Jolani called on the “heroic Mujahideen” in the Caucuses to attack Russians.

Continue . . . http://www.infowars.com/moscows-emb...-s-armed-al-nusra-calls-for-killing-russians/

 

ISIS In "Retreat" As Russia Destroys 32 Targets While Putin Trolls Obama As "Weak With No Strategy"

Perhaps the most amusing thing about Russia’s intervention in Syria is the degree to which it made the world wake up and question the West’s “anti-ISIS” strategy.

While everyone has been quick to characterize Moscow’s actions as the latest and perhaps greatest example of Vladimir Putin calling Washington’s bluff, it’s important to understand exactly why that’s an accurate characterization here. That is, this is more than just Moscow betting it could support Assad and Washington would simply move out of the way.

This was Russia and Iran realizing that the only reason the US and its regional allies have been able to keep up appearances in the eyes of the public with regard to the “campaign” against ISIS, is because the public has never seen what happens when someone powerful makes a serious effort to eradicate the group. Once Russia moved in, gave the superpower greenlight for Iran to abandon all pretense that it isn’t also directly involved, and began racking up gains in a matter of days, the Western public was left to wonder why the US couldn’t accomplish in 13 months what Russia appeared to have accomplished in a matter of (literally) 72 hours.

Then, just in case anyone was tempted to write off the discrepancy as a lack of US resolve or (gasp) diminishing American military capability, Moscow very publicly asked the US to join Russia in striking terrorist targets. Putin effectively said this: “You’re obviously no good at this, but that’s ok because we’re all in this together, so come help us.”

Of course that’s not what The Kremlin really meant - that was just the line fed to the public. What Moscow was really saying was this: “Checkmate, Washington. Either i) admit to the public you’re more concerned about ousting Assad than you are about eliminating the group who you’ve held up to the media as the scourge of humanity that must be eliminated at all costs, or ii) tell us you’re sorry and help us bomb the very same groups you helped create on the way to restoring the very same regime you created those groups to oust, or iii) pack up, turn tail, and get the hell out of the way.”

This put Washington into panic mode.

There was no explaining it to the public without somehow trying to convince everyone that Putin and Assad are worse than the white basketball shoe-wearing, black flag-waving, sword-wielding desert bandits that until recently were cutting people’s heads off and burning people alive on the nightly news in slickly-produced videos complete with eerie-sounding (at least to a Western viewer) music in the background.

And so, the US is now hoping to muddle through with this excuse: “Russia’s actions will only make things worse.”

Needless to say, even the clueless Western public is beginning to smell a rat here.

Continue . . . http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-...ets-while-putin-trolls-obama-weak-no-strategy

 

The thing about ragtag groups of militants that display a penchant for extreme violence is that in the absence of serious opposition, they can rack up gains at an alarming pace.

Of course there are plenty of (possibly credible) theories out there, which suggest that some of what you see in the videos released by ISIS is for show and we won’t endeavor to assess the degree to which the group’s brutality is real versus staged, but one thing is clear: regardless of who is funding, training, and/or supporting them, there are obviously fighters on the ground in the Mid-East waving the ISIS flag and committing atrocities in its name.

That works well when it comes to destabilizing fragile states that are already beset with sectarian bickering on the way to claiming large swaths of territory from a defenseless citizenry.

But you can’t intimidate a modern fighter jet by waving around a sword and if you’re a newbie on the Mid-East militant scene, you can’t scare a three decade veteran by beheading a couple of people, which is why if you’re ISIS, the combination of the Russian Air Force and Hezbollah ground troops is absolutely terrifying.

As we documented earlier today, Hezbollah and Iranian troops are advancing on Aleppo and Moscow is backing the offensive from the sky which means that the hodgepodge of anti-regime forces that control Syria’s largest city will almost (and we say "almost" because there are no sure things in war) certainly be routed in a matter of weeks if not days, which would effectively serve to restore the Assad regime in Syria.

After that, the Russian bear and Qasem Soleimani will turn their eyes to the East of the country and at that point, it is game over for ISIS.

Apparently all of the above isn’t completely lost on al-Nusra and Islamic State fighters because if you believe the Russian media (and we’re not saying you should), Sunni extremists are now shaving off their beards and running for their lives. Here’s Sputnik:

Continue . . . http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-...ers-cut-beards-and-run-away-russia-iran-close

 

Multipolarism Solves Syria at the Source

October 16, 2015 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - The Syrian conflict is profoundly misrepresented across the entirety of the Western press.

To call it a civil war is a gross mischaracterization. The entire conflict was engineered and fueled from beyond Syria's borders. And while there are a significant number of Syrians collaborating with this criminal conspiracy, the principle agents driving the conflict are foreigners. They include special interests in the United States, across the Atlantic in Europe, and regional players including Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Israel.

Syria is far from an isolated conflict. America's interest in dividing and destroying Syria is part of a much larger agenda serving its aspirations both in the region and globally. The division and destruction of Syria as a functioning, sovereign nation-state is admittedly meant to set the stage for the conquest of Iran next.

US End Game in Syria is Just the Beginning for Wider Regional War

Reuters recently published an op-ed titled, "Syria’s one hope may be as dim as Bosnia’s once was," which argues that the only way the US can cooperate with Russia regarding Syria is if all players agree to a weakened, fragmented Syria.

If this scheme sounds familiar, that is because this op-ed was authored by Michael O'Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution - a corporate-financier funded think-tank that has in part helped engineer the chaos now consuming the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). O'Hanlon previously published a paper titled, "Deconstructing Syria: A new strategy for America’s most hopeless war," in which he also calls for the division and destruction of Syria.

Continue . . . http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2015/10/multipolarism-solves-syria-at-source.html#more

 

One Story Shows Just How Insane U.S. Drone Policy Is

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know that U.S. drone policy is insane.

But one story told by the main drone whistleblowing reporter – Jeremy Scahill – shows just how insane it really is.

Specifically, Scahill explained today that Americans target TALL people in Afghanistan and other countries … assuming that tall men must be Arabs or “foreign fighters.”

In one instance, the U.S. targeted for drone assassination a man who they thought was unusually tall. In reality, he was a normal-size man … who happened to be surrounded by children.

The U.S. killed the man and all of the children (other than perhaps a single survivor):



Continue . . . http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/10/one-story-shows-how-insane-u-s-drone-policy-is.html

 

Syrian Showdown: Russia, Iran Rally Forces, US Rearms Rebels As "Promised" Battle For Aleppo Begins

On Friday, we previewed the battle for Aleppo, Syria’s largest city prior to the war.

It’s now run by a hodgepodge of rebels and militants including al-Qaeda, the Free Syrian Army, and ISIS and for the Assad regime, regaining control of the city is absolutely critical. As Reuters noted last week, "the assault means the army is now pressing insurgents on several fronts near Syria's main cities in the west, control of which would secure President Bashar al-Assad's hold on power even if the east of the country is still held by Islamic State."

In other words, if Assad can secure Aleppo, Iran and Russia will have successfully restored his grip on the country for all intents and purposes.

Here’s a look at a map showing where Aleppo is in relation to Russia’s base at Latakia, along with the before and after images we highlighted last week which depict nighttime light emissions on the way to vividly demonstrating the effect the war has had on the city.

Continue . . . http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-...s-us-rearms-rebels-promised-battle-aleppo-beg

 

Sen. Paul Says Syria No Fly Zone 'Dumbest Idea'

 

Putin: US Using Terrorists as ‘Battering Ram to Overthrow Disliked Regimes’

“Why play with words dividing terrorists into moderate and not moderate. What’s the difference?”

During the 12th annual meeting, entitled “Societies Between War and Peace: Overcoming the Logic of Conflict in Tomorrow’s World,” Putin spoke to numerous international issues including the ongoing war in Syria and the West’s questionable practices in the fight against Bashar al-Assad.

“Success in fighting terrorists cannot be reached if using some of them as a battering ram to overthrow disliked regimes,” Putin said. “It’s just an illusion that they can be dealt with [later], removed from power and somehow negotiated with.”

Putin also took aim at so-called US-backed “moderate rebels,” who admittedly support and fight alongside terrorist organizations such as ISIL and the al-Nusra Front.

“Why play with words dividing terrorists into moderate and not moderate,” the Russian president added. “What’s the difference?”

Since entering the battlefield, Russia has been accused by the US of bombing moderate groups and not ISIL. According to Putin, the US has thus far refused to provide intel on what areas should or shouldn’t be targeted.

“We are being criticized for allegedly hitting wrong targets. Tell us which targets are correct, if you know. But they keep silence,” Putin stated. “Tell us which targets we must not hit — they also refuse to.”

“The international community should realize who we’re dealing with. An enemy, in fact, of civilization, humanity and world culture.”

Continue . . . http://www.prisonplanet.com/putin-u...tering-ram-to-overthrow-disliked-regimes.html

 

Presstitutes At Their Work

Paul Craig Roberts

The Western media has only two tools. One is the outrageous lie. This overused tool no longer works, except on dumbxxxx Americans.

The pinpoint accuracy of the Russian cruise missiles and air attacks has the Pentagon shaking in its boots. But according to the Western presstitutes the Russian missiles fell out of the sky over Iran and never made it to their ISIS targets.

According to the presstitute reports, the Russia air attacks have only killed civilians and blew up a hospital.

The presstitutes fool only themselves and dumbxxxx Americans.

The other tool used by presstitutes is to discuss a problem with no reference to its causes. Yesterday I heard a long discussion on NPR, a corporate and Israeli owned propaganda organ, about the migrant problem in Europe. Yes, migrants, not refugees.

These migrants have appeared out of nowhere. They have decided to seek a better life in Europe, where capitalism, which provides jobs, freedom, democracy, and women’s rights guarantee a fulfilling life. Only the West provides a fulfilling life, because it doesn’t yet bomb itself.

The hords overrunning Europe just suddenly decided to go there. It has nothing to do with Washington’s 14 years of destruction of seven countries, enabled by the dumbxxxx Europeans themselves, who provided cover for the war crimes under such monikers as the “coalition of the willing,” a “NATO operation,” “bringing freedom and democracy.”

Continue . . . http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2015/10/24/presstitutes-at-their-work-paul-craig-roberts/