Replies

One wonders why they attacked. Ostensibly, these forces are fighting against the same people we are-ISIS, Al-Quaeda, etc. The Russian gov’t. is allied to Assad, so why did they attack?

I suspect they were hired by a private oil company and no formal connection to government forces. Although it is just one of many possibilities.

One wonders why they attacked. Ostensibly, these forces are fighting against the same people we are-ISIS, Al-Quaeda, etc.

It was about oil, not ISIS. A huge underestimate of the US dedication to defending the oil facility. They assumed they had the advantage of overwhelming armor against an very small force. The Americans dug in and called in air power. A severe miscalculation by Wagner. What they saw as an easy win was essentially a suicide mission.

[One wonders why they attacked. Ostensibly, these forces are fighting against the same people we are-ISIS, Al-Quaeda, etc. The Russian gov’t. is allied to Assad, so why did they attack?]

Made perfect sense. Resources. There’s apparently an oilfield in the area. Possession by the Syrian government would mean the reduction of the existing Russian subsidy for the Syrian government, which is running on fumes, financially-speaking. Syria’s economy was moribund *before* the civil war. Now, it’s a basket case on wheels, as all civil war-torn countries are. My guess is that Russia is bankrolling Syria to the tune of hundreds of millions, if not billions, a year. Getting that oilfield could mean a big reduction in that annual subsidy. Syria already owes Russia huge sums of money. The Russians presumably want that running tab to slow its rate of expansion and hopefully even go into reverse.

While the Russians hope that they can get the EU to pony up $350b worth of Syrian reconstruction aid in exchange for the repatriation of the 6m anti-Assad refugees to Syria, Assad, quite understandably, is not eager to have these Sunni Arabs return to possibly mount another revolt against him. This is similar to what happened after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, when the Israelis understandably rejected the return of Arabs who had fled their homes in Israel for neighboring countries. Their return would have caused huge demographic problems for the fledgling Jewish state.

Which is why the Russians are gonna be waiting a long time for that EU reconstruction money - there will be no repatriation as long as Assad remains in power. The way Assad looks at it - he has finally gotten the Sunni Arab to Alawite ratio from its original 7:1 down to 4:1, and Putin wants to bring it back up to 7:1? Not happening. He’s frantically trying to bring the ratio down even further, for as long as the EU’s borders remain open. For him, the ideal would be no Sunni Arabs in Syria.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/05/05/russias-payback-will-be-syrias-reconstruction-money/

[There is a growing consensus among observers, in the West and in the Middle East, that Assad does not want anti-regime refugees to return. Although there is no official data, it’s widely believed that a large percentage of the 6 million Syrians forced to flee their country oppose Assad.

Take the case of Syrians willing to return from Lebanon, a nation hosting 1.5 million Syrians and one that is friendlier to Assad compared with Turkey or Europe. Even from there, the Assad government is actively refusing Syrians re-entry, normally without offering any official explanation. Under the repatriation process, Lebanon’s General Security Directorate prepares a list of Syrians willing to go back and shares it with its counterparts in Syrian intelligence. Only those allowed by the Syrian regime are given the right to go back.

Mouin Merhebi, Lebanon’s state minister for refugee affairs until January this year and a supporter of Sunni Prime Minister Saad Hariri, said the fact that such a list is asked for by the Syrian state is an indicator of Assad’s unwillingness to accept the refugees. “How can they explain why they are asking for the list of the returnees? They don’t allow anyone to return without approval from the Mukhabarat [the Syrian intelligence branch],” he said. “Is it logical that Syrians in Lebanon need permission to go back to their own country?”

Merhebi said that during his time in office, the difference in numbers between the those who applied to go and those who finally could was massive. “I have been told by our General Security officials that when a list of 5,000 Syrians was sent, on an average just about 60-70 were cleared,” he said. Alain Aoun, a member of parliament for the Free Patriotic Movement, the party of Lebanese President Michel Aoun and a political ally of Hezbollah—and so generally softer on Assad—sits on the opposite side of the political divide to Merhebi. However, he endorsed his assessment and said the Assad government did not seem overly concerned about the return of its people.

“The Syrian regime is not doing anything to take its refugees back,” he said. Aoun quoted a meeting with Cardinal Paul Gallagher, the foreign minister of the Vatican, which has taken a close interest in the refugee issue, to substantiate his assertion. “Gallagher told a visiting Lebanese delegation that Assad would never take back the millions who fled.”]

“O” emboldened ALL our enemies... they are all spoiling for a fight.... They’re testing Trump because they think he’s ‘preoccupied’.

They have never respected us... and thanks to “O”, now they don’t even fear us.

They will find out, though