Category Archives: Military

Hillary has NO Defense Under the Law or Executive Order

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Executive Order #13526  Espionage Act

WASHINGTON — Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of the president of Afghanistan, gets regular payments from the CIA and has for much of the past eight years, The New York Times reported Tuesday.

The newspaper said that according to current and former American officials, the CIA pays Karzai for a variety of services, including helping to recruit an Afghan paramilitary force that operates at the CIA’s direction in and around Kandahar.

The CIA’s ties to Karzai, who is a suspected player in the country’s illegal opium trade, have created deep divisions within the Obama administration, the Times said.

Allegations that Karzai is involved in the drug trade have circulated in Kabul for months. He denies them.

Critics say the ties with Karzai complicate the United States’ increasingly tense relationship with his older brother, President Hamid Karzai. The CIA’s practices also suggest that the United States is not doing everything in its power to stamp out the lucrative Afghan drug trade, a major source of revenue for the Taliban.

Clinton email chain discussed Afghan national’s CIA ties, official says

FNC: EXCLUSIVE: One of the classified email chains discovered on Hillary Clinton’s personal unsecured server discussed an Afghan national’s ties to the CIA and a report that he was on the agency’s payroll, a U.S. government official with knowledge of the document told Fox News.

The discussion of a foreign national working with the U.S. government raises security implications – an executive order signed by President Obama said unauthorized disclosures are “presumed to cause damage to the national security.”

The U.S. government official said the Clinton email exchange, which referred to a New York Times report, was among 29 classified emails recently provided to congressional committees with specific clearances to review them. In that batch were 22 “top secret” exchanges deemed too damaging to national security to release.

Confirmation that one of these exchanges concerned a reported CIA asset means the emails went beyond issues like the drone strike campaign. Democrats repeatedly have said some messages referred to this, reinforcing Clinton’s position that the documents are over-classified.

Based on the timing and other details, the email chain likely refers to either an October 2009 Times story that identified Afghan national Ahmed Wali Karzai, the half-brother of then-Afghan president Hamid Karzai, as a person who received “regular payments from the Central Intelligence Agency” — or an August 2010 Times story that identified Karzai aide Mohammed Zia Salehi as being on the CIA payroll. Ahmed Wali Karzai was murdered during a 2011 shoot-out, a killing later claimed by the Taliban.

Fox News was told the email chain included then-Secretary of State Clinton and then-special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke and possibly others. The basic details of this email exchange were backed up to Fox News by a separate U.S. government source who was not authorized to speak on the record.

It’s unclear who initiated the discussion – Clinton, Holbrooke or a subordinate – or whether the CIA’s relationship with the Afghan national was confirmed, because the classified documents are not public.

Holbrooke died in December 2010, during his service as a special envoy.

A CIA spokesperson told Fox News they had no comment on the email chain.

A spokeswoman for the Office of the Intelligence Community Inspector General also had no comment.

The U.S. government official’s account of the Clinton email chain dovetails with a Feb. 3 interview on Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom,” where Republican Rep. Chris Stewart, a member of the House intelligence committee, said, “I have never read anything more sensitive than what these emails contain. They do reveal classified methods. They do reveal classified sources and they do reveal human assets.”

Stewart added, “I can’t imagine how anyone could be familiar with these emails, whether they’re sending them or receiving them, and not realize that these are highly classified.”

While the Clinton campaign claims the government classification review has gone too far, Executive Order 13526, in a section called “classification standards,” says, “the unauthorized disclosure of foreign government information is presumed to cause damage to the national security.”

Fox News was first to report that the Clinton emails contained intelligence beyond “top secret,” and some of the information was deemed “HCS-O” – a code that refers to human intelligence from ongoing operations.

National security and intelligence experts emphasized to Fox News that security clearance holders are trained to not confirm or deny details of a classified program in an unclassified setting, which would include a personal unsecured email network, even if the classified program appears in press reports.

“The rules of handling classified information dictate if something is reported in open source [news reports] you don’t confirm it because it’s still classified information,” said Dan Maguire, who spent more than four decades handling highly classified programs and specialized in human intelligence operations.

As secretary of state, Clinton signed at least two non-disclosure agreements (NDA) on Jan. 22, 2009, and received a briefing from a security officer whose identity was redacted. As part of the NDA for “sensitive compartmented information” (SCI), Clinton acknowledged any “breach” could result in “termination of my access to SCI and removal from a position of special confidence and trust requiring such access as well as the termination of my employment or any other relationships with any Department or Agency that provides me with access to SCI.”

It is remains unclear how classified materials “jumped the gap” from a classified system to her personal server.

On Feb. 12, Clinton’s national press secretary Brian Fallon emphasized that classified information would have been marked as such. “I think when this review plays itself out, at the end they’ll find that what we have said is true,” he told CNN. “Nothing was marked classified at the time it was sent.”

Fallon also attacked the State Department inspector general, Steve Linick, for what he described as “fishing expedition-style investigations” since Clinton decided to run for president. “There is no basis. It is intended to create headwinds for her campaign, but it is not going to work,” Fallon said. He leveled a similar allegation against Intelligence Community Inspector General I. Charles McCullough, III, after his office notified Congress the emails contained information beyond top secret.

Inquiries by Fox News to Clinton’s attorney David Kendall about the status of or changes to her security clearance, and access to classified information, have not been returned.

Russian Spy Plane and Chechens in Syria

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Chechen Special Forces On The Ground In Syria

iHLS: Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said that Chechen Special Forces loyal to Vladimir Putin are on the ground in Syria, operating in ISIS-controlled territory. He claimed that the operation is part of a Russian-led intelligence-gathering mission. International Business Times reports that in a preview of a documentary which is scheduled to be aired on Russia’s state-controlled TV channel, Russia One, later this week, Kadyrov is filmed at a training camp for special units in Chechnya. Kadyrov tells the camera that his “best fighters” were sent undercover to Syria to train alongside – and among — ISIS fighters, while Chechen intelligence agents had infiltrated ISIS cells “to gather information about the terrorist group.” A Russia One’s reporter says in the preview that the time had come to talk about those “who have safeguarded the success of Russian air strikes on the ground at the cost of their own lives.”

According to a report by Homeland Security News Wire, Kadyrov’s claims appeared to have irritated the Kremlin. In a rare public dispute between the Kremlin’s official line about Syria and the information broadcast on state TV, Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, refused to confirm Kadyrov’s claims. Peskov told reporters that Russia’s defense ministry has already provided “exhaustive information [about] who has been deployed to Syria and for how long and what they’re doing there … and one should not speak about the Chechen special task force but about relevant federal units.” The Russia One’s report, and the refusal of the Kremlin to confirm it, offers an indication of disagreements in the Russian leadership about what strategy Russia should be pursuing in Syria.

The Kremlin has insisted that there are no Russian troops on the ground, and has been tight-lipped about whether Russian special forces are operating in the country. The Russia One report also offers evidence that Kadyrov, considered among Putin’s closest allies, may be distancing himself from Moscow in effort to play a bigger role in the region. Kadyrov, who describes himself as a “foot soldier for Putin,” has taken power in Chechnya in 2007, when he was still in his early 30s, and has ruled the province with an iron fist since then. International organizations have harshly criticized his rule for systemic human rights violations. He also has at his disposal thousands of paramilitary fighters known in the region as “Kadyrovtsky” (Kadyrov’s men). The force was originally put together to serve the Kremlin, but over time they have become much more loyal to the Chechen leader.

Russia has just deployed its most advanced spy plane to Syria

A Russian Air Force Tu-214R is about to land at Latakia, Syria.

Aviationist: The Tu-214R is a Russian ISR (Intelligence Surveillance Reconnaissance) aircraft. In other words, a quite advanced spyplane.

As we have already explained here in the past, it is a special mission aircraft equipped with all-weather radar systems and electro optical sensors that produce photo-like imagery of a large parts of the ground: these images are then used to identify and map the position of the enemy forces, even if these are camouflaged or hidden.

The aircraft is known to carry sensor packages to perform ELINT (Electronic Intelligence) and SIGINT (Signal Intelligence) missions: the antennae of the Tu-214R can intercept the signals emitted by the enemy systems (radars, aircraft, radios, combat vehicles, mobile phones etc) so as it can build the EOB (Electronic Order of Battle) of the enemy forces: where the enemy forces are operating, what kind of equipment they are using and, by eavesdropping into their radio/phone communications, what they are doing and what will be their next move.

The aircraft is built by KAPO (Kazan Aircraft Production Association) and flown from the company’s airfield in Kazan.

On Feb. 15, the Tu-214R registered RA-64514, serial number 42305014, the second of the two examples of this kind of aircraft built under contract with Russia’s Ministry of Defense, flew from Kazan to Latakia airbase, Syria.

LX9203

Image credit: Flightradar24.com

With its ADS-B transponder signals broadcast in the clear and detected by Flightradar24 collecting stations, the aircraft could be tracked as it followed the eastern corridor from Russia, to the Caspian Sea and then to Syria via the Iranian and Iraqi airspaces. It’s not clear whether the aircraft has already been delivered to the Russian Air Force, even though it is quite weird that a developmental aircraft is deployed abroad (unless the reason is testing it at war in a real scenario…).

While it was still under development, the same Tu-214R aircraft flew what appeared to be an operative mission on Jun. 18, 2015, when it flew from Kazan to Crimea and back, closely following the border between Russia and Ukraine, most probably testing some of its sensors against real targets.

Previously, the aircraft was spotted flying near Crimea.Interestingly, while over the Caspian Sea, approaching the Iranian airspace, the Tu-214R performed a couple of 360° turns at 33.000 feet (weird, while enroute): maybe it was working on the diplomatic clearence to enter Iran?

Continuing south, approaching Iran…
Russian Air Force SIGINT a/c

Visualizza l'immagine su Twitter

Russian Su-35s often shadow German Tornados over Syria but “they do it professionally”

 

Meet ISIS’ Special Operations Unit, Katibat al-Battar

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Tip of the Spear? Meet ISIS’ Special Operations Unit, Katibat al-Battar

Bellingcat: On a mild November night last year, nine EU citizens roamed the streets of Paris with guns and explosives, murdering and injuring hundreds of civilians. In the days and weeks afterward, France declared emergency laws, Britain voted to expand the bombing of ISIS in Syria and ISIS supporters launched their own social media response on Twitter with #PrayforRaqqah.

But many of the most important questions around Paris remain unanswered. Where did these men come from? Were they part of a group? Who instructed them to commit these acts?

The following investigation reveals that a little-known group of battle-hardened and highly capable Libyans are the common factor behind many of the major terrorist attacks in Europe and North Africa since 2014.

1

Meet Katibat Al-Battar Al-Libi

When groups of Libyans involve themselves in foreign jihads, the West normally suffers. From the jihad in 1980s Afghanistan, through to running al-Qa’ida in Pakistan in the 2000s, Libyans fighters have played a significant role in most recent jihadist conflicts. As recently as 2007, the US Naval Academy at West Point released a study of seized Islamic State personnel files, which were found in a US Army raid in Iraq. To the author’s surprise, a disproportionate number of fighters were Libyan, and specifically from the town of Dernah, in the northeast Libya. Almost 20% of the Islamic State’s fighters in Iraq were Libyan, and of that figure, over 60% of them were from Dernah. According to the study, the city and its surrounds contained ‘the greatest concentration of jihadi terrorists anywhere on the planet’.

Unsurprisingly then, in 2012 as the Arab Spring caught fire, entire brigades of fighters from Dernah were among the first foreign fighters to arrive in Syria. Rather than immersing themselves with ISIS or Jabat al-Nusra, the Libyans created their own unit, Katibat al-Battar al-Libi, with the catching slogan ‘بالذبح جئناكم’ or; ‘We came to slaughter you’. Battar is a reference to one of the Prophet’s swords – known for its impact on the neck of his enemies. The group’s inaugural 2012 video is available here. Many of the Libyan members of KBL were seasoned veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan; battle-hardened fighters.

Over time, as ISIS’ power grew in Syria, KBL sensibly pledged allegiance to ISIS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi. With its cadre of experienced fighters, KBL began fighting for the ISIS cause in Syria and Iraq. In January 2015, KBL captured and brutally killed dozens of Peshmerga. Arabic media reports in July 2015 that 350 KBL fighters supported the ISIS presence in Baiji, Iraq, where a prominent leader, Abu Dujana Al-Libi was killed.

Blogs holding ISIS content indicate that KBL was one of the first groups in Syria to participate effectively in both fighting and relief work, playing a fundamental role in ISIS’ capture of Taftanaz airport and Khan Tuman.  Various reports estimate KBL’s strength in Syria from the low hundreds to over 1400. The group began life as a semi-autonomous commando unit fighting under the overall ISIS banner, but has clearly since expanded its role to include relief work in Syria and mass training camps in Libya (see below).

The group’s role as an elite unit of ISIS would have huge consequences for the Syrian war, but also for Europe, Libya and North Africa.

2

Europeans mix with KBL

In 2013 and 2014, European fighters began travelling to Syria in larger numbers. With its sterling reputation in Syria growing, KBL became an attractive group for Francophone fighters, specifically Belgians, French and Tunisians. Although the exact reason is unknown, one explanation for Belgians joining KBL is language; many Belgian-Moroccans are from eastern Morocco, whose Maghrebi dialect is very similar to Libyan Arabic.

During 2014, KBL records indicate a considerable number of Belgians died fighting for KBL in Syria. In addition to the domestic campaign, it appears that during 2014, KBL decided to expand its operations to Europe. One of the most prominent Belgians within KBL at the time was Abdelhamid Abaaoud. In order to evade the authorities, Abaaoud faked his own death in a published list of KBL martyrs, and he appears in social media with a number of KBL individuals during 2014.

Abaaoud was at the centre of a string of terrorist plots in Europe, before the Paris attacks in November 2015. It is likely that KBL introduced the concept of ‘Inghimasi’ operations to Abaaoud, and it is possible, if not probable that KBL – via Abaaoud – assisted, sponsored or directed at least four terrorist attacks in Europe in 2014-2015;

What is clear is that a considerable number of Europeans, Tunisians and Moroccans joined Katibat al-Battar as the group’s legend in Syria grew. Many of these fighters died in Syria or Iraq, fighting for Islamic State. However, in hindsight, the mixing of EU passport holders with perhaps the most violent, ruthless and capable group of Libyans in Syria dramatically escalated the terrorist threat to Europeans, both at home and abroad.

 

From Libya to Syria, and back again

Whilst KBL’s Belgians were busy in Syria plotting internal and external attacks, dozens of experienced KBL fighters returned to Dernah in Libya, creating the first ISIS province outside of Syria and Iraq – Wilayat Barqa. Some KBL fighters reorganised themselves under the Islamic Youth Shura Council. An ISIS delegation from Raqqah, including the Yemeni Abu Bara al-Azdi and the Saudi Abu Habib Al-Jazrawi visited IYSC in September 2014 and collected allegiances from IYSC aligned fighters.

KBL’s headquarters are now believed to be in Dernah, with secondary branches in Syria and Iraq. Online videos of KBL fighters generally indicate possession of small arms, mortars and vehicle mounted anti-aircraft. A KBL affiliated Facebook group has also been identified; the group’s icon is Jihadi John.

Reports indicate that the group runs training camps in Libya focused on assassinations, mass murder, weapons training and bomb-making. KBL’s is also reported to have an operations room in Dernah for terrorist activities in Tunisia.

3

According to several sources, the activities of KB are distributed across three teams:

  • Guarding IS leaders; this is mostly made up of Tunisian nationals and elements from the dissolved Iraqi Baath regime;
  • Liquidation Teams: in charge of assassinating those who refuse to pledge allegiance to Al-Baghdadi; unverified reports point to KBL’s involvement in the killing of Ansar Al-Sharia’s former leader, Mohamed Zahawi;
  • Mass Casualty ‘Inghimasi’ Operations: Inghimasi are well-trained terrorists who carries both light arms and explosives and fights until he runs out of ammunition. Though this information cannot be entirely verified, KBL affiliated fighters are thought to have played a role in the Tunisian attacks at the Bardo Museum and in Sousse

4 5

(Source: akherkhabaronline.com)

KBL are reportedly actively working in attracting young Tunisians to take part in fighting, following an initial training phase in its Libyan training camps. Nevertheless, the group’s strategies aimed at recruiting Western/European nationals remain ambiguous, particularly following the suspension of its official social media accounts.

The Age of the “Inghimasiyun”

Since joining ISIS, KBL have fostered and grown the concept of the Inghimasi; which is the jihadi equivalent of the kamikaze or the Nazi einsatzgruppen. The concept has gripped ISIS, who now broadcast their Inghimasi as heroes. Whilst there is no smoking gun pointing to KBL’s specific role in ‘Inghimasi’ style attacks at the Brussels museum, Paris, Sousse, the Corinthia hotel or the Bardo Museum in Tunis, it is important to note a) the modus operandi is entirely consistent with KBL’s Inghimasi operations b) many of the operatives were Tunisians and Belgians and c) All of these attacks came after KBL’s arrival in Dernah, in March 2014.

 

Going forward

One of the most important questions remains unanswered; to what extent are KBL subservient to ISIS, and do they retain a degree of operational autonomy? The evidence suggests KBL, moreso than ISIS, assisted or directed many of the major terrorist attacks in the past few years. Logically, then, from a Western perspective, Katibat al-Battar are the most dangerous unit within ISIS.

Perhaps of most concern to the West is KBL’s freedom to operate in Libya, with its Wilayat Barqa ISIS enclave. Whilst fighting other militias and subject to occasional airstrikes, the group is under far less pressure in Libya than its colleagues in Syria and Iraq.  It could be argued ISIS’ Libya branch presents a greater terrorist threat to Europe than its Syrian counterpart: mass training camps, proximity to Europe and the tourist beaches of Africa, and most importantly, operational pedigree – honed during years of conflict in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.

GW Bush’s Nitro Zeus to Stop Iran, Obama?

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Due to the Iran nuclear talks and eventual deal, this whole story while accurate it appears, may be an actual leak for the sake of legitimizing Iran.

 David Sanger and Mark Mazzetti report on the February 16, 2016 New York Times website that “in the early years of the Obama administration, the United States developed an elaborate plan for a cyber attack on Iran, in case the diplomatic effort to limit its nuclear program failed; and, led to a military conflict, according to a upcoming documentary film, and interviews with military and intelligence officials involved in the effort.”

 
     “The plan, code-named NITRO ZEUS, was devised to disable Iran’s air defenses, communications systems; and, crucial parts of the power grid,” the Times noted; but, was shelved when the nuclear deal with Iran was concluded.  The Times adds that “NITRO ZEUS was part of an effort to assure POTUS Obama that he had alternatives, short of a full-scale war — if Iran lashed out at the United States, or its allies in the region.  At its height, officials say, the planning for NITRO ZEUS involved thousands of American military and intelligence personnel, spending tens of millions of dollars; and, placing electronic implants in Iranian computer networks to “prepare the battlefield,” in the parlance of the Pentagon.” 
 
    FC:  The White House was no doubt hoping to dissuade Israel from conducting a pre-emptive military strike against Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, while the nuclear negotiations with Iran were nearing a conclusion.  Left unanswered in the Times article was any mention of Israel’s cooperation and/or participation in the NITRO ZEUS planning and ultimate execution.  Was Israel made aware of the plan?; but, not invited to participate?  Were they a full partner and expected to contribute to the operation if it had occurred?  Or, did the White House attempt to keep Israel out of any knowledge or participation in the effort?
     Mr. Sanger and Mr. Mazzetti note that in addition to NITRO ZEUS, “American intelligence agencies developed a separate, far more narrowly focused cyber plan to disable Iran’s Fordo nuclear enrichment site, which Iran built deep inside a mountain near the [religious] city of Qom.  The attack [on Fordo] would have been a covert operation,” which would have required POTUS approval.
 
 
   “Fordo has long been considered one of the hardest targets in Iran, buried too deep for all but the most powerful bunker-buster [bombs] in the American military arsenal,” Mr. Sanger and Mr. Mazzetti write.  “Thev proposed [covert] intelligence operation called for the insertion of a computer “worm” into the facility — with the aim of frying Fordo’s computer systems — effectively delaying, or destroying the ability of Iranian centrifuges to enrich uranium at the enrichment site.  It was intended as a follow-up to “OLYMPIC GAMES,” the code-name of a cyber attack [never acknowledged] by the United States and Israel that destroyed 1,000 Iranian nuclear centrifuges; and [at least], temporarily disrupt [nuclear fuel] production at Natanz, a far larger; but, less protected enrichment site.”  This operation involved the use of the STUXNET cyber worm; and is considered by many the first military use of a cyber weapon of mass disruption.
 
     Mr. Sanger and Mr. Mazzetti note that “the existence of NITRO ZEUS was uncovered in the course of reporting for “Zero Days,” a documentary that will be shown Wednesday [today] at the Berlin Film Festival.  Directed by Alex Gibney, who is known for other documentaries, including the Oscar-winning, “Taxi To The Dark Side,” about the [alleged] use of torture by American interrogators; and, “We Steal Secrets: The Story Of Wikileaks.”
     “Zero Days,” describes the escalating conflict between Iran and the West, in the years leading up to the agreement, and discovery of the cyber attack on the Natanz enrichment plant; and, the debates inside the Pentagon over whether the United States has [had] a workable [cyber] doctrine for the use of a new form of weaponry — whose ultimate effects are [still] only vaguely understood,” the Times noted.
    “For the seven-year old United States Cyber Command, which is still building its cyber “special forces,” and deploying them throughout the world, the Iran project [which involved infusing electronic implants at key digital ‘choke-points] was perhaps its most challenging program yet,” Mr. Sanger and Mr. Mazzetti write.  “This was enormous, and [an] enormously complex program [operation],” said one participant who requested anonymity because the program is still [highly] classified.  “Before it was developed, the U.S. had never assembled a combined cyber, kinetic attack plan on this scale,” the official added.
     “While U.S. Cyber Command would have executed NITRO ZEUS, the National Security Agency’s (NSA) Tailorerd Access Operations Unit (TAO) was responsible for penetrating the adversary’s [Iran’s] networks, which would have required piercing, and maintaining a presence in a vast number of Iranian networks, including the country’s air defenses and its transportation and command control centers,” The Times noted.
     “It is a tricky business, the war planners say, because their knowledge of how networks are connected in Iran, or any other hard target, is sketchy, and collateral damage is always hard to predict.  It is easier to turn off power grids, for example, than to start them up again.”  And, there is the critical and fundamental issue of restoring trust in the system by the people — something which is often difficult to do — just ask Target.  They have managed; but, it took a while.
     The covert operation to sabotage Fordo was challenging to say the least, since this was a clandestine Iranian nuclear enrichment facility, buried inside a mountain and no doubt heavily guarded and very difficult to breach.  Very difficult, but not impossible.  As The Times noted, some of the stolen NSA documents purloined by fugitive Edward Snowden allegedly demonstrate how computer worms and cyber viruses can be secretly inserted — remotely — into a targeted network — even if disconnected from the Internet.  I commented on article yesterday on how to steal secret keylogger data from a disconnected/stand-alone computer in another room.  Needless to say, Mr. Snowden greatly aided our adversaries and the Islamic State and al Qaeda, others with his reckless and destructive leaks.  CIA Director john Brennan admitted in a CBS 60 Minutes interview on Sunday that the Paris attackers used encrypted communications to plan, orchestrate, and launch their attack, an operational technique that allowed them to ‘remain dark’ thus prevent or undermine our ability to ferret out and hopefully prevent their operations.  In the aftermath of the Snowden leaks, these groups substantially enhanced their encryption software; as evidenced in both Paris and San Bernardino.
     For the life of me, I cannot figure out why some within the U.S. government thought disclosing this alleged operation was in our national security interests and beneficial for everyone to know.  If the report is true, it betrays extremely sensitive tactics, techniques, and procedures.  As the age old saying goes, “one cannot vanquish one’s enemies, by telegraphing one’s punches.”  Okay, nukes aside.  There are those who argue that a deterrent capability only works, if the opponent believes you can actually do what you say you can.  But, the cyber world is vastly different from the kinetic, military weaponry world, as revealing an offensive cyber capability is likely to render the digital weapon useless beyond the initial public disclosure and use.  Hackers, malcontents, others will take pleasure in being the first to reverse engineer the cyber weapon and post their findings on the open net for all to see — and, take appropriate counter-measures.  One also has to assume that North Korea, among others, is now aware of how their own networked nuclear infrastructure could be vulnerable and take pre-emptive steps to remedy their vulnerabilities. More details from the NYT’s here.

Who is Fighting in Syria and Who Wins?

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A mind-boggling stew of nations is fighting in Syria’s civil war

MilitaryTimes: Armies and militias from more than a dozen countries have joined the Syria conflict, making for a mind-boggling and dangerous stew of shifting and competing alliances.

Even as a proposed cease-fire is scheduled to begin as early as this week, more nations are escalating their roles in the nearly 5-year-old civil war: Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey said they may send ground troops to fight.

Here’s how different countries are currently aligned:

Pro-Syrian government

Forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad are backed by two nations, Russia and Iran, and many Shiite militias from across the region who are organized by Iran. The combatants include:

Syrian government troops

Iran

Afghan Shiite militia

Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militia

Iraqi Shiite militia

Russia. Russian airstrikes target the Islamic State and what Russia says are other “terrorist” groups. But the U.S. military says most Russian airstrikes are aimed at opposition groups threatening Assad’s forces.

Anti-Syrian government

Many rebel forces fighting to overthrow the Syrian government are backed by arms, funds and airstrikes by a U.S.-led coalition. The CIA vetted Syrian rebel groups and helped train them in Jordan to use advanced anti-tank weapons against Assad’s forces. Saudi Arabia and Qatar supplied the weaponry and funds. These rebels are being supported by:

Jordan

Saudi Arabia

Turkey

Qatar

United Arab Emirates

United States

Israel, on Syria’s southern border, provides some assistance to rebel forces fighting the Syrian government and has also launched airstrikes against Syrian and Hezbollah targets to prevent the transfer of “game changing” technology and weapons to Hezbollah, a U.S.-designated terrorist group.

Anti-Islamic State 

The U.S.-led coalition conducting airstrikes against Islamic State forces in Syria and Iraq includes:

Australia

Bahrain

Canada

France

Jordan

Saudi Arabia

Turkey

United Arab Emirates

United Kingdom.

Russia is not part of the U.S.-led coalition, though it has also hit Islamic State positions.

Other fighters

Kurdish militia from Turkey, Iraq and Syria are fighting the Islamic State, also known as ISIL or ISIS. But the Kurds are sometimes aligned with the Syrian government and seen as a threat by Turkey, which has fought for years against a Kurdish separatist movement threatening its territorial sovereignty. Syrian Kurds are backed by Russia, the United States and Iraqi Kurdish groups.

The Islamic State, a vicious al-Qaeda spinoff, and Jabhat al Nusrah, al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria that works with many Sunni Arab opposition groups in Syria, have attracted foreign fighters from across the Arab world and Europe. Both have expanded during the chaos in Syria.

Who wins in the end?

The Syrian ceasefire is a big win for Russia, Assad, and Iran

AEI: The Syrian ceasefire agreement of February 11 is a big win for the Russians and the Syrian regime. Russia, Iran, and Syria are in the midst of a major military offensive that has allowed them to besiege Aleppo and has them poised to make gains across the battlefield. This so-called “cessation of hostilities” agreement allows them to consolidate and prepare for further advances, while preventing the opposition that the US ostensibly supports from attempting to undo any of their gains.

It does not require the Assad coalition to allow humanitarian access to the hundreds of thousands they have just trapped in and around Aleppo itself, and it leaves them fully in control of what humanitarian aid goes to the other areas they themselves are besieging and deliberately starving. It was concluded without the participation of the opposition, and is thus an imposition of a truce on the fighters the US is theoretically supporting at a moment when they have lost vital ground.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Secretary of State John Kerry and UN Special Envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura (L-R) arrive for a news conference in Munich, Germany, February 12, 2016. REUTERS/Michael Dalder.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Secretary of State John Kerry and UN Special Envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura (L-R) arrive for a news conference in Munich, Germany, February 12, 2016. REUTERS/Michael Dalder.

The Russians, moreover, define all of the opposition groups in northern Syria as either ISIS or Jabhat al Nusra. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said today,

… if liberation of the city that has been taken by illegal armed groups can be qualified as aggression, then, well, yeah, probably. But to attack those who have taken your land is necessary – is a necessary thing. First of all, this has been done by Jabhat al-Nusrah, and also the western suburbs of Aleppo are still being controlled together with Jabhat al-Nusrah by Jaysh al-Islam and Ahrar al-Sham.

The Russians will read this agreement as letting them continue operations against all opposition groups in Aleppo and  continue their encirclement, siege, and targeting of that city.  They will therefore continue to weaken the non-Jabhat al Nusra, non-ISIS opposition now concentrated in Aleppo, and likely strengthen the hands of the terrorist organizations they purport to be attacking.

This “cessation of hostilities” also continues the policy of requiring the opposition to make concessions in order to get the regime temporarily to stop committing what the UN has called crimes against humanity.

This agreement is a ceasefire in the manner of the Minsk agreements that shaped the supposed ceasefires in Ukraine — ceasefires that have been nominally in effect throughout all of the major Russian and separatist military offensives since February 2015. The Russians posed as a neutral third party when in fact they are a belligerent in the conflict, and have continued to escalate and de-escalate military operations in Ukraine in order to extract concessions from the Ukrainian government.

Not only will this Syrian “cessation of hostilities” also fail, but it will fail in a way that further alienates the non-ISIS, non-al Qaeda Sunni opposition groups and populations on which any meaningful political settlement of the conflict in accord with America’s vital national security interests must rely.