#SyraqSITREP

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Syraq SITREP 45: Israeli Missiles Strike Tiyas Air Base After Trump Threatens Assad Government Over Douma Chemical Attack

As the Russian Analyst noted in our previous SITREP, there have been media reports in Russia of American troops being targeted by 'Syrian resistance' fighters with improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and roadside ambushes. We know that one American soldier and one British servicemen were recently killed by an IED in Manbij, where the U.S./UK and France are trying to block their NATO allies the Turks from seizing the Kurdish held city and driving armed Kurds out. We also know that the Skripal case and the apparently miraculous healing of ex-GRU agent and MI6 asset Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia from poisoning with deadly novichok nerve agents is linked to what is happening in Syria. The linkage being the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), currently led by a Turkish career diplomat known for towing the NATO line, Ahmet Üzümcü.

Just as the OPCW is due to release its findings regarding what poisoned the Skripals, and when the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) was reducing the last jihadi enclave near Damascus, suddenly a chemical attack takes place in Douma. The initial reports are confused, some saying chlorine gas was used, while others describe the civilian victims as having symptoms consistent with exposure to nerve agents like sarin. Regardless, the well-orchestrated psyops campaign on Twitter sought to create the appearance of outrage, particularly among President Donald Trump's deplorable supporters, against the Assad government.

Mindful of allegations from the new media the 'moderate rebels' gas civilians in order to blame Assad, and of Russia's warnings for weeks that the jihadists would carry out a chemical false flag attack in order to prompt U.S. air strikes, the deep state/British sock puppets like Tom Rogan are saying that Douma was surrounded by the SAA before Saturday's chemical attack. They claim therefore that it would have been impossible for the jihadists to smuggle poison gas components into the encircled pocket. The fact that the SAA found factories converted into labs where chlorine or other toxic gasses could be produced in large quantities while liberating East Ghouta was not mentioned in Rogan's Washington Examiner piece targeted to conservative Trump supporters. Ghouta of course, was the scene of the 2013 sarin gas attack that killed hundreds and which prompted then President Barack Obama to threaten strikes on Damascus before Russia intervened to offer a diplomatic solution, whereby Assad surrendered his chemical arsenal to the OPCW. The Times of Israel is reporting that Iranian personnel were killed or injured in the most recent Tiyas strike, and the allegedly Iranian operated drone base at T4 was the starting point for a drone that flew into air space over the IDF-occupied Golan Heights. The IAF strike also happened after Damascus began massing troops freed up from the Ghouta operation to destroy the remaining jihadi pockets in the far south near the Golan, where Al-Qaeda has served as a 'buffer' for the Israelis.

We'll have much more to say about these developments later in the week, particularly if the neocons convince President Trump to foolishly launch more missile strikes on Syrian government forces, insisting that Russia and Iran will not dare to fight back. Do we think it's going to be World War III? Short answer: no. But we do think there will be a tough response from the Eurasian axis of Russia-China-Iran, even if it's asymmetrical.

[roguenewsdao]

Syraq SITREP 40: From Salisbury to Syria

Was the Novichok Poisoning of Sergey Skripal a Dirty Deep State Back Up Plan After Chemical False Flags Planned for Ghouta to Justify U.S. Strikes on Damascus Failed to Go Off?

As many in the new and alternative media rightly suspect, the driver of allegations Her Majesty's Government demands be taken seriously but refuses to offer compelling evidence for (including the presumably near death medical condition of a Russian citizen and resident of Moscow, Yulia Skripal) seems to be found far beyond Old Blighty. The desire to accuse Putin of something shortly before he easily wins what's expected to be a fourth and final term in office Sunday, or of somehow getting FIFA to cancel the World Cup to be hosted this summer in the Russian Federation -- both seem insufficient motives to explain the present hysterics.

Unless a planned economic shock to the rotten, tottering Western fiat currencies-led financial order is imminent, as London Paul suggested during his appearances on RogueMoney this week, the Russian Analyst's conclusion is that the Salisbury event (or non-event false flag blamed on Russia) is mostly about Syria. Namely, that the Salisbury event may have been a hastily arranged 'back up plan' after major chemical false flag attacks planned to justify direct U.S. bombing of Syrian government forces and their embedded Russian advisers failed.

The fact that Sergey Skripal's daughter was visiting him from Moscow and may have been willing to convey a message on behalf of her father to the Russian authorities concerning Sergey's involvement in generating fake kompromat about Trump for Christopher Steele and the 'ex' MI6 men at Orbis Business Intelligence could have hastened their poisoning. Regardless, likely due to superb Russian intelligence and Syrian government infiltration of the Saudi-funded jihadist organizations tasked with carrying out the chemical false flags, and with the Tiger Forces advancing rapidly to carve up militant controlled territory in Ghouta, the big false flag planned for the Damascus exurbs didn't happen. Instead, a handful of alleged chlorine poisoning incidents occurred that could not be substantiated amidst heavy conventional fighting in urban and semi-urban terrain.

Rapid Tiger Forces Advance, Russian/Syrian Intelligence Seemingly Foil Chemical False Flag

The Syrian Arab Army claim to have captured a jihadi chlorine chemical facility set up in an old factory warehouse, which may have been used to stage the attacks. As of Saturday the Associated Press reports the SAA has captured 70% of the formerly rebel (including Al-Qaeda and ISIS linked terrorists) pocket east of Damascus. Tens of thousand have fled the fighting, taking advantage of safe corridors established by the SAA and monitored by Russian drones (which presumably, are also loitering to watch the front lines for any jihadi planted chemical bombs). The only military success the jihadis could claim as some of their young men presumably ditched their trenches and fled among civilian refugees was the shoot down of a Syrian government helicopter by one of their few remaining 'Osa' SAM systems captured from the Syrian Army in 2012-13.

The Russian Defense Ministry's warnings about an imminent collection of false flag chemical attacks to be blamed on Damascus and used as a pretext for American bombing of the Syrian capitol likely also played a role. The Skripal case of course overshadowed Moscow's warnings to the Americans in the U.S. and UK media, with only a few outlets reporting Chief of Staff Valery Gerasimov's vow to defend Russian forces embedded with Syrian units if they came under attack with anti-air and possible anti-shipping strikes on US Air Force attackers and perhaps, Tomahawk-launching U.S. Navy ships in the Mediterranean. Gerasimov's public remarks and his conversation with counterpart U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford came after Defense Secretary James Mattis and more explicitly, crazed neocon UN Ambassador Nikki Haley warned of American military action if the Syrian government continued to use chemical weapons or commit atrocities in bombing Ghouta. Not content merely to threaten a country backed by the Russia/China alliance, the deranged Haley also warned that the Russian chemical attack in the UK could be repeated on the streets of New York City. In its briefing at the end of the week, the Russian Defense Ministry did not let up on warning the Americans against staging any chemical provocations. It claimed specifically that U.S. special forces or CIA were aiding jihadis with training on how to stage chemical attacks at the al-Tanf base in southeastern Syria, close to the Jordanian border.

Putin's March 1, 2018 Warning as a Deterrent Against Major American Aggression Against Damascus?

While we don't know the most decisive factor in deterring further American aggression (so far) against the Syrian government, it seems Vladimir Putin's speech of March 1 was used both to unveil weapons systems long in development and in response to Russian intelligence regarding an imminent false flag facilitated American strike on Damascus. Putin's emphasis on hypersonic weaponry that U.S. Navy AEGIS and land-based ballistic missile defense systems cannot hope to intercept-- especially the operational on Russia's Southern Military District MiG31 jets [and supposedly Iskander derived] Khinzal system -- was no accident. As London Paul says, timing is everything and Putin declared he does not bluff. Just in case anyone at the Pentagon doubted the operational status of the Mach 8 and 1,200 mile striking range capable missile, the Russian Defense Ministry prominently displayed a Khinzhal test from a MiG31 days after Putin's speech, and the test was also featured on the English language network RT.

For Moscow, creating uncertainty in the mind of the aggressor -- even if the BUK or Pantsir SAMs engaging US jets near Damascus would be flying Syrian and not Russian flags while manned by Russian crews [as happened frequently during the Vietnam War] -- is deterrence. It's one thing for members of the Trump Administration like Haley who have no concept of military realities to imagine further American impunity in striking Damascus. It's another thing for competent professionals like CJCS Dunford to tell the neocons in the Administration that they cannot expect to carry out serious strikes in populated portions of Syria closer to Russian bases on the Med without anticipating losses. Including not just downed pilots but, as the serious injury to an Israeli Air Force F16 pilot in February showed, casualties among US aviation personnel too. Which leads us to the subject of American casualties and the end of illusions regarding a riskless U.S. partition of Syria together with the Turks.

HH60 Blackhawk Down at the Syraq Border and the Risks of Further American Casualties

The crash of an HH60 Blackhawk helicopter last week, which claimed the lives of seven U.S. servicemen [several of them National Guardsmen with civilian jobs] was not due to ground fire along the Syria-Iraq border. Nonetheless, the risk that man portable surface to air missiles either in ISIS hands or deployed by Hezbollah aligned Shi'a militia infiltrators could take down American choppers in the mostly desert, U.S. maintained zone of occupation east of the Euphrates is real. As are the risks of planted IEDs or anti-tank missile ambushes of American soldiers operating alongside Kurdish SDF units near the agreed deconfliction line with pro-Damascus forces.

As we've noted previously here at RogueMoney, Iraqi Shi'a militiamen have not lost their memories of fighting American occupiers in Baghdad back in the mid-2000s Sadr City battles, nor would Hezbollah lack Iraqi volunteers [including a few Kurdish speakers] for such missions targeting American personnel in eastern Syria. Thus even if Washington resorted to the standby from April 2017 of warning Russian forces to get out of the way before striking Syrian government bases, Moscow could still greenlight its Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah allies hitting back via guerrilla warfare. And the last thing President Trump who campaigned against George W. Bush's invasion and occupation of Iraq wants is to have American soldiers dying in Syria in similar fashion to what was happening in Mesopotamia from 2003-2007.

Media Staging for False Flag Battles Between U.S. Troops and 'Russians' in Syria?

However, we still see a propaganda campaign advanced in the usual suspect outlets like NBC News and Business Insider claiming U.S. troops engaged in a 'massive battle' that slaughtered 300 Russian mercenaries of the company 'Wagner' on Feb. 7-8. As Der Spiegel reported on March 2, the actual number of dead Russian combatants was likely a dozen or less, and it isn't at all clear if the Russian private military contractors even knew American troops were present in the Kurdish SDF held oil field their Syrian client wanted seized before they advanced:

US troops in Syria are digging in and preparing for future attacks after a massive battle played out in the country's east that ended with up to 300 Russian mercenaries killed by US artillery and airpower.

Reporting from the ground in Syria, NBC News' Richard Engel and Kennet Werner spoke to Brig. Gen. Jonathan Braga, whose forces beat back the pro-Syrian government advance on a well known US position near valuable oilfields.

The Pentagon said the pro-Syrian forces, including many Russians hired by private military contractors, made an "unprovoked attack" on their positions with artillery fire. The US response included airstrikes and artillery shelling that sources say wiped out much of the advancing column in just minutes.

"Those artillery rounds could have landed and killed Americans, and that's why we continue to prepare our defenses," Braga, who directs the US-led operations against ISIS, told NBC News.

Braga also confirmed that it was largely Russian nationals that took part in the fighting, though the Kremlin denies this.

But despite the overwhelming victory that saw zero casualties on the US side, Braga said he's "absolutely concerned" about further clashes in the future.

After the massive battle, Russian job listing sites were seen as advertising security work in Syria, in what is likely a recruitment play for more mercenaries. A man claiming to recruit Russians to work as private military contractors said that the recruits he now met were joining up to take revenge on the US, after the battle shook their national pride. If the above looks to you like media staging for the next 'battle' between 'Russian mercenaries or even regular forces' and American troops to dial the Russia fever up another notch, then it looks like that to us as well. In reality, U.S. troops ought to be more concerned about IEDs or MANPADs in pro-Damascus forces hands rather than the fantasy presented by NBC News, Bloomberg and Business Insider of Russians attacking them across open ground with zero SAM support or air cover. If such a 'battle' does take place, it will likely be staged with the casualties vastly inflated. The deconfliction hotline between Dunford and Gerasimov and Kheimmim and U.S. bases in Turkey, Jordan and Qatar still works, for now. Is a Joint U.S.-Turkish Partition of Syria a Done Deal? Or Will Ankara and Washington Remain at Odds Over Manbij and the Kurdish Issue? With the remnants of the Ghouta pocket caught between the anvil of Russian and Syrian firepower and the hammer of humanitarian evacuation on the green buses, it seems too late for Washington and London to stop the full liberation of the Ghouta region. What's left then to the regime changists turned partitioners of Syria is further mischief alongside the Turks in the north, specifically around northern Aleppo, jihadi dominated Idlib and in the Kurdish northeast. The Turkish Army and its 'Free Syrian Army' Janissaries have nearly cut off Afrin, a city of 200,000. After receiving a warm reception from Kurds and Arabs alike when joining its YPG defenders, pro-Damascus miltias are no longer reinforcing the Kurds' losing position in the city.

It appears the Russian Analyst underestimated the Turks after their Euphrates Shield setbacks against ISIS/USUS and that their Army has found a formula for minimizing Turkish casualties, relying on the FSA and former ISIS members to assault Kurdish villages. Without SAMs or air cover from Turkish bombing, YPG units appear increasingly demoralized and the Kurdish political party's mouthpieces continue to cry about Moscow as much as Washington betraying them. YPG fighters were reportedly fleeing Afrin this weekend as residents looted government food wares and offices in preparation for a full siege.

In fairness to the YPG's supporters in Western countries, Moscow and Ankara by all appearances have struck a deal over Afrin, while the Turks and Americans wrangle over joint patrols supposedly planned for Manbij. Damascus threat to shoot down Turkish F16s has, for the moment, failed to materialize as the SAA concentrates its forces on mopping up in Ghouta. The Russians continue to goad the Americans using the Turks, most recenty announcing this week that S400 SAMs will be delivered to Ankara in 2020. U.S. Senators have responded by demanding sanctions against any nation including NATO member Turkey that buys Russian S400s and other advanced arms. Presumably that category would include countries like India and Vietnam Washington is wooing as part of its China containment strategy in the Pacific. Nonetheless, the Turks extending their deconfliction aka occupation bases to the northern outskirts of Aleppo city may be pushing their irredentist land grab agenda too far.

[roguenewsdao]

Syraq SITREP 36: Russian Foreign Ministry Admits Dozens of FSU Citizens Wounded in U.S. Air Strike, Syrian Shi'a Join Kurds to Halt Turkish Aggression in Afrin

'Killing Russians' and the Risks of Escalation

If regular Russian forces had been involved in the deadly action, they almost certainly would have received air cover or been accompanied by road mobile Pantsir or advanced Verba MANPADs, and at least some of the low flying American Apache and AC130 gunships which savaged the ISIS hunters and their Russian contractor allies would've been shot down. The political consequences of such a black eye for Uncle Sam and the Trump Administration's supposedly risk free brinkmanship with the Russians and Iranian forces in Syria would be uncertain, but given the hysterical climate of Russophobia created since the election, Trump would be under enormous pressure to escalate to direct attacks on Russian bases. Russia's President Vladimir Putin has done everything possible it seems to avoid such scenarios while winning the ground war, using proxies wherever possible. The use of private military contractors in lieu of Russian special forces however, can be seen as a tactical if not strategic blunder by the Kremlin. It certainly created an inviting target for the Kremlin's enemies to, in ex Deputy CIA Director Mike Morrell's words, 'kill Russians' (and Donbass native former citizens of Ukraine) without running the major risk that Americans would die quickly in response (Moscow already has the coordinates of every significant U.S. forward operating base in eastern Syria ready to be hit with Iskander or Kalibr missiles in the event Kheimmim is destroyed in a surprise U.S. attack).

Nonetheless, even if the Feb. 7 body count has been exaggerated, the tone of the Western press in covering the incident has been almost gloating, while Russian media has been full of angry accounts from relatives asking why their husbands or brothers were given no direct support from the Russian Defense Ministry which disavowed them. The curious timing of the assault, in which the U.S. defended a demarcation line along the Euphrates River as if it were a border that the Americans have a legal right to be present on, was followed up within 72 hours by Israeli Air Force (IAF) standoff missile strikes, supposedly prompted by an Iranian drone overflight. The IAF of course, suffered the loss of at least one F16 fighter jet and likely severe damage to an F15, as well as disclosed near fatal injuries to an Israeli pilot. But the Americans unlike the Israelis still maintain their aura of invincibility in Syrian skies, notwithstanding their avoidance of Kheimmim's S400 batteries and the Russians reportedly adding multiple SU35 if not their latest SU57 interceptors to their Kheimmim contingent. As my white Russian Floridian friend The Saker wrote in mid-February:

"Events in Syria have recently clearly taken a turn for the worse and there is an increasing amount of evidence that the Russian task force in Syria is being targeted by a systematic campaign of “harassing attacks”. First, there was the (relatively successful) drone and mortar attack on the Russian Aerospace base in Khmeimin. Then there was the shooting down of a Russian SU-25 over the city of Maasran in the Idlib province. Now we hear of Russian casualties in the US raid on a Syrian column (along with widely exaggerated claims of “hundreds” of killed Russians). In the first case, Russian officials did openly voice their strong suspicion that the attack was if not planned and executed by the USA, then at least coordinated with the US forces in the vicinity. In the case of the downing of the SU-25, no overt accusations have been made, but many experts have stated that the altitude at which the SU-25 was hit strongly suggests a rather modern MANPAD of a type not typically seen in Syria (the not so subtle hint being here that these were US Stingers sent to the Kurds by the USA). As for the latest attack on the Syrian column, what is under discussion is not who did it but rather what kind of Russian personnel was involved, Russian military or private contractors (the latter is a much more likely explanation since the Syrian column had no air-cover whatsoever). Taken separately, none of these incidents mean very much but taken together they might be indicative of a new US strategy in Syria: to punish the Russians as much as possible short of an overt US attack on Russian forces."  -- https://thesaker.is/escalation-in-syria-how-far-can-the-russians-be-pushed/

The problem with such clever tactics of 'killing Russians' so long as they're contractors rather than servicemen, is that Moscow is unlikely to ever expose its non-servicemen groups in such numbers again without at least some air support or forward air controller spetsnaz accompanying them. The next time the Americans take a few shells falling hundreds of yards from their positions as a pretext to rain hell down on a Syrian force opposite them, they may find the retaliation more severe than expected.

The most likely risk to American forces and contractors accompanying them in Syria now, however, is likely to come from Iranian Quds force and linked Shi'a militia operatives infiltrating mixed Arab-Kurdish areas to plant IEDs or ambush an American convoy with thermobaric RPGs. Such Iraq-insurgency type attacks aimed at forcing the Americans to pull out are unlikely to be greenlit in Moscow or even Tehran, given that the Syrian government and its Iranian allies have their hands full at the moment. The Syrians are working with the Russians to contain Turkey's territorial ambitions in the Kurdish north around Afrin while cleaning up the jihadist dominated pocket east of Damascus, in the dense urban terrain of Ghouta. The jihadis corralled into Idlib province which Turkey has attempted to protect from further Syrian Arab Army (SAA) advances remain a threat to launch attacks, though they have been pushed back from the Aleppo-Khanasser highway. 

Turks Shell Pro-Syrian Government Forces Who Convoy into YPG Held Afrin, After Kurds Agree to Permit Damascus Loyalists to Show the Flag in Area as Deterrent Against Further Turkish Aggression

A convoy of Syrian Shi'a fighters made it into Afrin flying the Syrian government flag. Turkish media claimed that the convoy had been turned back by shelling which killed at least two militiamen, but at least several dozen vehicles made it through despite Turkey's artillery fire. Turkey's drones continue to swarm over the area but several have been shot down by Kurdish YPG forces, who continue to inflict losses on the Turks' Syrian jihadi proxies as they slowly advance on Afrin city outskirts. According to experienced Mideast correspondent Elijah J. Magnier, Damascus is making it clear to the Turks through Russian diplomatic intermediaries that the Turkish Army will not be permitted to advance any further. Erdogan has promised to besiege Afrin within days but it's unlikely the 'Olive Branch' operation forces he has committed present a sufficient amount of manpower for the task.

The most likely goal of the Turkish operation as we've mentioned before in Syraq SITREPs is to force the Afrin Kurds back into the arms of the Damascus government. That is to make them place Syrian Army forces not only along the border but within the canton to limit the YPG's ability to support PKK militants inside Turkey. Whether the Turks can actually achieve this goal. The Turkish Air Force can still bomb Afrin from its own air space and the Russians are not actively defending the skies over the enclave, but the Syrian Air Defenses reportedly moved closer to positions where they could engage Turkish drones and aircraft. If the Turks continue to bomb Afrin they are likely to see one of their own F16s shot down after Israel lost an aircraft of the same type earlier this month. If the Turks are forced to pull back after reaching some sort of face saving deal that nominally places YPG forces under SAA command if not actual control, then the U.S. would be left as the only major occupying force inside Syria. According to Magnier, that is the Russians' plan, which won't be deterred by American attacks like the air strike of February 7:

"Although the central government in Damascus agreed to send several hundreds of local militants from Nubbl and Zahraa and other national forces as a preliminary support, it is likely that the negotiations over Afrin will continue until mid-March in Kazakhstan between Russia, Turkey, Iran and Syria (indirectly), discussing not only Afrin but also Idlib- unless the Kurds acknowledge without delay all of Damascus’s conditions. Otherwise, with every day that goes by Turkey increases its influence and occupies more territory in the enclave. Russia is not expected to be satisfied with one hit against the US in Afrin but is accelerating the end of control by al-Qaeda and other militants (Faylaq al-Rahman and Jaish al-Islam) over al Ghouta, east of Damascus. The Russians would like to see the US alone (Russia considers Turkey is the lesser evil in Syria and can deal with it later) in Syria to point out its illegal presence and therefore illegal occupation of north east Syria, particularly when the remaining of ISIS concentration is situated within the area on the Syrian-Iraqi borders which is under the US control. The US forces are now looking like a force protecting the terrorist group and allowing it to continue its existence and operations in Syria and in Iraq."  -- https://ejmagnier.com/2018/02/21/the-olive-branch-is-breaking-afrin-pays-the-price-of-the-us-russia-struggle-and-turkey-is-part-of-it/

The Ghouta Urban Warfare Meatgrinder

The Ghouta region east of Damascus has been the scene of the bloody urban combat for years, with civilians suffering heavily as jihadists dug in using tunnel networks to hold off determined SAA assaults. This week Syrian and Russian air strikes have been pounding the area resulting in many civilian deaths, while the SAA masses armor and artillery for a major assault. Multiple rocket attacks and shellings from the area on Damascus city including Russian diplomatic and national reconciliation center relief facilities have created greater urgency in Moscow and among Syrian commanders to clean out the pocket and evict its jihadists to Idlib. Just as the Aleppo battle proved bloody to combatants and civilians alike, the U.S. and its allies are likely to demand a cessation of hostilities and condemn the Syrians and Russians for seeking a military solution to the humanitarian crisis created by the terrorists dominating the area.