_____________________________________________
Aug 2015...
Posted on 09/12/2015 10:06:22 AM PDT by ETL
As the Pentagon warily eyes a Russian military build-up in Syria, Western intelligence sources tell Fox News that the escalated Russian presence began just days after a secret Moscow meeting in late July between Iran’s Quds Force commander — their chief exporter of terror — and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Fox News has learned Quds head Qassem Soleimani and Putin discussed such a joint military plan for Syria at that meeting, an encounter first reported by Fox News in early August. ...”
The Quds Force is the international arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, involved in exporting terrorism to Iran’s proxies throughout the Middle East including Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen. ...”
Officials who have monitored the build-up say they’ve seen more than 1,000 Russian combatants — some of them from the same plainclothes Special Forces units who were sent to Crimea and Ukraine. Some of these Russian troops are logistical specialists and needed for security at the expanding Russian bases.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Meanwhile,
Russia Is Building A Massive Military Base On Ukrainian Border
Moscow will reportedly provide Russian troops in Syria with an advanced antiaircraft missile system as part of its military support for Syrian president Bashar Assad.
"This system is the advanced version used by Russia, and it's meant to be operated by Russians in Syria," a Western diplomat who is regularly briefed on US, Israeli, and other intelligence assessments told Reuters.
And as The Daily Beast's Michael Weiss points out, any antiaircraft missiles deployed by Russian troops in Syria won't be directed at ISIS, since ISIS has no air force.
In fact, none of the rebels do — only government forces have access to aircraft.
Russia has substantially increased its military presence in Syria over the past two weeks under the guise of helping the embattled Assad fight ISIS and other extremists. ..."
(Excerpt) Read more at Business Insider ...
Some of the Russian troops reportedly being sent to Syria are from the same brigade that helped annex Crimea, according to a lengthy investigation conducted by Ruslan Leviev, a specialist in social-media intelligence.
The Kremlin has declined to comment, but, if true, “the deployment of an elite unit from Crimea, which inaugurated Russia’s standoff with the West, is an intriguing choice,” writes The Daily Beast’s Michael Weiss.
“Moscow has spent enormous resources moving troops into Crimea and eastern Ukraine over the past year. Moving even some of them out of the area to a different conflict zone, particularly one outside of Europe, gives the lie that sanctions and diplomatic isolation have forced the Kremlin into compromise,” Weiss writes:.
“Rather, Russia appears ready and willing to take on multiple wars at once,” he adds.
Russia initially said that it had only deployed “military experts” to Syria to help government forces learn how to use Russian military equipment.
But the Israeli defense minister and Reuters have confirmed that the Russians are taking part in the fighting on the side of Syrian President Bashar Assad and building up their military presence in the western coastal province of Latakia.
Boris Zilberman, a Middle East and Russia expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told Business Insider by email that he thinks it makes logistical sense that Russia would deploy a brigade from Crimea to Syria, since the eastern Mediterranean is the responsibility of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.
“It wouldn’t make sense to deploy these types of troops from Kamchatka [in far east Russia], for instance,” Zilberman said. “Also, seeing as how they’ve have recently participated in the annexation of Crimea, they are probably more combat-ready than others.”
An intelbrief released by The Soufan Group affirms that Putin’s latest incursion into Syria on the side of Bashar Assad is deliberate and aligned with Russian interests.
“While Russia has provided military assistance to Syria for decades, the recent apparent increase in support is noteworthy in both its timing and future implications,” the brief reads. “It is difficult to overstate Russian determination not to lose its influence in Syria via the Assad regime, which provides Russia with a Mediterranean and Middle Eastern base that cannot be replaced elsewhere.”
...”
More, plus terrific maps and charts, at:
Russia Axis of Evil ping!
America was attacked by al Qaeda on 911.
On whose side is the White Mosque?
CIA?
Pentagon?
DO”J”?
The Girl Scouts are on the side
of America more than ANY of the above.
Al Qaeda Leader Al-Zawahiri Declares War on ISIS 'Caliph' Al-Baghdadi
ABC NEWS ^ | Sept 10, 2015 | JAMES GORDON MEEK
Russia has joined the radical Muslim movement. Russia is now a terrorists supporter against the western world.
Aug 2015...
No they haven't. They're simply using those idiot, backward barbarians as pawns in their mission to expand their own power and influence throughout the world.
Russia is now a terrorist supporter against the western world.
They have always been such.
Thanks ETL.
There aren’t too many ways for Israel to attack Iran with aircraft.
However, by ruling out aerial bombing they may make inevitable the alternative approach which will be less precise but more certain.
by Jacob Kornbluh
Sept 2, 2015
In a phone interview with CNN Tuesday evening, Trump claimed that there’s “something in the Iran deal” that “people don’t understand” saying if someone attacks Iran, “we have to come to their defense.”
“Does that include Israel?” Trump asked. “And most people say yes, they don’t have an exclusion for Israel. So if Israel attacks Iran, according to that deal, I believe, the way it reads, unless they have a codicil or they have something to it, that we have to fight with Iran against Israel.”
..."
Trump was most probably referring to language highlighted by the opponents of the deal. On page 142, the deal includes a clause that states, “Co-operation through training and workshops to strengthen Iran’s ability to protect against, and respond to nuclear security threats, including sabotage, as well as to enable effective and sustainable nuclear security and physical protection systems.”
Washington-based Center for Security Policy asserted that Annex III appears “to commit the United States and other world powers to the defense of Iran’s nuclear program.”
“Some of the Russian troops reportedly being sent to Syria are from the same brigade that helped annex Crimea,”
Using the Naval Infantry (Marines) to secure Tartus makes a lot of sense.
As a loyal FR Putinisata, are you actually criticizing your boy Putin’s decision?
I thought you were being sarc.
Guess you were referring to this:
“Boris Zilberman, a Middle East and Russia expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told Business Insider by email that he thinks it makes logistical sense that Russia would deploy a brigade from Crimea to Syria, since the eastern Mediterranean is the responsibility of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.”
Focus. ISIS is the enemy, and now they're bringing their show to Europe. I don't see anyone but the Kurds and now Russia stepping up to stop them.
A June article by Max Seddon of BuzzFeed reported the Kremlin was spending millions of dollars to pay English-speaking Russians to promote President Vladimir Putin and his policies in U.S. media like Fox News broadcasting and The Huffington Post and Politico news sites. Trolls are reportedly expected to manage multiple fake accounts and post on news articles 50 times a day, often with sentiments as simplistic as “Putin makes Obama look stupid and weak!”
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/the-kremlins-troll-army/375932/
____________________________
Documents Show How Russia’s Troll Army Hit America:
http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/documents-show-how-russias-troll-army-hit-america
____________________________
“Trolls are reportedly expected to manage multiple fake accounts and post on news articles 50 times a day, often with sentiments as simplistic as “Putin makes Obama look stupid and weak!”...”
They do this only in an attempt to win the trust of anti-Obama folks -- a clever/sneaky way to add credibility to their pro-Russia, pro-Putin BS.
Yet it seems to work on some of us! In reality, Obama is the best thing that has happened to Russia in a long time.
____________________________
____________________________
Kremlin pays internet trolls to flatter Putin
Ben Hoyle - Moscow
October 11 2013
Russian investigative journalists and bloggers have uncovered an army of internet trolls paid to pour invective on the Kremlin’s opponents and heap praise on President Putin.
Posing as job applicants, the reporters discovered the government hacks working at a small company called the St Petersburg Internet Research Agency. ...”
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/world/asia/article3891720.ece
"the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] century" -Russian leader Vladimir Putin on the collapse of the Soviet Union...
"World democratic opinion has yet to realize the alarming implications of President Vladimir Putin's State of the Union speech on April 25, 2005, in which he said that the collapse of the Soviet Union represented the 'greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century.'..."
"The more I see and read about Mr. Putin, in power since 1999, and his 'managed democracy,' the more apprehensive I become about the future of Russia and the safety of its neighbors.
If Putin believes that the dissolution of the Soviet Union into 15 independent states represents the 'greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,' then it follows that Putin might well believe he should do something to repair the loss..."
http://web.archive.org/web/20090415000000*/http://www.hooverdigest.org/053/beichman.html
______________________________________
“The demise of the Soviet Union was the 'greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century',” Putin said in 2005.
http://www.thetrumpet.com/article/11102.30640.0.0/asia/moscow-puts-the-soviet-squeeze-on-neighbor-nations
______________________________________
"Putin said Stalin deserves statues in his honor "
http://en.ria.ru/russia/20131219/185734707/Putin-Says-Stalin-No-Worse-Than-Cunning-Oliver-Cromwell.html
______________________________________
______________________________________
"'The Black Book of Communism,'; a scholarly accounting of communism’s crimes, counts about 94 million murdered by the supposed champions of the common man (20 million for the Soviets alone), and some say that number is too low."
Forgetting the Evils of Communism: The amnesia bites a little deeper
By Jonah Goldberg, August 2008:
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.