Either of those options is bad bad news for President Erdogan of Turkey, who seems to have thought he could play off Russia against the USA (negotiating a truce in NW Syria and buying their AS-400), to consolidate his seizure of NW Syria, and make it another ISIS-like mini-State, or annex it to Turkey outright.
Ping For Your Interest, Friend.
Strange they would tthink it safe to have this meeting.
I believe ‘jihadists’ is a term for pro-government militia in this case.
If their AS-400 could not deter/detect our attack, the Russians may have learned a lot more from this operation than we gained.
I sure hope those were important camel-humpers we wasted.
If Russia has no high value targets in the area, it’s not likely to be well defended. Also, you don’t necessarily waste missiles trying to defend an attack that is not a threat to your own assets.
If we really want to attack a target defended by AS-400, we will use aircraft/ordinance/tactics that will defeat the system.
We are so very very talented as a nation at defending the sovereignty of other countries with all of our military technology and acumen. Yet we cannot defend our own sovereignty and borders and have control over who shall or shall not inhabit our land, without being accused of racism. And it is our very own institutions who grant to invading hordes rights and privileges and protections our own natural born citizenry is not permitted to claim.
... their AS-400 system could not effectively detect or deter an actual American attack.
Turkey is also negotiating manufacture of the SU-57, in the wake of the failed F-35 bid (which created an F-35 spare parts problem for the US, since many parts were made in Turkey)
The systems at the Russian Tartus naval base only protect the base, and are usually not turned on.
Turkey has successfully played the US against the Russians; or perhaps is allying with Russia.
The Iranians don’t like Turkey’s idea of controlling part of Iraq and have surrogates (Al-Qods units directing) fighting them.
The Turkish supported and protected terrorists are still getting their butts handed to them by the UN recognized government.
“The US missile attack “targeted a meeting held by the leaders of Hurras al-Deen, Ansar al-Tawhid and other allied groups inside a training camp”, said Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Observatory.”
Typically when our company expects incoming ordnance, we hold our meeting by telecon. Harder to disrupt that way.