Obama the Mujahid: The Destruction of Syria

[georgephillip]

Conservatives were rightly skeptical when candidate Obama praised Reagan for his "transformational presidency." It's now appearing ever more likely that Obama will follow in the Gipper's Afghan jihadi footsteps on the road to Damascus.

Here's one view from stage left:

"Washington believes its own myth that it is 'indirectly' involved in vetting and arming opposition groups in Syria. Since 2011, the weaponizing of Syrian mercenary/jihadi gangs has been sourced through the black market, stockpiles in Libya, and in Croatia.

"The CIA has been up to its neck all along. Many of these weapons are now in the hands of hardcore jihadis of the Jabhat al-Nusra kind.

"The notion that the CIA is capable of vetting and weaponizing those gangs/mercenaries/jihadis to Washington’s benefit after the Bashar al-Assad government collapses is THE joke of the early 21st century.

"Just take a trip down memory lane to Afghanistan.

"Or imagine these Syrian McJihadis, or You Tube mujahideen, equipped with some fine shoulder-held heat-seeking missiles wreaking havoc all across Southwest Asia."

Anyone who doesn't think Damascus is merely roadkill on the way to Tehran needs to take off her ideological blinders.

The Roadmap to the Destruction of Syria » Counterpunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names

 

[georgephillip]

Defense Crescent?

" ISRAEL is preparing to agree a defence co-operation deal with Turkey and three Arab states aimed at setting up an early warning system to detect Iranian ballistic missiles.

"The proposal, referred to by the diplomats involved as '4+1', may eventually lead to technicians from Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Jordan working alongside Israelis in joint command-and-control centres.

"The American-brokered plan is to build a 'moderate crescent' of allied states that share a powerful vested interest in countering Iran’s nuclear ambitions."

Or maybe they share a corporate conception of what the Middle East borders should look like in the 21st Century?

 

[waltky]

Which rebels should we arm?...

Cameron and Obama's endless Syria conundrum
12 May 2013 - David Cameron's meeting with President Obama at the White House is likely to be dominated by Syria. Don't hold your breath for any great new announcements.

The UK prime minister is in the US partly for a big meeting at the UN on global development and partly for an event with Prince Harry, also in New York. So his meeting with the president is something added on, rather than the centrepiece of his trip. That means it will be strictly business - no playing of ping pong or sampling of BBQ. As well as Syria they will talk about Iran, transatlantic trade (the proposed deal with the EU is now known in the trade as "tee tip") and probably North Korea.

Doubtless the president will want to know the latest about the prime minister's proposed referendum on membership of the European Union and his troublesome colleagues' willingness to turn a political face-saver into a real choice. While some in Britain dream of leaving the EU and strengthening the transatlantic relationship it its place, America values what the president calls the "essential relationship" in part as a bridge to Europe. If it turns into a bridge to nowhere it will trouble them. But Syria is the hard case. Both Europe and the US are slowly inching towards arming the rebels. But that commonplace phrase disguises the fact that the "arms" will be well short of anything the rebels actually want to finish this protracted business.

For months now the noises from Western capitals have vacillated between the cry "Something must be done!" and the forlorn reply "But what?" One rather lame answer is the idea of a peace conference dangled by Russia. But there's not much diplomatic chatter about the proposal, which seems more like a passing thought than a hard plan. I get the impression that the US and Europe will go along with what they privately regard as a bit of a charade only because they have no better ideas.

Which brings us back to "arming the rebels" and allied concepts like a no-fly zone. Enthusiasts insist it isn't that difficult - find the right sort of rebels and give them the weapons they need. But as one insider put it to me: "What if we give the minority we trust the good stuff and five miles down the road they run into a road block and Islamist nutters take it off them? How does that help?" No-one has any particularly good answers to this conundrum. We'll see today if the two leaders can come up with anything that squares the circle.

BBC News - Cameron and Obama's endless Syria conundrum

See also:

No to direct military involvement in Syria, former defense chief says
May 12, 2013 WASHINGTON — Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates says he thinks direct U.S. intervention in Syria's civil war - particularly direct military involvement - would be a mistake.

Gates, who served both President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama, says he oversaw wars that began with quick regime change "and we all know what happened after that."

He asks on CBS' "Face that Nation, "Haven't we learned that when you go to war, the outcomes are unpredictable?" To those who think intervention might be `clean" and "neat," Gates says "most wars aren't that way."

He says that if the U.S. were to do anything in Syria, it might be picking opposition groups that the U.S. believes would have some degree of moderation, and providing them with intelligence and basic military equipment.

Source

 

[georgephillip]

I can't help wondering how likely it is that any of Obama's or Cameron's or Grate's words are actually reflective of the thoughts going through their minds in relation to Syria, Lebanon, Iran, Turkey, and "freeing" the Kurds? (Lying politicians and partisan hacks?)

FDR was pretty clear on out intentions in the Middle East in 1944.
Of course, so were the British.

"The Anglo-American Petroleum Agreement of 1944 was based on negotiations between the United States and Britain over the control of Middle Eastern oil. Below is shown what the American President Franklin D. Roosevelt had in mind for to a British Ambassador in 1944:

"Persian oil …is yours. We share the oil of Iraq and Kuwait. As for Saudi Arabian oil, it’s ours."

Every US president since that time has carried out similar policies, even when this country was the world's largest exporter of oil. It seems to have very little to do with selling the oil in the US, and everything to do with controlling who buys the oil and, of course, how much they pay for it.

Middle Eastern oil production appears to be in decline; however, this is not the case for Caspian Sea oil and gas deposits. In their case, the problem revolves more around pipelines than the actual sources of production. Control of those major pipelines appears to be one likely explanation for what's happening in Syria, Israel, and Lebanon, and Turkey today.

The following link was first posted in 2006 after Israel's unsuccessful push into Lebanon.
The map on page seven is particularly informative.
It's the one with Iraq divided into Sunni and Shia sub-states and a brand new member of the UN (NATO?)... Free Kurdistan.

"Recent developments in Syria and Lebanon point to military escalation, namely the evolution towards a broader regional war, which has been on the drawing board of the Pentagon since 2004.

"The borders of Syria and Lebanon are surrounded. British and US troops are stationed in Jordan, The Turkish High Command in liaison with NATO is providing military support to the Free Syrian Army. Allied naval forces are deployed in the Eastern Mediterranean.

"According to a recent report of the Israeli Intelligence News Service Debka:

“US troops sent to the Jordan-Syria border are helping build a headquarters in Jordan to bolster its military capabilities in case violence spills over from Syria, suggesting deepening US military intervention in the Syrian conflict.”

"The deployment of allied troops on Syria’s southern border is coordinated with actions taken by Turkey and its allies on Syria’s Northern border."

The War on Lebanon and the Battle for Oil | Global Research

I'm thinking Turkey gets into the EU.
Israel joins NATO.
Assad joins Saddam and Gaddafi.
The Pentagon (and Wall Street) move on to Iran.

 

[waltky]

Russia sellin' Assad missiles against air cover for rebels...

Russia to send Syria air defense system to deter "hotheads"
28 May`13 - Russia will deliver an advanced air defense system to the Syrian government despite Western opposition because it will help deter "hotheads" who back foreign intervention, a senior Russian official said on Tuesday.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov also accused the European Union of "throwing fuel on the fire" by letting its arms embargo on Syrian expire, saying it would complicate efforts to arrange an international peace conference.

His remarks toughened Russia's defiance of the United States, France and Israel over the planned sale of precision S-300 missile systems to President Bashar al-Assad's government, which is battling a Western and Gulf Arab-backed insurgency. "We think this delivery is a stabilizing factor and that such steps in many ways restrain some hotheads ... from exploring scenarios in which this conflict could be given an international character with participation of outside forces, to whom this idea is not foreign," he told a news conference.

Western experts say the air defense system could significantly boost Syria's ability to stave off outside intervention in the more than two-year civil war that has killed more than 80,000 people. The S-300s can intercept manned aircraft and guided missiles and their delivery would improve Assad's government's chances of holding out in Damascus. Western nations say the Russian arms deliveries could increase tension and encourage Assad.

Moscow is standing firm on the sale, despite a trip to Russia by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this month in which he pleaded with President Vladimir Putin to halt the delivery, and a veiled warning of a military response by Israel. "I can say that the shipments are not on their way yet," Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon said on Tuesday at a conference near Tel Aviv. "I hope they will not leave, and if, God forbid, they reach Syria, we will know what to do."

POWERFUL ALLY

 

[Katzndogz]

Syria is totally obama's fault. Completely.

 

[georgephillip]

He's not old enough:

"The Sykes–Picot Agreement, officially known as the Asia Minor Agreement, was a secret agreement between the governments of the United Kingdom and France,[1] with the assent of Russia, defining their proposed spheres of influence and control in the Middle East should the Triple Entente succeed in defeating the Ottoman Empire during World War I..."

"Britain was allocated control of areas roughly comprising the coastal strip between the sea and River Jordan, Jordan, southern Iraq, and a small area including the ports of Haifa and Acre, to allow access to the Mediterranean.[6]

"France was allocated control of south-eastern Turkey, northern Iraq, Syria and Lebanon."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sykes%E2%80%93Picot_Agreement#Territorial_allocations

 

[georgephillip]

Russia sellin' Assad missiles against air cover for rebels...

Russia to send Syria air defense system to deter "hotheads"
28 May`13 - Russia will deliver an advanced air defense system to the Syrian government despite Western opposition because it will help deter "hotheads" who back foreign intervention, a senior Russian official said on Tuesday.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov also accused the European Union of "throwing fuel on the fire" by letting its arms embargo on Syrian expire, saying it would complicate efforts to arrange an international peace conference.

His remarks toughened Russia's defiance of the United States, France and Israel over the planned sale of precision S-300 missile systems to President Bashar al-Assad's government, which is battling a Western and Gulf Arab-backed insurgency. "We think this delivery is a stabilizing factor and that such steps in many ways restrain some hotheads ... from exploring scenarios in which this conflict could be given an international character with participation of outside forces, to whom this idea is not foreign," he told a news conference.

Western experts say the air defense system could significantly boost Syria's ability to stave off outside intervention in the more than two-year civil war that has killed more than 80,000 people. The S-300s can intercept manned aircraft and guided missiles and their delivery would improve Assad's government's chances of holding out in Damascus. Western nations say the Russian arms deliveries could increase tension and encourage Assad.

Moscow is standing firm on the sale, despite a trip to Russia by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this month in which he pleaded with President Vladimir Putin to halt the delivery, and a veiled warning of a military response by Israel. "I can say that the shipments are not on their way yet," Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon said on Tuesday at a conference near Tel Aviv. "I hope they will not leave, and if, God forbid, they reach Syria, we will know what to do."

POWERFUL ALLY

"Russia sellin' Assad missiles against air cover for rebels."

Russia has a similar stake in Syria and Iran as we have in Mexico and Canada.
In spite of what James Baker said in '91, NATO is knockin' on the Bear's door.
If Syria and Iran go the way of Iraq and Libya, Russia will be ringed with western missile bases.
Rightly or wrongly the Kremlin believes that gives the west the option for a nuclear first strike one-hitter-quitter.
What would we do if the Russians were balkanizing Mexico and Canada on their way to regime change in DC?

From May 2, 2013

"Former US ambassador to the UN Bill Richardson, very close to the Clinton clan, has already gamed on ABC News that Obama is 'leaning towards aerial strikes'. Yes; this is just the beginning. Mini-Shock and Awes await.

"Just follow the roadmap

"The question is why did it take so long. The destruction of Syria – as conceptualized by Sheikh Nasrallah – with the West once more collaborating with jihadi gangs, has been in the cards for years. See how Seymour Hersh outlined it in 2007.

"And see how badly the bipartisan Washington establishment craves regime change.

"And Damascus, of course, is just a stop towards Tehran. The proverbial anonymous sources have leaked to the Rupert Murdoch-owned Sunday Times in London that a 'Defense Crescent' is becoming a reality.

"It’s the same GCC-Israel element in the coalition of the willing in Syria, in this case ganging up to 'counter Iran’s nuclear ambitions'. Turkey, the House of Saud, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Israel merrily partying in joint command-and-control centers to detect evil Iranian ballistic missiles.

"Don’t know much about history. But what a wonderful world this would be. Presided by Obama The Mujahid."

The Roadmap to the Destruction of Syria » CounterPunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names