De Mistura's Aleppo fantasy

 

"Deputy Prime Minister, Foreign and Expatriates Minister Walid al-Moallem reaffirmed that it is the duty of the Syrian state to save the citizens from being taken hostages by terrorists in Aleppo city, stressing that the idea of “self-administration” in eastern Aleppo is categorically rejected because “it is a reward” for terrorists.

“We held talks Sunday morning with UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura and his delegation, and we expected to hear from him that a date was set for resuming the intra-Syrian dialogue, but we did not,” al-Moallem said in a press conference, adding that de Mistura focused on what he called “ideas” about eastern Aleppo.

“In fact, we told him that we are in agreement about the need to get terrorists out of the eastern part of Aleppo, regardless of our differences about their numbers, but it makes no sense at all to leave 275,000 of our fellow citizens remain hostages by five or six or seven thousand militants. No government in the world would allow that,” al-Moallem added.

Al-Moallem pointed out that de Mistura talked about “self-administration” in eastern Aleppo is which is categorically rejected.

“Is it possible that the United Nations has come to reward the terrorists who are still firing random shells at Western Aleppo which claimed the lives of thousands of people and wounded many others?” al-Moallem said."  SANA

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 Just to be clear about what happened - Marquess Staffan de Mistura of the UN proposed yesterday to the Syrian government that R+6 halt their presently successful battle to capture jihadi held East Aleppo and grant jihadi held East Aleppo area autonomy as a rebel held enclave within the boundaries of Syria, a member state of the UN.  Say what? 

Why on earth would the Syrians do that?  Why?  Even the MI-6 run "Syrian Observatory for Human Rights" in London acknowledges that the jihadis in East Aleppo are running out of time, space, ammunition and food.

Ah, yes!  Of course!  The barrel bombing and hospital destruction memes are not having the desired effect and the "White Helmet" farce has been thoroughly debunked, so something else had to be tried.

"Nothing ventured, nothing gained."  pl 

http://sana.sy/en/?p=93897 

http://www.wsj.com/articles/syrian-government-refuses-un-truce-terms-for-aleppo-1479669927

Comments

[different clue]

Lemur,

Yes, thank you. It is interesting and heartening. It was also featured over at the Naked Capitalism site yesterday.

I read a few weeks ago that the Podesta emails revealed some of the leading Clintocrats discussing how Gabbard should receive zero DemParty assistance in her upcoming Congressional Election as payback for having supported Sanders early in the primary process. But she got elected anyway, no thanks to the Clintobamacrat leadership of the DemParty. She may play a role in the slow and steady purging and berning of the Clintobamacrats from out of the Party.

[Stumpy]

Ultimately Aleppo will not be deMistura's real estate to bequeath to the "colonists".

One wonders to what extent the grinding is throttled, both in Aleppo and Mosul. To me it almost looks less like a quest for military victory but more of a herding of tribes into a shrinking cauldron, that they might cook each other out of existence, with the major actors hoping to grab the spoils during the chaos.

Video footage from the region has become the equivalent of "stock photography".

[Babak Makkinejad]

Doesn't "Frank" mean that they were basically screaming at each other?

[A.I.Schmelzer]

There is a reason why I believe that Aleppo will be over before Mosul.

If you look at where what happened in the beginning of the Syrian civil war, what comes to mind is that both Aleppo and Damascus were mostly pro regime.

The "East Aleppo" thing happened when rural militias infiltrated Aleppo and tried to seize all of it, but only suceeded to do so in the east of the city.

Since then, their entire operation is effectively a "spoiler". As long as they hold East Aleppo, west aleppo operates at a very diminished capacity. Manpower from west aleppo cannot be moved elsewhere, economic life is strangulated etc. While Stockholm syndrome likely resulted in some pro Jihadi feelings in East Aleppo (I dont fault the civilians for that), even East Aleppo is still loyalist turf.

Mosul meanwhile actually seems to be a place where Jihadis enjoy actual support. They also actually run it, as opposed to using it as a spoiling operation.

[different clue]

A.I.Schmelzer,

As long as Iran supports Shia-Iraq in suppressing and oppressing the Sunni Arab Iraqis, just enough Sunni Arab Iraqis will always support ISIS or its successor groups just hard enough to keep them strong enough to keep the Sunni Arab zones rebellious and un-rulable. And Iran will keep supporting Shia-Iraq in its assertion of Shia Supremacism against Sunni Iraq for just as long as Iran wants to keep Iran helpless and divided and unable to re-emerge as a rival regional power.

Iran has the ultimate agency here. Iran wants to keep Iraq helpless and divided and keep Sunni terrorist groups in viable existence for the same basic reason that I have read that Japan and China both quietly agree that Korea must be kept divided to prevent Korea from re-emerging as a genuinely rival regional power.

So Iran will keep making sure that its Shia Iraqi client keeps oppressing Arab Sunnistan in order to keep Mosul ( and other places) supporting ISIS or other ISISes which may emerge.

[A.I.Schmelzer]

What Shia suprematism?

As it stands, the only fully Shia country is Iran. Shias are perceived to be ascendant in Iraq only because they were artificially repressed before. Shia politicians could potentially rule Iraq, but that does not by any means mean that their interests would be the same as those of their Iranian coreligionists.

In Syria, the Alawites one can make some pretty good cases that Alawites are not even Shia, which would conclusive rule out that they are Shia suprematists. They also rely on a pretty extensive coalition of moderate Sunnis and non Kurdish minorities (the Kurds think that they are large enough to be their own faction, and create rather then join coalitions. I think it is to early to tell if they are right).
Hezbollah is actually theologically Shia, but, as in Syria, relies on a fairly diverse (Lebanese politics are Game of thrones with less dragons in real life) mix of coalitions.

What is actually happening is that the window of Sunni supremacy, which mostly appeared after the end of Nasserism and Baathism as appealing ideologies go, is closing. Overall, it is less of a Shia upswing, and more of a Sunni downswing (resulting in a relative upswing for everyone else). To an extent, Saudi Arabia is to blame because their rampant support for Salafism, and their aggresive attempts to effectively turn Sunnism into Salafism light, made Sunnism toxic in the eyes of many.