"Novorossia" flag.
Attachment 19512
Attachment 19513
Or was it a rhetoric question?
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"Novorossia" flag.
Attachment 19512
Attachment 19513
Or was it a rhetoric question?
It was a rhetoric question, but still congrats on recognizing it.
I thought he was either Scottish or a Confederate, but thanks for clearing that up.
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
I've been observing this flag for close on three years now.
Meanwhile Kurds yield what they have gained to Assad. To avoid an encounter with the Turks?
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-39140880
To Syria, not Assad, and yes, they want the Syrian Army as a buffer-zone.
There are even talks of giving Manbij to Syria, but I doubt it.
Kurdish took that area from Isis control, not from Assad regime.
At this moment Turkish backed militias are clashing with YPG at the area, so their concern is quite realistic. With this attack against the Kurds. Turkey is only playing at the hand of Isis, because i doubt Kurds are going to continue their push against Raqqa while being attacked themselves by the so called "Euphrates shield" forces.
Yet they have been fighting whoever they could on their own without proclaiming allegiance to Assad. And they are a separate party of the civil war. Thus I don't believe they are totally ready to let Assad rule them again. And I doubt they would let Assad further than Manbij.
No one is saying that they are ready to unconditionally submit to Assad, but they are not actively fighting his regime either. In any case Turkish backed forces are hostile to Syrian Kurdish while Assad at least for the moment have other more pressing issues to deal with. What is common with both Assad and the Syrian Kurdish is that they both feel threatened by increasing influence of Turkey in Northern Syria. Like i said before. Turkish backed campaign against Isis seems nothing else then cover for them to check the two Syrian Kurdish owned territories from joining together at their Southern border.
On a more basic level this may be a case of "better the devil you know". The Syrian army are probably better than whatever loons the Turks are backing.
Apparently, by now the Syrian Army is an Alawite-populated husk of commissioned officers and heavy weapons units that leaves most of the ground fighting to sectarian militias, i.e. more of a brand than a professional institution. Could explain why they've performed much better on the offense than defense.
I don't think this crop will ever prove up to storming the Golan Heights. Maybe the air force has improved?
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017...l-assad-syria/
War, what is it good for?
Possibly Trump's approval ratings.
The situation seems nothing as black and white as you paint it:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-39508868
The thing is. Assad regime troops and Russian are covering the back of the Syrian Kurdish forces at Manjib from the Turkish backed forces. The Syrian Kurdish forces are attacking Isis capital Raqqa together with US forces.
But no, lets turn this into fight between US backed forces and Russian backed forces and let the real enemy ISIS to have a nice breather.:wall:
There no sense to believe that chemical weapons were used. All videos of them are staged. At least this is what Russia states.
http://24-my.info/zakharova-called-s...-syrian-idlib/
Russia knows extremism for what it is:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/...b0917d3476f919
Kage - complete the song lyric.
"War - what is it good for? Absolutely nothing."
That's hardly me painting things black and white, is it?
On the other hand, let's consider our willingness to continue to ignore the atrocities of the Assad Regime, this isn't even the first chemical attack.
The reality is that the only reason we haven't all-out crushed Assad by this point is Russian opposition. We need to face up to the fact that such an endeavour would be hard, and that's why we don't do it. No matter how many Syrians we re-settle we aren't addressing the core of the problem, Assad's oppression of his own people is what started this war. If Assad is not removed this war will only end when all the Syrians are dead, they have already ground swathes of their second city to rust fighting over it.
If Assad were removed, perhaps the various sides could come to some sort of accommodation, and then we would be able to remove ISIS from the region.
Edit:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-39522312
Looks like Trump is actively moving to a military solution, possible to cripple the Syrian Air Force.
"Cast your mind back to what President Trump said about Barack Obama, when the then president said a red line had been crossed and he did nothing about it afterwards.He heaped derision on President Obama. If Mr Trump were not to act now, he would look weak and he wouldn't want that."
It's true, Obama did say use of chemical weapons was a "red line" but nothing happened after they were apparently used.
US Launches Dozens of Missiles at Syrian Air Bases
https://nyti.ms/2oO4J9K
Stupid motherfucker
In my 8-d chess world, this is the deep state fracturing trumps base so it will be easier to impeach him
Few in his political base will grief that much about a missile strike, and more than a few will like it. Ground troops is what sways the opinion.
Just the one airfield? Not necessarily a miscalculation - it will depend on how the rules shift.
But it does mean that there can only be escalation from this response; inconveniencing the Syrian air force every time there is a high-profile chemical strike or crime against humanity (and no more) would get boring fast. Sisyphean slope, and all that.
So this would be rather useless as an isolated act, but by the same token putting it out as part of a potential system is what makes it risky.
The direct recipient, Assad, is only one of the people for whom this is intended as a cautionary message. Iran and NK are also on the list.
Counter theory to my theory. Putin got tired of Assad after the latest chemical attack and is giving Trump this mess, figuring he can hammer out a gas deal with whatever hellish theocracy comes to power. RT tweeted that Russian forces were warned before the attack.
this also serves as a major distraction from a scandal ridden 100 days.
B-b-but guys, I thought I had voted for the pacifist one, not war-crazy Shillary.
I thought we were gonna invade Saudi Arabia not bomb Syrian pilots. Did the God-Emperor lie t-t-to gain votes? Won't we drain the swamp until we MAGA it to death?!
That is not true. Obama was going to force the USA to war, against US opinion and against the opinion of its Allies in the UK (parliament had vote and said no). Russia came in and said "We will do a deal with Assad and get rid of all the chemical weapons.. that will make you happy, da?" and Obama agreed to it.
This happened while Xi Jinping is in the US to meet Trump. This is clearly a message to China and North Korea.
The message to NK was obvious.
The message to PRC a little less direct. Trump would certainly appreciate real Chinese pressure on NK to stop the crap. And China traditionally has taken a dim view of things happening in NK because of its proximity to the Middle Kingdom itself.
Russia condemns U.S. missile strike on Syria, suspends key air agreement
Quote:
Russia on Friday condemned a U.S. missile strike against Syrian government forces as an attack on its ally and said it was suspending an agreement to minimize the risk of in-flight incidents between U.S. and Russian aircraft operating over Syria.
Even as Russian officials expressed hope that the strike against Syrian President Bashad al-Assad’s forces would not lead to an irreversible breakdown in U.S. relations with Moscow, the Kremlin’s decision to suspend the 2015 memorandum of understanding on the air operations immediately raised tensions in the skies over Syria.
[...]
Russia on Friday condemned a U.S. missile strike against Syrian government forces as an attack on its ally and said it was suspending an agreement to minimize the risk of in-flight incidents between U.S. and Russian aircraft operating over Syria.
Even as Russian officials expressed hope that the strike against Syrian President Bashad al-Assad’s forces would not lead to an irreversible breakdown in U.S. relations with Moscow, the Kremlin’s decision to suspend the 2015 memorandum of understanding on the air operations immediately raised tensions in the skies over Syria.
[...]
Two U.S. military officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Friday morning that they were aware of Russia’s stated intention to suspend the channel, but it was not yet clear how losing it may affect air operations. The Pentagon was still assessing the situation, they said.
[...]
There have been no reports of Russian casualties in Friday’s strike, but Syrian officials claimed that civilians, including children, were killed in the attack.
In Moscow on Friday, a Russian Defense Ministry spokesman, Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, said Russia would help strengthen Syrian air defenses to “protect the most sensitive Syrian infrastructure facilities.”
Konashenkov said the attack destroyed a warehouse, classrooms, a cafeteria, six Mig-23 fighter jets that were being repaired and a radar station. The runway and other aircraft were not affected, he said.