Strategery and tactickery in Eurasia

There is not enough data with which to do an adequate job of analysis on all that is occurring just now, but I think I must make a preliminary "stab" at it with the understanding that all this is subject to revision.

1.  Russia/Turkey.   "My dear friend" is what Erdogan called Putin several times yesterday, and now Erdogan has issued an "ultimatum" to the US to hand over Gulen or forget about its relationship to Turkey.  Firstly, lets get the nukes out of Incirlik.  Why tempt the sultan?  Secondly, does this mean that Turkey will abandon its support of the non-IS rebels in Syria?  My SWAG would be that it does not.  I would expect that Erdogan will try to have it both ways.  IMO he will try to surrepticiously continue to make Turkey available as strategic depth to the rebels while simultaneously trying to obtain Russian support against the emergence of anything like a Syrian statelet.  Whether or not the YPG Kurds and the SDF Arabs advance to al-Bab, heavy IS counterattacks should be expected as the occupation of Manbij threatens remaining  IS communications from Turkey to the Caliphate. 

2. Iraq.  The US/Iraqi effort on the axis Baghdad-Mosul is going to take a long time to develop.  The Iraqi Army and militia forces still have a long way to go to develop the kind of capability that the Pesh Merga and YPG Kurds already have.  A Clinton Administration advised by people like Morell and the AEI neocons would likely double-down on the Iraq effort with US ground troops to carry the offensives all the way to Raqqa and Mosul.   Would the US then let the Iraqi government run the country? IMO that is an open question.  Big Grandma (the Borg Queen) may well think that the children do not play together well enough to be left unsupervised.

3.  Afghanistan.   IS and the Taliban have made a deal to cooperate against the Kabul government.  This doesn't sound like good news.  The government is saddled with "forces of order" that are far too large and expensive for it to ever afford.  It seems to me that this makes the Afghan government something familiar to me, i.e., a regime with large, fairly clumsy forces trying to defend a number of more or less besieged localities against guerrillas who control the countryside.   All of this makes Afghanistan an unacknowledged overseas protectorate of the US.  Will Big Grandma double down there as well?

4.  Libya.  US, French and British SF are engaged on the ground in holding back the IS "hordes."  Well, smallish "Hordes," are evidently the case at present.  But ... small "hordes" may grow.  What will Big Grandma do then?

5.  Ukraine.  I don't know.  Someone please tell me.

6.  Syria.  My SWAG is that R+6 will be able to seal off the penetration in SW Aleppo and re-isolate East Aleppo.   The jihadi friendly media are doing their best to depict the jihadi rebels and their supporters in the pocket as something like Robin Hood and his archers or maybe the Cisco Kid fighting off the forces of Spanish oppression.  That doesn't work very well.   Jihadis are, well, jihadis, but the process of myth building will probably make them heroic figures just as the Argentinian adventurer, Che Guevara has become a tee-shirt theme.  If the Turks do not provide enough support across the Hatay border crossings, the rebel losses at Aleppo and along the dusty, air stricken roads in Idlib will have greatly weakened the rebels.  We will then see if R+6 has enough strength and energy to launch an offensive into Idlib.  If not, then the Russians and Iranians will have to re-think their deployed strength levels in Syria.  pl

Comments

[ex-PFC Chuck]

Now both links work again. Must have been a short term outage. I had thought it might be related to this: "Kovitidi told the independent television network Dozhd that Internet access has been disabled in the area to assist police in their efforts to apprehend armed “saboteurs” who allegedly infiltrated from mainland Ukraine."
https://globalvoices.org/2016/08/11/russian-officials-in-crimea-shut-off-the-internet-at-the-ukrainian-border/

[Kooshy]

IMO, at this stage and how the MSM is covering Trump and his campaign, to disorient the media, and HillyBilly' campaign, I would ask my voters and supporters not to disclose who and how they will vote to the media and the pollsters. Like PL said, there are too many forces havely mobilized against him, he needs to confuse them in any which way possible.

[Swamp Yankee]

I like "tactickery." Closely mirrors the original.

[Les]

More on 'NovoRussia'

It seems to be getting very hot.
Major shelling of civilian areas at multiple locations.
More & more tanks & arty coming into the line.
Regular Ukie units are getting a growing % of desertion, incl the 'shoot yer officers & bolt to the other side with weapons'
Regular units are being replaced with the 'Affinity groups', Chechens & other mercs.
Probing & takeover of neutral ground are increasing.
The attempted asassination of Plonitski increased the temperature.
Donestsk Republic's Zakhachenko suggested that next time LDR forces would end up in Kiev.
My major source is "The New Cold War" site, specifically the LDR SitReps from DONi: https://newcoldwar.org/situation-donetsk-lugansk-august-9-2016/
I also use https://Slavyangrad.org
They have just broken the story that the Uke 'Tornado' volunteer battalion has been raping children & filming it on their cellphones.
I've been saying that the Ukraine is being prepped as 'an October Surprise' in case HRC starts polling badly against 'the Donald' but things are getting so hot I wouldn't be surprised to see major fighting erupt tomorrow.
In respect to the sabotage/recce incursion into 'Krim', the Russian Foreign Ministry has just let out a press release that ends with "People should not play with fire"!

[Timothy Hagios]

Conspiracy theory:
Russia agreed to the first BS "ceasefire" after Saudi Arabia and Turkey threatened open invasion. Perhaps the threatened Ukie attack on Crimea is a similar bargaining chip? Something alone the lines of, "If you save our jihadists in Aleppo, we'll keep the Ukies from going in with a suicidal attack on Crimea."

[SmoothieX12]

Clausewitzism-Suntzunism.

[turcopolier]

SmoothieX12

Terms for, what? pl

[turcopolier]

Timothy Hagios

One caution. Saudi Arabia might be able to invade Bahrein but not more than that. Wallah! The Houthis have defeated their "invasion." pl

[MRW]

Peace will depend on Putin keeping his nerve and not being provoked into an over-reaction.

[SmoothieX12]

For Strategery.

[SmoothieX12]

They have just broken the story that the Uke 'Tornado' volunteer battalion has been raping children & filming it on their cellphones.

It is a rather old story--at least 10 days old. Even Kiev regime couldn't ignore it. When even psycho (literally--she was evaluated) Chornovil goes ballistic, that tells you something. And she was the one who demanded Russian blood.

[Matthew]

Kooshy: I think Trump is actually doing that. That is why he's now saying that President Obama and Hillary "founded" ISIS. This outrageous claim overshoots, but it does draw attention to that unfortunate interview President Obama gave last year where Obama thought the insurgency in Iraq would prompt political reforms (outcomes) more favorable to American interests. Considering that this lever on Iraq produced kidnapped Yezidi women sold at slave markets, I doubt President Obama wants to explain his "nuance" to the public.

[Matthew]

Col: I know you've addressed this before, but I still don't understand why after all this time, the Iraqis and Saudis cannot develop that core of NCO's or culture of military professionalism?

[jld]

Yes but it's a bit unsettling that the Defence Ministry feel the need to publish such propaganda video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ca6ARA4V0v4
What is the intended audience/purpose?

[robt willmann]

Tayyip Erdogan's visit to Russia this week (and not the other way around) is obviously to try to shore up and solidify his present political position, especially with real problems in Turkey's economy. In all of Erdogan's maneuvering, there was one thing of importance that definitely got everyone's attention: his suggestion that Turkey start paying for and settling trade with Russia using their money -- the lira and ruble -- and not the U.S. dollar. This of course is a lure to try to get Russia to resume economic activity with Turkey, after Russia cut it back after Turkey shot its plane down. But I think Russia will seriously consider it.

Russia, China, and some other countries got tired of the financial fraud coming from the "West", primarily the U.S. and Britain, and the militarism, and started to work out their own ways to settle trade using their own money, gold-backed trading documents, and so forth. This is to break away from using the U.S. dollar (and U.S. Treasury debt) as the "reserve currency" and "bank reserves" in banks around the world, because the real source of U.S. influence and "power" across the world is the U.S. dollar's role as the reserve "money" for banks and its use in paying for trade in all types of goods and services, especially for oil and gas, the infamous Petrodollar.

Some other countries (primarily China, I think) have also been developing computer servers and software for a system to route orders between banks around the world that is separate from the SWIFT system presently being used. A rumor is that it has been tested some, but it is a very complex undertaking, to write software that is compatible with banks around the world for different languages, with (relatively) secure networking links between them.

Once other countries start using money other than the U.S. dollar for "bank reserves" and to pay for and settle trade between them, it will also be harder for the U.S. to unilaterally impose economic sanctions on other countries, and to get agreements with other countries to do them, and to enforce them. Then when the neocons and others who want to be King of the World continue to demand that other countries submit to their orders, they will start to see middle fingers being raised here and there. At that time, their only options will be to launch aggressive war, or to try to use covert action to bring about regime change. Those options are shrinking fast, with almost $20 trillion, plus interest, in acknowledged U.S. public debt, insolvent large banks (with derivatives), and some degree of domestic political resistance, especially from a destructive Middle East foreign policy for 25 years.

[SmoothieX12]

Conspiracy theory:

This is exactly what it is.

[irf520]

It's probably been suggested to them by US 'representatives' that from now to October would be a good time to ramp up for an attack. Then when the Russians turn round and smack them into the middle of next week Hillary and her media minions can say something like, "Look how brutal those horrible Russians are being to our poor little Ukrainian Nazi friends. And Trump wants to be friends with them."

[LeaNder]

The question is, how and why such a plan succeeded to start with.

[LeaNder]

"What is happening under Obama is bad enough; just look for more ..."

No intention to defend Obama, but I would assume that the master sometimes does not control his apprentice perfectly.

[LeaNder]

Hmmm? OK.

[JerseyJeffersonian]

jld,

My layman's guess would be that the purpose is to convey that two can play at a war of nerves. This particular production only focuses on a certain subset of piloted aircraft and aircraft carriers, but there were lessons to be gleaned - and hopefully taken to heart - from the earlier use by the Russian military of long-range cruise missiles and strategic bombers (no doubt capable of delivering not only conventional bombs but also stand-off weaponry) as well. The Bear shows_some_of his teeth; does the US wish to bait the Bear? God, I hope not, but there are some truly pathological, unbalanced people in positions of policy formulation and power in the US who give me pause when I think on these matters. The ones who advocate fervently for no-fly zones in Syria, the ones who stir up the Neo-Nazis in Ukraine, are those whom I have before my mind. No good can come of this chatter nor from these provocations.

[LeaNder]

ex-PFC, I have this too sometimes, not only on the web, by the way. ;)

I deal with it as some type of remnant of what I like to call the syntactical remnants on my brain (just invented that) of my self-exploring experience in the US conspiracy universe in the post 9/11 universe. And please understand, I still have a big sympathy for their desire to understand.

[LeaNder]

Smoothie, I wondered if you are around, higher up.

But: Poroshenko is a pawn, what's your evidence?

[Ghostship]

Over at antiwar.com, Justin Raimondo has a good write up on what's happening down south in Ukraine:
http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2016/08/11/ukraines-october-surprise/
And Pyatt, US ambassador to Ukraine, has been snorting something because he has a raging case of psychological projection.
“Russia has a record of frequently levying false accusations at Ukraine to deflect attention from its own illegal actions.”

[jsn]

US policy isn't perfect, it can't ALWAYS be a disaster...
Or maybe it can.