Operation "Grand Dawn" Post 4 - TTG

"BEIRUT, LEBANON (5:45 P.M.) – Syria and Jordan have entered into talks mediated by Russia to reopen the Nassib Border-Crossing, Al-Masdar learned today from a military source. If the talks are successful, the rebel forces at the Nassib Border-Crossing will be ordered to withdraw from the area by their Jordanian partners.

Reopening the Nassib Border-Crossing would have a positive impact on Syria’s strained economy, as both countries were once key trade partners in the region.

While the two governments discuss economic rapprochement, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) has resumed its offensive in the Dara’a Governorate, today, targeting the eastern part of the provincial capital in a bid to expel the rebel forces from the area." (Al Masdar News)

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Leith Fadel and Al Masdar News are fairly reliable sources. A second source, Ivan Sidorenko, provided what appears to be a machine translation of an Arabic language report of a more far reaching development in this area. 

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“Daraa: A ceasefire is looming in the horizon, a ceasefire will start tomorrow at 12 PM from both sides (the regime by Russia’s mediation and the states funding the Southern front), the first stage of this ceasefire will be a 48 hours ceasefire, after that, a meeting will be organized to introduce a complete ceasefire. The ceasefire will include the stopping of reinforcements from both sides, stopping the barrel bombs & the warplanes strikes & heavy machines shelling by the regime, but will the “Bunian al-Marsous” operation command accept this? We shall see in the next upcoming hours”  (@IvanSidorenko1)

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Sounds like good news… or wishful thinking. The R+6 is slamming the rebel forces in Daraa with aerial, artillery and rocket strikes. They are making progress on the ground and are massing for an even larger offensive. If this all happens, it will be due to the negotiating power of Russia backed up by determined threat of serious R+6 military force in this area. I would think Jordan is not at all comfortable with the 31st Guards Air Assault Brigade sitting so close to their border. I also believe many of the rebels in this area do not have their heart in the fight and only continue fighting because of the diehard AQ units among them. I don’t think Jordan’s heart is in this fight, either.

If this ceasefire does come to fruition, this will be a major success for Operation Grand Dawn. It will secure another section of Syria’s southern border and will facilitate the implementation of the southernmost de-escalation zone. It will also free up some major firepower for the eastward push to Al Bukamal and Deir Ezzor.

TTG

https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/syria-jordan-talks-reopen-border-crossing/

https://twitter.com/IvanSidorenko1/status/875888684314361856

Comments

[FB Ali]

According to the Der Spiegel article (linked above), all the different labels used by various Kurd factions are irrelevant - they are all essentially PKK Kurds. Specifically:

"All groups are under the control of the same Kurdish leadership that has holed up in the expansive Qandil Mountains since the 1990s, from where they provide military and, of particular importance, ideological training to volunteers from Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria. All of them revere PKK founder Abdullah "Apo" Öcalan..."

Despite this (or, because of it?), the Kurds have always made the fatal error of allying themselves, and relying upon, some outside power (ie, from outside the region). This gives them some initial successes, but ultimately proves deadly when the outside power (usually the US) changes its policies, and drops them. This is likely to happen again in Syria.

[Pundita]

Brig. Ali - I found the Spiegel report to be very helpful, very illuminating. And it pointed up a situation that had been missed by the US media. i wonder how much it's been understood by the American military command all these many months, and by the Syrian and Russian commands.

Well, after the Spiegel report, everyone should be up to speed by now.
[chuckling] I can imagine Erdogan emailing copies of the report to everyone at NATO/CENTCOM with the remark, 'What have I been trying to tell you?!!'

The question is how the US and Syrian coalitions are going to react to the Kurdish land grabs.

[Pundita]

What was Tillerson -- or Trump -- thinking? Not only did Tehran hear what he said, they responded. The only good news is that Tehran's response, at least from what Sputnik quoted of it, was surprisingly mild: (I note Sputnik's brief report tactfully avoided mentioning the specific term "regime change.")

From Sputnik, June 20
https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201706201054783411-tehran-tillerson-remarks/

"Tehran Summons US Representative Over Tillerson's 'Unwise' Remarks on Iran"
BEGIN QUOTES
The Iranian Foreign Ministry summoned the Swiss charge d’affaires, who represents the United States diplomatically in Iran, to protest the US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson remarks on Iran, local media reported citing Ministry Spokesman Bahram Qassemi.

On Wednesday Tillerson said that Iran played a destabilizing role in the region and promised that the United States would support those elements inside the Islamic Republic which would bring about peaceful government transition.

The Tasnim news agency reported that the ministry slammed the remarks on Monday as “unwise and clear meddling in Iran’s internal affairs."
[...]
END QUOTES

[fanto]

Anna,FourthAndLong,
I took the time and looked up some of the intriguing cases of sudden deaths which were made public. Of course one can suspect that there are many more cases which never see the light of day. The Western media present almost nothing (correct me if I am wrong) of suspicious deaths in the Asian or African world. The BuzzFeed with its diagram of suspicious lethal events needs (irony alert) help from volunteers like me and maybe some of the SST authors and contributors; the nice curvy lines linking this person to that, should definitely be made into a wider net. I am contributing below the list of names. I start this list with a very old “cold” case of Ivar Krueger (or Kreuger?) – who died under suspicious circumstances in his Paris home, possibly forced to write his suicide note. I include him because of the connections between banks, governments, high finance world. The list is made randomly.
Ivar Krueger
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivar_Kreuger
Ivars Bruder Torsten Kreuger vertrat die Ansicht, sein Bruder sei ermordet worden. Obwohl Details von Kreugers Tod ungeklärt blieben, wird dies überwiegend als eine Verschwörungstheorie angesehen. Die Vermutungen darüber, wer der Auftraggeber eines Mordes gewesen sei, reichen von der schwedischen Industriellenfamilie Wallenberg über das amerikanische Bankhaus J.P. Morgan bis hin zu Josef Stalin. Unbestreitbar ist, dass Kreuger zahlreiche mächtige Feinde hatte.
Uwe Barschel
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uwe_Barschel
This reference has curious mention of a possible linkage to the Iran Contra affair.
Robert Maxwell
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2003/nov/24/mondaymediasection6
Edmond Safra
http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2000/12/dunne200012
Udo Ulfkotte
http://www.globalresearch.ca/udo-ulfkotte-europes-courageous-journalism-voice-has-passed-away/5568629
Juergen Moellemann
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C3%BCrgen_M%C3%B6llemann
... In the 2002 national election, he produced a flyer criticizing Ariel Sharon's actions against Palestinians and Michel Friedman's endorsement of those actions; the flyer was regarded as "antisemitic" by some, and the debate surrounding these events led to Möllemann leaving the FDP in March 2003 and resigning his position as NRW party leader; however, he kept his seat in the Bundestag without party affiliation, despite promises to resign from it.
Möllemann, a passionate and experienced skydiver, died on 5 June 2003 in a parachuting incident at Marl-Loemühle.[1] His death was investigated by the Essen district attorney's office, which published a final report on 9 July 2003. While outside interference was ruled out, no definite verdict was reached on whether Möllemann committed suicide or had an accident.[2]..”

David Kelly
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/8566789/David-Kelly-timeline.html

Schloter, Wauthier, Eicher
http://fortune.com/2013/09/23/tragedy-in-switzerland-what-drove-two-top-executives-to-suicide/
„…But the Swiss countryside has not been a picture of calm lately. On July 23, five weeks before Wauthier’s death, Swisscom CEO Carsten Schloter, 49, hanged himself in his home in rural Fribourg, near the capital Bern. (Six weeks earlier, Schloter’s friend Daniel Eicher, CEO of ABC Verlag, a greeting-card company, committed suicide at home in Bern, though little has been reported about his death.) Like Wauthier, Schloter left a suicide note, reportedly short and vague…”
Andrzej Lepper
Lepper was against globalisation and for friendly relations with Russia, also rumors of anti-semitism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrzej_Lepper

Clifford Baxter: suicide
http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/02/us/enron-fast-facts/