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Orange Devil posted:According to the Russians the Israelis use civilian airliners as cover to carry out air strikes on the regular. And we should believe anything the Russians say why, exactly.
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Feb 7, 2020 17:20
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Plastic_Gargoyle posted:And we should believe anything the Russians say why, exactly. We shouldn't. These are two terrible actors acting terribly, who even knows what's real?
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Feb 7, 2020 17:44
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Sinteres posted:Turkey's been moving dozens of vehicles into Idlib over the past few days, and doesn't show any signs of letting up. So far I haven't seen anything showing them moving toward the M5 highway, so the deal they may work out is Assad getting his highway and then Turkey physically guaranteeing the cease fire going forward. Russia established a new post of their own to the south of Turkey's safe zone in Rojava, so it seems like they're working on deterring retaliation in that area. Make that hundreds of vehicles: https://twitter.com/mghorab3/status/1225837443754139649?s=21 The SAA continues to roll northeast up the M5, and I suspect the rebels will begin abandoning their heavily fortified positions to the south and west of Aleppo city pretty soon since they're completely exposed in the rear now. Obviously explicit Turkish intervention on their behalf could change things, but so far Turkey still hasn't made any move toward the highway, and I can't help feeling that if they intended to stop this advance (as opposed to one aimed at Idlib city, which I think would be too far for Turkey to allow), they would have already done so at Saraqib. The big question to me is if the SAA will get away with continuing north after clearing the M5 and eliminating the rebel presence between Aleppo and Nubl to the northwest. Dr Kool-AIDS fucked around with this message at 21:01 on Feb 7, 2020 |
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Feb 7, 2020 19:04
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turkey has made a lot of noise about demanding Syria pullback beyond all of their observation posts. Hard to tell what Turkey's ultimate objective in all this is -- you'd think if they were determined to go balls deep in Syria they'd have done it before the rebels had already practically lost. https://twitter.com/metesohtaoglu/status/1225832346764619776?s=20
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Feb 7, 2020 22:15
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If i understand correctly there will be a meeting between Turkey and Russia tomorrow on this current issue. So until then its positioning and posturing. But hey you can always have some young man screw things up through some mistake.
RaffyTaffy fucked around with this message at 00:45 on Feb 8, 2020 |
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Feb 7, 2020 22:18
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Squalid posted:turkey has made a lot of noise about demanding Syria pullback beyond all of their observation posts. Hard to tell what Turkey's ultimate objective in all this is -- you'd think if they were determined to go balls deep in Syria they'd have done it before the rebels had already practically lost. Turkeu has people in refugee camps who they plan to resettle in Kurdish regions. Assad killing the rebels is basically just clearing the region of more mouths to feed. Erdogans lebensraum plan needs to kill a lot of syrians who arent loyal to turkey. If they are viewed as genociders too early things wont go accprding to plan. We view assad as a genocidal maniac regardless of whether he eradicates idlib province or not.
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Feb 7, 2020 22:47
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So this is the “Let the Nazis liquidate Warsaw while we sit across the river” strategy? It’s difficult to see how this does not end up with Syria and Turkey taking major actions against one another. Assad won’t let them annex a good chunk of territory while he still has Russian backing.
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Feb 7, 2020 23:19
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ganglysumbia posted:So this is the “Let the Nazis liquidate Warsaw while we sit across the river” strategy?
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Feb 7, 2020 23:36
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ganglysumbia posted:So this is the “Let the Nazis liquidate Warsaw while we sit across the river” strategy? Except in Warsaw it was explicitly an uprising to make sure the Soviets didn't liberate the city and it would be in Polish Home Army hands, and was launched after the Soviets had told them that any support would not be possible?
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Feb 8, 2020 09:13
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ganglysumbia posted:So this is the “Let the Nazis liquidate Warsaw while we sit across the river” strategy? Depends if the Russians are willing to back Assad just for territorial integrity - I can see them cutting a deal with Turkey to stay out and just cutting Assad out the loop - not like he can take them back from the Turkish army. And Turkey does still have an awful lot of Syrian Refugees they'd rather resettle in a patch of Syria...
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Feb 8, 2020 09:45
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WhiskeyWhiskers posted:Except in Warsaw it was explicitly an uprising to make sure the Soviets didn't liberate the city and it would be in Polish Home Army hands, and was launched after the Soviets had told them that any support would not be possible? I mean, I would argue about calling Soviet's takeover from the Germans "liberation".
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Feb 8, 2020 11:03
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Aumanor posted:I mean, I would argue about calling Soviet's takeover from the Germans "liberation". Then you're a loving Nazi.
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Feb 8, 2020 11:08
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WhiskeyWhiskers posted:Then you're a loving Nazi. I'm not equivocating Nazis with the Communists, but calling something liberation heavily implies the existence of a free country afterwards, and an authoritarian puppet regime propped up by a constant threat of a military intervention and falsifying every single popular vote from 1946 to 1988 in a hilariously blatant way (and you only had one party to vote for in a majority of them to begin with) simply cannot be called that, except I guess for the most tankie brains. Which, looking at your av/text, might be where the problem lies.
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Feb 8, 2020 12:00
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There was a real "damned if you do, damned if you don't" motivation behind the Warsaw Uprising, in that they knew that if they launched their uprising they most likely could not prevail without help, and if they didn't the Soviets would almost certainly use that as evidence in an accusation of collaboration to justify repressive measures. The organizers hoped that they might force the Soviets' hand and that if they seized control of the city they would have gained a bargaining chip and some real and solid legitimacy that the Soviets just couldn't arbitrarily sweep away. It's a lie that the Soviets couldn't have relieved the Uprising, the Soviet forces were explicitly ordered to slow their advance and not to enter the city. It was in the Soviets' interests to let the Uprising fail to eliminate a challenge to their puppet government, and the organizers probably underestimated Stalin's callousness and free hand vis-a-vis the Western Allies, as well as how willing commanders on the spot were to obey orders to just let the Uprising be massacred. Though, as stated, a part of them probably also knew that they were doomed in any case and they'd rather roll the dice than just wait to be rounded up.
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Feb 8, 2020 13:10
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Today the regime has been busy rolling up the territory East of the M5 motorway. Based on the speed, there aren't any rebels left in that area. Seems likely they'll soon secure the south west of Aleppo, a front line that has held since... 2012?
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Feb 8, 2020 17:47
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Aumanor posted:I'm not equivocating Nazis with the Communists, but calling something liberation heavily implies the existence of a free country afterwards, and an authoritarian puppet regime propped up by a constant threat of a military intervention and falsifying every single popular vote from 1946 to 1988 in a hilariously blatant way (and you only had one party to vote for in a majority of them to begin with) simply cannot be called that, except I guess for the most tankie brains. Which, looking at your av/text, might be where the problem lies. do you remember that time the Americans liberated Iraq
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Feb 8, 2020 17:49
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ganglysumbia posted:So this is the “Let the Nazis liquidate Warsaw while we sit across the river” strategy? Germany in ww1 starved to 1 beet a day rations. Hitler says gee we need some loving lebensraun! Syria in 2014 starving to death civil war breaks out. Turkeys watching closely and actively helping break syria into pieces by supprting isis. Turkey still watching sees a big shift in 4 years of war etc isis fails, rebels fail, kurds fail to an extent. The regime failed early on and had to ask for help and use demoralization weapons called gas attacks to hold on to less than a quarter of the country. Everyone failed in Syria. The Only 2 sides that werent aided by turkey left standing are the kurds in some part and the regime.
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Feb 8, 2020 17:49
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WhiskeyWhiskers posted:Then you're a loving Nazi. And you're an idiot.
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Feb 8, 2020 18:22
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JacobinPhoney posted:And you're an idiot. it turns out the people who say the poles were better off under the Nazis have a pretty consistent political alignment
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Feb 8, 2020 21:08
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Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:people who say the poles were better off under the Nazis Are you talking about Aumanor? He headed this off pretty early: Aumanor posted:I'm not equivocating Nazis with the Communists
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Feb 8, 2020 21:31
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Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:do you remember that time the Americans liberated Iraq See, this guy gets it. Just because an imperial power calls something "liberation" doesn't necessarily make it so
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Feb 8, 2020 21:32
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Flavahbeast posted:Are you talking about Aumanor? He headed this off pretty early: in precisely the way your republican coworkers head off potential criticism with "I'm not racist, but," yes. he's not a Nazi! he just thinks that suggesting the poles weren't better off under Nazi rule is extremely debatable, and takes great offense to those who suggest the concentration camps were "liberated." the need to own the libs takes people to strange and unpleasant places.
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Feb 8, 2020 21:37
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Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:the need to own the libs takes people to strange and unpleasant places. like supposed anti-imperialists defending stalinist poland in the middle east thread?
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Feb 8, 2020 21:39
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Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:in precisely the way your republican coworkers head off potential criticism with "I'm not racist, but," yes. He was making the exact same point you were with this post, you moron: Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:do you remember that time the Americans liberated Iraq
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Feb 8, 2020 22:05
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The regime's about halfway from Saraqib to Aleppo via the M5, and the second half should be super easy going unless the rebels suddenly decide to make a suicidal stand since the regime frontlines from the east are already pretty close to the highway, so any defenders would be enveloped very easily. As reluctant as they may be to leave the heavily fortified positions they've held there for years, I don't think they're going to be left much of a choice. As I said yesterday, the next question is what happens to the rebel territory northwest of Aleppo, between it and the Kurdish rump territory there. The other question mark to me is whether or not Turkey will extend their new military presence in Idlib south of Arihah, into the territory west/southwest of Maarrat al Numan. If not, there's still an opportunity for the regime to create pretty borders by heading west from there to link up with their forces in Latakia.
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Feb 8, 2020 22:12
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This is not the thread for discussing Poland's fate at the end of WWII, or for comparing the Nazi occupation of Poland with the Soviet occupation of Poland, or anything else along those lines. Please make a new thread if you're intent on arguing it.
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Feb 8, 2020 22:43
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um. . . what the gently caress is Turkey doing in Idlib and Aleppo right now? the build up in Idlib just keeps on getting bigger. It really looks like they are about to go on a major offensive: https://twitter.com/ragipsoylu/status/1225727147588902914?s=20 there's more video supposedly from tonight of massive Turkish convoys. I don't think the negotiations with Russia have paid off for the Syrian government Squalid fucked around with this message at 00:42 on Feb 9, 2020 |
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Feb 9, 2020 00:37
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this video was supposedly recorded tonight: https://twitter.com/mohmad_rasheed/status/1226269590667350017?s=20
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Feb 9, 2020 00:49
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So I'm as guilty as anyone of treating war like a map game (I literally talked about pretty borders in my last post), but it's worth remembering that even beyond the civilians suffering in the immediate sense due to terror bombing of cities, the conditions for refugees are awful with pretty much every country turning them away at this point (the United States is taking zero), particularly since it's winter right now. https://twitter.com/LizSly/status/1226282344836935680 As lovely as it is that the refugees aren't being provided with adequate relief after they flee, it's the Syrian government that deliberately precipitated this crisis at a time of their choosing. Maybe you feel that they had no choice but to capture Idlib by force at some point, and I'm not entirely unsympathetic to that view, but they chose to do so at a time when civilians fleeing the area (and forcing civilians to flee is clearly part of their strategy) would be at increased risk due to the weather. I don't know if that was calculated too or just not a concern, but either way, that's just another in a long list of crimes against humanity committed by the Syrian regime. I don't think Erdogan is a benevolent leader by any stretch of the imagination, but at this point maybe it's a good thing that he's committing forces to the province to stop the carnage, as long as he doesn't go full madman and bring war to areas which have already been pacified. Maybe he should have stepped in to defend them before, but bringing carnage back to those areas at this late date seems counterproductive.
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Feb 9, 2020 01:21
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A new army invading Syria isn't going to stop the carnage. This is just more fuel on the fire. There's even rumors he may be planning an attacking towards Aleppo. If Turkey ends up just parking those tanks on the border between government and rebel territory, it might bring some respite to the war, but it feels like Erdogan is gearing up for something more.
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Feb 9, 2020 01:40
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I feel like turkey's plan surely isn't to depopulate the area, but also I have no better explanation for what they're doing that makes more sense.
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Feb 9, 2020 01:50
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I feel like all those tanks making no move at all toward the M5 is an indication that they're still working out a deal rather than actually planning a maximalist campaign to undo facts on the ground. If Turkey wanted to fight a war for Idlib province and/or Aleppo city, they could have done so a long time ago when they could have actually meaningfully affected the course of the war. If the reason they didn't was because Russia wouldn't allow it back then, why would Russia allow it now, especially with a more Russophile US president in office now?
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Feb 9, 2020 01:52
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Yeah almost everything Turkey is doing idk why they haven't done at various points over the years earlier when there was far less stable opposition to them, but perhaps now they are fully trying to step into the vaccuum left by the US publicly more or less withdrawing?
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Feb 9, 2020 01:56
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I think it's mostly just posturing and saying that future incursions are a red line for them, with forces there to back it up from the start so there's no room for doubt. Maybe I'll look like a dumbass when Erdogan's deadline expires at the end of the month and he openly assaults regime positions, but I think it's very unlikely that the regime will have to give up any substantial gains given how active Russia was in helping them acquire this territory, and how Turkey is staying out of the way of the continuing advance now. I don't think Turkey signed up for getting eight of their service members killed, so I do think that legitimately heightened tensions, but the majority of the Turkish retaliation has been shelling aimed at the Kurdish rump south of Afrin when they could have blown away the regime forces around Saraqib with a serious artillery bombardment, which says to me they're still more or less working in the same framework they've been working in for a while now. A lot of people have been wondering why the rebels never put together a serious counterattack, and while the air dominance enjoyed by the regime can explain some of that, it's something they always had, while rebels used to be able to put together counterattacks even after the Russian intervention (even if they ended up being mostly quixotic in the sense that they'd recapture some territory by concentrating on a regime weak point but then generally lose it again pretty quickly). If the rebels have known for a while that there will be a Turkish presence to hide behind though, moving out of the areas not covered by that protection makes a lot more sense. I don't know if Russia feels the need to make concessions or not, but if they do, what wouldn't completely stun me is if we see Russia trade away Kobane. With the US now planning to stay in eastern Syria indefinitely again (explicitly to steal or at least play keepaway with the bulk of the country's oil), there hasn't been much progress on negotiations to bring any YPG territory back under even nominal regime control (though my understanding is that the main sticking point is the regime offering nothing and demanding everything). If they don't see a cooperative way forward with the Kurds, trading more of their territory away to Turkey to secure SAA gains that are more vital to the security of the regime, such as the major highway connecting Damascus to Aleppo, might not look like a terrible option. Dr Kool-AIDS fucked around with this message at 02:19 on Feb 9, 2020 |
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Feb 9, 2020 02:06
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Herstory Begins Now posted:I feel like turkey's plan surely isn't to depopulate the area, but also I have no better explanation for what they're doing that makes more sense. i mean there's no reason not be believe erdogan doesn't care about the Sunni civilians in idlib. He at least doesn't want them to flee into Turkey
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Feb 9, 2020 02:19
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Squalid posted:i mean there's no reason not be believe erdogan doesn't care about the Sunni civilians in idlib. He at least doesn't want them to flee into Turkey Where are the refugees fleeing to?
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Feb 9, 2020 02:30
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squalid camps along the border
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Feb 9, 2020 02:31
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Squalid posted:squalid camps along the border you do? that's some dedication, but why refer to yourself in the third person?
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Feb 9, 2020 02:40
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V. Illych L. posted:you do? that's some dedication, but why refer to yourself in the third person?
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Feb 9, 2020 03:03
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Ive said this once ill say it again Volkerball lives in idlb province.
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Feb 9, 2020 03:06
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