Syria Superthread [merged]

[tomahawk6]

The FSA captured a Russian intelligence site on the Israeli border.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/10/07/syrian-rebels-seize-russian-spy-station-near-israeli-border.html?via=desktop&source=twitter#

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GDDbYfp7Sc&feature=youtube_gdata_player

 

[George Wallace]

Google Earth

Latitude:  33° 3'46.58"N

Longitude:  35°59'32.37"E

[Edit to add:
Interestingly, if you scroll out a bit, five clearly defined dug-in  anti-aircraft missile battery positions are visible to the Southwest. ]

 

[MilEME09]

I keep waiting for Turkish intervention to save the town.They did say the other day that they wouldnt let Kobane fall.Warthogs may arrive in time,but will need coordination with the ground.

considering all the forces the turks are putting in place, either A) they still have chess pieces to move, or B) they are waiting for something we don't know about or have over looked

 

[CougarKing]

Mustard gas in ISIS hands?

ISIS Using Chemical Weapons against Kurdish Fighters in Kobane?

excerpts:
The MERIA Journal report noted that the type of chemical agent used on the Kurdish fighters in Kobane has been verified by its Israeli experts, who after analysing the blisters formed on the bodies on several Kurdish soldiers found that it was caused by mustard gas.

The bodies of three Kurdish fighters showed no signs of damage from bullets. Rather "...burns and white spots on the bodies of the dead indicated the use of chemicals, which led to death without any visible wounds or external bleeding," said Kurdish health minister Nisan Ahmed.

source:
http://www.ibtimes.co.in/isis-using-chemical-weapons-against-kurdish-fighters-kobane-photos-611223

 

[George Wallace]

Mustard gas in ISIS hands?

So far with all the epic fails that are posted on YouTube, and the likelihood that none of the members of ISIS have any experience in handling Chemical weapons, we may just see another case for the Darwin Awards.

 

[CougarKing]

Meanwhile, across the border in Turkey...

This could be the main reason why they`re not intervening in Kobani- they don`t want to help the Syrian Kurds get any breathing room from ISIS.

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/mideast-violence-spreads-turkey-bombs-kurdish-militants-101734509.html

Mideast crisis widens as Turkey bombs Kurdish militants
Reuters

By Daren Butler and Humeyra Pamuk | Reuters – 2 hours 19 minutes ago

By Daren Butler and Humeyra Pamuk
ISTANBUL/SURUC Turkey (Reuters) - War against Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq threatened on Tuesday to unravel the delicate peace in neighbouring Turkey after the Turkish air force bombed Kurdish fighters furious over Ankara's refusal to help protect their kin in Syria.
Turkey's banned PKK Kurdish militant group accused Ankara of violating a two-year-old cease-fire with the air strikes, on the eve of a deadline set by the group's jailed leader to salvage a peace process aimed at halting a three-decades-long insurgency.

At least 35 people were killed in riots last week when members of Turkey's 15-million-strong Kurdish minority rose up in anger at the government for refusing to help defend the Syrian border town of Kobani from an Islamic State assault.

"For the first time in nearly two years, an air operation was carried out against our forces by the occupying Turkish Republic army," the PKK said. "These attacks against two guerrilla bases at Daglica violated the ceasefire," the PKK said, referring to an area near the border with Iraq.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[CougarKing]

An update on the US-led air campaign:

Defense News

US Military: 21 Strikes Slow Islamic State Advance
Oct. 14, 2014 - 02:20PM  |  By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
WASHINGTON — US-led aircraft hammered Islamic State jihadists with 21 bombing raids near Kobane on Monday and Tuesday amid signs the strikes had “slowed” the group’s advance on the Syrian border town, the American military said.

In one of the heaviest bombardments so far against the Sunni jihadists encircling Kobane, coalition airstrikes “destroyed” two IS staging locations, a building, a truck, two vehicles, three compounds and damaged several other targets, it said.

A separate air raid in eastern Syria struck a small oil refinery, it said.

“Indications are that airstrikes have slowed ISIL advances” around Kobane, US Central Command, which is overseeing the air campaign, said in a statement.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[CougarKing]

The name of the current air operation over both Iraq and Syria has been chosen:

Defense News

Campaign Against Islamic State Named 'Operation Inherent Resolve'

The war against the Islamic State now has a name: “Operation Inherent Resolve.”

That announcement by the Joint Staff comes almost 10 weeks after the US began airstrikes in Iraq and later Syria to blunt the Islamic State, which has carved out a Taliban-like caliphate in both countries.

The Wall Street Journal reported Oct. 3 that US military leaders had rejected the name “Operation Inherent Resolve” because of a feeling that it was “just kind of ‘bleh,’ ” one unidentified military office told the newspaper.

Air Force Col. Ed Thomas, a spokesman for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, declined to comment on whether the top brass initially had rejected the name and then reconsidered it.

According to CENTCOM, the name “is intended to reflect the unwavering resolve and deep commitment of the US and partner nations in the region and around the globe to eliminate the terrorist group ISIL and the threat they pose to Iraq, the region and the wider international community. It also symbolizes the willingness and dedication of coalition members to work closely with our friends in the region and apply all available dimensions of national power necessary — diplomatic, informational, military, economic — to degrade and ultimately destroy ISIL.”

(...SNIPPED)

 

[Kirkhill]

Meanwhile, across the border in Turkey...

This could be the main reason why they`re not intervening in Kobani- they don`t want to help the Syrian Kurds get any breathing room from ISIS.

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/mideast-violence-spreads-turkey-bombs-kurdish-militants-101734509.html

A bit more context?

Turkish Strikes On Kurds Complicate Anti-IS Fight (excerpt)

(Source: Associated Press; published Oct 14, 2014)

WASHINGTON --- In a fresh test for U.S. coalition-building efforts, Turkey is launching airstrikes against Kurdish rebels inside its borders this week despite pleas from the Obama administration to instead focus on an international campaign to destroy Islamic State militants wreaking havoc in the region.

...

The Turkish airstrikes occurred Monday and marked the country's first major strikes against Kurdish rebels on its own soil since peace talks began two years ago. The strikes came amid anger among the Kurds in Turkey, who accuse the government there of standing by while Syrian Kurds are being killed by Islamic State militants in the besieged Syrian border town of Kobani.

The Islamic State militants also have targeted Kurds in Iraq, who have to some extent been able to hold off their advances.

The U.S. has been pressing Turkey - a NATO ally - to take a more active role in the campaign to destroy the Islamic State group, but unless the U.S.the Turks have said they won't join the fight -led coalition also targets Syrian President Bashar Assad's government. The Obama administration sees those as separate fights and has no appetite to go to war against Assad. (end of excerpt)

Does that leave open the option that a Kurdish overthrow of Assad and the establishment of Syria as a Kurdish state would be acceptable to Turkey?  ???

Because, if so, that is something that should be jumped on as a war aim.  It has historical antecedents and the current game needs shaking up. 

 

[a_majoor]

The problem with overthrowing Assad and making Syria a Kurdish state is there are no historic antecedents: "Kurdistan" encompasses the northern third of Iraq, and adjoining pieces of Syria, Iran and Turkey. Even if the Kurds were to overthrow Assad, the Arab population of Syria would look on them as alien conquerers.

The middle East is a toxic mixture of ethnic and religious chauvinism that cuts across current political boundaries and even across ethic groups (there are Shia and Sunni Kurds, for example).

Sadly this is really a prime example of a situation described by my namesake in the Melian dialogue:

" Since you know as well as we do that right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must"

 

[CougarKing]

What do they intend to do with antiquated MiG21s and MiG23s that have no chance against the fighters that the coalition nations fly?

:facepalm:

ISIL training pilots in 3 captured jets -monitor
World Bulletin/News Desk

Iraqi pilots who have joined ISIL in Syria are training members of the group to fly in three captured fighter jets, a group monitoring the war said on Friday, saying it was the first time that the militant group had taken to the air.

----------------------------
It was not clear whether the jets were equipped with weaponry or whether the pilots could fly longer distances in the planes, which witnesses said appeared to be MiG 21 or MiG 23 models captured from the Syrian military.

World Bulletin

 

[George Wallace]

What do they intend to do with antiquated MiG21s and MiG23s that have no chance against the fighters that the coalition nations fly?

:facepalm:

I imagine they are only teaching them how to get into the air.  Although antiquated, they make a very large "Suicide Vest".

 

[Edward Campbell]

The Globe and Mail's Jeffrey Simpson is a good, knowledgable commentator on Canadian politics, he is less certain on foreign affairs and what he says must, normally, be taken with a grain of salt, sometimes a whole shovel full of it. But, in a recent column he shows that he does understand Syria:

    "In Syria, of course, there are so many groups fighting each other – from Bashar al-Assad’s secular government dominated by the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiism, to the Islamic State and every shade in between – that the country has become the epicentre of
      intra-Islamic conflict. Syria is a cauldron of chaos into which the West has moved with the noble but nigh-impossible task of identifying and organizing “moderate” Muslims to fight simultaneously against Mr. al-Assad and the Islamic State. A mission less likely to
      succeed can scarcely be imagined."

 

[CougarKing]

Another gas facility targeted by coalition jets:

Canadian Press

US-led strike on IS-held gas facility in eastern Syria kills 8
The Canadian Press

MURSITPINAR, Turkey - A U.S.-led coalition airstrike on a gas distribution facility in a stronghold of the Islamic State group set off a series of secondary explosions and killed at least eight people in eastern Syria, activists said Saturday.

The airstrike targeted a distribution station in the town of Khasham in the oil-rich province of Deir el-Zour late Friday, Deir el-Zour Free Radio, an activist collective, said on its Facebook page. The collective named four of those killed and said another four charred bodies were placed in a nearby mosque. It said the slain men were mostly fuel tanker drivers.

Another activist group, the Deir el-Zour Network, described "long tongues of flames" from the strike. The incident was also reported by the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists inside Syria.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[CougarKing]

Perhaps the Turks tipped off ISIS on where the likely air drop zones would be?

Military.com

ISIS Fighters Seize Airdropped Weapons Meant for Kurds

Associated Press | Oct 21, 2014 | by Diaa Hadid
Fighters with the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militant group seized at least one cache of weapons airdropped by U.S.-led coalition forces that were meant to suppy Kurdish militiamen battling the extremist group in a border town, activists said Tuesday.

The cache of weapons included hand grenades, ammunition and rocket-propelled grenade launchers, according to a video uploaded by a media group loyal to the Islamic State. The video appeared authentic and corresponded to The Associated Press’ reporting of the event. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the militants had seized at least once cache, but may have seized more.

The Observatory, which bases its information on a network of activists on the ground, said the caches were airdropped early Monday to Kurds in the embattled Syrian town of Kobani that lies near the Turkish border. The militant group has been trying to seize the town for over a month now, causing the exodus of some 200,000 people from the area into Turkey. While Kurds are battling on the ground, a U.S.-led coalition is also targeting the militants from the air.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[George Wallace]

Perhaps the Turks tipped off ISIS on where the likely air drop zones would be?

Military.com

Not necessarily.  A lousy Navigator giving the "Green Light" way off the Drop Zone could cause it; as could changes in the wind; or the Friendlies did not give the correct coordinates, and perhaps were not where they should of been.  A multitude of things could have gone wrong.


[Edit to add:  Early in video, it looks like a box of No. 36 Grenades without primers and fuses.]

 

[CougarKing]

And Assad forces reportedly shoot down 2 of the 3 jets ISIS was said to have:

Reuters

Syria says shoots down two of three Islamic State jets

(Reuters) - Syria's air force has destroyed two fighter jets operated by Islamic State militants in the north of the country, Information Minister Omran Zoabi said in remarks published on Syria's state news agency SANA late on Tuesday.

A Syrian monitoring group said on Friday that Iraqi pilots trained under former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had joined Islamic State and were conducting training flights in three captured fighter jets at a air base in Aleppo province.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Islamic State, which has seized swathes of land in Syria and Iraq, had been flying the planes over the captured al-Jarrah military airport east of Aleppo.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[CougarKing]

Defense News

US-Led Strikes Kill More Than 500 Militants in Syria
Oct. 23, 2014 - 02:17PM  |  By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

MURSITPINAR, TURKEY — US-led airstrikes in Syria were reported Thursday to have killed more than 500 jihadists in a month, as Kurdish fighters readied to reinforce the embattled border town of Kobane.

An AFP correspondent across the frontier in Turkey reported fierce clashes and fresh air raids in Kobane, with heavy gun and mortar fire rocking its western side in the evening.

The Islamic State (IS) group, which on June 29 declared a “caliphate” over territory it seized in Iraq and Syria, was on Thursday described as the world’s wealthiest “terror” group, earning $1 million a day from oil sales alone.

The battle for Kobane has become crucial for both IS and its opponents, with a senior US official this week saying that the Kurds there were inflicting heavy losses on the jihadist group.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[CougarKing]

Many of these mercs are reportedly former Taliban fighters...

Wall Street Journal

Iran Pays Afghans to Fight for Assad
Offers Them $500 Stipend, Residency Benefits

Iran has been recruiting thousands of Afghan refugees to fight in Syria, offering $500 a month and Iranian residency to help the Assad regime beat back rebel forces, according to Afghans and a Western official.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, recruits and trains Shiite militias to fight in Syria. Details of their recruitment efforts were posted this week on a blog focused on Afghan refugees in Iran and confirmed by the office of Grand Ayatollah Mohaghegh Kabuli, an Afghan religious leader in the Iranian holy city of Qom. A member of the IRGC also confirmed the details.

"They [IRGC] find a connection to the refugee community and work on convincing our youth to go and fight in Syria," said the office administrator of Ayatollah Kabuli, reached by telephone in Qom. "They give them everything from salary to residency." Tehran is also offering them school registration for their children and charity cards.

Many Afghan young men have written to Ayatollah Kabuli to ask whether fighting in Syria was religiously sanctioned, his office said. He responded only if they were defending Shiite shrines. Lately, his office said he has kept silent and not even attended funerals of Afghans killed in Syria.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[Kirkhill]

How much ideology is left in the trenches?  How many of these guys are just in it for the money and the gore?

During the 30 years war, of fond memory, James VI & I, and Charles I, acted to resolve their problems with Border Reivers (think Anglo-Scots Pathans) by paying to have them formed into regiments and sailed to the continent under Border War Lords like Scott of Buccleuch. 

Many takers were found.  The alternatives being go to Ireland, like the Grahams, and take your chances on being slaughtered by Catholics.  Or stay at home and be hanged for being an Armstrong.

At least in Holland they got a chance to slaughter somebody, meals were almost guaranteed and the booty was good (both ancient and modern usage).

Stop me when it sounds familiar.