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Paul Merrell

Anne-Marie Slaughter on how US intervention in the Syrian civil war would alter Vladimi... - 0 views

www.project-syndicate.org/...ir-putin-s-calculus-in-ukraine

war & peace Hillary Syria Russia Ukraine U.S.-foreign-policy

shared by Paul Merrell on 28 Apr 14 - No Cached
  • Anne-Marie Slaughter, a former director of policy planning in the US State Department (2009-2011), is President and CEO of the New America Foundation and Professor Emerita of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University.
  • The solution to the crisis in Ukraine lies in part in Syria. It is time for US President Barack Obama to demonstrate that he can order the offensive use of force in circumstances other than secret drone attacks or covert operations. The result will change the strategic calculus not only in Damascus, but also in Moscow, not to mention Beijing and Tokyo.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphMany argue that Obama’s climb-down from his threatened missile strikes against Syria last August emboldened Russian President Vladimir Putin to annex Crimea. But it is more likely that Putin acted for domestic reasons – to distract Russians’ attention from their country’s failing economy and to salve the humiliation of watching pro-European demonstrators oust the Ukrainian government he backed.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphRegardless of Putin’s initial motivations, he is now operating in an environment in which he is quite certain of the parameters of play. He is weighing the value of further dismemberment of Ukraine, with some pieces either joining Russia or becoming Russian vassal states, against the pain of much stronger and more comprehensive economic sanctions. Western use of force, other than to send arms to a fairly hapless Ukrainian army, is not part of the equation.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphThat is a problem. In the case of Syria, the US, the world’s largest and most flexible military power, has chosen to negotiate with its hands tied behind its back for more than three years. This is no less of a mistake in the case of Russia, with a leader like Putin who measures himself and his fellow leaders in terms of crude machismo.
  • It is time to change Putin’s calculations, and Syria is the place to do it. Through a combination of mortars that shatter entire city quarters, starvation, hypothermia, and now barrel bombs that spray nails and shrapnel indiscriminately, President Bashar al-Assad’s forces have seized the advantage. Slowly but surely, the government is reclaiming rebel-held territory.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraph“Realist” foreign policy analysts openly describe Assad as the lesser evil compared to the Al Qaeda-affiliated members of the opposition; others see an advantage in letting all sides fight it out, tying one another down for years. Moreover, the Syrian government does appear to be slowly giving up its chemical weapons, as it agreed last September to do.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphThe problem is that if Assad continues to believe that he can do anything to his people except kill them with chemicals, he will exterminate his opponents, slaughtering everyone he captures and punishing entire communities, just as his father, Hafez al-Assad, massacred the residents of Hama in 1982. He has demonstrated repeatedly that he is cut from the same ruthless cloth.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphSince the beginning of the Syrian conflict, Assad has fanned fears of what Sunni opposition forces might do to the Alawites, Druze, Christians and other minorities if they won. But we need not speculate about Assad’s behavior. We have seen enough.
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  • A US strike against the Syrian government now would change the entire dynamic. It would either force the regime back to the negotiating table with a genuine intention of reaching a settlement, or at least make it clear that Assad will not have a free hand in re-establishing his rule.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphIt is impossible to strike Syria legally so long as Russia sits on the United Nations Security Council, given its ability to veto any resolution authorizing the use of force. But even Russia agreed in February to Resolution 2139, designed to compel the Syrian government to increase flows of humanitarian aid to starving and wounded civilians. Among other things, Resolution 2139 requires that “all parties immediately cease all attacks against civilians, as well as the indiscriminate employment of weapons in populated areas, including shelling and aerial bombardment, such as the use of barrel bombs….”CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphThe US, together with as many countries as will cooperate, could use force to eliminate Syria’s fixed-wing aircraft as a first step toward enforcing Resolution 2139. “Aerial bombardment” would still likely continue via helicopter, but such a strike would announce immediately that the game has changed. After the strike, the US, France, and Britain should ask for the Security Council’s approval of the action taken, as they did after NATO’s intervention in Kosovo in 1999.
  • Equally important, shots fired by the US in Syria will echo loudly in Russia. The great irony is that Putin is now seeking to do in Ukraine exactly what Assad has done so successfully: portray a legitimate political opposition as a gang of thugs and terrorists, while relying on provocations and lies to turn non-violent protest into violent attacks that then justify an armed response.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphRecall that the Syrian opposition marched peacefully under fire for six months before the first units of the Free Syrian Army tentatively began to form. In Ukraine, Putin would be happy to turn a peaceful opposition’s ouster of a corrupt government into a civil war.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphPutin may believe, as Western powers have repeatedly told their own citizens, that NATO forces will never risk the possibility of nuclear war by deploying in Ukraine. Perhaps not. But the Russian forces destabilizing eastern Ukraine wear no insignia. Mystery soldiers can fight on both sides.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphPutting force on the table in resolving the Ukraine crisis, even force used in Syria, is particularly important because economic pressure on Russia, as critical as it is in the Western portfolio of responses, can create a perverse incentive for Putin. As the Russian ruble falls and foreign investment dries up, the Russian population will become restive, giving him even more reason to distract them with patriotic spectacles welcoming still more “Russians” back to the motherland.
  • Obama took office with the aim of ending wars, not starting them. But if the US meets bullets with words, tyrants will draw their own conclusions. So will allies; Japan, for example, is now wondering how the US will respond should China manufacture a crisis over the disputed Senkaku Islands.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphTo lead effectively, in both the national and the global interest, the US must demonstrate its readiness to shoulder the full responsibilities of power. Striking Syria might not end the civil war there, but it could prevent the eruption of a new one in Ukraine.
  • Paul Merrell on 28 Apr 14
     
    The author was Hillary Clinton's director of policy planning at the State Dept. She still serves on State's foreign policy advisory board and is well-positioned at the very center of the U.S. War Party. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anne-Marie_Slaughter#Other_policy.2C_public.2C_and_corporate_activities It's a given that she would likely be back in government should Hillary win Auction 2016. To say that the lady is a hawk after reading this article would be a gross understatement. 
Paul Merrell

Reported US-Syrian Accord on Air Strikes | Consortiumnews - 1 views

consortiumnews.com/...s-syrian-accord-on-air-strikes

war & peace Syria ISIL U.S.-foreign-policy limited-truce

shared by Paul Merrell on 17 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • Exclusive: A problem with President Obama’s plan to expand the war against ISIS into Syria was always the risk that Syrian air defenses might fire on U.S. warplanes, but now a source says Syria’s President Assad has quietly agreed to permit strikes in some parts of Syria, reports Robert Parry.
  • The Obama administration, working through the Russian government, has secured an agreement from the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad to permit U.S. airstrikes against Islamic State targets in parts of Syria, according to a source briefed on the secret arrangements. The reported agreement would clear away one of the chief obstacles to President Barack Obama’s plan to authorize U.S. warplanes to cross into Syria to attack Islamic State forces – the concern that entering Syrian territory might prompt anti-aircraft fire from the Syrian government’s missile batteries.
  • In essence, that appears to be what is happening behind the scenes in Syria despite the hostility between the Obama administration and the Assad government. Obama has called for the removal of Assad but the two leaders find themselves on the same side in the fight against the Islamic State terrorists who have battled Assad’s forces while also attacking the U.S.-supported Iraqi government and beheading two American journalists.
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  • The usual protocol for the U.S. military – when operating in territory without a government’s permission – is to destroy the air defenses prior to conducting airstrikes so as to protect American pilots and aircraft, as was done with Libya in 2011. However, in other cases, U.S. intelligence agencies have arranged for secret permission from governments for such attacks, creating a public ambiguity usually for the benefit of the foreign leaders while gaining the necessary U.S. military assurances.
  • Just last month, Obama himself termed the strategy of arming supposedly “moderate” Syrian rebels “a fantasy.” He told the New York Times’ Thomas L. Friedman: “This idea that we could provide some light arms or even more sophisticated arms to what was essentially an opposition made up of former doctors, farmers, pharmacists and so forth, and that they were going to be able to battle not only a well-armed state but also a well-armed state backed by Russia, backed by Iran, a battle-hardened Hezbollah, that was never in the cards.” Obama’s point would seem to apply at least as much to having the “moderate” rebels face down the ruthless Islamic State jihadists who engage in suicide bombings and slaughter their captives without mercy. But this “fantasy” of the “moderate” rebels has a big following in Congress and on the major U.S. op-ed pages, so Obama has included the $500 million in his war plan despite the risk it poses to Assad’s acquiescence to American air attacks.
  • In a national address last week, Obama vowed to order U.S. air attacks across Syria’s border without any coordination with the Syrian government, a proposition that Damascus denounced as a violation of its sovereignty. So, in this case, Syria’s behind-the-scenes acquiescence also might provide some politically useful ambiguity for Obama as well as Assad. Yet, this secret collaboration may go even further and include Syrian government assistance in the targeting of the U.S. attacks, according to the source who spoke on condition of anonymity. That is another feature of U.S. military protocol in conducting air strikes – to have some on-the-ground help in pinpointing the attacks. As part of its public pronouncements about the future Syrian attacks, the Obama administration sought $500 million to train “vetted” Syrian rebels to handle the targeting tasks inside Syria as well as to carry out military ground attacks. But that approach – while popular on Capitol Hill – could delay any U.S. airstrikes into Syria for months and could possibly negate Assad’s quiet acceptance of the U.S. attacks, since the U.S.-backed rebels share one key goal of the Islamic State, the overthrow of Assad’s relatively secular regime.
  • Without Assad’s consent, the U.S. airstrikes might require a much wider U.S. bombing campaign to first target Syrian government defenses, a development long sought by Official Washington’s influential neoconservatives who have kept “regime change” in Syria near the top of their international wish list. For the past several years, the Israeli government also has sought the overthrow of Assad, even at the risk of Islamic extremists gaining power. The Israeli thinking had been that Assad, as an ally of Iran, represented a greater threat to Israel because his government was at the center of the so-called Shiite crescent reaching from Tehran through Damascus to Beirut and southern Lebanon, the base for Hezbollah.
  • The thinking was that if Assad’s government could be pulled down, Iran and Hezbollah – two of Israel’s principal “enemies” – would be badly damaged. A year ago, then-Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren articulated this geopolitical position in an interview with the Jerusalem Post. “The greatest danger to Israel is by the strategic arc that extends from Tehran, to Damascus to Beirut. And we saw the Assad regime as the keystone in that arc,” Oren said. “We always wanted Bashar Assad to go, we always preferred the bad guys who weren’t backed by Iran to the bad guys who were backed by Iran.” He said this was the case even if the other “bad guys” were affiliated with al-Qaeda. More recently, however, with the al-Qaeda-connected Nusra Front having seized Syrian territory adjacent to the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights – forcing the withdrawal of UN peacekeepers – the balance of Israeli interests may be tipping in favor of preferring Assad to having Islamic extremists possibly penetrating directly into Israeli territory.
  • In the longer term, by working together to create political solutions to various Mideast crises, the Obama-Putin cooperation threatened to destroy the neocons’ preferred strategy of escalating U.S. military involvement in the region. There was the prospect, too, that the U.S.-Russian tag team might strong-arm Israel into a peace agreement with the Palestinians. So, starting last September – almost immediately after Putin helped avert a U.S. air war against Syria – key neocons began taking aim at Ukraine as a potential sore point for Putin. A leading neocon, Carl Gershman, president of the U.S.-government-funded National Endowment for Democracy, took to the op-ed pages of the neocon Washington Post to identify Ukraine as “the biggest prize” and explaining how its targeting could undermine Putin’s political standing inside Russia. “Ukraine’s choice to join Europe will accelerate the demise of the ideology of Russian imperialism that Putin represents,” Gershman wrote. “Russians, too, face a choice, and Putin may find himself on the losing end not just in the near abroad but within Russia itself.” At the time, Gershman’s NED was funding scores of political and media projects inside Ukraine.
  • The Russian Hand Besides the tactical significance of U.S. intelligence agencies arranging Assad’s tacit acceptance of U.S. airstrikes over Syrian territory, the reported arrangement is also significant because of the role of Russian intelligence serving as the intermediary. That suggests that despite the U.S.-Russian estrangement over the Ukraine crisis, the cooperation between President Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin has not been extinguished; it has instead just gone further underground. Last year, this growing behind-the-scenes collaboration between Obama and Putin represented a potential tectonic geopolitical shift in the Middle East. In the short term, their teamwork produced agreements that averted a U.S. military strike against Syria last September (by getting Assad to surrender his chemical weapons arsenal) and struck a tentative deal with Iran to constrain but not eliminate its nuclear program.
  • Direct attacks on Israel would be a temptation to al-Nusra Front, which is competing for the allegiance of young jihadists with the Islamic State. While the Islamic State, known by the acronyms ISIS or ISIL, has captured the imaginations of many youthful extremists by declaring the creation of a “caliphate” with the goal of driving Western interests from the Middle East, al-Nusra could trump that appeal by actually going on the offensive against one of the jihadists’ principal targets, Israel. Yet, despite Israel’s apparent rethinking of its priorities, America’s neocons appear focused still on their long-held strategy of using violent “regime change” in the Middle East to eliminate governments that have been major supporters of Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Palestine’s Hamas, i.e. Syria and Iran. One reason why Obama may have opted for a secretive overture to the Assad regime, using intelligence channels with the Russians as the middlemen, is that otherwise the U.S. neocons and their “liberal interventionist” allies would have howled in protest.
  • By early 2014, American neocons and their “liberal interventionist” pals were conspiring “to midwife” a coup to overthrow Ukraine’s elected President Viktor Yanukovych, according to a phrase used by U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt in an intercepted phone conversation with Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland, who was busy handpicking leaders to replace Yanukovych. A neocon holdover from George W. Bush’s administration, Nuland had been a top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney and is married to prominent neocon Robert Kagan, a co-founder of the Project for a New American Century which prepared the blueprint for the neocon strategy of “regime change” starting with the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
  • The U.S.-backed coup ousted Yanukovych on Feb. 22 and sparked a bloody civil war, leaving thousands dead, mostly ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine. But the Gershman-Nuland strategy also drove a deep wedge between Obama and Putin, seeming to destroy the possibility that their peace-seeking collaboration would continue in the Middle East. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “Neocons’ Ukraine-Syria-Iran Gambit.”] New Hope for ‘Regime Change’ The surprise success of Islamic State terrorists in striking deep inside Iraq during the summer revived neocon hopes that their “regime change” strategy in Syria might also be resurrected. By baiting Obama to react with military force not only in Iraq but across the border in Syria, neocons like Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham put the ouster of Assad back in play.
  • In a New York Times op-ed on Aug. 29, McCain and Graham used vague language about resolving the Syrian civil war, but clearly implied that Assad must go. They wrote that thwarting ISIS “requires an end to the [civil] conflict in Syria, and a political transition there, because the regime of President Bashar al-Assad will never be a reliable partner against ISIS; in fact, it has abetted the rise of ISIS, just as it facilitated the terrorism of ISIS’ predecessor, Al Qaeda in Iraq.” Though the McCain-Graham depiction of Assad’s relationship to ISIS and al-Qaeda was a distortion at best – in fact, Assad’s army has been the most effective force in pushing back against the Sunni terrorist groups that have come to dominate the Western-backed rebel movement – the op-ed’s underlying point is obvious: a necessary step in the U.S. military operation against ISIS must be “regime change” in Damascus.
  • That would get the neocons back on their original track of forcing “regime change” in countries seen as hostile to Israel. The first target was Iraq with Syria and Iran always meant to follow. The idea was to deprive Israel’s close-in enemies, Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Palestine’s Hamas, of crucial support. But the neocon vision got knocked off track when Bush’s Iraq War derailed and the American people balked at extending the conflict to Syria and Iran. Still, the neocons retained their vision even after Bush and Cheney departed. They also remained influential by holding onto key positions inside Official Washington – at think tanks, within major news outlets and even inside the Obama administration. They also built a crucial alliance with “liberal interventionists” who had Obama’s ear. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “The Dangerous Neocon-R2P Alliance.”]
  • The neocons’ new hope arrived with the public outrage over ISIS’s atrocities. Yet, while pushing to get this new war going, the neocons have downplayed their “regime change” agenda, getting Obama to agree only to extend his anti-ISIS bombing campaign from Iraq into Syria. But it was hard to envision expanding the war into Syria without ousting Assad. Now, however, if the source’s account is correct regarding Assad’s quiet assent to U.S. airstrikes, Obama may have devised a way around the need to bomb Assad’s military, an maneuver that might again frustrate the neocons’ beloved goal of “regime change.”
  • Paul Merrell on 17 Sep 14
     
    Robert Parry lands another major scoop. But beware of government officials who leak government plans because they do not invariably speak the truth.  I am particularly wary of this report because Obama's planned arming and training of the "moderate Syrian opposition" was such a patent lie. The "moderate Syrian opposition" disappeared over two years ago as peaceful protesters were replaced by Saudi, Qatari, Turkish, and American-backed Salafist mercenaries took their place. Up until this article, there has been every appearance that the U.S. was about to become ISIL's Air Force in Syria. In other words, there has been a steady gushing of lies from the White House on fundamental issues of war and peace. In that light, I do not plan to accept this article as truth before I see much more confirmation that ISIL rather than the Assad government is the American target in Syria. We have a serial liar in the White House.
Paul Merrell

US air war against jihadists in Syria begins - The Long War Journal - 0 views

www.longwarjournal.org/...us_launches_airstrik.php

war & peace U.S.-foreign-policy Syria ISIL al-Nusra war-begins

shared by Paul Merrell on 24 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • The United States and "partner nation forces" have expanded airstrikes against the Islamic State into Syria, broadening the war with the jihadist group beyond Iraq. Additionally, the US targeted the Khorasan Group, a coordinating council made up of al Qaeda leaders in Syria. US military officials involved in the operation told The Long War Journal that the strike package includes US B-1 bombers, carrier-based F/A-18 fighters and ground-based F-15s and F-16s, remotely piloted drones, and Tomahawk cruise missiles launched from warships. Airstrikes targeted Islamic State command and control centers in Raqqah, the jihadist group's de facto capital in Raqqah province in eastern Syria, as well as arms caches, supply depots, and ground units near the Iraqi border. Rear Admiral James Kirby, the Pentagon's spokesman, confirmed that airstrikes have begun. "I can confirm that US military and partner nation forces are undertaking military action against ISIL [Islamic State] terrorists in Syria using a mix of fighter, bomber and Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles," Kirby said in a statement obtained by The Long War Journal. In the early morning of Sept. 23, US Central Command, or CENTCOM, which is directing the operations in Iraq and Syria, provided further details of the attack.
  • Fourteen strikes against the Islamic State were executed using by "a mix of fighters, bombers, remotely piloted aircraft and Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles," according to a statement by CENTCOM. Forty-seven cruise missiles were "launched from the USS Arleigh Burke and USS Philippine Sea, which were operating from international waters in the Red Sea and North Arabian Gulf." "The strikes destroyed or damaged multiple ISIL targets in the vicinity of the towns of Raqqah in north central Syria, Dier al Zour, and Abu Kamal in eastern Syria and Hasakah in northeastern Syria," the statement says. "The targets included ISIL fighters, training compounds, headquarters and command and control facilities, storage facilities, a finance center, supply trucks and armed vehicles." According to the Syrian Observator for Human Rights, more than 70 Islamic State fighters were killed in the strikes and and over 300 were wounded. Other countries that participated in the operation include Bahrain, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. Additionally, the US launched eight airstrikes against "a network of seasoned al Qaeda veterans - sometimes referred to as the Khorasan Group - who have established a safe haven in Syria to develop external attacks, construct and test improvised explosive devices and recruit Westerners to conduct operations." The strikes targeted "training camps, an explosives and munitions production facility, a communication building and command and control facilities" as part of an effort "to disrupt the imminent attack plotting against the United States and Western interests."
  • CENTCOM did not provide details on the names or numbers of Islamic State and al Qaeda fighters killed. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that "no less than 50 fighters from Jabhat al-Nusra (most of them were Syrian fighters), were killed by air strikes by the warplanes of the international coalition." In addition, eight civilians, including three children and a women, are reported to have been killed. CENTCOM was clear that only the US targeted al Qaeda's network in Syria. The Khorasan Group is closely tied to the Al Nusrah Front and other jihadist groups in Syria, which are at odds with the Islamic State. These groups are poised to gain from any setbacks to the rival Islamic State. President Barrack Obama stated 13 days ago that the US air campaign against the Islamic State, which began in northern Iraq on Aug. 7, would be expanded into Syria. US and French warplanes are now operating over Irbil, Sinjar, Kirkuk, the Mosul and Haditha dams, southwest of Baghdad (likely in Jurf al Sakhar in northern Babil), and somewhere on the Euphrates River. According to CENTCOM, the US has launched 194 airstrikes in Iraq since Aug. 7. The Islamic State has threatened to retaliate against the US and other Western countries that participate in military action against the jihadist group. Just yesterday, Abu Muhammad al Adnani, the spokesman for the Islamic State, called for Muslims in Western countries to wage jihad. [See Threat Matrix report, Islamic State spokesman again threatens West in new speech.]
Paul Merrell

Russia to expand Syria Air Strikes: Mission Creep or Strategy? | nsnbc international - 0 views

nsnbc.me/...ikes-mission-creep-or-strategy

war & peace Syria Russia Kyrgyzstan international law NATO

shared by Paul Merrell on 04 Oct 15 - No Cached
  • Russian Air Force jets have flown over 60 sorties since the onset of the Russian campaign against ISIL in Syria on Wednesday. The campaign has dislodged ISIL and al-Qaeda associated terrorist brigades. Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev expressed his support for Russia. French President Francois Hollande accused Russia of having become a conflicting party due to its support of Syrian President Al-Assad. The Russian initiative is consistent with countering long-term NATO plans aimed at destabilizing the Russian Federation’s underbelly. 
  • On Wednesday, September 30, 2015, Russia began launching air strikes against ISIL targets in Syria. As of Saturday, the Russian Defense Ministry reported that there had been flown over 60 sorties, bombing 50 facilities of the Islamic State. Col Gen Andrey Kartapolov of the General Staff told reporters on Saturday that: “The aircraft have been taking off from the Hmeimim air base, targeting the whole Syria. … In the past three days we have managed to disrupt the terrorists’ infrastructure and to substantially degrade their combat capabilities. … Intelligence reports say that militants are leaving the areas under their control. … There is panic and desertion among their ranks. … Nearly 600 mercenaries have abandoned their positions and are making attempts to get out to Europe.” The President of fellow CSTO member Kyrgyzstan, Almazbek Atambayev, told the press on Sunday, that members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) should primarily think about protecting their own borders. President Almazbek Atambayev did, however, express his support for Moscow’s air strikes, stressing that the so-called Islamic State, a.k.a. ISIL, ISIS or Daesh had declared its ambition to control large territories. He added that:
  • Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, for his part, would note that when someone behaves, moves and acts like a terrorist it is probably a terrorist. A diplomatic way of telling the press that Moscow does not see a great difference between ISIL and e.g. the Al-Qaeda associated Jabhat Al-Nusrah. Iraq, Iran, Syria and Russia have established a joint intelligence center in the Iraqi capital Baghdad. Moscow has previously hinted that Russia was prepared to look positively at a request for help from the Iraqi government. Alexander Mezyaev is the Head of the Chair of the Academy on International Law and Governance in Kazan, Tatarstan, Russia explained the Russian and international legal background for Russia’s military operations in an article entitled “Russian Operation in Syria: International Law”.
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  • Hollande would later accuse Moscow of having become a party to the conflict in Syria due to what he described as Moscow’s support to Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad. The remark fell within the context of allegations that Russian jets had targeted positions of other than ISIL fighters.
  • In a January 2013 interview with nsnbc, retired Pakistani Major Agha H. Amin noted that one of NATO’s long-term objectives with the destabilization of Syria was to spread a string of low intensity conflicts from the Mediterranean along Russia’s and other CSTO members soft and resource-rich underbelly to Pakistan. It is within this context that the statement of the President of Kyrgyzstan, Almazbek Atambayev, and his country’s support for the Russian air strikes can be understood. Expanding Russian air strikes to also include e.g. Jabhat al-Nusrah and other mercenary brigades operating in Syria and Iraq would not be mission creep but rather part of a long-term strategy to counter well-documented, predominantly US and UK forged plans to destabilize and eventually to “Balkanize” the Russian Federation by drawing Russia and other CSTO member States into protracted low-intensity conflicts.
Paul Merrell

French strikes in Syria may have hit French jihadists: prime minister | Reuters - 0 views

www.reuters.com/...ce-syria-idUSKCN0S60EF20151012

war & peace ISIL France French-jihadis airstrikes

shared by Paul Merrell on 12 Oct 15 - No Cached
  • French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said on Monday that French jihadists may have been killed during an air strike targeting an Islamic State (IS) camp last week and he deflected criticism, saying the primary objective was to hit the militants.Rafale fighter jets bombed a training camp for suicide bombers near Islamic State's Syrian stronghold of Raqqa on Friday, according to the French Defence Ministry.France announced it was joining what have been U.S.-led air strikes on Islamist insurgents in Syria to prevent Islamic State from carrying out attacks against its interests and to protect Syrian civilians.It says the decision is legal and based on a United Nations charter enabling self-defense, something French media and analysts have started to question since reports that French citizens may have been killed. "Terrorist attacks have taken place (in France) .. In the name of self-defense it is obligatory to strike Daesh and we will continue," Valls told reporters in Amman, Jordan, using the derogatory Arabic acronym for Islamic State.
  • "Whether there are French (citizens) among them, it's possible, but we have a responsibility to hit Daesh. Terrorists do not have passports."A French government source said Paris could not confirm a Syrian non-governmental organization's estimate that six French jihadists were killed in the Raqqa-area air strike. France was shaken by a series of deadly Islamist attacks earlier this year, including the killing in January of 12 people at the office of the weekly Charlie Hebdo, which in articles and cartoons had satirized militant Islam. It has become alarmed by Islamic State gains in northern Syria despite more than a year of U.S.-led air strikes and the possibility of France being sidelined in negotiations to reach a political solution in Syria.
Paul Merrell

Text - H.Con.Res.105 - 113th Congress (2013-2014): Prohibiting the President from deplo... - 0 views

beta.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-concurrent-resolution/105/text/170606?q={%22search%22:[%22iraq%20combat%22]}

war & peace Iraq ISIL U S.-combat-role

shared by Paul Merrell on 26 Jul 14 - No Cached
  • 113th CONGRESS 2d Session H. CON. RES. 105 _______________________________________________________________________ CONCURRENT RESOLUTION Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), SECTION 1. PROHIBITION REGARDING UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES IN IRAQ. The President shall not deploy or maintain United States Armed Forces in a sustained combat role in Iraq without specific statutory authorization for such use enacted after the date of the adoption of this concurrent resolution. SEC. 2. RULE OF CONSTRUCTION. Nothing in this concurrent resolution supersedes the requirements of the War Powers Resolution (50 U.S.C. 1541 et seq.). Passed the House of Representatives July 25, 2014. Attest: Clerk. 113th CONGRESS 2d Session H. CON. RES. 105
  • Paul Merrell on 26 Jul 14
     
    Passed the House today overwhelmingly, 370-40. Watered down from the original bill, which set firm dates for withdrawal of all U.S. military forces not needed for protection of U.S. Embassy, diplomats, and contractor staff. The key phrase of the prohibition, "sustained combat role," is incredibly vague and open- ended. Moreover, it can be read as authorizing use of our Armed Forces in a combat role multiple times for any period that is shorter than "sustained."   E.g., a period of air strikes, take a break for a few days, start another period of air strikes, then argue that it's allowed because the first series of air strikes was not sustained.  Let's hope that the Senate fixes it.
Paul Merrell

Why Obama's campaign in Iraq could require 15,000 troops | Army Times | armytimes.com - 0 views

www.armytimes.com/...aq-could-require-15-000-troops

war & peace Iraq Obama slipery-slope

shared by Paul Merrell on 11 Aug 14 - No Cached
  • President Obama says it all the time — no combat troops will return to Iraq.But many experts believe it will be extremely hard to achieve Obama’s newly expanded military mission there without more Americans on the ground.“I think the slippery slope analogy is the right one for Iraq right now,” said Barry Posen, director of the Security Studies program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.On Thursday, Obama authorized a new open-ended operation in response to gains by the Islamic State militants in northern Iraq.
  • For now, the new mission relies on aircraft based outside Iraq. The U.S. will help defend the Kurdish city of Erbil from Islamic State fighters using “targeted air strikes,” Obama said. Those air strikes began Friday morning and included at least three separate bombings before noon, defense officials said.The second mission is a commitment to protect some 40,000 Iraqi Yazidis who are trapped on a mountain surrounded by the militants. That began Thursday night with air drops of food and water for at least 8,000 people.Military experts say tactical commanders will want more ground forces. Forward air controllers could provide more precise targeting information. U.S. advisers could support the Kurdish forces fighting the militants. And U.S. commanders may need to expand their intelligence effort on the ground.
  • Getting the Yazidis off the mountain and safely transporting them to a secure location will require either an “an enormous helicopter air lift” or ground combat units to confront militants and secure a safe-passage corridor for the refugees, Mansoor said.“That may require some kind of ground presence to escort them through enemy held territory,” Mansoor said.“That is [IS] controlled territory. There could be major combat along the way. This could be very difficult,” Mansoor said.
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  • In turn, U.S. forces might need a forward operating base with a security perimeter, more force protection and a logistical supply line. Medevac capabilities may require a helicopter detachment and a small aviation maintenance shed.“You’re talking about a 10,000- to 15,000-soldier effort to include maintenance, and medevac and security,” said retired Army Col. Peter Mansoor, who served as executive officer to David Petraeus during the 2007 surge in Iraq and now is a professor of military history at Ohio State University.“But that is the price you’re going to pay if you want to roll back [Islamic State]. You can’t just snap your fingers and make it go away,” Mansoor said.
  • While the need for U.S. ground troops may be limited, Jones said, Obama’s plan poses another risk: If air strikes are successful in the area around Erbil, pressure may grow for the U.S. to provide similar air strikes in other parts of Iraq. “The slippery slope may be a much broader demand for air strikes,” Jones said.It’s unclear how far Obama and his military leaders plan to take this current campaign.“There is still some question about whether this is going to be a major air campaign to defeat [the Islamic State] or whether it is going to me more along the lines of strikes and raids to deny them access and prevent them from making further advances. I’m not sure,” Gunzinger said.Obama’s language Thursday was ambiguous, Posen said. Despite his repeated aversion to sending “combat troops” back into Iraq, Obama has signaled a long-term commitment to support the Iraqi military and a continued belief in a cohesive, Democratic Iraq in which Sunnis and Shiites and Kurds share power under a Bagdad led government.“Is this going to be a limited mission? Or is this the beginning of a project where we are once again going to fix Iraq, to build a homogenous, unified Iraq?” Posen said. .
  • “If they are going to succumb to that logic, if they are going to try to build the beautiful outcome that the Bush Administration failed to build, then they are not edging up to the slippery slope — they are diving over it.”
Paul Merrell

Case of Navy nurse who refused to force-feed could put Guantánamo hunger stri... - 0 views

www.miamiherald.com/...of-navy-nurse-who-refused.html

war & peace Gitmo force-feeding litigation

shared by Paul Merrell on 30 Aug 14 - No Cached
  • No decision has been made on whether the U.S. Navy will court-martial a nurse who refused to force-feed hunger strikers at Guantánamo during the summer, the nurse’s commander says.But those who are watching the case say a military trial could put a spotlight on both Guantánamo’s hunger-strike policy and how the military manages medical-ethics issues. Retired Navy Capt. Albert J. Shimkus Jr., who teaches at the U.S. Navy War College in Newport, R.I., calls it “an important time, not only for this individual but also an important time for military medicine and how we interact with our patient and the process by which these decisions are made.”
  • The nurse, who has been identified as a Navy lieutenant, reportedly turned conscientious objector after handling months of feedings. He was sent home early to the Naval Health Clinic New England in Newport, R.I., this month after serving with the 139-member Navy medical staff assigned to care for Guantánamo’s 149 detainees.
  • At Guantánamo, “there was an investigation done and currently it’s under review. The process has started.”
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • As the lieutenant’s commander, it would be up to Pennington to decide what, if any, disciplinary action to pursue. Typically that starts with what is called a 15-6 investigation: a description of what happened and a recommendation of whether to order a court-martial. The captain would not say whether that was the investigation she had received. Whatever the outcome, two former senior military medical officers said the case would serve as a significant precedent in this, the 13th year of the detention center at the U.S. enclave in southeast Cuba, where an undisclosed number of the 149 captives were on a hunger strike Thursday.
  • The case is also likely to drive a review of “the process of how to recuse oneself” when a health provider in uniform navigates the “dual loyalty question” of obligation to the nation versus the obligation to the patient. Retired Army Brig Gen. Stephen Xenakis, a psychiatrist who has examined Guantánamo captives, also says a court-martial could end up putting Guantánamo hunger-strike policy on trial.During the 1980s, he notes, military doctors were allowed not only to refuse to perform abortions but also to proclaim their opposition to doing them, “and we didn’t prosecute them.” But something about medical autonomy changed during the war on terror. “The issue is that, with this war, there has been a shift in what has been the professional autonomy of clinicians. They’ve been subordinated to the combat arms, to the war-fighters,” says Xenakis.
  • Paul Merrell on 30 Aug 14
     
    The case may well put the Gitmo hunger-strike policy on trial. All U.S. military officers are under a general order to disobey unlawful commands. Therefore, it is conceivable to me that the nurse's best defense may well be that the order to force-feed the prisoners was unlawful.
Paul Merrell

Has Israel's Air Force Joined Obama's Air Campaign against Syria? Israeli Jets Strike D... - 0 views

www.globalresearch.ca/...5488480

war & peace Israel Syriia airstrikes Hezbollah

shared by Paul Merrell on 13 Nov 15 - No Cached
  • According to a report by Algemeiner (November 11, 2015), Israel’s Air Force was involved in bombing inside Syria, hitting targets close to Damascus airport.  According to reports in Syrian media outlets affiliated with President Bashar Assad, Israel Air Force jets hit targets near the Damascus airport, Israel’s Channel 2 reported Wednesday evening. The report, a breaking story that interrupted the nightly news, was neither confirmed nor denied by Israeli authorities. Channel 2 military correspondent Roni Daniel said that Israel has made it clear it would not allow the transfer of weapons from Iran, via Damascus, to Hezbollah in Lebanon. This is not the first time that air strikes in Syria have been attributed to Israel without confirmation from officials in the Jewish state. But this comes on the heels of meetings between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly held to coordinate operations in Syria — and ensure that there are no unwitting collisions between planes from their respective air forces. During a visit to the US this week, Netanyahu gave insight into Israel’s Syria policy. He told an audience at a gala for the American Enterprise Institute that he laid out Israel’s red lines in Syria to Putin in September.
  • “We will not allow Iran to set up a second front in the Golan, and we will act forcefully — and have acted forcefully — to prevent that. We will not allow the use of Syrian territory from which we’d be attacked by the Syrian army or anyone else and we have acted forcefully against that. And third, we will not allow the use of Syrian territory for the transfer of game-changing weapons into Lebanon into Hezbollah’s hands, and we have acted forcefully on that. I made it clear that we will continue to act like that,” he said. (Ruth Blum, Algemeiner, November 12, 2015) This report begs the question as to the ultimate objective of Netanyahu’s visit to Washington. The Israeli delegation to Washington was also integrated by military and intelligence officials who no doubt had meetings with their counterparts at the Pentagon and Langley, not to mention the US Congress. A week prior to the Obama-Nentayahu “summit”,  Netanyahu dispatched his defense chief, Moshe “Bogie” Ya’alon, to Washington, “to help smooth the way for his own visit”. Was there an understanding that Israel would henceforth play a more active role in the war against Syria? In an earlier statement, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter intimated:
  • “It is a reasonable expectation that the defense relationship [with Israel] will be one of stability and endurance, …” (quoted by Defense One, November 3, 2015) Ya’alon was hosted in Washington  by Defense Secretary Ashton Carter who is credited for having stabilized the US-Israel relationship.  Were these talks between Carter and Ya’alon behind closed doors indicative of a shift in US-Israel military relations,  specifically with regard to Syria. Quoting Syrian opposition sources, the Israeli media dismissed the reports that the IDF was behind the air strikes: Syrian opposition activist Ahmed Yabrudi said: “Israeli warplanes entered from south Lebanon, arrived at Qalamoun and flew above the international airport in Damascus where they struck nearby military outposts.” He added that “the Israeli planes remained in Syria’s skies for a half hour, and there is no information about the outposts that were hit – except that they belonged to Hezbollah.” Official Syrian media failed to report on the air strikes attributed to Israel. [According to Algemeiner, it was announced on Syrian TV] Israeli defense officials also declined to comment on the foreign media reports. However, Israel did previously announce a strict-policy of intolerance towards threats to the state, such as weapons transfers to Hezbollah in Lebanon. (Jerusalem Post, November 12, 2015)
Paul Merrell

Iraqi parliament approves Russian air strikes against ISIL - 0 views

www.todayszaman.com/rikes-against-isil_402565.html

war & peace Syria Iraq Russia airstrikes

shared by Paul Merrell on 26 Nov 15 - No Cached
  • After weeks of political wrangling, the Iraqi parliament finally agreed to allow Russia to launch air strikes against the terrorist Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Iraq, paving the way for the involvement of a powerful new combatant in an already complex battleground in a move that will likely incense the US.
  • Russia's foray into Iraq has created another quandary for the US, which has agreed to build a line of communication with Russia to avoid inadvertent incidents in the air between the two air forces that are operating in the same theater for the first time since World War II. Hakim al-Zamili, the head of the defense and security committee of the Iraqi parliament, announced on Monday that Iraq had struck a deal with Russia to launch operations against ISIL targets in the country. According to a report by Russian news agency Sputnik, once the air strikes are under way, ISIL fighters who might seek safe haven in Iraq after fleeing strikes in Syria will not find safety in Iraq. With the agreement, Russia aims to cut the supply lines of ISIL between Iraq and Syria. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi had previously said Iraq might seek Russia's help against ISIL if Russian air strikes prove to be effective in Syria. Baghdad's appeal to Moscow has irked the US, which reportedly told the Iraqi government that it would have to choose between the US and Russia in the fight against ISIL. In a visit to Baghdad last week, US Chief of General Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford told Iraqi officials that possible Russian air operation would make it almost impossible for the US to continue its military campaign.
  • Paul Merrell on 26 Nov 15
     
    From October 26, 2015. I had missed this one, but so had U.S. mainstream media. Will the U.S. treat Russia's intervention in Iraq as grounds for U.S. withdrawal from Iraq and Syria? And what about U.S. command and control and supply of ISIL and al Nusrah?  Does that end too? The Obama Administration seems to be in the midst of a policy pivot in the Middle East, brought about by Russia's intervention. But does Obama yet know where his policies will land? 
Paul Merrell

Those Missile Strikes Were Old News « LobeLog - 0 views

lobelog.com/-missile-strikes-were-old-news

war & peace U.S.-foreign-policy missile-attack

shared by Paul Merrell on 13 Apr 17 - No Cached
  • Military analysts and political commentators have deluged their readers over the past week with their views about the U.S. missile strike on Syria ordered by President Donald Trump. Some of the assessments were more useful than others, but what was surprising was that the authors mostly seemed surprised. They shouldn’t have been. The firing of cruise missiles into Middle Eastern countries with which the United States is not at war is old news. Some articles, including one in The Washington Post, used the word “unprecedented” about the strike, but the only unprecedented part was the identity of the ruler whose facilities were targeted. In fact, as the astute Juan Cole of the University of Michigan noted, the United States has been doing this for more than 20 years – with little if any known impact on whatever conflict provoked the missile strike or whatever ruler was in disfavor with Washington at the time.
Paul Merrell

'I don't want to be complicit' in an Israeli strike on Iran, says US army chief | The T... - 0 views

www.timesofisrael.com/ike-on-iran-says-us-army-chief

war & peace Iran Iranian nukes Israel

shared by Paul Merrell on 05 Sep 12 - No Cached
  • The US should not become embroiled in an Israeli military strike on Iran that would not only fail to destroy Iran’s nuclear program, but could also undo international diplomatic pressure on Tehran, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey said Thursday in London. Such an attack by Israel would “clearly delay but probably not destroy Iran’s nuclear program,” Dempsey said, adding: ”I don’t want to be complicit if they [Israel] choose to do it.”
  • Thursday’s comments from Dempsey, who was in London for the Paralympic Games, come amid mounting chatter over a possible Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear program. The US has been working to keep Israel from launching a unilateral strike, maintaining that sanctions should be given more time to work. Last week, the former American ambassador to Israel, Martin Indyk, termed Israel’s talk of attacking Iran “a classic case of crying wolf.”
Paul Merrell

U.S. military officers have deep doubts about impact, wisdom of a U.S. strike on Syria ... - 0 views

www.washingtonpost.com/...3-b4cb-fd7ce041d814_story.html

war & peace Syria Obama DoD DoD-objects

shared by Paul Merrell on 30 Aug 13 - No Cached
  • The Obama administration’s plan to launch a military strike against Syria is being received with serious reservations by many in the U.S. military, which is coping with the scars of two lengthy wars and a rapidly contracting budget, according to current and former officers. Having assumed for months that the United States was unlikely to intervene militarily in Syria, the Defense Department has been thrust onto a war footing that has made many in the armed services uneasy, according to interviews with more than a dozen military officers ranging from captains to a four-star general.
  • The Obama administration’s plan to launch a military strike against Syria is being received with serious reservations by many in the U.S. military, which is coping with the scars of two lengthy wars and a rapidly contracting budget, according to current and former officers. Having assumed for months that the United States was unlikely to intervene militarily in Syria, the Defense Department has been thrust onto a war footing that has made many in the armed services uneasy, according to interviews with more than a dozen military officers ranging from captains to a four-star general.
  • Former and current officers, many with the painful lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan on their minds, said the main reservations concern the potential unintended consequences of launching cruise missiles against Syria.Some questioned the use of military force as a punitive measure and suggested that the White House lacks a coherent strategy. If the administration is ambivalent about the wisdom of defeating or crippling the Syrian leader, possibly setting the stage for Damascus to fall to fundamentalist rebels, they said, the military objective of strikes on Assad’s military targets is at best ambiguous. “There’s a broad naivete in the political class about America’s obligations in foreign policy issues, and scary simplicity about the effects that employing American military power can achieve,” said retired Lt. Gen. Gregory S. Newbold, who served as director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the run-up to the Iraq war, noting that many of his contemporaries are alarmed by the plan.
Paul Merrell

Netanyahu orders IDF to prepare for possible strike on Iran during 2014 - Diplomacy and... - 0 views

www.haaretz.com/...1.580701

war & peace Israel Iran Iranian-nukes-myth

shared by Paul Merrell on 20 Mar 14 - No Cached
  • Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon have ordered the army to continue preparing for a possible military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities at a cost of at least 10 billion shekels ($2.89 billion) this year, despite the talks between Iran and the West, according to recent statements by senior military officers. Three Knesset members who were present at Knesset joint committee hearings on Israel Defense Forces plans that were held in January and February say they learned during the hearings that 10 billion shekels to 12 billion shekels of the defense budget would be allocated this year for preparations for a strike on Iran, approximately the same amount that was allocated in 2013.
  • Some MKs asked the army’s deputy chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot, and planning directorate official Brig. Gen. Agai Yehezkel whether they felt there was justification for investing so much money in those preparations, said the MKs present at the meetings, who asked that their names be withheld because of the sensitivity of the issue. They said some lawmakers also asked whether the interim agreement reached between Iran and the six powers in November 2013, and the ongoing negotiations for a full nuclear accord, had caused any change in the IDF’s preparations. The IDF representatives said the army had received a clear directive from government officials from the political echelon – meaning Netanyahu and Ya’alon – to continue readying for a possible independent strike by Israel on the Iranian nuclear sites, regardless of the talks now happening between Iran and the West, the three MKs said.
  • Ya’alon recently indicated during a speech at Tel Aviv University that his view has shifed and he is now likely to support a unilateral Israeli strike on Iran, in light of his assessment that the Obama administration will not do so. “We think that the United States should be the one leading the campaign against Iran,” Ya’alon said this week. “But the U.S. has entered talks with them and unfortunately, in the haggling in the Persian bazaar, the Iranians were better. ... Therefore, on this matter, we have to behave as though we have nobody to look out for us but ourselves.” The second round of nuclear talks opened in Vienna on Tuesday, with the participation of European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Jawad Zarif and senior diplomats from the six powers.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • After the first day of talks, Ashton’s spokesman, Michael Mann, described them as “positive, serious and substantive.” Iranian media reported that officials with the Iranian delegation said this round of talks will focus on how much uranium enrichment Iran will be permitted as part of a final accord, along with the future of the heavy water plant at Arak and the lifting of sanctions. In an opinion piece in Britain’s Financial Times this week, Zarif argued that his country is not seeking nuclear weapons and said the West’s suspicions will threaten Iran’s national security. Nuclear weapons are a tool of the past, Zarif argued, writing: “Israel’s nuclear arsenal was of little help in Lebanon in 2006.” Zarif said Iran must convince the West that it is not seeking nuclear arms, citing the fatwa ostensibly written by supreme leader Ali Khamenei that forbids the production of nuclear weapons.
Paul Merrell

Syrian army moves Scud missiles to avoid strike - 0 views

news.msn.com/...-scud-missiles-to-avoid-strike

war & peace Syria Obama US-strike

shared by Paul Merrell on 30 Aug 13 - No Cached
  • President Bashar Assad's forces have removed several Scud missiles and dozens of launchers from a base north of Damascus, possibly to protect the weapons from a Western attack, opposition sources said on Thursday.
  • At the headquarters of the army's 155th Brigade, a missile unit whose base sprawls along the western edge of Syria's main highway running north from the capital to Homs, rebel scouts saw dozens mobile Scud launchers pulling out early on Thursday.Rebel military sources said spotters saw missiles draped in tarpaulins on the launchers, as well as trailer trucks carrying other rockets and equipment. More than two dozen Scuds — 35-foot-long ballistic missiles with ranges of 200 miles and more — were fired from the base in the Qalamoun area this year, some of which hit even Aleppo in the far north.The base was among a list of suggested targets presented by the rebel Syrian National Coalition to Western envoys in Istanbul earlier this week, opposition sources said. Scud units, of Soviet or North Korean manufacture, are designed to be mobile and so could still be set up quickly to fire from new positions.
  • Assad's forces appeared already by Wednesday to have evacuated most personnel from army and security command headquarters in central Damascus, residents and opposition sources in the capital said.In the Qalamoun area, an activist calling himself Amer al-Qalamouni told Reuters by telephone: "Most of the personnel in the base appear to have left.He added that trailer trucks loaded with military equipment were also seen on the Damascus ring road to the south: "Either the hardware is being transported to be stored elsewhere or it will remain constantly on the move to avoid being hit," he said.Captain Firas Bitar of the Tahriri al-Sham rebel force, who is from the Qalamoun area but is based in a Damascus suburb, said two other missile units based near the 155th in the districts of Qutaifa and Nasiriya were also moving rockets out.He said they could be move northwest to loyalist strongholds near Homs or further into the coastal mountain heartland of Assad's minority Alawite sect.Opposition sources also suspected the evacuation of another missile unit based in Sahya, just south of Damascus."The Sahya barracks have been hitting the southern suburbs with rockets and artillery non-stop," said rebel commander Abu Ayham of the Ansar al-Islam brigade. "Since yesterday, nothing has been fired from the camp, suggesting it has been emptied."
  • Paul Merrell on 30 Aug 13
     
    Have you noticed that there has been no Obama Administration call for investigation, identification, and prosecution of the White House leakster who leaked the targets for the allegedly planned U.S. strike on Syria? A very kind way of saying to Assad, "would you be so kind as to move your weapons out of our targeted areas so we cause as little damage as we can while still showing the world that Obama doesn't back down from his red lines." Apparently that is precisely what Assad is doing.
Paul Merrell

'This Week' Transcript: Ambassador Samantha Power - ABC News - 0 views

abcnews.go.com/...story

war & peace ISIL Iraq Syria U.S.-foreign-policy

shared by Paul Merrell on 22 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • STEPHANOPOULOS: And we are joined now by the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power. Thanks for coming back to This Week. And you know, the president said he's prepared to strike Syria. Those strikes could be imminent. Will the United States try to get UN Security Council authorization first? Or do you accept now that's just not going to be possible? SAMANTHA POWER, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS: Well, let me say that Secretary Kerry just convened a meeting of the Security Council on Friday which showcased just how much support there is on the Security Council and in the broader international community for the anti-ISIL effort. STEPHANOPOULOS: But the Russia veto.
  • POWER: Russia has vetoed in the past, but on very different issues. I think Russia has made clear for a long time its opposition to ISIL. The Iraqis have appealed to the international community to come to their defense not only in Iraq, but also to go after safe havens in foreign countries. And what they mean by that of course is Syria. And they're quite explicit about that. So they have made an appeal to the international community for collective defense. And we think we have a legal basis we need if the president decides... STEPHANOPOULOS: Without a UN authorization. POWER: Consistent with the UN charter, we -- it will depend on the facts and circumstances of any particular strike in Syria, but we have a legal basis we need.
  • Paul Merrell on 22 Sep 14
     
    Context: U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., Samantha Power, holds the U.N. Security Council's rotating chair this month. Powers'  claims a right for the U.S. to wage war against ISIL in Syria on grounds of the collective security exception to the U.N. Charter's prohibition; that is, that the U.S. has a collective security agreement with the nation of Iraq, that makes it lawful for the U.S. to strike ISIL. True enough as a matter of international law, ignoring the fact that Obama has yet to obtain permission from the U.S. Congress, which the U.S. Constitution requires him to do. But ISIL is not the nation of Syria; hence to attack ISIL in Syria, an additional exception is necessary for both Iraq and the U.S. The only other recognized exception that might seem to do deals with the situation when a nation in which a private organization inflicting harm on another nation  is "unwilling or unable" to protect the second nation (Iraq) from the depradations of the private organization. And that is where Powers' legal analysis dissembles because the U.S. has been actively attempting to overthrow the Syrian government via proxy terrorist organizations including ISIL. So the U.S. lacks clean hands in claiming any lawful right to invade Syria on the theory that the Syrian government is unwilling or unable to put down the ISIL organization. The Syrian government is certainly willing and has been attempting to do so. But its inability to do so thus far is entirely due to the U.S., its Gulf Coast state allies, and its ally Turkey continuing to supply ISIL and other terrorist groups in Syria with weapons, training, and supplies, aimed at overthrowing the Syrian government. The doctrine of unclean hands has limited applicability in international law governing human rights. See Lisa LaPlante, The Law of Remedies and the Clean Hands Doctrine: Exclusionary Reparation Policies in Peru's Political Transition, 23 Am Univ Int Law Rev 50 (2007), https://digitalcommons.wcl.american.edu/cg
Paul Merrell

Another Gaza Hospital Hit by Israeli Strike; Four Dead, 40 Hurt - NBC News.com - 0 views

www.nbcnews.com/...rike-four-dead-40-hurt-n161086

Israel Gaza Palestine war crimes hospitals

shared by Paul Merrell on 21 Jul 14 - No Cached
  • AZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- Israeli forces fired a tank shell at a hospital in Gaza on Monday, killing at least four people and injuring 40 others, health officials said. It was the third hospital Israel's military has struck since launching a ground offensive in Gaza last week. advertisement The four people killed at al-Aqsa Hospital on Monday included one patient and three visitors, health officials told NBC News. Health Ministry spokesman Ashraf Al-Qidra told Reuters that the tank shell hit the third floor of the building that houses an intensive care unit and operating rooms.
  • The Hamas-run al-Aqsa TV station showed chaotic footage from the scene, including what it said was an ambulance driver being wheeled inside on a stretcher and a doctor with a neck wound. Speaking to the station, deputy hospital manager Dr. Faiz Zaidan said: "I urge the Red Cross and its hospitals to come and transfer as many cases as possible, we have nothing to offer to patients." He added that shrapnel had been found in the facility's reception area. Another doctor, who was not identified, added: "The Israeli aggression, they could not find any targets to hit, so they started hitting hospital, hitting patients."
  • Israel has defended shelling civilian-inhabited areas where Hamas allegedly hides rockets. The strike came just hours after charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said health workers in Gaza were coming under fire and urged Israel to stop its strikes. Gaza's Wafa hospital was evacuated and then "obliterated" by more than 15 direct hits from Israeli forces on Friday, senior nurse Ali Hassan said in an interview with the U.K.'s Channel 4 News.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • More than 500 Palestinians, most of whom were civilians, and 20 Israeli soldiers have died during two weeks of bombing as well as a ground invasion launched into Gaza on Thursday.
  • Paul Merrell on 21 Jul 14
     
    Israel racked up over 100 kills in less than 24 hours over the weekend. From other reports, they have also been targeting ambulances ("Hamas uses them to transport rockets."). Most kills with a single bomb so far, 24 members of a single family just sitting down to dinner. Gaza dead now tally over 500 with over 3,100 wounded.   
Paul Merrell

Lopez not on Hunger Strike: Venezuelan Ombudsman | nsnbc international - 0 views

nsnbc.me/...er-strike-venezuelan-ombudsman

war & peace Venezuela U.S.-foreign-policy color-revolutions snipers

shared by Paul Merrell on 28 May 15 - No Cached
  • Venezuela’s chief ombudsman, Tarek William Saab, has publicly refuted international media reports that imprisoned politician, Leopoldo Lopez, has gone on hunger strike. On Sunday, international journalists took to the web to announce Lopez’s “hunger strike” after he released a video on Saturday evening in which he claimed that he and fellow jailed far right leader Daniel Ceballos, ex-mayor of San Cristobal, would refuse to eat as a form of political protest.
  • But a leaked conversation featuring Lopez suggests that the “strike” is part of yet another attempt to destabilise the Bolivarian government. Both Ceballos and Lopez were arrested in early 2014 for their role in inciting violent anti-government street mobilizations known as the “barricades” which resulted in the deaths of forty three people. The wave of street violence was later found to have been infiltrated by rightwing paramilitaries.
  • Yet an audio recording leaked on Monday by state agencies suggests that Lopez’s video is part of a wider plan to bring down the government through a combination of civil unrest and violence. In the recording, which appears to be a secret conversation between Lopez and Ceballos held prior to the release of Lopez’s video, both men can be heard concocting a strategy to deal a fatal blow to the elected government of Nicolas Maduro. The plan includes mass protests infiltrated by snipers to sow civil unrest as well as mounting camps outside of the United Nations headquarters. The strategy seems to mirror the tactics used in 2014’s violent barricades for which both men are currently under arrest.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The opposition Roundtable of Democratic Unity (MUD) coalition has since revealed that it will not support this coming Saturday’s march called by Lopez. In an official communique, the MUD stated that it “supports and values” the reasons behind the March, but that “circumstances” preclude their participation.
  • Paul Merrell on 28 May 15
     
    The report involves principles of the U.S. "blue revolution" in Venezuela, a thus-far unsuccessful effort to overthrow the Venezuela Bolivarian government. Note carefully the plan to embed snipers amongst the "protestors." The deployment of snipers to give the appearance of the established government killings of protestors seems to be a staple tactic in U.S. color revolution strategy.  
Paul Merrell

Brutal Crackdown on Turkish Protests - 0 views

www.informationclearinghouse.info/article35308.htm

Turkey Arab Spring

shared by Paul Merrell on 19 Jun 13 - No Cached
  • Turkey threatens to deploy army to end unrest: Deputy PM says army could be called into action to restore order, as unions go on strike to protest police crackdown. Five Turkish trade unions begin nationwide demonstrations with one-day strike; Five trade unions are set to begin today a nationwide demonstration campaign and one-day strike following the harsh police intervention in Taksim the night of June 15, daily Hürriyet has reported. Turkey Protests: Government Targets Doctors Who Treated Injured Demonstrators: The Health Ministry had demanded a list of the names of all doctors who treated demonstrators from the Turkish Medical Association (TBB), the association said on Friday 14 June.
  • Paul Merrell on 19 Jun 13
     
    As Erdogan promised, the government has responded brutally to Turkish protests, while concurrently censoring news sources. But the resistance grows as five unions announce a one-day strike in protest over the government violence. 
Paul Merrell

Pakistan Charges CIA Officials Over Drone Deaths | Al Jazeera America - 0 views

america.aljazeera.com/...-lawyer-over-drone-deaths.html

war & peace drone attacks Pakistan murder-charges CIA U.S.-foreign-policy

shared by Paul Merrell on 08 Apr 15 - No Cached
  • A Pakistani judge on Tuesday ordered criminal charges to be filed against a former CIA lawyer who oversaw the agency’s drone program and a former station chief in Islamabad over a 2009 strike that killed two people. Former acting general counsel John A. Rizzo and former station chief Jonathan Bank must face charges of murder, conspiracy, waging war against Pakistan and terrorism, ruled Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui of the Islamabad High Court. A court clerk and a lawyer involved in the case, Mirza Shahzad Akbar, confirmed details of the ruling. Rizzo and Bank could not be immediately reached for comment. The CIA declined to comment when contacted by Al Jazeera America. Bank’s cover was blown in late 2010 when a Pakistani man, Kareem Khan, threatened to sue the CIA and others for $500 million over the deaths of his sons Zaenullah Khan and Asif Iqbal in a Dec. 31, 2009, strike in the North Waziristan tribal region.
  • As the outrage over the deaths grew, protesters in Islamabad began carrying placards bearing Bank's name, as listed in the lawsuit, and urging him to leave the country. The CIA pulled Bank from the country on Dec. 16, 2010, when he began receiving death threats. His outing spurred questions at the time of whether Pakistan's spy service might have leaked the information, something Islamabad denied. The disclosure didn't prevent Bank from landing another sensitive job. He became chief of the Iran operations division at CIA headquarters in Virginia. He was removed from that post after CIA officials concluded that he created a hostile work environment in the division. He has since been detailed to the Pentagon's intelligence arm.   Rizzo was the CIA's acting general counsel overseeing its drone program. He later left the agency and wrote a book about his experiences at the CIA.  
  • It is estimated that since 2004, the U.S. has carried out over 400 drone strikes in the country, killing anywhere from 421 to 960 civilians, according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, which tracks the U.S. campaign. The foundation says the last U.S. drone strike in Pakistan was on Jan. 29 and killed at least six suspected fighters. It is not clear how the judge's ruling will affect relations between Pakistan and the U.S., especially over the drone program. While Pakistan's government often decries the strikes, many believe it allows them to target the insurgents who threaten it. Massive protests against the drone program previously blocked a land route used by NATO forces to resupply troops in neighboring Afghanistan.   Any legal action stands no chance of success unless U.S. officials cooperate with the court, something highly unlikely, given the secretive nature of the drone program, which the CIA rarely publicly discusses.
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  • Under the judge's order, Pakistan's federal police force must file the charges against Rizzo and Bank, though the police have so far refused, reportedly out of a reluctance to upset the country's diplomatic relations with the U.S.
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