Hillary, Write a Fat Check to the FBI/Benghazi Cmte.

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Taxpayers are on the hook for this malfeasance and dereliction of duty and reckless behavior, so the entire bill as it accumulates needs to be paid by Hillary. Ever wonder why she did this? My bet is to keep from responding to Freedom of Information Act requests and to keep information from the White House…cant prove but she has a history of being cunning.

It is time for a special prosecutor, voters…DEMAND IT

Employees at company working with Clinton email server expressed concerns

Washington (CNN)Employees at the company that maintained Hillary Clinton’s private email server expressed concern among themselves about the way the former secretary of state’s team directed them to manage data backups after the FBI started looking into the arrangements, according to emails obtained by a senator.

In a letter obtained by CNN, Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Ron Johnson, R-Wisconsin, asks Datto, Inc, the makers of Clinton’s server back-up system, for information on how her emails were preserved and protected. The FBI has also sought information from the company, according to sources.

Johnson indicates that a “Clinton family company,” Clinton Executive Service Corp., paid for the back-up services, operated through a device called the Datto SIRIS S2000, and that the purchase was made by Platte River Networks when the server was moved from her private residence to a New Jersey-based data center in 2013.

7 photos: Hillary Clinton email controversy

In the letter, Johnson quotes from emails sent by and to employees at Platte River Networks, which indicate there was discussion about how the duration of data backups could be reduced, apparently at the direction of the Clinton Executive Service Corp.

Clinton on emails: ‘It is a drip-drip-drip’

Then this past August, a Platte River Networks employee wrote to a coworker that he was, “Starting to think this whole thing really is covering up some shaddy (sic) s**t.”

“I just think if we have it in writing that they told us to cut the backups, and that we can go public with our statement saying we have backups since day one, then we were told to trim to 30days (sic), it would make us look a WHOLE LOT better,” the unnamed employee continued.

The email was sent shortly after news emerged that the FBI was looking into the security of the server, and several months after it was revealed that Clinton exclusively used the private account to conduct State Department business.

The employee indicates in the email that Clinton’s team asked them to change the back-up duration between October and February, presumably of 2014/2015, though that isn’t explicitly stated in the portion of the email included in Johnson’s letter.

Clinton’s email controversy explained

In a statement Wednesday morning, the Clinton campaign accused Johnson of “ripping a page from the House Benghazi Committee’s playbook and mounting his own, taxpayer-funded sham of an investigation with the sole purpose of attacking Hillary Clinton politically.”

“The Justice Department’s independent review is led by nonpolitical, career professionals, and Ron Johnson has no business interfering with it for his own partisan ends,” campaign spokesman Brian Fallon said in the statement.

The committee did not share any of the emails with CNN, but excerpts and descriptions from them are printed in Johnson’s letter.

Emails sent between Datto and Platte River Networks during that time indicate there was confusion about where the backed-up data would be stored, and for a while it was backed-up to an off-site Datto server, apparently against the wishes of Clinton staff.

When Platte River Networks became aware of the off-site syncing issue, they contacted Datto and discussed how they could retrieve that data for storage on-site, according to Johnson’s letter.

“Despite these communications, it is unclear whether or not this course of action was followed,” Johnson said. “Additionally,questions still remain as to whether Datto actually transferred the data from its off-site datacenter to the on-site server, what data was backed up and whether Datto wiped the data after it was transferred.”

Johnson wrote to Datto seeking more information about their dealings with Platte River Networks and Clinton Executive Service Corp.

Johnson also asked the company to say whether Datto is authorized to store classified information, and whether any employees at the company have security clearances that would allow them to view classified information.

 

FBI seizes four State Department servers in Clinton email probe

The FBI has seized four State Department computer servers as part of its probe into how classified information was compromised on former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s private email system, according to people familiar with the investigation.

The four servers, which were located at the State Department’s headquarters building, were seized by the FBI several weeks ago. They are being checked by technical forensic analysts charged with determining how Top Secret material was sent to Clinton’s private email by State Department aides during her tenure as secretary from 2009 to 2013, said two people familiar with the probe. The people spoke on condition of anonymity because it is an ongoing investigation.

State Department spokesman John Kirby referred questions about the computer servers to the FBI. An FBI spokeswoman, Carol Cratty, declined to comment.

No other details about the servers, including whether they are part of the department’s classified system, or used for unclassified information networks, could be learned.

A spokesman for the Clinton campaign did not respond to an email request for comment.

Clinton has offered varying explanations for her use of a private email server, initially claiming she had done nothing wrong. Then, under pressure from critics, she said she was sorry people were confused by the practice, later admitting in early September that her use of a private email system had been a mistake.

The State Department uses two separate networks, one for classified information and one for unclassified information. The two networks are kept separate for security reasons. Most classified networks are equipped with audit systems that allow security managers to check who has accessed intelligence or foreign policy secrets.

The FBI is trying to determine the origin of the highly classified information that was found in Clinton emails.

However, the task is said to be complicated because those with authority to create classified information have broad authority to label information in one of three categories: Confidential, Secret, and Top Secret.

The FBI is primarily concerned with trying to determine how Top Secret information made its way on to the private server.

Chris Farrell, an investigator with the public interest legal group Judicial Watch, said the State Department has been reluctant to describe the nature of its computer networks as some of the 16 Freedom of Information Act lawsuits the group has filed make their way through the courts.

Farrell said in an interview that the department also has been unwilling to say whether the private email system, used by Clinton and close aides Huma Abedin and Cheryl Mills, should be considered an official State Department network covered by FOIA laws.

Farrell said the seizure of the four State Department servers is likely part of the forensic investigation underway by the FBI into hardware used by Clinton and her aides to send email to the private server.

“In the midst of what I believe to be a forensic examination of the hardware that [Clinton lawyer David] Kendall surrendered on behalf of Mrs. Clinton, any serious national security investigation would seek to track all emails inbound and outbound,” Farrell said. “If they are doing that tracking of email since she was secretary of state, then they would be looking at any email that could have crossed into a State server.”

The servers were part of the State Department bureau of information resource management.

The bureau helps the department “to successfully carry out its foreign policy mission by applying modern IT tools, approaches, systems, and information products.”

In addition to improving efforts of “transparent, interconnected diplomacy,” the bureau is “focused on enhancing security for the department’s computer and communications systems.”

The FBI probe of State Department servers is the latest disclosure on the criminal investigation into the private Clinton email server that has embroiled the leading Democratic presidential candidate for several months.

The FBI took possession of Clinton’s private email server last summer after classified information was found in some of the more than 30,000 emails Clinton turned over to the State Department.

The investigation began after I. Charles McCullough, the intelligence community inspector general, reported to Congress Aug. 11 that Clinton’s private emails included some highly classified information labeled “Top Secret//SI/TK//Noforn.” Information classified at that level is deemed by the government to be very sensitive, requiring strong security protections because its compromise would cause grave damage to U.S. national security.

The politics surrounding the probe prompted FBI Director James Comey to tell reporters last week that the bureau will not be influenced by politics.

“One of the main reasons I have a 10-year term is to make sure that this organization stays outside of politics, and if you know my folks, you know that they don’t give a whit about politics,” Comey said, adding that the FBI has devoted sufficient resources and personnel so that the Clinton email probe can be completed in a timely way.

Those remarks were the first official confirmation of the investigation.

The State Department contacted Clinton’s lawyer, David E. Kendall, seeking additional emails that were not part of the more than 30,000 emails provided to the department earlier, the Washington Times reported on Tuesday.

The private email server was discovered by the legal public interest group Judicial Watch in late 2014 after the State Department informed the group that it had discovered a new tranche of records. Judicial Watch currently has at least 16 lawsuits related to State Department and other government records.

The email server material then became the focus of House investigators looking into Clinton’s handling of the terrorist attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi in 2012.

The House investigation of the Benghazi attack was attacked by Clinton this week after Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.), the frontrunner to be the next House speaker, said the Benghazi probe was part of a political effort to diminish Clinton’s presidential prospects.

Clinton seized on the comments in a New Hampshire town hall meeting this week.

Asked if she would have investigated a member of a Republican administration amid charges of improperly using a personal email account and server, Clinton said, “I would never have done that.”

“Look at the situation they chose to exploit to go after me for political reasons, the death of four Americans in Benghazi,” she continued.

In a sign of increasing worries about the probe at the Clinton campaign, the New York Post reported that an unidentified legal aide to Clinton has advised her to hire a criminal defense lawyer.

The number of communications regarded as classified is about 400, according to the latest State Department release of emails. Three of the new emails released last month were marked secret, including emails relating to Iranian nuclear talks.

Security analysts have voiced concerns that foreign hackers may have breached the private email server.

One theory is that Clinton aides who were cleared for access to national security secrets first read classified reports on State Department information system and then “gisted” the material into private emails for Clinton.

Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill told the New York Times that none of the candidate’s aides had mishandled classified information.

“She and her team took the handling of classified information very seriously, and at home and abroad she communicated with others via secure phone, cable, and in meetings in secure settings,” Merrill said.

The State Department has confirmed to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) in a related development that Clinton currently holds a security clearance for Top Secret, Sensitive Compartmented Information, the highest-level security clearance.

The department said Clinton’s clearance was “revalidated” after she left office in 2013 and was done so as part of a standard practice allowing former high-ranking officials to be granted access to secrets.

Critics in Congress have called for Clinton’s clearance to be revoked based on the compromises involved in her use of the private email system.

Immigration Crisis Includes CAIR and no Vetting System

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From RefugeeResettlementWatch Yesterday we told you that Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) is leading the charge to lessen the security screening for Syrian and other Middle Eastern refugees and he wants to expand the so-called P-3 (fraud ridden!) family reunification program.

See yesterday’s post by clicking here.

That is CAIR-Connecticut’s Executive Director behind Senator Blumenthal. Getting pretty brazen aren’t they, or is Blumenthal just pretty dense to invite CAIR to be so prominently involved in lessening security screening for refugees?

Now we know the answer to the question I asked all of you to help answer.  Looming over Blumenthal’s shoulder is none other than Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR)- Connecticut director Mongi Dhaouadi.

(When I mentioned to a friend that I had updated my post with that information (thanks to Kyle), she suggested I write a second post because as a subscriber, who received the earlier one, she would not see the update.)

But it is worth mentioning again because this is now the second time we have seen CAIR involving itself directly in the Syrian (mostly Muslim) resettlement issue (and you can bet they are not advocating for the persecuted Syrian Christians).

Clearly their interest is in boosting the Muslim population in the US.

CAIR was here in the St. Louis ‘Bring them here march’ last month.

Here is Mr. Dhaouadi’s bio at CAIR’s website:

Mongi Dhaouadi
Executive Director

Mongi S. Dhaouadi was born and raised in Tunisia. He moved to the US when he was 19 years old and studied Electrical Engineering at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. As The Executive director of CAIR-CT, he conducts civil rights workshops throughout the state of Connecticut under the title “Know Your Rights.” Also, he leads several workshops and discussions on Islamophobia and the Muslim experience before and after 9/11. He has participated in and led several media campaigns and press conferences on issues concerning the Muslim community ranging from discrimination cases to advocating for the change of racial profiling laws in the state of Connecticut. Dhaouadi was featured in countless local, national, and international media outlets including NPR, FOX News, and Democracy Now with Amy Goodman. During the summer, he runs a youth internship program during which high school and college students work on several projects ranging from preparing a toolkit on Islamic cultural competency for schools, to writing and publishing articles from a Muslim youth perspective in the local papers and publications. Dhaouadi leads a Connecticut delegation at the Capitol Hill visits; an event that is organized every year by CAIR National, where members of the Muslim community visit their representatives in Wasington, DC and advocate for issues of concern domestic and foreign. Prior to joining CAIR-CT on a full time bases Dhaouadi was the Head Administrator at SKF Academy in Hamden Connecticut. Dhaouadi is married with three children: ages 11, 14 and 18. He lives with his family in New London, Connecticut. His favorite past time is playing or coaching soccer.

So far Connecticut doesn’t get very many refugees compared to other states.  I guess Blumenthal and Dhaouadi would like to change that.  Go to this map and have a look!

Is CAIR getting into the refugee resettlement program where you live?  Let me know.  And, while you are at it, see if you notice the involvement of Islamic Relief (USA) as well.

Go here to find the regional offices of Islamic Relief (USA) thanks to reader Cathy.

***

DHS Confesses: No Databases Exist To Vet Syrian Refugees

Immigration: As the White House prepares to dump another 10,000 Syrian refugees on U.S. cities, it assures us these mostly Muslim men undergo a “robust screening” process. Not so, admits the agency responsible for such vetting.

Under grilling from GOP Sen. Jeff Sessions, head of the Senate subcommittee on immigration, the Homeland Security official in charge of vetting Syrian and other foreign Muslim refugees confessed that no police or intelligence databases exist to check the backgrounds of incoming refugees against criminal and terrorist records.

“Does Syria have any?” Sessions asked. “The government does not, no sir,” answered Matthew Emrich, associate director for fraud detection and national security at DHS’ U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Sessions further inquired: “You don’t have their criminal records, you don’t have the computer database that you can check?” Confessed Emrich: “In many countries the U.S. accepts refugees from, the country did not have extensive data holdings.”

While a startling admission, it confirms previous reporting. Senior FBI officials recently testified that they have no idea who these people are, and they can’t find out what type of backgrounds they have — criminal, terrorist or otherwise — because there are no vetting opportunities in those war-torn countries.

Syria and Iraq, along with Somalia and Sudan, are failed states where police records aren’t even kept. Agents can’t vet somebody if they don’t have documentation and don’t even have the criminal databases to screen applicants.

So the truth is, we are not vetting these Muslim refugees at all. And as GOP presidential front-runners duly note, it’s a huge gamble to let people from hostile nations enter the U.S. without any meaningful background check. It’s a safer bet just to limit, if not stop, their immigration.

“If I win, they’re going back,” Donald Trump vowed. “They could be ISIS. This (mass Syrian immigration) could be one of the great tactical ploys of all time.”

Ben Carson, for his part, said that he would bar refugees from Syria because they are “infiltrated” with terrorists seeking to harm America. “To bring into this country groups infiltrated with jihadists makes no sense,” Carson asserted. “Why would you do something like that?”

The Obama regime claims to have no evidence of terrorist or even extremist infiltration. But Sessions made public a list of 72 recent Muslim immigrants arrested just over the past year who were charged with terrorist activity.

The list doesn’t include the Boston Marathon bombers, who emigrated from Chechnya as asylum seekers. Or the several dozen suspected terrorist bomb-makers brought into the U.S. as Iraq war refugees.

 

Iran Cmdr: Ready for War with U.S.

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‘No big deal’: Senior Iranian commander says Tehran ready for war with US

RT: A top commander warned that Iran is ready for an all-out war with US, alleging that aggression against Tehran “will mobilize the Muslim world” against it. The remarks follow Secretary of State John Kerry’s claims that military force was still an option.

Brigadier General Hossein Salami, lieutenant commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), spoke Wednesday to a state-run TV channel as Western powers readied for a new round of talks on getting the Islamic Republic to curb its nuclear ambitions ahead of a June 30 deadline.

He also stated, “War against Iran will mobilize the Muslim world against the US, an issue which is very well known by the enemy.”

Iran recently agreed on a framework deal concerning its nuclear interests with the P5+1 group in Switzerland, which would pave the way for it to be finalized. However, Israel was highly critical of the move. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated that it “would not block Iran’s path to the bomb. It would pave it.”

Kerry has recently appeared to try to ease tensions with the Jewish state by assuring it that war was still on the table. This and possible other similar remarks don’t sit well with Salami.

“We have prepared ourselves for the most dangerous scenarios and this is no big deal and is simple to digest for us; we welcome war with the US as we do believe that it will be the scene for our success to display the real potentials of our power,” Salami said, as cited by Iran’s FARS news agency.

The general’s rationale is that past US military victories owe themselves to their enemies’ “rotten” armies – not the case with Iran, he warned.

Addressing the officials currently at the negotiating table, Salami urged them to halt negotiations if any threat of force is issued again by a US official.

Salami echoed the words of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, who in a separate speech remarked that making simultaneous military threats while at the negotiating table will not fly. More to the story here.

The U.S. loves Iran relationship is over:

American Enterprise Institute in part: Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ruled out the possibility of expanded negotiations with the U.S. Supreme Leader Khamenei proscribed any future negotiations with the U.S. during a meeting with IRGC Navy commanders on October 7 in Tehran. Khamenei stressed that “we now have to negotiate with the entire world,” but warned that “negotiations with America would mean paving the way for [U.S.] infiltration into the country’s economic, cultural, political and security domains.” The Supreme Leader also censured a “certain group” for attempting to “justify negotiations” between the U.S. and Iran. Khamenei also condemned the U.S. airstrike on a hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan. Special Parliamentary Commission to Review the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, Head Ali Reza Zakani responded to allegations from fellow commission members Alaeddin Boroujerdi, Mansour Haghighat Pour, Gholam Reza Tajgardun, Massoud Pezeshkian, and Abbas Ali Mansouri Arani that the commission’s report was written “outside the commission” and unfairly ignores the “very positive points” of the nuclear deal. Zakani stated that the report used “all of the [commission] subcommittees’ reports.” Zakani also criticized the National Security and Foreign Policy (NSFP) Parliamentary Commission’s review of the resolution implementing the JCPOA, arguing that it had rushed their appraisal of the resolution earlier this week. NSFP Parliamentary Commission members Mansour Haghighat Pour and Hossein Sobhani Nia both noted that Parliament’s review of the resolution is unlikely to change its contents.

TWS: Go Easy on Iran

Yeganeh Torbati of Reuters reports:

…the U.S. government has pursued far fewer violations of a long-standing arms embargo against Iran in the past year compared to recent years, according to a review of court records and interviews with two senior officials involved in sanctions enforcement.

Well, one thinks, perhaps Iran has decided to forsake its wicked ways.  But no:

The sharp fall in new prosecutions did not reflect fewer attempts by Iran to break the embargo, the officials said. Rather, uncertainty among prosecutors and agents on how the terms of the deal would affect cases made them reluctant to commit already scarce resources with the same vigor as in previous years, the officials said.

“Uncertainty” seems to be the word of choice, these days. Useful in just about any geopolitical context.  Remember how, not so long ago, President Obama was saying:

“Faced with the potential of mass atrocities, and a call from the Libyan people, the United States and our friends and allies stopped Qaddafi’s forces in their tracks … This comes at a time when we see the strength of American leadership across the world. We’ve taken out Al Qaeda leaders, and we’ve put them on the path to defeat. We’re winding down the war in Iraq, and have begun a transition in Afghanistan.”

So much certainty, back then.

Then, The Deadly Drug Cartels

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Map of Mexican Drug Cartel Territories Intel Report 2015

DEA report and map of major cartels and areas of dominance in Mexico.  The DEA identifies the major cartels as a total of eight.  C.J.N.G is identified as  the cartel with the most significant growth.

MEXICO Drug Cartel Map Oct 2015..BB2015

Cartel killer convicted after detailed confession, but authorities can’t prove any links

VISALIA, Calif. (AP) –  Once Jose Manuel Martinez acknowledged a vast killing spree that included nine people in California, officials set out to decide whether the self-described cartel enforcer actually carried out the horrific crimes.

Details the 53-year-old Martinez provided confirmed his claims. He described with remarkable accuracy the victims’ clothes, body positions and the caliber of bullets he fired, investigators said.

“He was spot on almost 100 percent of the time,” Tulare County’s Assistant Sheriff Scott Logue said.

On Tuesday, a judge in central California accepted a guilty plea from Martinez that will put him behind bars for the rest of his life.

Yet confirming his ties to Mexican drug cartels couldn’t be independently determined, Logue said, because Martinez refuses to name them.

“It’s not like you can go to a business front door and ask if Jose worked for you,” Logue said. “There were whispers for a long time.”

Martinez was arrested in 2013, acknowledging a violent career that he said involved more than 30 killings across the country. Martinez will be sentenced next month to life in prison without the possibility of parole under the terms of a plea deal that removes the possibility of the death penalty.

The deal came on the same day a preliminary hearing was set to begin to determine if Martinez would stand trial.

Tulare County District Attorney Tim Ward said prosecutors were pleased about resolving the case. No relatives of victims disagreed with the decision to offer the deal, he said.

Martinez also pleaded guilty to a count of attempted murder of a 17-year-old.

In court, Martinez answered “guilty” to each count read aloud by Judge Brett Alldredge.

Nathan Leedy, an attorney in the county public defender’s office who represented Martinez, declined to comment outside of court.

Last year, Martinez pleaded guilty in Alabama to killing a man for making derogatory remarks about Martinez’s daughter. He was given a prison sentence of 50 years.

In California, he was charged with killing people in Tulare, Kern and Santa Barbara counties between 1980 and 2011. The victims ranged in age from 22 to 56.

Investigators say that in 1980, Martinez shot a man who was driving to work with three other people in the vehicle. Martinez was accused of shooting another man in bed early one morning in 2000 while the man’s four children were home.

Martinez had lived at times in Richgrove, a small farming community in central California about 40 miles north of Bakersfield. He was arrested shortly after crossing the border from Mexico into Arizona and began to disclose details of his past while facing the case in Alabama.

“After he confessed to it, it was just like opening up the floodgate,” Tim McWhorter of the Lawrence County Sheriff’s Office in Alabama said at the time.

Martinez also is facing two murder charges in Florida.

26 Missiles Fired From Russian Warships in the Caspian

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Russia launched the missiles Wednesday morning from four ships in the Caspian Sea nearly 1,500 kilometers (around 930 miles) from their 11 targets, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told President Vladimir Putin in a televised meeting.

Russian (4) warships fire cruise missiles into Syria

AFP: Russian warships joined in strikes in Syria with a volley of cruise missile attacks Wednesday as Russian President Vladimir Putin pledged his air force would back a ground offensive by government forces.

Ships from the Caspian Sea fleet launched 26 cruise missile strikes that hit 11 targets over 1,500 kilometres away in Syria, Moscow said.

Putin said Russian efforts “will be synchronised with the actions of the Syrian army on the ground and the actions of our air force will effectively support the offensive operation of the Syrian army”, at a televised meeting with Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu.

The Russian leader, however, also stressed the need for cooperation with a US-led coalition fighting Islamic State jihadists, saying that without cooperation from the US, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, the intervention was unlikely to work.

Russian forces have struck 112 targets in war-torn Syria since last week launching a bombing campaign that Moscow says is targeting the IS group, Shoigu told Putin in the televised briefing.

“Strikes have hit 112 targets from September 30 until today,” Shoigu said. “The intensity of the strikes is increasing.”

In a sign that Russia was ramping up its involvement, Shoigu said that four Russian warships had hit sites in Syria on Wednesday with cruise missiles.

“In addition to the air force, four warships of the Caspian flotilla have been involved,” Shoigu said, adding that the warships had carried out 26 cruise missile strikes against 11 targets.

A military spokesman told Russian news wires that the strikes from the warships had hit positions of IS and Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front.

Rockets in the darkness

A video released by the Russian defence ministry showed rockets being launched from a ship in darkness and traced their route to Syria over Iran and Iraq.

Russia began air strikes in Syria a week ago following a request by long-standing ally President Bashar al-Assad.

Moscow insists it is hitting IS and other “terrorist” targets, but the US and its allies fear that Moscow is aiming to bolster Assad’s regime.

Putin also said that French leader Francois Hollande had suggested a possible plan to get Assad’s forces to combine efforts with the Western-backed Free Syrian Army, the main moderate opposition group fighting the Damascus regime.

A Hollande aide later denied he had said any such thing. “The president spoke of the necessary presence of the Syrian opposition around a future negotiating table. The rest is not a French idea,” he told reporters in Strasbourg.

“During my last visit to Paris, French President Hollande expressed an interesting idea according to which, in his opinion, it might be possible to at least try to unite the efforts of the government troops of president Assad’s army and the so-called Free Syrian Army,” Putin said.

A member of Hollande’s entourage denied that he had suggested an alliance between the groups.

Putin met with Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel to discuss a peace plan for Ukraine in Paris last Friday.

Meanwhile:

EXCLUSIVE: Russian jets ‘intercept’ US predator drones over Syria, officials say

FNC: Russian fighter jets shadowed U.S. predator drones on at least three separate occasions high above Syria since the start of Russia’s air campaign last week, according to two U.S. officials briefed on this latest intelligence from the region.

“The first time it happened, we thought the Russians got lucky. Then it happened two more times,” said one official.

Both officials said that the incidents took place over ISIS-controlled Syria, including its de facto headquarters in Raqqa, as well as along the Turkish-Syrian border near Korbani. Another occurred in the northwest, near the highly contested city of Aleppo.

The U.S. military’s MQ-1 Predator drone is not a stealth aircraft.

“It is easy to see a predator on radar,” said one official.

The Russians have not attempted to shoot down any of the U.S. drones, but instead have flown “intercept tracks,” a doctrinal term meaning the Russians flew close enough to make their presence felt, according to one official.

One other official said, “the Russians flew very close, but did not impede the drone flight.”

“The first time it happened, we thought the Russians got lucky. Then it happened two more times.”

– U.S. official briefed on intelligence

Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook, traveling with the defense secretary in Europe leading up to a NATO ministerial meeting in Brussels Thursday, said the Pentagon is open to more military-to-military talks with the Russians. No immediate date has been established to conduct the next round of talks, according to one defense official.

This development comes as Russia has moved some of its Mi-24 gunships and transport helicopters from an air base along the Mediterranean to another air base outside Homs, roughly 100 miles away. Russian ground forces, hundreds of Russian marines — as well as four BM-30 Smerch rocket launchers capable of firing cluster munitions, mines as well as high explosive warheads — are now in position to strike, but there is no evidence they have done so according to multiple defense officials. Infantry fighting vehicles and more a conventional artillery battery has also been seen by the intelligence community.

All these movements demonstrate the Russians are forming a “protective belt” around Latakia, the stronghold of Syrian President Bashar Assad, and are carrying out airstrikes against anti-Assad rebel forces, some backed by the CIA, to protect both regime and Russian interests, including a Russian naval base in Tartus established in the 70s.

The Pentagon maintains the vast majority of strikes from its forward operating base at Bassel al-Assad airport in Latakia including some 30 fighter/bomber jets have been against Syrian opposition forces and not ISIS, and one official pushed back on Russian defense ministry claims on the number of strikes the Russians have launched.

“The Russians carried out only one half or at best a quarter of the strikes they claim to have conducted,” said a senior military official.

Over the past weekend, Turkey claims that Russia on two separate occasions violated its airspace. Despite Turkish pressure on NATO and top US government officials calling the action “unprofessional” and a “provocation” two senior US military officials downplayed the incident.

“The Russians flew along the border and we still don’t know for sure what happened.”

At least one of the alleged incidences occurred in Turkey’s Hatay Province.

In 1939, land belonging to Syria and the Assad family in the northwest, along the Mediterranean bordering Latakia where the Russia has established an air base, was annexed by Turkey. Syria has never recognized the action and the two countries have been bitter enemies ever since.