Operation “Grand Dawn” Post 2 - TTG

Although details are scarce and often conflicting, it appears the R+6 operation to reclaim Syria's southern border is proceeding. It is also about to come face-to-face with the Coalition plan to carve out a safe area in this part of Syria. We shall see who blinks first. 

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“Russian paratroopers and special forces arrived in the Al-Sweida Governorate of southern Syria this week, following the U.S. attack on a pro-government convoy near the Iraqi border-crossing, a military source told Al-Masdar News last night. The Russian military personnel will take the role of advising the Syrian government troops in southern Syria, while also helping to deter any potential response from the U.S. and Jordanian forces that have carved a niche in the Al-Sweida and Homs governorates.

According to some media activists in southern Syria, the Russian forces are planning to build a base along the Al-Sweida Governorate’s border with Jordan; however, this could not be confirmed by Al-Masdar News. Rumors have also surfaced regarding the deployment of the 31st Brigade of the Russian special forces; they are allegedly meant to engage the enemy forces and help the government troops seize the Iraqi border-crossing.”  (AMN)

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This Russian Brigade is the 31st Guards Air Assault Brigade based in Ulyanovsk. The brigade consists of three mechanized infantry battalions (2 air assault, 1 airborne), an artillery battalion (also mechanized), an aviation squadron and other support and combat support units. This brigade forms the core of Russia's immediate response force. In addition to its high state of combat readiness, it is well trained in peace keeping/peace enforcement operations. I have seen no reports of this unit entering combat. However, Russian advisors and spetsnaz target acquisition teams appear to be liberally spread among the SAA, NDF and other units involved in Operation Grand Dawn. There are also enough Russian aircraft and helicopters in the area to make it look like a Moscow air show.

 

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“On Friday, US-backed Jaish Maghawir al-Thawra launched an attack against the Syrian Army in the Zuluf Reserve area in the southeastern Syrian desert in order to regain this strategic point from the Syrian military. However, the attack filed and Jaish Maghawir al-Thawra was not able to capture any point.

Jaish Maghawir al-Thawra targeted the SAA allegedly using a US-made Switchblade suicide drone. It is known that this type of suicide drones are operating only by the US Special Forces.

On Saturday, the SAA deployed the 800th Battalion of the Republican Guards in the eastern Zuluf reserve area on the Syrian-Jordanian border.  The battalion 800 is among the best equipped Syrian forces, and all of its tanks have active protection systems Sarab-1 or 2 and thermal sights, which may indicate that the SAA may be preparing for a possible confrontation with US forces in al-Tanf.”  (South Front)

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 Well so much for our story that these "rebels" were only there to take on the IS jihadis. They are there to take on the SAA with the ultimate goal of toppling the Assad government. All with the full backing of the US-led Coalition and the Trump administration... at least for now.

Those Switchblade suicide drones are not really suicide drones. They are tactical reconnaissance and attack drones with a ten kilometer range that are launched from a hand held launcher. They do carry an explosive charge and are, in effect, small guided missiles. They were recently developed on a SOCOM contract for use by special operations forces. They have been in use in that part of Syria for months. In this recent attack using Switchblade drones in east Suweida, SAA/SSNP forces shot down seven drones. I imagine it was like skeet shooting. In the hollow Army days of the 70s, we would practice engaging target drones with nothing but M-16s and M-60s. We got damned good at it.

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“The US-led coalition warplanes dropped warning leaflets on the Al-Tanf road after Syrian Arab Army (SAA) advanced to the Shehmi area, 55 km from Al-Tanf town. The leaflets warned the SAA from continuing its advance and asked it to withdraw to the Zaza Triangle. They also included sectarian expressions, according to local sources. According to the Syrian TV, the SAA managed to advance in the vicinity of the Scientific Research area in the eastern desert in the Suweida countryside. The SAA also repelled an attack of the US-backed Free Syrian Army (FSA) in the same area. It became clear that the presence of the FSA in this area is to keep threatening Damascus and to prevent the SAA from capturing the Iraqi border area and thus securing the unity of Syrian territory.”  (South Front)

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 The gauntlet has been thrown down. Who will blink first? 

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“The Arabic-language al-Hadath news quoted field sources as saying that the US and Britain have evacuated half of their forces that were deployed in Syria's al-Tanf border region, relocating them to Jordan.

In the meantime, social networks affiliated to the Syrian Army reported that the US and British forces that are backing the terrorists of Aswad al-Sharqiyeh and Jeish al-Thowreh have left their bases in the two regions of Hamimeh and Sukri in Eastern Homs. The sources said that the US forces retreated via al-Tanf border-crossing towards Iraq and the British forces left al-Tanf for Jordan. The sources also said that the entire patrolling groups of the US and British forces have left the border lines.

Arab media outlets said on Tuesday that the Russian armored units entered regions along the Syria-Jordan border to fortify the Syrian Army's border posts and positions and seal the borderline.”  (FARS News Agency)

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Judging by this FARS report, the R+6 is calling our bluff along the Syrian-Jordanian border. We came to the gunfight with Switchblades and leaflets. They came with well equipped, well trained and well supported forces like the 31st GAAB and the 800th Tank Battalion. I've seen reports that Russian jets have chased US jets out of the area on at least two occasions. The CJTFOIR has confirmed one of these incidents. There still may be surprises, but I think it is more likely it will end relatively quietly with the new unicorn army squatting on the Jordanian side of the border.

Just an educated guess on my part, but I imagine the 31st GAAB will pay a major role in securing the Syrian border from Suweida to Tanf and on to Bukamel. They will leave the lifting of the siege of Deir Ezzor to the SAA while they secure this southern flank. Another possibility is that the 31st GAAB will eventually play a part in the southernmost de-escalation zone. Given their training in peace keeping/peace enforcement operations, I believe this is a possibility. The Coalition and the Izzies will have to do some serious soul searching before they assist their jihadi allies in the face of the 31st GAAB.

TTG

https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/russian-forces-arrive-southern-syria/

https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/video-syrian-army-shoots-seven-us-manufactured-drones-eastern-sweida/

https://southfront.org/us-backed-militants-counter-attack-failed-syrian-military-deploys-reinforcements-in-southeastern-syria/

https://southfront.org/us-led-coalition-warns-the-syrian-army-not-to-approach-al-tanf-town/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

http://en.farsnews.com/newstext.aspx?nn=13960307000751

https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/syrian-army-will-continue-iraqi-border-offensive-us-warnings-ignored/

Comments

[plantman]

Man, you have to admire the way the Russians operate. Smooth as silk, so far, and it doesn't look like the Saudi coalition is any too eager to mix it up with the green men on the opposite side of the border.

But what about Deir Ezzor? I still think that's where the chances of a faceoff are greatest. But once the border is secure it becomes a moot point, doesn't it? Isis will face the SDF to the north and the SAA to the south.

But who get's the city when the dust settles?

[Gene O.]

TTG -

Is the entire 31st deployed in southern Syria? Or just elements? It is unclear to me from the links.

[Norbert M Salamon]

Thank you Colonel for the informative post. IMHORussians do nopt know how to blink.Best adviceforunicorns and enabl;ers to quitly find another [place to camop.

[rjh]

I'll admit to initial surprise at hearing the Switchblade called a "suicide drone" but it's not that bad a description for an outside observer. The Switchblade does perform "suicide" dives that destroy the drone. It would logically follow to call JDAM's suicide bombs, etc. :-)

[b]

Yesterday the NYT had a report about the renting out of Iraq's Highway 1, Baghdad-Amman, to a U.S. mercenary company for 25 years. One branch of that road goes through al-Tanf to Damascus. It is the central economic lifeline between Jordan/Syria on one side and Iraq on the other.

There is no way that nationalist forces in those countries will let a U.S. company with private armed forces have control of that road. No. Way.

But some lunatic in the U.S. government (likely military) came up with that idea and al-Tanf seems to have been one item in that larger plan.

In effect this would have created the "Salafist principality" in west Iraq/south-east Syria but, for lack of reasonable Salafists, occupied by U.S entities. Nice try. But Iraq and Syria (as well as their allies) are adamant on preventing such.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/27/world/middleeast/iraqi-toll-road-national-highway-iran.html?_r=0

[The Twisted Genius]

Gene O.,

Don't know. Deployment of the entire 31st makes more sense from an operational point of view.

[Former 11B]

It sounds like the Rooskies have laid down the law.One bomb kills one Russian and a whole bunch of highly trained pilots for the coalition will burn.
Shit just got really real. I vote we form the Bill Kristol brigade filled with chicken-hawk neocons and send them Al Tanf to engage the rooskies. They are big tough talking MoFos when they got no skin in the game. Lets see how they act when its their ass on the line.
I bet they would cry like little bitches.

[The Twisted Genius]

plantman,

If anyone thinks that bear of a Druze general in charge of Deir Ezzor will hand the city over to anybody but the SAA, they'd be flat crazy.

[ToivoS]

Obvious point.

Any notion of building a private road through that area run by a US corporation has to be a joke. Who in their right mind would agree to man any of the toll booths? What rational investor would put up the money? It is the same problem with the gas pipeline linking the Gulf states to Israel which was proposed to follow that same route. Again what rational investor would sink money into a project through an area that has been in continuous war going back 30 years. How many divisions would be required to protect a 4 hundred mile road and pipeline that could be cut by a 5 man sabotage unit? Maybe if oil reaches $1000 per barrel the investors could afford the insurance premium.

[turcopolier]

TTG

"Do not gaze too long into the abyss lest the abyss take notice and begin to gaze back at you." Excelletn piece. pl

[The Twisted Genius]

b,

After reading the article, the idea isn't as bat-shit crazy and ominous as it first sounds. The contract is more of a repair and maintain in exchange for tolls deal than ceding a MSR to a PMC. The idea had to sprout in DC where we now have privately built and managed toll roads. The tolls go as high as thirty dollars for a few miles during rush hour. I'd like to see how toll collection is going to be enforced in the Iraqi hinterland. It's still a bad idea.

[The Twisted Genius]

Thanks, pl.

[b]

All that repair and maintain talk is just junk to hide the real purpose.

Olive Corp is part of Constellis Corp which also owns Triple Canopy and Akademi, the former Blackwater. It is a military contractor, mercenary shop - not some toll road investor. It doesn't know shit about road construction and management.

It wants to run armed protection for convoys on that road and guard the road too. It would be a private U.S. army (of "former" U.S. military men) in the heart of the Middle East. Iraq can find enough credit to repair bridges and road surface in the area. There is no need at all to toll out such an important road.

[eakens]

What exactly is the purpose of these leaflets, because it seems to me that a foreign country dropping leaflets in your country telling you where you can and cannot go would do nothing but lift the morale of those fighting for Syria.

[The Twisted Genius]

b,

In that case, this is as morally bankrupt and craven an idea as you first made it appear. It's all a part of attempting to establish jihadi safe areas under Saudi-US control. The PMU is growing in military power. I doubt they'll stand for this crap.

[Jack]

TTG, Sir

What choice does the US government have with respect to the actions of the Shia-led Iraqi government? If the Iraqi government with prodding from their Shia leadership and the Iranian government decide to align with Syria and attack any jihadi area, what can the US-Saudi alliance do about it other than to continue funding and arming such groups?

It seems the US doesn't have a coherent strategy. On one side it is aligned with the Shia Iraqi government and the Rojava Kurds against ISIS and then on the other side they're arming and training and actively involved on the side of the Saudi sponsored jihadists in Syria. How do folks on the ground deal with this dissonance?

[mauisurfer]

pardon for this off topic post
John Helmer has just posted a remarkable article about Brzezinski under President Carter.
quote
To Brzezinski goes the credit for starting the organization, financing and armament of the mujahideen, the Islamic fundamentalists who have metastasized — with US money and arms still — into Islamic terrorist armies operating far from Afghanistan and Pakistan, where Brzezinski started them off. Only today, Russia – the target of Brzezinski’s scheming — is relatively better prepared and safer from the terrorists than the countries of western Europe and the US itself.

To Brzezinski also goes the credit for projecting Iran on to its nuclear-armed path against the Great Satan and US allies in the Middle East, making the sunni-shia sectarian division into a cause of international war which it was not, before Brzezinski began. That it was not is due to the power of the secular Arab leaders to sustain an alternative to religion for governance. Brzezinski’s idea was to target them as Kremlin stooges and overthrow them. To Brzezinski also goes the credit for releasing Israeli ambition under Menachem Begin and his successors on the Israeli right; the promotion of Egyptian corruption and weakness under Anwar Sadat and his successors; and the destruction of the Palestinians.

If not for Carter, Brzezinski would have remained the marginal voice he was before and after the four-year Carter term. From the start of that term, in the first six months of 1977, Carter was also warned explicitly by his own staff, inside the White House and working on his confidential instruction, not to allow Brzezinski to dominate his policy-making to the exclusion of all other advice, and the erasure of the evidence on which the advice was based.

I know this because I was a member of the staff in those days. I know because I drafted the terms of a series of staff investigations which Carter requested and then authorized

http://johnhelmer.net/zbigniew-brzezinski-the-svengali-of-jimmy-carters-presidency-is-dead-but-the-evil-lives-on/print/

[Allen Thomson]

Crazy Fred said many things both excellent and bad, but Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. Und wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein. should be the morning recitation in a lot of security/law enforcement organizations.

[Former 11B]

That's how I see it too. That bit struck me as counterproductive, but then our whole foreign policy is counterproductive. But sure, goad those SAA hard asses with your juvenile unenforceable threats. What could go wrong?

[charly]

Does the SDF want Deir ezzoz? I personally doubt that.

[Account Deleted]

Whatever their purpose, I'm pretty sure I know exactly what use the SAA has found for them.

[Bill Herschel]

Macron just got through telling Putin that chemical weapons use by Assad crosses a red line. That has got to mean that a false flag chemical weapons attack in Syria is just around the corner to be used as a casus belli to draw NATO into Iraq. In other words, it won't just be U.S. British and Norwegian special forces; it will also be French, German, etc. special forces: the combined might of "Europe" against the evil Assad (read: Putin).

Or, put another way, soft WW III.

As someone pointed out, the Russians seem not to care. And why should they? Let's compare civilian constituencies. The French rising up against Russia? The average Frenchman may very well think Putin is a scoundrel and nous sommes tous les Crimeans maintenant, but I don't think that translates to body bags coming back to CDG being acceptable.

On the other hand, the Russian populace? They don't want body bags and they do want to be recognized as Europeans, but the shadow of Chechnya hangs over all, not to even mention the Great Patriotic War.

Have I got it right? Probably not.

[ex-PFC Chuck]

Speaking of counterproductive foreign policy John Helmer, who for a while now has been an independent journalist based in Moscow but was earlier on President Carter's White House staff, has a scathing piece up about the pernicious impact of the late (but apparently not late enough) Zbigniew Brzezinski.

http://johnhelmer.net/zbigniew-brzezinski-the-svengali-of-jimmy-carters-presidency-is-dead-but-the-evil-lives-on/

[VietnamVet]

TTG

Al-Tanf could be an East West flash point. Thanks for keeping us updated.

Opening the Damascus Baghdad Highway is vital to the Shiites for resupply and it cuts off the Islamic State to the north.

Private Public Partnerships are the New World Order’s way to cut taxes and increase fees for services. It is also a way to hire mercenaries to guard right-of-way, look the other way for a price and keep western control of resources. Making the Iraqi highway a toll road and continuing the support of Islamists maybe a justification for drawing a line in the sand at this crossroad. After the Saudi Sword Dance, the visit to the Wailing Wall and Jared’s Russian complications, a stand down seems unlikely.

On the other side of Eurasia, the halt of arms sales to Taiwan and the third carrier group on the way to the East China Sea indicate that there still is every intention of taking down North Korea. This could be the Eighth War.

[Account Deleted]

PMU have reportedly now reached the border at Um Jaris: http://syria.liveuamap.com/en/2017/29-may-badr-organization-secretary-general-hadi-alamiri-announces

Elijah Magnier is now saying PMU are intent on sealing border from there right down to to al-Qaem, regardless of US wishes:

All along Nineveh until Anbar, #Iraq security forces #PMU will start cleaning the Iraqi-Syrian borders until reaching al-Qaem.

US has nowhere to go at al-Tanf. They face increasingly overwhelming opposition and will eventually be surrounded as R+6 rolls around them to Iraqi border and on to ultimately meet PMU. Any significant offensive action would likely see them obliterated and SAA would claim self-defense.

This is what makes Macron's words on immediate French response to a future CW attack (Brits said words to same effect recently) all the more ominous. It looks to me as though this may be seen as the only remaining option to trigger war proper on Assad. Only way I can see this being avoided is by grounding SyAAF & using RuAF only until danger is over (when?). Grounded planes can't drop CW and surely no one is crazy enough to false flag a Russian CW attack - are they?