Syria: "humanitarian intervention" gathering steam

[KGW]

http://blogs.rediff.com/mkbhadrakuma...-invade-syria/

Turkey and its western allies are transferring the Libyan fighters whom they trained and armed to depose Muammar Gaddafi to Syria. Around 600 Libyan ‘volunteers’ have entered Syria. Daily Telegraph reported that secret meetings were held on Friday in Istanbul between the Turkish officials and the Syrian opposition representatives and the Libyan fighters. Large-scale infiltration of weapons from Turkey and Jordan have been going on for months to create civil-war conditions in Syria, but this is the first move to introduce ‘volunteers’.
The move is necessitated by the failure to induce defections form the Syrian armed forces, except a mere handful. Turkey and the western powers are desperate to create the myth of a ‘Syrian resistance’ force without which their blatant aggression will be in full display.
Moscow reacted today indicating it might supply arms to the Syrian regime to defend itself. FM Lavrov just stopped short, calling any arms embargo on Syria as ‘unfair’. Moscow has confirmed that a Russian battle group is sailing toward the Syrian naval base of Tartus on the eastern Mediterranean, close to the Turkish border with Syria. Lavrov criticised the foreign interference in Syria, but without naming Turkey, Jordan, etc.
Things seem to be heading for a flash point, indeed. The sure sign is that US V-P Joseph Biden is heading for Ankara in the weekend. It is a major signal of the US giving the go-ahead to Turkey to act on Syria without fear. Again, Jordanian King, Abdullah, travelled to israel. He is Saudi Arabia’s ‘back channel’ to Israel and a key regional ally for the western intelligence.
Turkey is indeed shedding its fear of the unknown and is coming out into the open on the Syrian situation. Turkish FM Ahmet Davitoglu indicated today for the first time that Turkey is all set for invasion of Syria once it gets the green signal from its western allies. He said this before heading for the combined meeting of EU foreign ministers and Arab League representatives (read Saudi Arabia and Qatar).
The day Davutoglu spoke, November 29, will stand out as a notable date in the chronicle of the Turkish Republic that Kemal Ataturk founded. Ataturk’s ‘red line’ used to be that Turkey should never get entangled in the affairs of the Muslim Middle East but should instead concentrate on its own ‘modernization’. Evidently, the Islamist government in power today thinks Turkey is today ‘modern’ enough already and can now go back and reclaim its Ottoman legacy.
A Turkish army moving into an Arab country - it is a historic point. It is a century after the Turks were driven out by the ‘Arab revolt’. The matrix is dripping with irony. The Arab revolt against the Turks was instigated by Great Britain. And Britain, although a far weaker power today, is still playing a seminal role - except, it is encouraging the Turks to return to the Arab world. One hundred years ago, Britain successfully pitted the Arabs against the Turks. Today, Turks join hands with some Arabs who have a grouse against some other Arabs.

[don]

Re: Syria: "humanitarian intervention" gathering steam

Kuwait (with Saddam's help), Iraq, Libya, Syria, Iran . . . set 'em up and knock 'em down. An interesting world.

[Slimprofits]

Re: Syria: "humanitarian intervention" gathering steam

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...4000-mark.html

As Syria's exiled government-in-waiting announced it had formed an alliance with army defectors, Navi Pillay, the High Commissioner for Human Rights dramatically raised the estimated death toll since protests were launched on a Day of Dignity protests on March 15.

"We are placing the figure at 4,000, but really the reliable information coming to us is that it is much more than that," Mrs Pillay said. "I have said that as soon as there were more and more defectors threatening to take up arms, I said this in August before the Security Council, there was going to be a civil war. At the moment that's how I am characterising this."

[don]

Re: Syria: "humanitarian intervention" gathering steam

The shadow war in Syria
By Pepe Escobar

Target Syria - the strategic prize that outstrips Libya. The stage is set. The stakes couldn't be higher. Libya 2.0 equals Syria? It's more like Libya 2.0 remix. With the same R2P (''responsibility to protect'') rationale - starring civilians bombed into ''democracy''. But with no UN Security Council resolution (Russia and China will veto it). Instead, Turkey shines, fanning the flames of civil war.

US Secretary of State Hillary ''we came, we saw, he died'' Clinton set the scene on Indonesian TV a few weeks ago, when she prophesied there would be ''a civil war'' in Syria, with a well financed and ''well-armed opposition'' crammed with army deserters.

Now it's up to NATOGCC to make it happen. NATOGCC is of course the now fully accomplished symbiosis between selected North Atlantic Treaty Organization members such as Britain and France and selected petromonarchies of the Gulf Cooperation Council, aka the Gulf Counter-revolution Club, such as Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

So feel free to bask in the glow of yet another mercenary paradise.

The NATOGCC war
The Libyans formerly known as rebels, with explicit consent from Transitional National Council (TNC) chairman Mustafa Abdul NATO, aka Jalil, have already shipped to Syria - via Turkey - 600 highly motivated troops fresh from toppling the Gaddafi regime, to fight alongside the Free Syria Army (FSA). This followed a secret meeting in Istanbul between the TNC and the Syrian ''rebels'', rebranded as Syrian National Council.

The trigger-happy Libyans have access to a wealth of weapons plundered from the Gaddafi's regimes military depots or gently ''donated'' by NATO and Qatar. A delicious parallel may already be traced with the House of Saud in the 1980s - which gave the green light for hardcore Islamists to go fight in Afghanistan, instead of raising hell at home.

For the TNC, better keep those testosterone-heavy, unemployed warriors away in the Middle East rather than raising hell in Northern Africa. And for NATO member Turkey, in the absence of war (blame those pesky Russians and Chinese), the next best option is to rely on mercenaries to do the job.

The pressure is relentless. Diplomats in Brussels confirmed to Asia Times Online that NATOGCC operatives have set up a command center in Iskenderun, in Hatay province in Turkey. Crucial Aleppo, in northwest Syria, is very close to the Turkish-Syrian border. The cover story for this command center is to engineer ''humanitarian corridors'' to Syria.

Although these ''humanitarians'' come from NATO members US, Canada and France, and GCC members Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE, their cover is that they're only innocent ''monitors'', and not part of NATO. Needless to say these humanitarians consist of ground, naval, air force and engineering specialists. Their mission: infiltrate northern Syria, especially Idlib, Rastan, Homs but most of all the big prize, Aleppo, the largest city in Syria, with at least 2.5 million people, the majority of which are Sunni and Kurdish.

Even before this news from Brussels, the French satirical weekly Le Canard Enchaine - as well as the Turkish daily Milliyet - had already revealed that commandos from French intelligence and the British MI6 are training the FSA in urban guerrilla techniques, in Hatay in southern Turkey and in Tripoli, in northern Lebanon. Weapons - from shotguns to Israeli machine guns and RPGs - have been smuggled en masse.

It's no secret in Syria that armed gangs - from Salafis to petty criminals - have been attacking regular soldiers, the police and even civilians since the early stages of the protest movement. Of roughly 3,500 people killed during the past seven months, a large number of civilians and more than 1,100 soldiers were killed by these gangs.

And then there are the deserters. So when the Assad regime insists the current Syrian tragedy is to a great extent incited by well-paid and well-armed elements - not to mention mercenaries - at the service of foreign powers, it is essentially correct.

In Homs, a local source tells Asia Times online that as far as the FSA is concerned, ''it's clear that they are just a nice media cover for criminals. They had a video of themselves in Baba Amr in which they appeared like complete idiots (here it is, with captions conveniently!). But whoever these kids or guys are, they have lots of support amongst the Sunni population. Also, they are connected within the community, whether rich or poor. A Christian woman who teaches at a private school just outside Homs which has largely Sunni students had her car stopped and stolen by some gang. When she came to Homs she made some phone calls and her car was returned. So whoever stole her car outside city limits had connections to middle to high class people in the city and they were able to return the car. This tells me of the infiltration of the dogma of the revolution in Homs. The 'concept' of FSA is probably supported enough, and just the people of poor areas like Baba Amr, Bayada and Khalidiyya can self-sustain the FSA.''

Round up the usual votes
Just as in Libya, the Arab League also duly fulfilled its doormat function for NATOGCC, voting for harsh sanctions that include a freeze of Syrian government assets, no more trade deals with the central bank and no more Arab investment. In short: economic war. The Lebanese paper L'Orient Le Jour politely called it ''a political euphemism''. Of the 22 League members, 19 voted - Syria was already suspended. Iraq - where the government is majority Shi'ite - and Lebanon - where Hezbollah is part of the government - were the only ones that ''dissociated'' themselves from the vote.

Meanwhile, the nasty opportunist game of musical chairs - the Syrian version - is also in effect. The Syrian National Council and its Islamist cohorts totally rejected any dialogue with the Bashar al-Assad regime. The secretary-general of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, Riad Chakfi, pulled a ''Libyan rebel'' and implored the Turkish army to invade northern Syria and establish a buffer zone. Dodgy exiles such as former vice-president Abdelhalim Khaddam - exiled in Paris - and another vice-president, Rifaat al-Assad - exiled in Spain - are under the illusion that the Muslim Brotherhood (which will be the top power in a ''new'' Syria) would allow them to sit on the throne.

This is downright silly - because the name of the game in a ''new'' Syria will be the House of Saud. The House of Saud is the crucial link between the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt (which is getting closer and closer to taking power); the AKP party in Turkey (which is essentially a Muslim Brotherhood lite); and the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria. The Saudis are crucial investors in Turkey. They are positioning themselves as major investors in Egypt. And they're dying to become a major investor in ''new'' Syria.

Then there's the key question of Turkey's game. In the Syrian dossier, Turkey is not a mediator anymore; it has become a brash advocate of regime change. Forget about the Tehran-Damascus-Ankara entente, which was a reality not along ago, in 2010. Forget about soft power and the much-advertised foreign policy of ''zero problems with our neighbors'', coined by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.

Davutoglu himself announced Turkey's own sanctions on Syria - a replay of the Arab League's, with freezing of the government's financial assets and no transactions with the central bank. Davutoglu insists a military buffer zone inside Syria, along the border with Turkey, is ''not on the agenda'' - but that's exactly what those shady NATOGCC ''humanitarian monitors'' are up to. Since mid-November Turkish media has been ablaze detailing plans for a no-fly zone in northern Syria and the aforementioned buffer zone stretching as far as Aleppo.

The motive? Ask ''prophet'' Hillary Clinton - to foment civil war.

Showdown, Club Med style
In its mad rush to sell the Turkish political model to the majority-Sunni parts of the Arab world (yet the GCC is not buying), Turkey may be severely miscalculating its crucial relations with both Russia and Iran. Around 70% of Turkey's energy is imported from Russia and Iran. Not to mention that both Russia and Iran are fuming with Turkey bowing to NATO pressure to host a radar station as part of missile defense.

Russia has very clear ideas about the Syrian scenario. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been more than explicit for weeks now; ''We absolutely do not accept a scenario of military intervention in Syria.''

Last week's meeting of the deputy foreign ministers of the emergent BRICS group (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), in Moscow, was unmistakable.

The BRICS essentially drew the red lines. No excuse whatsoever for a foreign intervention in Syria, as in ''any external interference in Syria's affairs, not in accordance with the UN Charter, should be excluded.'' No ''bomb bomb Iran''; instead, dialogue and negotiations. And no additional sanctions, deemed ''counterproductive''. The BRICS clearly see how the Libya scenario is slowly morphing into the modified NATOGCC war.

To add extra sauce, the aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov - equipped with nuclear missiles - has already left Murmansk towards the Eastern Mediterranean, alongside the destroyer Admiral Chabanenko and the frigate Ladny. They will arrive at the Tartus naval base, in Syria, in mid-January, and will be met by other ships from the Russian fleet in the Black Sea.

Tartus, hosting around 600 military and technicians from the Russian Defense Ministry, is a center of maintenance and refueling for the Russian Black Sea fleet. It will be a thrill to watch whether the Russians will invite members of the George H W Bush Carrier Strike Group - now also in the Eastern Mediterranean - for a volleyball match.

It's fair to argue that masses of Syrians want something other than the Assad regime - but certainly not some variant of humanitarian bombing, not to mention civil war. They saw NATO's legacy in Libya - virtually the whole infrastructure of the country destroyed, cities bombed to dust, tens of thousands of dead and wounded, al-Qaeda-linked fanatics wielding power in Tripoli, widespread ethnic hatred. They don't want a brand new massacre. But NATOGCC does.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/ML02Ak01.html

[KGW]

Re: Syria: "humanitarian intervention" gathering steam

The pot gets stirred. . .

http://blogs.rediff.com/mkbhadrakuma...n-syria-rises/


The Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov’s statement today re-affirmed Moscow’s rejection of arms embargo against Syria. It comes on a day EU FMs met in Brussels and tightened the sanctions against that country. But what makes the Syrian situation rather interesting is that Moscow also let it be known today that it is arming Syria to defend itself. There were reports last week that Russia is supplying Syria with S-300 missiles.
Now, Interfax reported today that Russia has supplied Syria with Bastion mobile coastal missile systems with supersonic anti-ship Yakhont cruise missiles as part of an arms deal - about which there were US and Israeli objections previously. A Russian naval battle group is also reaching Syria shortly with military advisors. Interestingly, the Interfax report appears on the same day that Russian DFM Sergey Ryabkov met Israeli FM Avigdor Lieberman and the head of Israeli National Security Council Yaakov Amidror in Tel Aviv. The Yakhont cruise missile significantly puts up the cost of intervention in Syria for Turkey and its western allies. Moscow has done well to anticipate the likely repetition of the western plan to first incrementally destabilise and degrade an interntionally-recognised regime and then ‘delegitimise’ it in order to pave the way for armed intervention and ‘regime change’. This was what happened in Iraq and recently in Libya.
So, if the Turks and the French really want to go for Syria, let them also take with them a few additional coffins to bring back the corpses of their brave warriors. Whether the Russia ploy works as a ‘disincentive’ on the dogs of war, time only will tell. But it may just about make them think twice, at least. And maybe something good may come out of it, after all, if the Turks and the western powers change their cussedness and would permit the Syrian opposition to enter into a national dialogue with the government in Damascus.
In Turkey, at least, there is a sharp division of opinion about Syria. The main opposition party CHP strongly questions the interventionist policy of the government. The CHP is a staunchly secularist party and it is wary of the present government abandoning Kemal Ataturk’s dictum that Turkey shouldn’t get entangled with the Muslim Middle East. CHP is rooted in the Kemalist principles of Turkish nationalism. But then, its leadership also has no ‘entanglement’ with the unaccounted ‘green money’, which flows into Turkey from the Persian Gulf sheikhs.