Syrian Civil War: News #4

Vann7 wrote:

Those 90 km will not matter ,as soon Aleppo falls and IDLIB , Syria with the help of Russian airforce LOCK the border effectively moving 30km beyond the border. and still will lock it.
Anything that try to fly or travel from Turkey to Syria will need to pass through Syrian army
temporary moved border control.  So effectively ISIS supply lines will be cut.  

And when the time is right that Russia cleared all eastern Syria from Southern Syria to the near north.. Russia can retake completely the border and even even engage the turkey army directly
if try to stop Syria from COntrolling its own territory .

Looks similar to the Situation of Russian special forces that took an airport in Serbia to block
NATO from taking it. What they did? they block the gates of the airport.. and lock the Russian troops there , So Turkey will be unable to defend or hold for long the border inside Syria. Will have to move their artillery inside Syria that can be bombed. Once Aleppo taken + the 90km border locked by Syrian army.. the war in north of Syria will effectively won.. the trucks with food and oil and ammunition will no longer have a place to transit from Turkey inside Syria.. And Supply drops by plane can be bombed by Russia. Then it will be then when they move towards Raqqa and take easter Syria.

I predict that things will get really ugly for Turkey.. Because once ISIS and ALqaeda defeated..
RUssia and Syria can supply weapons to the Kurds to start fighting Turkey and Reverse the war against them.. IF Russia ,IRAN and Syria support the syrian Kurds with weapons and logistics to fight Turkey it will be the end of that nation. Kurds control like 30% of Turkey territory that is very mountain like and impossible for tanks to enter..and very high altitude terrain ,which makes  easy for manpads to reach high altitude flying planes .  

So i predict a major Russia retaliation to Turkey (but also to Saudi Arabia) through a proxy war through kurds if they continue with their hostilities. and support to ISIS and Alqaeda.

Morpheus Eberhardt wrote:Do you think anybody has ever cared about a Turkish "red line" intended only ever for its domestic consumption?

George1 wrote:If ISIL is totally defeated then probably will withdraw in SouthEast Turkey regions and then who knows what can happened concerning Turkey's internal stability

According to the Syrian Arab Army Spokesman, the Syrian Air Force carried out 114 sorties that targeted 447 militant sites in the Damascus Countryside, Homs, Hama, Idleb, Aleppo, Deir Ezzor, and Lattakia provinces in the time frame between November 15th-20th.

http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/19400/

Dima wrote:


btw, can our French members translate what is it written


"world exclusive: Bashar Al-Assad"
"You cannot battle with Daesh and rely on Qatar and KSA as allies who arm the terrorists."
War with barbarians. Tracking the islamists and stopping immigration.

iad tawil ‏@IadArtwork Nov 19
NewCartoon: Supporting one #terrorisme leads to another. #Syria #Paris #ParisAttacks #PrayForParis #Hollande #ISIS

ShahryarHedayatiSHBA wrote:Here we go again:

Islamist Rebels Capture Several Sites in Southern Aleppo


http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/islamist-rebels-capture-several-hilltops-in-southern-aleppo/

Zivo wrote:Do not bite my head off for this. I'm going to post this map only as a visual aid as it's circulating on twitter... but it's not accurate. About the bottom-rightmost 1/3 of the JaF "recaptured" territory was never taken by the SAA, it was only contested rebel territory. I'm sure there's plenty more inaccuracies across the entire map.

Siempre_Leal wrote:

Zivo wrote:Do not bite my head off for this. I'm going to post this map only as a visual aid as it's circulating on twitter... but it's not accurate. About the bottom-rightmost 1/3 of the JaF "recaptured" territory was never taken by the SAA, it was only contested rebel territory. I'm sure there's plenty more inaccuracies across the entire map.

I wonder if SAA/Hezbollah and other Shia groups actually took ICARDA in the first place? wouldn't there be pics? now its allegedly under Al-Fatehs/AQ hands...

Zivo wrote:

Siempre_Leal wrote:

Zivo wrote:Do not bite my head off for this. I'm going to post this map only as a visual aid as it's circulating on twitter... but it's not accurate. About the bottom-rightmost 1/3 of the JaF "recaptured" territory was never taken by the SAA, it was only contested rebel territory. I'm sure there's plenty more inaccuracies across the entire map.

I wonder if SAA/Hezbollah and other Shia groups actually took ICARDA in the first place? wouldn't there be pics? now its allegedly under Al-Fatehs/AQ hands...

I think most of these Al nusra "gains" are just contested territory.

For example, this is Al nusra supposedly taking a SAA "controlled" town, yet you can see a Hell cannon and fortifications right on the edge of the town there. Indicating that the rebels had some control.

Get Out Of Your Trucks And Run Away": US Gives ISIS 45 Minute Warning On Oil Tanker Strikes

Last week, in the wake of Russian and US airstrikes on ISIS oil convoys, we asked three important questions:

Who are the commodity trading firms that have been so generously buying millions of smuggled oil barrels procured by the Islamic State at massive discounts to market, and then reselling them to other interested parties? In other words, who are the middlemen?
Can it possibly be true, as officials now claim, that the Obama administration refrained from bombing Islamic State oil trucks because Washington thought the group was “only” making $100 million per year instead of $400 million?
Is it likely, considering how cavalier the US is about collateral damage from drone strikes, that The Pentagon refused to take out Islamic State’s revenue stream because the military was afraid of killing a few “innocent” truck drivers who by definition knew they were transporting illegal crude for a terrorist organization?
The first question is, for now anyway, unanswerable. As to the second and third, here’s what we said:

Perhaps the US overestimated the effect its airstrikes were having on Islamic State’s oil production capabilities and perhaps The Pentagon was concerned with killing innocent truck drivers, but it could also be that, as Sergei Lavrov suggested earlier this month, the US has until now intentionally avoided hitting ISIS where it hurts in order to keep them in the game and ensure they can still be effective at destabilizing Assad. If you cut off the oil trade, they lose the ability to battle the regime.
Whatever the case, it's too late now, because just as Russian airstrikes and the Iranian ground presence forced the US to do something - anything - to prove to the world that America is serious about fighting terrorism, Moscow's targeting of ISIS oil convoys has forced the US to get on board (the Russians are going to hit them anyway, so there's no point in vacillating).

American airstrikes reportedly destroyed 116 oil tanker trucks earlier this month and another 280 today in Paris mastermind Abdelhamid Abaaoud's former fiefdom of Deir ez-Zor.

Of course the US would hate to catch ISIS off guard risk killing innocent truck drivers, so prior to the November 16 strike, US planes dropped leaflets warning the drivers to "get out of your trucks now, and run away from them." Here's the leaflet (note the stick figures running for their lives):

...

Zivo wrote:

Siempre_Leal wrote:

Zivo wrote:Do not bite my head off for this. I'm going to post this map only as a visual aid as it's circulating on twitter... but it's not accurate. About the bottom-rightmost 1/3 of the JaF "recaptured" territory was never taken by the SAA, it was only contested rebel territory. I'm sure there's plenty more inaccuracies across the entire map.



OK, over the last week, we know the SAA reached the peak of their first S. Aleppo offensive and stopped to avoid overextending. They dug in, and waited for the Al Nusra counter attack from Idlib, which over the last few days has been ongoing. As you all know, this is textbook warfare, Military Strategy 101. The SAA have the advantage in this terrain. They have armor, and Al Nusra relies on light infantry. The topography is mainly flat with small hilltops doting the land. This forces defensive troop concentrations along a few predicable points, or out into the open, both options catering to the RuAF.

This is the weak point along the rebel line. The SAA intentionally chose this flanking path instead of pushing north out of Hama. Al Nusra's hand was forced, they had no choice but to pull their Idlib reserves to confront the SAA/Hezbollah/IRGC at this location, as it's the last strategic point before Saraqib and Idlib proper. If Al Nusra's reserves are defeated here, the path to Idlib will be cleared, and the southern most rebel positions risks division.

The back and forth is expected during the dig in/counterattack phase so don't be upset by it. It's not about territory since all the terrain in this region is homogeneous and equally worthless, it's about attrition. The SAA have to deplete Al nusra's reserves, and this is a good battlefield to do it in. What few videos the rebels have uploaded, shows unsupported infantry waves moving across open fields and tiny villages like ISIS did during their counterattack at Kweires/Al Safira. This is a freaking godsend.


Keep in mind, there are those reports and pics of T-90A's in Aleppo, if Russia was going to launch a shock assault, this is the place to do it. A victory here could put the SAA at the gates of Idlib.