The difference between Aleppo and Mosul?

Gatling

Jimmy Garlic wrote: »

You are not understanding me Gatling. If an overdubbed translation completely drowns out the original voice then there is no way to independently verify it. If Russian media were putting out translations where the original voice is completely inaudible then I wouldn't believe them either.

I'm perfectly understanding you most media do badly over dubbed translations whether it be wrong age to wrong accent I personally wouldn't dismiss anything based off that,
Haven't watched anything on BBC lately but in the clip you talked about some one saying Assad is a murderer ,
What did you expect the person to say highly likely he's been bombed out of his home or had family members killed ,
If that was you would you be cheering for the person responsible for bombing everything in your city ,

Like yesterday a calendar was produced by a russian company showing scantily clad ladies purported to be Syrians with suggestive quotes attributed to them at some point it's going to appear on here as some kind of proof that Syrians love valdi Putin .

KingBrian2

Much of the media reporting coming out of Syria is from totally biased and propaganda sources. The British observatory monitoring the humanitarian situation is completely focusing on the opponents of the Gvt. We rarely see reporting for third parties and that is down to the dangers of the terrain. Outside of gvt controlled areas anyone can print or say whatever figure they want we have no means to verify these reports. Indeed much of these reports come with a warning attacked they have not been corroborated.

recedite

Gatling wrote: »

You may or may not be aware the assad regime blocked the majority of media from reporting or even entering Syria

There is no blanket ban on journalists entering Syria. All they have to do is apply for a visa. Those who abused their visas on previous trips by fabricating lies and campaigning for "regime change" in Syria are obviously not going to be welcomed back.

aled

am I right or wrong in saying that Saudi arabia is bang in the middle of all this. all the arms that are being sold are going through Saudi. then it goes to rebel fighters in yemen or Syria. am I wrong in thinking that Saudi arabia is a middleman for the sale of arms?

KingBrian2

aled wrote: »

am I right or wrong in saying that Saudi arabia is bang in the middle of all this. all the arms that are being sold are going through Saudi. then it goes to rebel fighters in yemen or Syria. am I wrong in thinking that Saudi arabia is a middleman for the sale of arms?

Yes for the most part. Iran also plays its role in sponsoring all groups that hate Saudi Arabia. Both the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran are spreading the terror with their proxies.

Yourself isit

Assad meets the Queen in 2002 and was close to being knighted. We've always been at war with eastasia West Asia.

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/National/article1072174.ece

Gatling

Yourself isit wrote: »

Assad meets the Queen in 2002 and was close to being knighted.

Massacreing your own population will ruin any chance of Knight hood or other awards

Yourself isit

Gatling wrote: »

Massacreing your own population will ruin any chance of Knight hood or other awards

It doesn't harm the Saudis

Gringo180

Yourself isit wrote: »

It doesn't harm the Saudis

Nor Bush or Blair, the former remarkably becoming a middle eastern peace envoy :pac:

Gatling

Yourself isit wrote: »

It doesn't harm the Saudis

Post removed just realised this is the politics forum not AH ,

Apologies mods

KingBrian2

Gatling wrote: »

Massacreing your own population will ruin any chance of Knight hood or other awards

You know those demonstrators were not looking for a democratic country.

Gatling

KingBrian2 wrote: »

You know those demonstrators were not looking for a democratic country.

Depends on what propaganda you subscribe to

KingBrian2

Gatling wrote: »

Depends on what propaganda you subscribe to

For once I agree with you. Propaganda on all sides.

johnp001

Gatling wrote: »

Massacreing your own population will ruin any chance of Knight hood or other awards

Mugabe was Sir Robert from 1994 to 2008.
Mandela was barred from entering the US as a terrorist until 2008, more than a decade after he became president of South Africa.
And Oslo University and the Nobel committee invite former peace prize winner Kissinger this month to lecture on peace despite local protests

I don't think the statuses accorded to figures on the world stage are in any way related to the morality of their actions but purely on the basis of political expediency.

Manach

Unfortunately the violence is that region is spiriing even more out of control.
"Russian ambassador to Turkey shot dead in Ankara"
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38369962

How Russia reacts to this will be interesting.

Hande hoche!

Would imagine more military aircraft being moved to Syria by the Russians. Syrian army will probably get more equipment T72s etc.

johnp001

Paul R. Pillar article on ConsortiumNews yesterday talking about Aleppo in the context of other international conflicts.

Paul R. Pillar wrote:

...
If one were to search for dispassionate and objective reasons to have more despair over Aleppo than over countless other instances of wartime suffering or of man’s inhumanity to man, such reasons would be hard to find. As important as possession of Aleppo is, it has still been only one piece of one front in one war out of the complex of wars that have constituted the violence in Syria over the past six years. There are many instances of brutality, at the hand of different perpetrators, to be found in the Syrian violence.

Outside Syria it is easy to find current or recent situations that are also heartstring-worthy. This is true even if limiting one’s purview to the Middle East and to instances of government forces assaulting populated areas and inflicting many civilian casualties and other civilian suffering.

Two instances that come readily to mind are the repeated armed assaults on the Gaza Strip and aerial bombardment in the current war in Yemen. The situation in Aleppo has in one respect been milder than those cases; rather than being an instance of “extermination,” in Aleppo even fighters, let alone civilians, have been given a chance to evacuate. There have been no convoys of green buses to take the people of Gaza or Yemen to safer places.

Policy Misdirection

The oversimplification and emotion that have come to characterize the dominant narrative about Aleppo are generating serious misunderstanding about that situation and about the wider war in Syria, and are laying groundwork for policy misdirection about other civil wars in the future.
More...

Meanwhile the Mosul conflict drags on with no immediate end in sight:

IS shows no sign of weakening as Mosul battle enters third month

'Tragedy' Inside Mosul As Food Runs Out, The Battle Against ISIS Drags On

recedite

The war has taken its toll with the various protagonists at both Aleppo and Mosul being exhausted and depleted. And yet there is one major force in the area still fresh. Turkey still has one of the largest tank and infantry armies in the world, idling nearby. And they also control the most of the supply routes for Syrian rebel and IS positions.
It looks like these talks in Moscow could be very significant. Putin has obviously decided to treat the ambassador as expendable, and not let his death interrupt the greater scheme of things.
USA and EU have become somewhat irrelevant recently. But I think the aim of the talks will be to come up with a plan end the war in a way which suits Assad, Turkey Russia and Iran, but which Trump will also support when he takes office. So basically, it will probably involve quietly shafting the Kurds, giving some autonomy to a few Turkmen and "moderate rebels" in a buffer zone close to Turkey, and then all involved destroying IS utterly and completely, with maximum press coverage.

A Primal Nut

So a week or two ago social media was full of reports from people inside Aleppo about how they are about to die because the regime was going to kill everyone. The word genocide was being thrown around. Has any of this come to pass? Have any of those people on social media actually died yet?

KingBrian2

A Primal Nut wrote: »

So a week or two ago social media was full of reports from people inside Aleppo about how they are about to die because the regime was going to kill everyone. The word genocide was being thrown around. Has any of this come to pass? Have any of those people on social media actually died yet?

Some day the media is going to have to own up to the falsification they put out there and retract what they have reported to be the case which had no trace of truth in them.

johnp001

KingBrian2 wrote: »

Some day the media is going to have to own up to the falsification they put out there and retract what they have reported to be the case which had no trace of truth in them.

Given that the "war of aggression" waged on Iraq based on falsified WMD evidence has led to no consequences for the ultimate war criminals responsible or the media that led the unquestioning cheerleading I am not holding my breath waiting for this to happen...

International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg wrote:

To initiate a war of aggression is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime, differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.

I would love to believe that the day when the truth prevails is imminent but every recent action where governments seek to control the public discourse on these issues by banning "propaganda" or "fake news" pushes us further towards the dystopian future described in Orwell's 1984.

George Orwell wrote:

Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past.

Jimmy Garlic

Any word on the seven year old girl that Tweets in perfect English and whose first follower on Twitter was an Al Jazeera ''journalist''?

Gatling

Jimmy Garlic wrote: »

Any word on the seven year old girl that Tweets in perfect English and whose first follower on Twitter was an Al Jazeera ''journalist''?

Is there a reason a 7 year old girl in Syria who's mother is an English teacher couldn't possibly communicate in English.

But to answer the first part she met with president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey the other day

A Primal Nut

Christians in Aleppo celebrating Christmas for the first time in years....presumably they didn't feel safe doing so when being ruled by the "moderate" rebels.

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN14E0HN?il=0

Hande hoche!

Interesting tweet from a coalition commander in Iraq as regards the popular mobilization units. Could be that they are getting ready to allow these units , together with the Pershmerga, to encroach on Mosul itself. Would make sense given the hard fought progress thus far.

https://twitter.com/Hayder_alKhoei/status/813523437373288448

johnp001

Kurt Nimmo/Newsbud wrote:

On this episode of The Geopolitical Report, we counter the establishment’s narrative on the conflict in Syria and the flashpoint of Daraa, a town near the Syria-Jordan border where the CIA, working with the Muslim Brotherhood, attacked police and set the stage for a conflict that has so far claimed the lives of more than 400,000 Syrians. The proxy war is designed to take down a secular government and replace it with a Salafist principality controlled by the Brotherhood, a longtime CIA and British intelligence asset.

Very interesting short video just published today describing how the Syrian insurrection started.

donaghs

Gatling wrote: »

Massacreing your own population will ruin any chance of Knight hood or other awards

Gatling, it seems like your hatred of Assad is the only thing that defines your contributions, trumping anything that ISIS or Syrian Al Queda do.

Its distorting your overall view. Its nonsense to say someone would be denied a knighthood if they had been responsible for massacres. Ceausecu got a knighthood when he was seen as an emerging critic of the Soviets, within the eastern bloc. It was only taken away after the fall of the Berlin Wall and when he was removed from power - i.e. when it became "politically incorrect".

Other notables the British knighted included Benito Mussolini (removed 1940, gassing the Ethiopians in 1936 was not a problem), Robert Mugabe, Chiang Kai-shek, Konstantin Rokossovsky, Leopold II of Belgium, the last Shah of Iran, etc.

The point being that post the 1990 Gulf War, "the West" (i.e. the US and major NATO countries) did a deal with Assad's father. They were happy enough with his son taking over, keeping order post 9/11. Happy enough to trumpet his minor reforms as the beginning of a new brighter era in Syria. Just have a read of Vogue's puff piece of Assad's wife.
But post Iraq War 2003, the "Arab Spring" etc, an opportunity was seen to remove a regime who was never going to be their guy. e.g. FDR's comment on Nicaragua's dictator in the 1930s/40s: "Somoza may be a son of a bitch, but he's our son of a bitch."

Gatling

donaghs wrote: »

Gatling, it seems like your hatred of Assad is the only thing that defines your contributions, trumping anything that ISIS or Syrian Al Queda do.

Ive Absolutely no idea what your talking about seriously

Wheeliebin30

After all those deaths and destruction things are still the same.

What a waste. The "rebels" should be real proud of their achievements.

realitykeeper

The difference between Aleppo and Mosul is that Aleppo is free thanks to Russia and Mosul is under attack by terrorists who are supported by the west.

johnp001

Nicholas J S Davies writing on Consortium News today

Consortium News wrote:

The ‘Post-Truth’ Mainstream Media

...
The corporate media’s selective crocodile tears over the plight of civilians in East Aleppo stand in sharp contrast to their diametrically-opposed framing of the similar plight of an estimated 1.5 million civilians in Mosul, under siege and daily bombardment by the U.S. and its allies. While the plight of civilians in East Aleppo was blamed entirely on the attacking forces and not on their Al Qaeda-linked captors, the crisis facing civilians in Mosul is blamed entirely on ISIS, while the forces gradually destroying the city with artillery and air strikes are presented as the people’s liberators.

In reality, U.S. air strikes have killed thousands of people in and around Mosul, destroyed all the bridges over the Tigris, and struck at least two hospitals, the university, food warehouses, dairies, flour mills, factories, banks, apartment buildings, private homes, telephone exchanges and water and electricity plants.

After months of escalating siege, artillery bombardment and air strikes, much of the population has lost access to food, water, medicine, electricity and other necessities of life, but still have no means of escape from the twin dangers of American bombs and Iraqi government death squads on one side and ISIS’s murderous rule on the other.

Can we hope that U.S. corporate media will now pay more attention to the plight of civilians in Mosul, or even acknowledge our country’s leading role in the destruction and misery that is engulfing them?
More...

ilkhanid

KingBrian2 wrote: »

As for Gadhafi and Milosevic the left never condoned any of the actions of these leaders. Usually it is the right that talks about nuking the middle east and allowing military dictators butcher their people. The Brits don't put nearly enough pressure on Israel to make peace with their Arab neighbours and spend more time starting wars.

As for Miloslevic some sections of the left certainly did. Remember the "Living Marxism" libel case? And Chomsky didn't cover himself in glory on that subject either.

KingBrian2

ilkhanid wrote: »

As for Miloslevic some sections of the left certainly did. Remember the "Living "libel case?

Sorry not old enough to remember Milosevic's time.

ilkhanid

Link here...
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2000/mar/15/pressandpublishing.tvnews

Brian?

realitykeeper wrote: »

The difference between Aleppo and Mosul is that Aleppo is free thanks to Russia and Mosul is under attack by terrorists who are supported by the west.

The Iraqi army are terrorists? The Kurds? Or is the Shia and Sunni militias you're referring to? What about ISIS, are they valiant defended of Mosul or terrorists?

I hate the word "terrorist". It's lost all meaning. Everyone is a poxy terrorist now.

I think it really shows how deplorable ISIS are when the Shias, Sunnis, Kurds, the West and Russia can all agree they have to go.

recedite

Aleppo seems to be very quiet these days, but a humanitarian disaster is unfolding in Mosul.

Trump seems to have forgotten all about his pre-election promises to seek greater co-operation with Russia to destroy Islamic State.

Following Trumps recent air strike against a Syrian/Russian airbase, the Israeli's have now been emboldened to launch a similar strike against pro-Assad forces.

A massive explosion has struck near Damascus International Airport after a suspected Israeli air strike on an arms depot used by Hizbollah

And with Turkey also launching airstrikes against the Kurdish ground troops, IS fighters must be thanking Allah for giving them such a good start to the year. Things are really looking up for them.

And the war now looks set to drag on indefinitely.

Gatling

recedite wrote: »

Aleppo seems to be very quiet these days,

Trump seems to have forgotten all about his pre-election promises to seek greater co-operation with Russia to destroy Islamic State.

Following Trumps recent air strike against a Syrian/Russian airbase, the Israeli's have now been emboldened to launch a similar[ strike

And the war now looks set to drag on indefinitely.

Aleppo is about as quite as anywhere else in Syria currently,
Trump had make sure and I'm sure the civillian population of Syria would agree had to stop Assad using Sarin Gas against them ,their still hitting Isis and Isis infrastructure on a near daily basis without having to bomb heavily populated areas ,
And Israel have been targeting hizbollah , Iranian and Assad regime forces for nearly 5 years now it's pretty old news at this stage,
But yes the war will rage on for a few more years

recedite

Sporadic use of sarin gas is old news in Syria, but the evidence for who deployed it has always been on about the same level as the evidence for WMD's in Iraq, ie not enough to warrant an aggressive attack on a foreign sovereign nation. Otherwise the UN would sanction it.

Anyway, I'm not sure the thousands who have died suffocating underneath bombed out rubble would consider dying of sarin gas poisoning to be any worse a fate.
When did Israel last strike Syria? Perhaps it escaped my notice, but I don't remember it happening in recent years?

Gatling

recedite wrote: »

S
When did Israel last strike Syria? Perhaps it escaped my notice, but I don't remember it happening in recent years?

I can think of at least 6 or 7 airstrikes in the last few years ,
The first major one targeted a chemical weapons lab ,and multiple other strike hitting hizbollah or Assad forces over the last few years ,

recedite

recedite wrote: »

...The possible outcome then is that the "naive" Kurds attack IS in Raqqa, backed by coalition air support. Putin sits back and waits while the two sides grind each other down. Then Turkey moves in, finishes off the Kurds and seizes a "buffer zone" in Northern Syria - the Kurdish part.
Assad, backed by Russian air power, finishes off the IS resistance in the Sunni part, and plants the Syrian flag in Raqqa. US special forces then forced to retreat back across the border to Iraq.
US President then claims "victory" over IS, "major operations completed" in the war, and "peace restored" to Syria (to much relief and applause at home)

And so the final phase begins. The largest land army in the region kicks into gear as Turkey invades Syria.
The question now is how long the US will continue backing and supplying the Kurds, or is this the moment they get hung out to dry?
I think by calling the annexation "Operation Olive Branch" Turkey is signalling to the other powers (and their proxies) that if everybody stays cool and just allows it to happen, there will be less casualties. They'll stop after they have eliminated the Kurdish "threat" and got their 30Km slice of Syria.

Gatling

recedite wrote: »

And so the final phase begins. The largest land army in the region kicks into gear as Turkey invades Syria.
The question now is how long the US will continue backing and supplying the Kurds, or is this the moment they get hung out to dry?
I think by calling the annexation "Operation Olive Branch" Turkey is signalling to the other powers (and their proxies) that if everybody stays cool and just allows it to happen, there will be less casualties. They'll stop after they have eliminated the Kurdish "threat" and got their 30Km slice of Syria.

Turkey annexation wouldn't stop at Kurdish regions only last week Turkey declared Assad a terrorist who will be removed ,
Now Turkey have a large army yes , but can they fight going from what I seen since they went into Syria last year "No" for the most part there was several videos doing the rounds showing a group of six plus Turkish tanks getting picked off by small team of Kurdish fighters one after another ,not a great start for Turkish forces ,
We already know the US are creating and supporting a 30,000+strong Kurdish border defense force ,so I can't see them standing back and letting Turkish forces repeatedly attack Kurds .
But only time will tell

donaghs

interesting how Turkey kept a quiet and porous border with IS in Syria for years, but only throw a hissy fit and attack when the Kurds take over from IS on the border.

recedite

Gatling wrote: »

We already know the US are creating and supporting a 30,000+strong Kurdish border defense force ,so I can't see them standing back and letting Turkish forces repeatedly attack Kurds .
But only time will tell

What's the Nato protocol for when one member is fighting a proxy war against another member?
That's the difficulty now for the USA. They have to decide whether they want Turkey as an ally or the Kurds. If the Kurds lose US backing, they don't stand a chance.

donaghs

Erdogan says he’s willing to continue military action against the Syrian Kurds “until there is no terrorist on our border leading to Iraq".

Clearly he was happier sharing a border with an “Islamic State”.

Gatling

donaghs wrote: »

Erdogan says he’s willing to continue military action against the Syrian Kurds “until there is no terrorist on our border leading to Iraq".

Clearly he was happier sharing a border with an “Islamic State”.

He's a bit of a nutter , he's already stated there going take Manbij by force ,
Manbij just happens to be under Kurdish and American control with something like a thousand US troops and fighting vehicles based there ,
Looks like a direct conflict is looming ,
Expect erdogan to announce he's now in bed with putin and Assad to remove the Kurd problem

VonZan

Gatling wrote: »

He's a bit of a nutter , he's already stated there going take Manbij by force ,
Manbij just happens to be under Kurdish and American control with something like a thousand US troops and fighting vehicles based there ,
Looks like a direct conflict is looming ,
Expect erdogan to announce he's now in bed with putin and Assad to remove the Kurd problem

Possibly but unlikely. Assad has absolutely no support in ‘Kurdish Syria’. He may try and retake the land but he has no control in the region. I suspect Assad is more worried about the Rebels than the Kurds as the rebels are still going to be a major problem for him politically. The US also won’t stand for another escalation in region and are unlikely to remain idle again when the Kurds are attacked. If anything the US have finally realised the value of supporting the Kurds after leaving them for dead in Iraq.

If Assad pushes for the rest of Syria it will be his downfall. Iran would also probably prefer Kurdish control of that region rather than Sunni militias invading again who pine for the Caliphate now they have tasted it. Assad doesn’t have the support to control or govern the north east.

Del.Monte

It's a dangerous mess and one thing for sure you won't see any of the heroes responsible for it getting their heads shot off. Easy to order people to their deaths from thousands of miles away.

recedite

VonZan wrote: »

If Assad pushes for the rest of Syria it will be his downfall.

You'll notice that Assad has not been pushing though. He has declared the presence of US troops and their allies in his country as "illegal" but has carefully avoided any direct confrontation with them.
I think in order of preference he would like the region controlled by...
1. His own national govt.
2. US backed Kurds
3. Turkey
4. Islamic State

So until he has the strength and/or Russian backing to retake the region, he will have to bide his time.
But from Putin's point of view, the current situation is just fine. It's driving a wedge between the two NATO allies. It suits Putin to be on good terms with both Assad and Erdogan, even though these two despise each other.

For the Kurds, its chance to gain some autonomy in a second country, and they will fight hard because it could be many generations before they get another chance. They are a proud and ancient nation with 30 million people. Really they should have their own country at the junction of Syria,Turkey Iraq and Iran.