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Posts Tagged ‘Syrian War’

Questions for the USNI

by Bunk Five Hawks X ( 108 Comments › )
Filed under Immigration, Military, U.S. Navy at November 17th, 2017 - 1:35 am

Dad was a LTJG Navy veteran, long-standing member of the Glow-In-The-Dark Society for his participation in Operation Ivy. He passed away a few years ago. He had a membership with USNI (United States Naval Institute) and I prepaid on his behalf, mainly for it’s monthly publication entitled PROCEEDINGS that Dad enjoyed receiving, even though it was apparent that he couldn’t read it in his later years.

PROCEEDINGS is a tough ride for anyone not familiar with military acronyms and jargon, but some of it is fascinating. The articles are unclassified, so if you want to find out what’s really going on, you need to realize that we’re years beyond what is allowed to be published. Some of the uncensored OpEds are excellent.

Because my deceased father’s account is still active, being prepaid and all, I get notifications from USNI of upcoming highlights via email, like this one:

This is an unusual image posted by USNI and it doesn’t have a lot to do with the essay by Dr. Linton Wells, PhD, entitled “Prepared for the Battle But Not for the War.” Or maybe it does. What bothers me is the image posted by USNI is not of U.S. Soldiers. An image search results in this:

Rigonce, Slovania: Migrants mainly Syrians arriving from Croatia are escorted by Slovanian police.

http://www.marcovacca.com/features/295/the–balkan-route-towards–eu

Okay. But when you download the image you get an entirely different .jpg title: “REF Hungary-Serbia.”

So, according to USNI, the countries involved are probably Croatia, Hungary, Serbia, Syria and Slovania, but not the United States.

What ever happened to the concept of honesty?

Iranians defeated by al-Nusra at Khan Touman

by Phantom Ace ( 134 Comments › )
Filed under Al Qaeda, Hezballah, Iran, Islam, Islamists, Syria at May 17th, 2016 - 10:26 am

Nusra-Khan Touman

One would think the fact an al-Qaeda affiliate defeated the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps in a conventional battle would be mentioned in the news. Instead an omerta is in effect covering up this Iranian debacle by both the Progressive and Conservative medias. The Leftist media outlets love Iran and can’t bring to themselves to admit their beloved Persians were defeated. the alleged “Rightie” outlets have made the IRGC out to be some fearsome force that Americans must cower before. Hence both Right and Left in America have their own reasons to cover up this news.

On the 6th of May, the Syrian rebel alliance composed of Nusra Front, Ahrar al Sham, and the Free Syrian Army called Jayesh al-Fatah (Army of Conquest) fought and defeated the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, Iraqi Shia militias and Hezbollah were defeated at Jhan Touman, a village south of Aleppo. It was not a normal military defeat, but a debacle in with the Nusra led alliance used Milan and Tow anti tank weapons. The rebels also used manpads and other anti aircraft weapons to prevent the Russians from proving close air support. The result was that an al-Qaeda affiliate defeated a conventional army in battle.

On May 6, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) lost the Syrian village of Khan Touman, strategically located near the Aleppo-Damascus highway southwest of Aleppo, to Jaysh al Fath, a jihadist-led alliance of rebel groups. Al Nusrah Front, al Qaeda’s Syria branch, and other jihadi groups publicized footage of the assault and its aftermath on social media, which included images of captives and dead bodies. This ambush has garnered significant public attention in Iran, with some observers describing the rout as the Guard’s worst loss in the Syrian war.

According to an unconfirmed report by Iranian outlet Jam News, 80 pro-government combatants were killed, including members of the Afghan Fatemiyoun Division, Lebanese Hezbollah, and the IRGC. Footage on social media shows a large number of Afghans and Iranians, and possibly some Hezbollah fighters, among the dead. An alleged text message exchange among trapped Afghans in Khan Touman has since gone viral, particularly for its ominous ending: “God willing we will be martyred, not captured.”

[…]

Videos and photos taken of two of the captives claimed that they were Iranians or Hezbollah fighters, though Hezbollah has denied that any of its members were captured in the ambush. The two appeared to be native Syrian Arabic speakers (Jund al-Aqsa, an al Qaeda front group, claimed the execution of one of them yesterday). Other footage of prisoners shows two Afghan Fatemiyoun Division members.

Although Qods Force Commander Qassem Soleimani missed a scheduled briefing of Iranian parliamentary-elects on May 8, with sources citing “travel,” he was in Iran on May 11 to attend the funeral of his former commander. Rear Admiral Second Class Mohammad Nazeri, commander of the IRGC Navy Eba Abdollah Commando Unit, was Soleimani’s trainer in 1979 (and was also present during the arrests of the British and US navy sailors in 2007 and 2016). The IRGC officially announced at first that Nazeri was “martyred” on Guard Day during a mission in the Persian Gulf; subsequent public statements and biographies indicate that he succumbed to chemical complications sustained after being gassed in the Iran-Iraq War.

Nonetheless, Iranian officials and commanders have attempted to downplay the loss of Khan Touman. Ali Akbar Velayati, the supreme leader’s top foreign policy adviser, boasted that the pro-regime coalition in Syria is “stronger” than ever.

The irony of al-Qaqeda defeating the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps should not be lost on people. In the 90’s the IRGC and Hezbollah helped train al-Qaeda. In Bosnia, al-Qaeda and IRGC both fought side by side against the Serbs. This battle also proves that the IRGC are not some fearsome invincible force as they are portrayed by Fox News. Nusra Front is a force to be reckoned with and should get more media attention. The fact an al-Qaqeda affiliate now fields a powerful conventional force is a game changer and one that needs to be monitored.

Stairway to Aleppo? Yeah, Right.

by Bunk Five Hawks X ( 12 Comments › )
Filed under History, Iran, Iran, Islam, Islamists, Middle East, Muslim Brotherhood, Politics, Syria, World at July 14th, 2015 - 1:30 am

Stairway to Aleppo

Earliest date found for this image [via Tineye] is 1 April 2014 with this caption:

Left After Assad Bombing in Aleppo.

I have a bit of a problem with that structural impossibility, and so does physics. Then I found this:

Stairway to Aleppo 0
That image dates to 23 March 2014. A more recent post dated 19 June 2015 comes from TehranPress.com. Even Google Translate can’t crack that one, but it appears that someone’s laughing.

Stairway to Aleppo Original

This seems to be the unadulterated version, with an interesting caption:

Residents try to find their belongings among the rubble left of their homes after what activists said was an air attack from forces loyal to Syria’s President Bashar Al-Assad in Bab Neirab, Aleppo, on July 27, 2013.

That caption and image came from The Atlantic via *ahem* Reuters… who have never *cough* posted manipulated propaganda photos before.
[Hint: Google Islamic Rage Boy, Green Helmet Man, Wailing Woman, Iraqi Missile Photoshop.]

Yet even the description (“what activists said”) sounds specious. When Assad was under attack by the Muslim Brotherhood, why would his forces bomb his own people, unless Syria was already infiltrated by radical islam?

Oh, wait…

[Top image found here entirely by accident, and the others didn’t come from Little Green Footballs either.]

The Fall of Idlib

by Phantom Ace ( 189 Comments › )
Filed under Iran, Middle East, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey at March 30th, 2015 - 7:00 am

Obama’s Iranian/Shia Axis buddies suffered a defeat over the weekend in Syria. Last week the Free Syrian Army, Nusra Front and other rebels who united under the name Jaish al-Fath (the Army of Conquest) have captured the city of Idlib which is the provincial capital of the province with the same name. The rebels took it in a 5 day assault where they used firepower they previously did not have as it is apparent that the Saudis and other Sunni nations are now arming the rebels with every weapon available against Iran’s client state.

Here is a comparison of the before and after he Idlib offensive.

The Syrian opposition will now use Idlib as the capital of their provisional government

BEIRUT: Syria’s opposition-in-exile vowed Sunday to launch efforts to turn the newly seized provincial capital of Idlib into its base of operations, in a bid to maintain the momentum generated by a five-day battle that resulted in a shockingly sudden regime withdrawal.

Supporters of the regime and the opposition spent much of the weekend digesting the news that government forces had abandoned the northwestern town, amid reports that the regime would soon launch a fierce counter-offensive.

[….]

“The Syrian provisional government will strive to make the free city of Idlib an example to the entire world about what Syrians want for the future of their country,” it said. “It will begin sending its [government bodies] to work inside the city, along with the local council for the province of Idlib, to begin coordinating with its partners and with the [militias] and influential forces to make the city a headquarters for administering liberated regions of Syria.”

Idlib fell after a battle that cost just over 70 rebel lives, according to the “Army of Conquest” coalition of militias that announced the campaign last week. A spokesman for the Army of Conquest told The Daily Star Sunday that the precise number of regime dead remained unclear, due to the presence of many bodies under the rubble of destroyed buildings, adding that 53 troops and paramilitaries – all Syrians – were taken prisoner by the rebels.

This is the 3rd major defeat for Assad, Hezbollah and Iran in the past month. There was a failed offensive in Aleppo that attempted to encircle the rebels, but ended in disaster. In Quinetra province, Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps attempted an offensive to reach the Israeli border. They were defeated by Nusra Front and the FSA’s Southern Front Army with alleged Israeli assistance in the forms of intelligence.

The turning of the tide in Syria is related to this Pan Sunni front against Iran and its clients. Saudi Arabia and other Sunni nations have had enough of Iran’s attempt to dominate the Mideast via its Shiite clients. With intervention in Yemen and the flood of weapons to the Syrian rebels, the Sunni-Shiite conflict has entered a new phase. Sadly, Obama is on the side of Iran who is viewed as threat by the Sunnis and Israelis alike.