How Putin blindsided the US over Syria

BBC ^ | 30 September 2015 | Jon Sopel

[keat]

There should be no surprises about what the Russians have done.

They have consistently made clear their support for President Assad. It was hardly a great secret that they had moved military assets into Syria - and the Russian pilots hadn't flown their fighter aircraft over to the Eastern Mediterranean to earn some extra air miles.

President Vladimir Putin had a meeting with President Barack Obama on Monday night to explain what Russia's plan was - and although there were profound differences, US officials said they understood better what Russia's intentions were.

And yet.

Isn't there something totally jaw-dropping, gob-smacking, eyebrow-arching, ear twitchingly extraordinary - and not to mention, casual - about the way the Americans learnt about Russian plans?

It began with a phone call from a Russian diplomat to his counterpart in Baghdad to say "we've got something interesting to tell you".

Then a three-star Russian general leaves the Russian embassy compound and knocks on the door of the American one, and asks to see the US military attache.

He tells the American military man that bombing starts in an hour, so you'd better get out of Syrian airspace now and move any assets you have off the ground. And 60 minutes later, the bombing started.

Wow. To say the Americans were blindsided by this unorthodox line of communication is to put it mildly. Having had their "clear the air" meeting on Monday night there was an anticipation that though there might be big policy differences, there would be a degree of co-ordination and openness.

[Southack]

Idiotic post that ignores Obama’s response to Crimea, to the Ukraine crisis, to Obama’s sanctions on Russia, Obama’s attempts to embarrass Putin at Sacha, the current geopolitical reality in Syria, etc.

All for what, so that you could push a fantasy narrative?

Good grief. Your imagination is not useful to contributing to the debate or analysis.

[justa-hairyape]

No one trusts DC anymore and they never will again.

[Southack]

Russian UN delegates just applauded Netanyahu at his UN speech today.

Obama’s UN delegates did not.

So who is anti-Israel?

[Southack]

"What of your boy Putin's true sympathies? ie, allying with Israel-hating Iran (the world's leading state sponsor of islamic terrorism), helping them get nukes"

You are an idiot for not knowing that Obama just did a deal with Iran that puts them on the path to obtaining nuclear weapons.

You are a liar if you claim that Russia is helping them more than Obama.

[DiogenesLamp]

Obama didn't get blindsided. Utter chaos is his goal.

I wish people would quit saying that bumbling, lazy, incompetent, ignorant Obama is some kind of diabolical genius who plays 4 dimensional chess and thinks deeper than Einstein.

No, Obama is a f***ing idiot who is simply following left wing crap that he has heard all his life. A monkey wrench doesn't have to know anything when it is tossed into the gears, it will still screw things up anyway.

Obama has never held a job that wasn't some sort of government tit sucking position. He didn't get into Harvard because he was smart, he got there because he is black. He smoked dope, and didn't apply himself. He says so in his book.

His personal finances before he was elected to the US Senate were a total wreck. He spent far more than he made, he was deep in debt, and if he hadn't won that US Senate seat, (Again for being "black", not for being smart.) he would have lost his house through foreclosure.

His law license is suspended because he lied several times on his bar exam, and his first act as President was to dive bomb New York City in Air Force One.

Every wednesday is "Party Night" at the White House, and just about every Thursday, President Stupid is hung over.

The man is a complete clown with no deep thoughts, or even an ordinary level of competence. That everything he does ends up hurting the US is due to the crap he has been learned all his life, and also due to the fact that he is about the most ignorant-stupid man that has ever sat in that office.

People need to stop portraying him as a super brilliant strategist who is always two steps ahead of everyone else. He isn't. He's an idiot.

[ETL]

You are an idiot for not knowing that Obama just did a deal with Iran that puts them on the path to obtaining nuclear weapons. You are a liar if you claim that Russia is helping them more than Obama.

And, unless YOU are brand spanking new to this site, you are a total f-ing moron for not seeing the following post of mine which I must have posted 100+ times in the past month or so. Of course I know about the Obama-Putin Iran deal!

Trump: Iran Deal Requires U.S. Protecting Iran in Event of Israeli Strike

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.”

http://jpupdates.com/2015/09/02/trump-iran-deal-requires-u-s-protecting-iran-in-event-of-israeli-strike/
__________________________________________________________

Aug 2015...

[Southack]

Hey newbie...when you are in a hole, stop digging.

Your narrative is crap, and even if you get 1 post right, you are still an idiot for pretending that Putin is helping Iran get nukes more than Obama.

[Fhios]

Blind sided? This was predicted several years ago somewhere between Egypt’s ousting Morsei and Hillary’s Libya debacle.

[ETL]

I wish people would quit saying that bumbling, lazy, incompetent, ignorant Obama is some kind of diabolical genius who plays 4 dimensional chess and thinks deeper than Einstein. No, Obama is a f***ing idiot who is simply following left wing crap that he has heard all his life.

I don't think anyone with even half a brain in their head would believe that Obama himself is orchestrating any grand schemes on his own. Rather, it is old-school commie handlers that does his strategizing. When they need time to think about what he should do or say next they send him off to play golf somewhere. He is basically just an empty suit puppet of the commie left.

[ETL]

even if you get 1 post right, you are still an idiot for pretending that Putin is helping Iran get nukes more than Obama.

You're the idiot. Putin has been helping Iran obtain nukes since at least 2005. Then Senator Obama, at that time, was still attending Jeremiah Wright's communist-concocted Black Liberation Theology 'church'.

[DiogenesLamp]

I don't think anyone with even half a brain in their head would believe that Obama himself is orchestrating any grand schemes on his own. Rather, it is old-school commie handlers that does his strategizing. When they need time to think about what he should do or say next they send him off to play golf somewhere. He is basically just an empty suit puppet of the commie left.

And this is exactly right. Obama is an idiot. He plans nothing. He just shows up and gives Liberals Orgasms over the fact that he's black and gives orders.

Any "strategy" he implements is other people's ideas. Usually they're stupid too.

[Southack]

Ah, your fantasy narrative again. Good job, boy! Pat, pat, pat.

[Psalm 144]

“He is as dangerous, if not more so, than Obama!”

You are unusually candid in your support of Obama. You people are seldom so open in supporting him, although I still entertain the possibility that you specifically are a living fossil from the Cold War, like one of those marooned Japanese soldiers carrying his rusty Arisaka into the 1960s oblivious to the fact that world has moved on. I understand. There are days I miss the old verities as well. So again, you may just be the little toy train going around the same circle over and over again.

As for Putin, I take him at his word. He is going to kill some jihadists, including the ones who were your boy McCain’s pets. When enough of them are dead, I expect the situation to stabilize. After that, we’ll see, and it will be time to reevaluate then.

I note that Benjamin Netanyahu is considerably less worried about this than your boy Obama and the Obamacon peanut gallery at large. I also note that Israelis and Russians enjoy better communications than your boy Kerry enjoys with either. I respect Netanyahu’s cautious engagement, but this administration’s histrionics just make my eyes roll. As a final note, I listen in vain for word from your boy Soros, who was pushing for the ouster of Assad before it was cool. Too much silence from him is a bad sign, unless he has also begun to decay.

In the meantime, anyone anywhere killing militant Sunni jihadists has my best wishes and indeed prayers for good hunting and high tallies. Iranian troops will be the infantry cannonfodder for this effort too. I just don’t see a downside to Soros, Obama, Kerry, Sunnis, Shi’ites and Obamacons all suffering together.

[ETL]

Russia, Iran, and the Nuclear Question: The Putin Record

Authored by Dr. Robert O. Freedman. | November 2006

Vladimir Putin inherited a strong Russian-Iranian relationship from his predecessor, Boris Yeltsin. Russia made major arms agreements with Iran under Yeltsin, selling Tehran jet planes, tanks, and submarines, and also began building a nuclear reactor for Iran at Bushehr. The two countries also cooperated on regional issues such as Tajikistan and Afghanistan, and Yeltsin valued the low Iranian profile during the first Chechen war (1994-96).

Putin strengthened the relationship further, beginning his rule by abrogating the Gore-Chenonymdin agreement under which Russia was to cease selling arms to Iran by 2000.

While Putin and Iran were to have some problems over Chechnya and the optimal exit route for Caspian Sea oil and natural gas, these were overcome by 2005 when Iran emerged, despite its clandestine nuclear program, as Putin's most important ally in the Middle East, as Russia sought to reemerge as a major power there.

Moscow increasingly became Iran's protector against the sanctions that first the United States and then the European Union sought to impose because of Iran's violation of international agreements. ...”

http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/summary.cfm?q=737

[BluH2o]

Interesting how Putin and Obama have a face to face meeting and within 24-48 hours Putin embarrasses Obama by embarking on some military type action. Crimea/Ukraine & now Syria. Putin has nothing but contempt for our light in his loafers, girlie man President.

[Southack]

Ah, still with more of your fantasy narrative. Geesh, by this point you are supposed to be screaming that I’m a commie pro-Putin lackey butt-boy.

Didn’t you get your memo?!

[ETL]

You are unusually candid in your support of Obama. You people are seldom so open in supporting him

My support of Obama, eh? You friggin disingenuous jerk. Well, at least everyone, at least on this thread, now knows what a phony you are.

[Psalm 144]

He is an idiot, see ‘corpse-man’ for proof, but what he is principally is a sock puppet. Whose hand is up the sock is the question.

[Psalm 144]

“My support of Obama, eh?”

Indeed. As you promote his policies you support the man.

“You friggin disingenuous jerk.”

ETL, what an ugly thing to say... does this mean we’re not friends anymore? You know, ETL, if I thought you weren’t my friend, I just don’t think I could bear it.

“Well, at least everyone, at least on this thread, now knows what a phony you are.”

I call it as I see it. Nothing phony about it. You Obamacons are a new and easy to identify phenomenon. It doesn’t take a keen mind to recognize, just a strong stomach.

[ETL]

Ah, still with more of your fantasy narrative. Geesh, by this point you are supposed to be screaming that I’m a commie pro-Putin lackey butt-boy.

Gave up arguing the facts, did you?

In any case, both Obama and Putin are screwing the US royally. Despite all that Obama has done to assist Putin with his obvious expansionist agenda (on missile defense and nukes, etc), Putin STILL plays him for the (willing) imbecile that he is. Perhaps the KGB/FSB agent feels it no longer matters at this point what Obama thinks about anything, despite him basically agreeing with Putin on the 'new international order' vision: weaker US, stronger Russia and China.