[Rich]

You're confusing the general population with the puppet rulers.

Whilst puppet "Sunni" leaders do indeed collaborate with the West, the general Sunni population are the most anti-Western.

What a joke religion Sunni Islam is then, that its people allow themselves to be pushed around and manipulated so easily. I thought Mohammad's religion was supposed to produce the best governance. Its not like Muslims were in some isolated part of the world. They were at the very centre of the civilised world astride the major trade routes with easy access to the technologies of East and West and the enormous inheritance of the Roman and Persian empires.

ISIS are just another gang of terrorist tyrants. They can only produce another corrupt shit hole like all their predecessors.

[abu_rashid]

In case you haven't noticed, Sunni Islamic rule lasted a good 1300 years. The current situation is a temporary glitch, that will soon be rectified. Stay tuned.

[roxunreal]

]It's funny - if SAF is "ISIL's airforce" because it bombs al-Qaeda and other Salafist rebels while ISIL is attacking them - then doesn't that also mean that the USAF is al-Qaeda's and Salafist's airforce, because it bombs ISIL while al-Qaeda is attacking them?

http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/s ... 37702.html


Also, I guess bombing Ahrar/JaN in favor of ISIL is still objectively worse for the Syrian people than bombing IS in favor of the other mentioned rebels, as ISIL is objectively worse.

[Potemkin]

Also, I guess bombing Ahrar/JaN in favor of ISIL is still objectively worse for the Syrian people than bombing IS in favor of the other mentioned rebels, as ISIL is objectively worse.

It really depends which side is winning at any given moment, roxunreal. IS is potentially objectively worse than Ahrar/JaN, but only if they actually win. Assad's plan is to ultimately defeat both of them, thus rendering the question as to which of them is objectively the worst a moot point.

Besides, when Joseph Stalin was asked which were the worst, the Trotskyists or the social-fascists, he replied, "They are worse than each other!" Contemplate those words for a few moments, and learn from Comrade Stalin's genius....

[Rich]

Besides, when Joseph Stalin was asked which were the worst, the Trotskyists or the social-fascists, he replied, "They are worse than each other!" Contemplate those words for a few moments, and learn from Comrade Stalin's genius....

We might also contemplate Joseph Stalin's antics in the Spanish Civil War when he jumped into bed with these Social fascists and more right wing parties and conspired against the CNT and the POUM. Really with his wild swings in policy, his habit of blaming subordinates for the very extremist polices he had pushed. Stalin made Mitt Romney look like a man of principle.

[Azure Angel]

Potemkin, I believe Rich just pissed on Stalin.

Good job, Rich!

[Dagoth Ur]

lol I knew Rich used to be a trot. His whole outlook makes total sense now.

[Rich]

Potemkin, I believe Rich just pissed on Stalin.

Good job, Rich!

To be fair I'm not sure exactly how much Potemkin and Decky are tongue in cheek when they talk about Stalin.

lol I knew Rich used to be a trot. His whole outlook makes total sense now.

Are you sure? I used to be part of a gaming group in the late eighties that included:

A Conservative party member, who joined the Referendum party.
A Conservative Party Council Candidate and leading member of the dominant Libertarian faction of the Federation of Conservative students who was later a Liberal Party Council Candidate.
A member of Cruise Watch.
A labour Party hack who was a full time NUS official.
A Socialist Workers Party member who later joined the Anarchist Workers Group.
A Socialist Organiser member who later joined the Anarchist Workers Group.
A member of the Communist Party Britain Marxist Leninist who later became a full time Labour party official.
There was one guy who claimed to be completely non political, naturally he was by far the most right wing of the whole group.

[Potemkin]

There was one guy who claimed to be completely non political, naturally he was by far them most right wing of the whole group.

Yeah, I've noticed that about guys who claim to be 'non-political'. "I'm not political, but these bloody immigrants....", "I'm not political, but these bloody unions....", "I'm not political, but the bloody EU...."

[skinster]

[roxunreal]

It really depends which side is winning at any given moment, roxunreal. IS is potentially objectively worse than Ahrar/JaN, but only if they actually win. Assad's plan is to ultimately defeat both of them, thus rendering the question as to which of them is objectively the worst a moot point.

Hah, can't argue with that

Looks like there was a bit to that gossip from the south after all.
News of the day is that the Southern Front rebels took over the Brigade 52 base near al-Hrak, one of the bigger military bases in the country. There is an airbase next door which is still held by the SAA. This is near Suweida and there is really no major obstacle from there to the mentioned city.

A bit more on the Suweida situation from what I've read recently:

As most probably know, Suweida is a provincial capital of the province of the same name that has had the fortune of still being largely untouched by this war. The majority sect in the city and province are the Druze. The Druze have largely ignored this war, deserted the SAA in large numbers and remained here. Some think that the southern rebels plan to strike here next, but there is also talk that the rebels are largely uninterested in waging war here and would prefer to stay on neutral terms with the Druze or even better, bring them over to their side. How? Well let's just say the Druze are rather pissed at Assad for his pullout from Palmyra and this whole area during the ISIL offensive, which brought ISIL to their door now. There were reports yesterday that they blocked a shipment of SAA weapons that was planning to exit the city for other fronts. The rebels could on the other hand prove that they can and will not only tolerate the Druze (there are very few hardline islamists in the SF and pretty much no jihadists), but protect them from ISIL, which they have proven as there has been a battle raging between the Southern Front and ISIL for a few weeks now in which the ISIL aligned faction was all but vanquished from Daraa province. On the other hand, it is still unlikely that the Druze will side with them simply because the SF is still nominally sided with the northern rebels which are fucked up for non-Muslims. They will probably become something like the Kurds in the north are politically.

[GandalfTheGrey]

Is the US giving much support to these Southern Front Rebels - and if so is it starting to have an impact in terms of SF gains? Are they the same as the old secular FSA (Free Syrian Army)? And finally, what are the prospects of all out war between the SF rebels and islamist rebels - particularly Al Nusra (as I'm assuming ISIL is pretty much hostile with everyone)?

[pikachu]

They will probably become something like the Kurds in the north are politically.

I would bet against that. The are important differences here -
1. The Druze are nowhere near numerous enough to fight for their own state, they don't even have such ambitions, nor do they already have a quasi-state nearby that is ready to help them out, like the Kurds in the north do (with the Iraqi Kurdish region as well as PKK from the Turkish Kurdistan). If the Druze decide to go their own way, they will be all on their own as well, and that is just not something that they can afford really. They won't be able to defend themselves should the push come to shove, they need serious help.

2. The infancy of Rojava included the government peacefully ceding control over Kurdish territory to PYD along with weapons, and it did so for complex reasons - presumably because it realized that it could no longer maintain a solid presence alone in an area so far away from the capital, and because it wanted to create a distraction for the rebels and for Turkey to struggle with, in the form of Kurdish nationalism. Concerns like these do not exist in the Jabal al Druze region. It is very close to the capital - Damascus, and granting de-facto independence to the Druze is not likely to produce much of a headache either to the rebels or to Jordan which supports them - so why bother? According to one article, a Druze delegation recently went to Damascus to ask for just that sort of arrangement, they wanted to create their own autonomous militia with the help of the government weaponry. But Bashar gave them a cold shoulder. He said - either join the army, or NDF, or don't bother asking.

3. In war, either your country is neutral, or you create your own country that is neutral, or you are not neutral. And indeed, the Druze have not been neutral. They didn't join the rebellion, they allowed the government to use their territory as a base for shelling and bombing the neighboring rebel regions, they paid taxes, they voted in the presidential election, and indeed - many have joined the armed forces and even led the armed forces - some of the prominent regime generals are Druze. The rebels aren't just going to forget this.

4. Unlike the Syrian Kurds who are at least 99% Sunni, the Druze are of a different religion, which is often linked to Shi'ism as an added bonus. This automatically puts them at odds with all kinds of Sunni Islamists, be they radical or not so radical. I'm pretty sure that in choosing between Bashar and, say, Army of Islam, they'd prefer the former. Same with Ahrar ash-Sham. And the two groups I just listed were heavily involved in the brigade 52 offensive. And by the way, although Nusra apparently "no longer coordinates" with the Southern Front, they're still present in the south in pretty decent numbers. They are in fact an important component of the rebel southern frontline, and until they are physically expelled from the south, they're a significant long term threat to consider. Given that Nusra and other islamists (many from the FSA) have had such a huge problem with the Kurds from the very beginning and as you know they still do, (the Kurds had to fight to defend themselves initially from a Nusra-FSA onslaught) - it's hard to imagine that their treatment of the Druze would be any more tolerant.

Given the above, I'd bet against the Druze becoming their own autonomous region akin to the Kurds.

I guess bombing Ahrar/JaN in favor of ISIL is still objectively worse for the Syrian people

Yeah well, in addition to what Potemkin said, in my opinion no one sitting comfortably 2000 or 10000 kms away from Syria has either the capability or the right to determine what is and what isn't objectively worse for the Syrian people. Unfortunately, that's not a very popular opinion in the West at the moment. Perhaps when the collective military spending of NATO drops from the first place on earth to at least the second or the third, my opinion will become more popular. That'll probably happen about the same time as you get sick of hearing Beijing lecture you about what is and what isn't objectively good for Croatia, and send fleets and impose sanctions should the Croats happen to disagree.

[Philby]

[Ornate Placebo]

Syrian Army Captures Strategic Gas Field in East Homs
It has been a rocky two months for the Syrian Armed Forces in the eastern countryside of the Homs Governorate, as the disheartening loss at the ancient city of Palmyra, followed by the abrupt loss of their final border-crossing into Iraq from Al-Tanif has dissipated the morale of the soldiers entrenched on this desert front.

Furthering their progress in east Homs, the Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham (ISIS) attacked the Syrian Armed Forces at the Jazal Gas Fields from their positions at the nearby town of Jazal, resulting in the withdrawal of all Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and National Defense Forces (NDF) soldiers from the latter after a series of intense firefights that engulfed most of the morning on Tuesday.

Following their retreat to the southern outskirts of the Al-Sha’ar Mountains, the Syrian Arab Army’s 67th Brigade of the 18th Tank Division – in coordination with the National Defense Forces and Liwaa Suqour Al-Sahra (Desert Hawks Brigade) – launched a counter-assault at the town of Jazal and the Jazal Gas Field, killing over 25 enemy combatants from ISIS, while also seizing a small cache of weapons in the process.

Not long after the Syrian Armed Forces reentered Jazal and the Jazal Gas Field, the militants from ISIS were forced to withdrawal after their fractured frontline positions collapsed; this led to the Syrian Armed Forces taking full control of the town and gas field, along with surrounding oil wells that are no longer functional.

If the Syrian Armed Forces were to launch a counter-offensive into the ancient city of Palmyra, the town of Jazal will likely be the location they use; however, there are currently no plans to retake this city at the moment.

http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/syrian-army-captures-strategic-gas-field-in-east-homs/

ISIS blows up main gas pipeline in central Syria
ISIS Jihadis detonated on early Wednesday a main pipeline for supplying natural gas to the capital Damascus and its suburbs, cutting off electricity power in many districts.

The work of sabotage took place near the T-4 military airbase (90 km east of Homs) as the terror group seeks to deprive citizens loyal to the Syrian government from the basic needs of life.

In neighboring Iraq, ISIS militant has recently closed Ramadi dam gates, cutting off water to pro-government populations.

The pipeline is solely used to feed natural gas to the residential suburbs of Homs and Damascus, and has no military use whatsoever.

After capturing the ancient city of Palmyra, ISIS has seized a number of oil and gas fields in the area. The group controls most of the country’s oil and gas wealth, especially in the northeastern region, and uses the revenues to finance its activities.

http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/isis-blows-up-main-gas-pipeline-in-central-syria/

I'm not too well-versed in the full picture here so I'll leave the commentary to others.

[pikachu]

Syria doesn't have that many energy resources, but the few it does have are spread between rural Hasakah, Deir Ez Zor, and Homs. ISIS controls all of the Deir Ez Zor energy, much of Hasakah, and thanks to their Palmyra offensive recently, they now control a huge chunk of Homs energy as well, and the Damascus government is left with bare scraps.

Which is one of the reasons I think that if Damascus actually gets a division or two of Iranian reinforcements as rumored/promised, retaking Palmyra from ISIS will be high on the list of priorities. There's other reasons too of course - removing the ISIS threat to Homs city and the coastal highway, re-establishing a land supply route to the Deir Ez Zor city stronghold, liberating the ancient ruins of Palmyra before ISIS decides to destroy them as un-Islamic (which will be very good international PR as well), and proving to its constituency that it is in fact an effective bulwark against ISIS and not a pushover.

[pikachu]

Strange timing for Nusra to do that.

[abu_rashid]

What a waste. Sacrificed himself for nothing.

IS will no doubt soon control every piece of land he tried to help them hold.

[roxunreal]

Given the above, I'd bet against the Druze becoming their own autonomous region akin to the Kurds.

I'm not saying they will tell everyone to fuck off, proclaim a state and man their borders alone. However I expect their position to become increasingly more ambiguous and/or internally divided, they will probably not clearly side with either the regime or the rebels, but rather remain ambiguously neutral. The Kurds after all are (uneasily) neutral with the rebels in Aleppo and with the SAA in Hasaka, but still collaborate against ISIL (at least in Hasaka, but will likely also in Aleppo if need be). The Druze would not be alone against ISIL, neutrality or not. I think for both the SAA and the rebels it's most important to not make the Druze their enemies, making friends is second priority. Neither side can afford even more enemies and frontlines. Recent developments only confirm that the Druze are far from undoubtedly pro-regime. Also neither Ahrar nor Jaysh al-Islam have anything near prelevant influence in the SF, not yet anyway.

What are the implications if they outright back the SAA to the end? That end could come to Suweida sooner than they think, it can become cut off from the rest of the regime territory as IS and the SF expand, the SAA can pull out to protect the Damascus-Homs-Hama-coast backbone, or they can just make a stand and become obliterated. In any case, Assad isn't winning this currently, and you don't just side with a losing side and taint yourself to reap the very possible fallout from such a decision when the war comes to a place near you, especially not if the other side doesn't want to explicitly kill or forcefully change your beliefs like ISIL or JaN and other non-SF rebels.

Suweida was shelled by mortars today and a lot of Druze websites are reporting that the mortars were heard to be fired from within the city (rebels aren't in mortar range) and that this was a pro-regime false flag to sow bad blood between the Druze and the rebels. Supposedly one of the Druze leaders ordered the arrest the head of Syrian military intelligence in Suweida. On the other hand a Druze leader urged the Druze in Suweida to stand by the government a few days ago. Dunno what to make of all this but things may get heated soon.

The SF made a statement in light of the attack:

To Our Family of Bani Ma'arof in Jabal Al-Arab and in all of the Lands of Syria:

The Southern Front Command Of The Free Syrian Army strongly condemns Regime attempts At planting discord between the different peoples of Syria, and especially between the people of Suweida and Dara'a, in an attempt to plant sectarianism between the two, especially after the string of defeats the regime has suffered in the fronts of Southern Syria.

The Southern Front strongly condemns urban shelling operations in general from which is the shelling of Swueida city centres with mortar fire that happened today, and this criminal shelling is part of the regime's game to scare the people of Suweida and isolating them from their homes in southern Syria, and we repeat that the people of Swieda are out brothers and family, and we have not and shall never fight them, and we will be together hand in hand in repelling all the dangers on Suwieda if they asked us to,.

The Souther Front Command also re-emphasizes its role in combating the Daesh menace on Suweida and extends its hand to the people of Suweida and all the people of Syria to work together to fight the Daesh Menace.

That and us in the Southern Front Command strongly condemns in the harshest words, the appalling atrocity that happened in the village of Luza in Idlib on the hands of Jabhat Al-Nusra, and considers it a crime on the homogeneous living and the future of Syria in general, and announces its readiness to take on an active role in defending all Druze villages in Idlib as part of a next step to protect the rich and diverse Syrian society.

And Southern Front will continue its sternous effort to end the file of kidnapped people in all the areas in which its units are located, especially Dara'a and Suwieda, and re-emphasizes its role in the protection of farmlands in the western villages of Swueida to protect these areas for the time of harvest.

May Syria Live Free.

Colonel Issam Al Ries Official Spokesperson of the Southern Front The Free Syrian Army.

Meanwhile:

Just southeast of Brigade 52 base there has been a lot of back and forth between the rebels and the SAA around the regime-helt Tha'lah airbase, last I read supposedly the SAA repelled a rebel attack that took the western part of the airbase. This and the overall situation in Daraa:


Since 6-7 days ago ISIL reversed the rebel fortunes in Aleppo and gained a lot of ground. This could have serious implications for rebel supply lines to Aleppo as well as for the Arfin Kurds if ISIL proceeds further west. Too bad the Kobani Kurds can't push to the west as ISIL blew all the bridges.


YPG has entered Suluk from the East:

[pikachu]

However I expect their position to become increasingly more ambiguous and/or internally divided, they will probably not clearly side with either the regime or the rebels, but rather remain ambiguously neutral.

1. It's hard to imagine how they could achieve more ambiguity or neutrality than they already have without kicking out the SAA or refusing to pay taxes, which would put them in full conflict with Damascus, that is unless Damascus approves of this for some reason like it did with the Kurds
2. Normally, when a battle moves closer to your borders and into your territory, it is not conducive to maintaining neutrality, to the contrary, it is conducive to picking a side and throwing your weight behind it. I'm not aware of there being a lot of wars that were fought in essentially neutral territory.

The Kurds after all are (uneasily) neutral with the rebels in Aleppo and with the SAA in Hasaka, but still collaborate against ISIL (at least in Hasaka, but will likely also in Aleppo if need be). The Druze would not be alone against ISIL,

While that is a valid point, I feel that there is still a difference. There are only a couple hundred rebels helping the YPG in the Kobane canton, as for the SAA - it doesn't really help the Kurds so much as it happens to have compatible interests in keeping the ISIS away from Hasakah. Either way, at least 90% of the fighting in that region is done by the Kurds. Even if the rebels AND the government both stopped helping the Kurds or even turned on them, that would be a setback but far from a decisive one - they'd survive most likely. Same can hardly be said for the Druze in Suweida. If the SAA left, it would probably withdraw from the entire province up to the Khalkhalah Airbase at least, and the mountain Druze (probably less than a million at this point due to people fleeing the war) will have to fend for themselves with no heavy weapons. Good luck with that. It could be all right, or could go horribly wrong. No "Southern Front" can be expected to be willing, let alone capable to defend them. Just yesterday these guys were Nusra's best friends, and they still go hand in hand with some hardcore Islamists. Would they be willing, say, to postpone the fight against Bashar to go and defend the Druze en masse from an ISIS onslaught? Doubtful. 99% of them would say it's not our problem, or worse - the Druze have it coming for cooperating with Bashar for so long and continuing to refuse throwing full weight behind the revolution, and besides they're almost like Shia so who cares about them. And what if ISIS and Nusra join forces in this region? Hell even if the SF guys wanted to do something about it, it's doubtful that they could in that scenario.

it can become cut off from the rest of the regime territory as IS and the SF expand, the SAA can pull out to protect the Damascus-Homs-Hama-coast backbone

If the regime makes a decision to pull out from Suweida, the Druze will be forced to either fend for themselves or try to join the Southern Front, they won't have any other options - so there is no argument there. Likewise if the SAA stays but becomes completely cut off from Damascus, it will probably accede to greater Druze autonomy as a matter of practical necessity. But that requires the regime to make that decision first. The Druze would most likely prefer the the SAA stay and defend them for as long as it is capable, because like I described above, the few other options are a lot more dangerous.

abu_rashid
I'm curious, who do you think is right and who is wrong in the ISIS-Nusra fight?