Syrian Civil War: News #2

What an irony ???
Do you remember, that americans had said Russia will suffer heavy casualties at airraids in Syria...

US air force fighter jet crashes after finishing tour of duty in Syria

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3282653/US-air-force-fighter-jet-crashes-taking-RAF-Lakenheath-Suffolk.html?ito=social-twitter_dailymailUK

Update : MQ-1 Predator UAV crashes in Turkey near Incirlik

Update 2: Islamic State currently assaulting kweires airbase. Situation unclear but base perimeter may have been breached...:?

Update3: #AhrarSham say that a drone landed near their HQ then exploded killing at least 1 militant

Update4: #SAA & Hezbollah assert control over Kadar and advance towards Al-Hadher in south Aleppo countryside

Solncepek wrote:What an irony ???
Do you remember, that americans had said Russia will suffer heavy casualties at airraids in Syria...

US air force fighter jet crashes after finishing tour of duty in Syria

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3282653/US-air-force-fighter-jet-crashes-taking-RAF-Lakenheath-Suffolk.html?ito=social-twitter_dailymailUK

Think that is a bit of a stretch of the imagination. Not sure how a crash at Lakenheath has much to do with air raids.

Also, there is no indication that that Marine F-18 was active over Syria. As a carrier based aircraft it was as likely to have been used over Iraq.

EDIT

Sorry, got to eat my words here. Looks like it was a Jordan based aircraft which could well have hit Syrian targets..

On Oct. 21, a U.S. Marine Corps F/A-18C Hornet belonging to VMFA-232 crashed shortly after take off from RAF Lakenheath. Unfortunately, the pilot died in the incident: according to some reports he didn’t manage to eject but avoided the plane from crashing on some houses.

The aircraft was part of a flight of four Marines Hornets returning stateside after being deployed to the Middle East (Jordan) to support Operation Inherent Resolve against ISIS in Syria and Iraq. The first 6 out of 18 VMFA-232 F/A-18C arrived at Lakenheath from Souda Bay, on Oct. 17. The Aviationist’s photographer Tony Lovelock was there and took the photographs you can find in this post. All the aircraft had bomb markings painted below the cockpit: the CAG bird had 72 ones, whereas the 165230/WT-11 sported 55 bombs.

http://theaviationist.com/2015/10/21/vmfa-232-crash-in-uk/


ANOTHER EDIT

Now the US are saying that it started its journey in Bahrain, probably stopping in Jordan, like Crete, to refuel. So it may only have been active in Iraq.

"The A-10 is going to war once again — this time in Syria, where its particular brand of close-air support is needed to augment the faster jets that have been bombing ISIS targets for more than a year. “There are A-10s arriving in Incirlik [Air Base], and I don’t have the exact number…and this was part of a regular rotation that was planned,” said Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook. It’s not the first time the Thunderbolt II has been sent to fight ISIS — last November, several Indiana Air National Guard were sent to help out in Iraq — but this latest deployment is sure to add fuel to the long-simmering debate over the Air Force’s push to retire the cheap, slow-flying, highly effective attack planes.



Mentioned airbase in Turkey

Cook also said that U.S. and Russian defense officials had signed a memorandum of understanding that lays out safe-conduct measures for each nation’s pilots over Syria. “The [memorandum of understanding] includes specific protocols for aircrews to follow,” he said. “These protocols include maintaining professional airmanship at all times, the use of specific communication frequencies, and the establishment of a communication line on the ground.” Cook stressed the memo should not be viewed as an “agreement” because Washington does not agree with Moscow’s actions in the Syrian crisis. “The MoU does not establish zones of cooperation, intelligence sharing or any sharing of target information in Syria,” he said. “The discussions through which this MoU was developed do not constitute U.S. cooperation or support for Russia’s policy or actions in Syria. In fact, far from it. We continue to believe that Russia’s strategy in Syria is counterproductive. And their support for the Assad regime will only make Syria’s civil war worse.”

Both nations will also form a working group to ensure the measures are followed, Cook added. Meantime, while the Pentagon laid out these new safe conduct measures, the Russian defense ministry released footage of its jets circling what appears to be a U.S. Reaper drone in the Syrian skies."

Source: http://www.defenseone.com/management/2015/10/a10s-are-heading-back-war/122961/

Severe Clashes/Infighting Reported:
1. Nusra vs Southern Front In Darra
2. Ahrar vs Al-Aqsa In Aleppo

As a CK2 character would say "haha, the fools are fighting amongst themselves"

https://twitter.com/HISTROIKA/status/652846949926862848/photo/1
^ Its a good one so share and spread this simple message.

Also, a good expose on the 'moderate terrorists'
Photo Proof ~ Identifying the “FSA” ~ [WARNING: Disturbing Images]
https://syrianfreepress.wordpress.com/2015/10/11/identifying-fsa/

Solncepek wrote:Update 2: Islamic State currently assaulting kweires airbase. Situation unclear but base perimeter may have been breached...:?

Hope the perimeter is intact. Kuwayres airbase need to be linked without any loss now. SAA men have defended it for over 2 years and nothing should be lost when its so close. I feel/think Kuwayres could/should be a staging ground for an assault on Raqqah and further east and north.

Regarding Raqqah, its looking like a Berlin kind of affair. Oldest demo-crazy, the US will be eager to kick the IS out before SAA/Russia/Hez/Iran, through the Kurdish forces, so that they can make it a poster stuff for their fight against the IS. After all taking the capital of IS is a big stuff for demo-crazies.

Cheetah Forces Enters Sheikh Ahmad – 4km Left to Lift the Siege of Kuweires Airport
http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/breaking-cheetah-forces-enters-sheikh-ahmad-4km-left-to-lift-the-siege-of-kuweires-airport/

This is a good one as no major town/point (maybe one on the base perimeter - Kuwayres Sharqi) now stand between the Cheetha forces to connect with the air-base.

Map earlier posted by zg18 for reference.
https://www.russiadefence.net/viewimage.forum?u=http%3A%2F%2Fs2.img7.ir%2FCzKZy.jpg

SAA advanced further towards the Kweirs airbase, taking the ceramics factory and killing 14 ISIS.

PapaDragon wrote:

Solncepek wrote:....................

Update : MQ-1 Predator UAV crashes in Turkey near Incirlik

Update 2: Islamic State currently assaulting kweires airbase. Situation unclear but base perimeter may have been breached...:?

Update3: #AhrarSham say that a drone landed near their HQ then exploded killing at least 1 militant

Update4: #SAA & Hezbollah assert control over Kadar and advance towards Al-Hadher in south Aleppo countryside

Sources? Links? Anything?

Update 1 https://www.russiadefence.net/t3351p90-us-air-force-discussion-and-news post 94

PapaDragon wrote:

Solncepek wrote:....................

Update : MQ-1 Predator UAV crashes in Turkey near Incirlik

Update 2: Islamic State currently assaulting kweires airbase. Situation unclear but base perimeter may have been breached...:?

Update3: #AhrarSham say that a drone landed near their HQ then exploded killing at least 1 militant

Update4: #SAA & Hezbollah assert control over Kadar and advance towards Al-Hadher in south Aleppo countryside

Sources? Links? Anything?

"U.S. Air Forces in Europe and Air Forces Africa Public Affairs

10/21/2015 - RAMSTEIN AIR BASE, Germany -- An Air Force MQ-1 Predator Remotely Piloted Aircraft crashed in Southern Turkey at approximately 9:36 p.m. local time, Oct. 19, 2015.

The aircraft experienced mechanical failure after conducting a mission in support of Operation Inherent Resolve. The Air Force maintained positive control and brought the aircraft down in an unpopulated area.

There were no military or civilian injuries. The U.S. Military and Turkish officials have positive control of the aircraft. An investigation is underway to determine the specific cause of the crash."

Source: http://www.usafe.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123461411

I posted this today in USAF thread.

When its about assault on Airbase i saw this: https://twitter.com/markito0171/status/656898400961564672

This will up the anti. The US, doubling down, obviously thinks there are lots of tanks to hit, ISIS of course.

Navy Cmdr. Elissa Smith, a Defense Department spokeswoman, confirmed Tuesday that the U.S. has sent A-10s to Turkey after the French news agency Agence France Presse reported that 12 A-10s had arrived at Incirlik Air Base. The A-10s and airmen are with the 75th Fighter Squadron from Moody Air Force Base, Georgia, Smith told Air Force Times. They are replacing six F-16s that have been flying combat missions against the Islamic State from Incirlik since August.

“The planes are deploying as part of OIR [Operation Inherent Resolve] and will be available to be flown in either Iraq or Syria depending upon the need," Smith said in an email Tuesday.

Ground troops love the A-10 because its 30mm gun has often meant the difference between life and death, but the Air Force has tried to retire the aircraft to meet the deep spending cuts imposed by Congress. Retired Gen. Mike Hostage, the former head of Air Combat Command, told reporters in July 2014 that the A-10 could not survive combat missions in Syria, but A-10s went on to prove him wrong.

http://www.airforcetimes.com/story/military/2015/10/20/-10s-deploy-turkey-fight-isis/74288250/



According to an article from the Turkish daily Hürriyet, this deployment has been the most extensive one by the U.S. since Turkey decided to open Incirlik for coalition forces fighting against the ISIS terror organization in Syria and Iraq. The U.S. had earlier deployed six F-16 jets and 300 soldiers at Incirlik along with three Predators, of which one had to make an emergency landing in Turkey's southern Hatay province on Monday. There are also U.S. helicopters and a search and rescue crew in the Diyarbakır Airbase.

The A-10's are expected to target tanks and other armored vehicles used by ISIS, however, the number such vehicles held by ISIS is unknown and used very limitedly in warfare. Meanwhile, Soviet-made tanks also make up the bulk of the Syrian regime forces and are being used extensively both in rural and urban warfare.

http://www.dailysabah.com/syrian-crisis/2015/10/20/us-deploys-six-a-10-tank-hunter-jets-in-turkeys-incirlik-airbase

PapaDragon wrote:

JohninMK wrote:..................
Update 1 https://www.russiadefence.net/t3351p90-us-air-force-discussion-and-news post 94

Militarov wrote:.......................

"U.S. Air Forces in Europe and Air Forces Africa Public Affairs

10/21/2015 - RAMSTEIN AIR BASE, Germany -- An Air Force MQ-1 Predator Remotely Piloted Aircraft crashed in Southern Turkey at approximately 9:36 p.m. local time, Oct. 19, 2015.

The aircraft experienced mechanical failure after conducting a mission in support of Operation Inherent Resolve.  The Air Force maintained positive control and brought the aircraft down in an unpopulated area.

There were no military or civilian injuries. The U.S. Military and Turkish officials have positive control of the aircraft. An investigation is underway to determine the specific cause of the crash."

Source: http://www.usafe.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123461411

I posted this today in USAF thread.

Thank you guys.

I was hoping that Solncepek might finally start posting some links himself but I guess it ain't happening...

Surprise, surprise! Predator drone crashes in Southern Turkey, not all that far from Kras-4's 'sphere of influence'.

Solncepek wrote:What an irony ???
Do you remember, that americans had said Russia will suffer heavy casualties at airraids in Syria...

US air force fighter jet crashes after finishing tour of duty in Syria

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3282653/US-air-force-fighter-jet-crashes-taking-RAF-Lakenheath-Suffolk.html?ito=social-twitter_dailymailUK

Are there any evidence/pictures actually showing the pieces of an F-18 around Lakenheath? The "report" at the link provided is too "descriptive" for not being suspicious.

Heavy and bloody fighting at kweires airbase. Many casualties on both sides reported...
I hope they will withstand this night and tomorrow the blockade will be broken...

Solncepek wrote:Heavy and bloody fighting at kweires airbase. Many casualties on both sides reported...
I hope they will withstand this night and tomorrow the blockade will be broken...

How do kweires defences look like and what forces are stationed there?

I checked the are on Google Maps - the area is 100% flat and every attack, even by numerically superior enemy, should end with a bloodbath for the attacking force. I don't believe SAA didn't plant hundreds of mines in the expected direction of IS assault.

Morpheus Eberhardt wrote:

Solncepek wrote:What an irony ???
Do you remember, that americans had said Russia will suffer heavy casualties at airraids in Syria...

US air force fighter jet crashes after finishing tour of duty in Syria

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3282653/US-air-force-fighter-jet-crashes-taking-RAF-Lakenheath-Suffolk.html?ito=social-twitter_dailymailUK

Are there any evidence/pictures actually showing the pieces of an F-18 around Lakenheath? The "report" at the link provided is too "descriptive" for not being suspicious.

Probably difficult to get 'this is definitely a F-18' pictures when the crashed aircraft is in the middle of fields and the police don't want anyone to get near. This is probably as good as it gets atm. There is probably little doubt that the plane went down and of course the plane may have gone down somewhere else and this is just for public consumption.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-34593948

Solnepeck you comment as if you are on ground zero. Kindly provide sources to back your claims.

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:

Solncepek wrote:Heavy and bloody fighting at kweires airbase. Many casualties on both sides reported...
I hope they will withstand this night and tomorrow the blockade will be broken...

How do kweires defences look like and what forces are stationed there?

I checked the are on Google Maps - the area is 100% flat and every attack, even by numerically superior enemy, should end with a bloodbath for the attacking force. I don't believe  SAA didn't plant hundreds of mines in the expected direction of IS assault.

The whole area of the airbase surrounds should be within range of advancing Syrian Army artillery by now. That should give some relief.

This should have the SAA and RuAF really worried after the stunning Saudi and UAE work in Yemen..

Throughout Syria’s bloody civil war, the government of Qatar has been an active supporter of anti-government militants, providing arms and financial backing to so called "rebels." Many of these, like the al-Nusra Front, were directly linked to al-Qaeda. That strategy has, of course, done little to put a dent in terrorist organizations in the region.

But as Russia enters its fourth week of anti-terror airstrikes, Qatar has indicated that it may launch a military campaign of its own. "Anything that protects the Syrian people and Syria from partition, we will not spare any effort to carry it out with our Saudi and Turkish brothers, no matter what this is," Qatar’s Foreign Minister Khalid al-Attiyah told CNN on Wednesday, when asked if he supported Saudi Arabia’s position of not ruling out a military option. "If a military intervention will protect the Syrian people from the brutality of the regime, we will do it," he added, according to Qatar’s state news agency QNA.

Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad was fast to warn the Middle Eastern monarchy that such a move would be a disastrous mistake with serious consequences. "If Qatar carries out its threat to militarily intervene in Syria, then we will consider this a direct aggression," he said, according to al-Mayadeen television. "Our response will be very harsh."

Still, Attiyah stressed that Qatar is also considering a more diplomatic solution to the crisis in Syria.

Read more: http://sputniknews.com/middleeast/20151021/1028898327/qatar-syria-intervention.html#ixzz3pEwupLs9

Russian TV in Latakia

Can't SAA call Russian air power to help in Kweiris? Together with deploying reinforcements via Mi-24s?

JohninMK wrote:This should have the SAA and RuAF really worried after the stunning Saudi and UAE work in Yemen..

Throughout Syria’s bloody civil war, the government of Qatar has been an active supporter of anti-government militants, providing arms and financial backing to so called "rebels." Many of these, like the al-Nusra Front, were directly linked to al-Qaeda. That strategy has, of course, done little to put a dent in terrorist organizations in the region.

But as Russia enters its fourth week of anti-terror airstrikes, Qatar has indicated that it may launch a military campaign of its own. "Anything that protects the Syrian people and Syria from partition, we will not spare any effort to carry it out with our Saudi and Turkish brothers, no matter what this is," Qatar’s Foreign Minister Khalid al-Attiyah told CNN on Wednesday, when asked if he supported Saudi Arabia’s position of not ruling out a military option. "If a military intervention will protect the Syrian people from the brutality of the regime, we will do it," he added, according to Qatar’s state news agency QNA.

Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad was fast to warn the Middle Eastern monarchy that such a move would be a disastrous mistake with serious consequences. "If Qatar carries out its threat to militarily intervene in Syria, then we will consider this a direct aggression," he said, according to al-Mayadeen television. "Our response will be very harsh."

Still, Attiyah stressed that Qatar is also considering a more diplomatic solution to the crisis in Syria.

Read more: http://sputniknews.com/middleeast/20151021/1028898327/qatar-syria-intervention.html#ixzz3pEwupLs9

Well then how's Jordan reacts ? Saudi and Qatar has no land border with Syria.. If they want to attack Syria.. it can only be done from air.. Through Iraqi or Jordan airspace. Same for land operation... Jordan or Iraq will need to be consulted/join their cause.

max steel wrote:Solnepeck you comment as if you are on ground zero. Kindly provide sources to back your claims.

It's just posts on Russian forums saying there is heavy fighting going on...apparently the shelling is very intense and can be heard in Aleppo.