The friends of "the moderates" are not through yet

1.  Having lost the Battle for Aleppo, the Assad must Go crew have now moved on to projecting memes involving false analogies to The Shoah and NAZI Germany as the aftermath of Jihadi defeat in the city.  Wild and unsubstantiated rumor is being spread by the UN, SOHR (MI-6) and Western media to the effect that Syrian troops are butchering civilians including THE CHILDREN in the streets in a re-enactment of every sack of a city the propagandists can dimly remember.  In fact the Syrians and Russians are evacuating civilians from the recently liberated combat areas, caring for them in makeshift shelters and preparing them for return to their homes.  Does the SAA have a list of hard core jihadis who they are looking for and aiming to eliminate?  SAA intelligence has had agents inside East Aleppo where they made appropriate lists.  These lists would include some fervent civilian collaborators with the jihadi cause.  This is war. Dead men don't bite.

2.  It seems that the former Nusra front and its allies are moving men up to the Aleppo area from Hama in anticipation of a next phase operation into Idlib province probably oriented on Idlib City and Jisr al-Shugur. 

3.  ISW is pushing the propaganda theme that the capture of Palmyra by an "army" of Technicals and suicide bombers is a major setback for the R+6.   It is not.  IMO the  attack was made on an opportunistic basis by IS seeking to take advantage of R+6 focus on the Aleppo battle. 

4.  Palmyra can wait.  The ruins and the propaganda leverage that IS capture of them provide are not worth diverting scarce ground assets from the center of gravity of the fight.  That center of gravity is in Idlib Province and the Turkish border crossing at Bab al-Hawa.  pl

Comments

[b]

I sarcastically tweeted the cats in a three tweet challenge to the UN Human Rights nonsense of "receiving (unverified) reports of atrocities" which the BBC and others "translated" into "UN says atrocity happened".

Funny - that pics helped to get some 50+ retweets ... any "dead human" pic would likely have received less.

[begob]

This is from the Jeremy Vine show on BBC R2, popular lunchtime news programme - discusses Aleppo for first half hour: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b084w0q9

Starts with Samantha Power line, but ends up with guests concluding Assad is lesser of two evils, rebels are jihadis, atrocities are on the rebel side, Syrian army is looking after refugees, war needs to end through Russian intervention. First time I've heard this conclusion from the BBC, and it follows on from Boris Johnson's criticism of SA last week.

[turcopolier]

Jason and Mac

They have been so programmed that nothing helps. pl

[Don Sorce]

Interesting video of Russian SOF in Syria (and training).

Washington Post: New battlefield video shows how Russia’s elite KSO military unit is fighting in Syria

https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/checkpoint/wp/2016/12/13/new-battlefield-video-shows-how-russias-elite-kso-military-unit-is-fighting-in-syria/

[The Beaver]

@ Brig. Ali

Correct.

First we have the fact that the U.S. point of contact for the Russians could not be reached for 27 minutes when the strikes started .
Secondly the U.S. military gave the Russian forces erroneous information in advance of the bombing (9 kms off from where they intended to strike).
Third one intel analyst expressed concern that the forces on the ground were not ISIS fighters, but it was not widely distributed.

The best part was, after the fact, the coalition of forces participating in those air strikes rushed to proclaim their participation: the Aussies , Danes and the Brits

[The Beaver]

@ Ex-PFC

The blood of Clarissa Ward from CNN and Samantha Power must be boiling :-) looking at this video.

[turcopolier]

All

Today, the 14th, a group of jihadis who had surrendered yesterday decided to reverse course and attacked government troops. Mopping up is underway. This is what the MSM is calling "ceasefire collapse." Also, the UN denies having said that government troops killed 82 civilians yesterday. pl
·

[LeaNder]

Interesting. From the linked article:

In North Africa, the Germans had introduced a non metallic mine, which baffled the electronic mine detectors, which until then had sucessfully found the buried explosives; and enabled safe paths to be marked through mine fields. The new mines were slowing the British and allied advances.

I once stumbled across an interesting comment ... according to which the Nazis funded the development of mines that could not be defused. Maybe this is what kept it on my mind: till the funding authorities understood the implications, or someone alerted them to them, they themselves wouldn't be able to defuse those mines.

No idea if it was a rumor only.

******
'Die Hundewelt', not 'Die Hunderwelt'. Hunde is the plural of dogs, 'Welt' is world. ...

[LeaNder]

slightly rude, but I would like to understand where she is coming from. As human being. Below the surface indication a love for sensations.

[kooshy]

I think it's about time that Mr. Assad can say "Obama Must go" and be sure is done.

[Matthew]

TGG: It's especially ironic in light of the media's refusal to show the crowds of cheering civilians welcoming the SAA.

[Matthew]

Col: I'm basically drowning in fake news now. This exchange sums up the brave new world of anti-facts. See https://twitter.com/LinaArabii/status/809077857888694274

In football terms, this is Texas A & M's claim that they never lose, they are just out-scored.

[The Beaver]

@TTG

Since her father was part of the East Aleppo council, most probably already fled to Idlib.

Incredibly CNN and other networks fall for that propaganda.

[A Pols]

Anyone take note of Samantha Power's recent histrionic performance at the UN?
"Have you no shame?"

[Petrous]

So true!

[FkDahl]

Any readers in Raqqa or Mosul? The colonel has that map thingy on the main page... he can track... of course VPNs can be used.

[Serge]

"Islamic State militants have been producing weapons on a scale and sophistication which matches national military forces and have standardized production across their self-styled caliphate, an arms monitoring group said on Wednesday."
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-iraq-weapons-idUSKBN143007
Fascinating stuff in this report. Under "dispatches"
http://www.conflictarm.com/publications/

[different clue]

FkDahl,

I remember someone commenting over a year ago that some of the senior Naqshbandi Army officers had "had enough" and moved to Jordan. Those among them who really have "had enough" may be totally out of touch with the Bitter Baathists still in ISIS. But if some of them were only pretending to "have enough" so they could lend ongoing plausibly-deniable help or comfort to their Naqshbandi BaathISIS comrades still in the field, they might be reading this blog from their Jordanian sanctuaries and sending anything of interest on to ISIS.

[different clue]

Serge,

I heard on BBC last night that ISIS was getting all the mass-quantities of arms-parts from Turkey. Is there any political significance to the fact that BBC would permit that to be broadcast on its news?

[ToivoS]

b I saw the satire in your original post -- it was very funny playing off on the fake news meme and the crazy stuff coming out of Aleppo. It looked like very few people realized your intent -- sometimes it is very difficult to satirize reality when the reality is more extreme than your satirical attempt.

[Babak Makkinejad]

I think what the Fortress West accomplished in Syria was to make certain that all religious minorities in the Near East as well as a significant numbers of Sunni Arabs to seek shelter with Iran and her allies; the Passion of Imam Hussein becoming the shelter for the Passion of Christ.

Please also consider that the Fortress West is denying that it is any shape way for form Christian; the Cult of Shoah leaves no room for the Passion of Christ - evidently.

[The Beaver]

Colonel,

It is the freaking HRW which is responsible for most of the lies being spread around:
https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/12/13/syria-desperate-pleas-protection-aleppo

[kooshy]

Colonel, here in LA, Los Angeles police provides police escort and security on Harley for street movie shots. I wonder if Vladimir Hitler and Assad the Attila are providing the same protection service to the western MSM’ jihadists, who are making fake news clip titled “I will be dying any minute here in Aleppo”, and the new version by UN rep Samantha P. “don’t cry for me UN”.

[Cortes]

An interview with President Assad covering his take on recent events in Syria, the media and more (English transcript):

https://www.rt.com/news/370283-bashar-assad-rt-interview/

[charly]

To find the orbits of spysats isn't that difficult. Just point a radar installation up and that can do a whole lot more countries than launch a satellite.