May 16th, 2015.
US Special Forces Kill “Prominent ISIL” Leader in SYRIA.
The US Department of Defense has announced that US Special Forces killed a man they describe as a senior ISIL leader in Eastern Syria. This marks the first US ground operation of the Syrian Civil war, It will not be the last.
Defense.gov News Article: Carter: Special Operations Troops Conduct Raid in Syria
The man is named as Abu Sayyaf, not to be confused with the South East Asian synthetic terror outfit of the same name.
The internet does not yield any information that indicates that there was a senior IS/ISIL/ISIS/Daesh leader called Abu Sayyaf prior to this announcement. His name does not appear on the lists of IS leaders provided here.
List of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant members – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia or here: IS hierarchy
Crossing a Threshold.
The real story here is that the US has now begun conducting ground operations in Syria, this is a significant escalation that carries new risks for US personnel and does not portend well for Syria or the Middle East.
This follows the revelation from Tony Cartalucci earlier this week that a Brookings Institute article had admitted that the US has now largely seized command and control of the anti-government insurgents and is directing the insurgent operations from clandestine commands in Jordan and Turkey.
Why Assad is losing | Brookings Institution
“Several commanders involved in leading recent Idlib operations confirmed to this author that the U.S.-led operations room in southern Turkey, which coordinates the provision of lethal and non-lethal support to vetted opposition groups, was instrumental in facilitating their involvement in the operation from early April onwards. That operations room — along with another in Jordan, which covers Syria’s south — also appears to have dramatically increased its level of assistance and provision of intelligence to vetted groups in recent weeks.”
These events, combined with a fresh media propaganda barrage and the picture is clear. Regime change in Syria is high on the US agenda again and they have used the anti- IS operation as a way to both transgress Syrian sovereignty and to sculpt and bomb the insurgency into cooperating with the goals of the Empire.
The Importance of Presidents May Be Overstated.
.Earlier US President Barack Obama stated that there is no military solution to the Syrian war, that neither side can win.
This appears to be correct but Obama is merely the titular head of the US, he is neither the leader of the US government nor the people. His words have little impact or meaning. In the same speech Obama also stated that he expected that the War would outlast his departure from the Presidency in January 2017. A fact that did not seem to trouble him unduly indicating his weakness and fecklessness. The overwhelming traits of his presidency along with presumably fake good intentions and brazen lies.
Assad.
Earlier today a single source reported that there had been an assassination attempt on the Syrian President Bashar al Assad. http://www.veteranstoday.com/2015/05/15/breaking-french-attempt-to-kill-syrian-president-assad/
There is no way of checking the story, although it was interesting to note this earlier piece on the same topic from mid 2012 that detailed an apparent French/Saudi plot.
Obama vetoed Assad assassination attempt — RT USA
http://rt.com/usa/obama-assassination-assad-syria-641/
Ultimately, despite the infantile Western mania for regime change, the death of Assad at this point would make very little difference to the fate of the Syrian Civil war. Hezbollah are not going to walk down from the Qalamoun mountain positions they have captured over a period of several years, the Syrian Army is not fighting for Bashar al Assad, the idea that Assad’s sudden removal would fix anything or end the war are no more than the childish nonsense of Hollywood propaganda.
It may be crude and incorrect to describe the Yemen war as a proxy war, as Gareth Porter recently pointed out.
The Media Misses the Point on ‘Proxy War’ by Gareth Porter — Antiwar.com but the Syria war is very much a power struggle between NATO and the Saudis and Israel on one side and Iran and Russia om the other. The Saudis are freshly motivated by what they regard as the Iran nuclear deal betrayal. The Iranians have stated that they will send hundreds of thousands of troops to Syria to protect their interests if necessary. The Syrian Government has made a number of deals with opposition forces on the ground. The rebel side, believing that eventually the US will bomb them to victory are the people who are unwilling to compromise. We know from experience that if the Syrian government is violently overthrown, even worse mayhem and chaos will be the result. Oba,a was right that there is no military solution to the Syrian war but it is incumbent upon him to try to act like an actual leader and bring the war to an end with a permanent ceasefire and a negotiated settlement.
The people of Syria have only suffered from the attempts to change the Government by it’s enemies, It appears that most of the people of Syria whether in Government or opposition ruled territory would simply like the war to end.
The Syrian war is an ongoing massive human crisis and political goals should surely be secondary in this situation.
Obama Orders Syria Raid, ISIS Commander Abu Sayyaf Killed by U.S. Special Operations Forces
Sources.
CONFIRMED: US “Operation Rooms” Backing Al Qaeda in Syria | New Eastern Outlook
http://journal-neo.org/2015/05/11/confirmed-us-operation-rooms-backing-al-qaeda-in-syria/
The Media Misses the Point on ‘Proxy War’ by Gareth Porter — Antiwar.com
http://original.antiwar.com/porter/2015/05/05/the-media-misses-the-point-on-proxy-war/
IS Leader Abu Sayyaf killed in US Special Forces raid
IS hierarchy
http://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/images/2015/3/4/is-hierarchy
Abu Yusaf – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Yusaf
Abu Ali al-Anbari – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ali_al-Anbari
List of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant members – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Islamic_State_of_Iraq_and_the_Levant_members
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State_of_Iraq_and_the_Levant#Leadership_and_governance
Abu Sayyaf – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Sayyaf
U.S. Special Ops forces kill ISIS commander in Syria raid – CNN.com
http://edition.cnn.com/2015/05/16/middleeast/syria-isis-us-raid/
US special forces kill senior ISIS commander in Syria raid – DoD — RT USA
http://rt.com/usa/259253-us-syria-raid-isis/
The terrorists fighting us now? We just finished training them. – The Washington Post
US special forces kill ISIL’s Abu Sayyaf in Syria raid – Al Jazeera English
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298072-nasrallah-to-give-qalamoun-victory-speech.ashx.htm
298190-more-gains-as-hezbollah-plows-on.htm
Thank you James, for jumping up and down. Listened to Alex last night, first time – in a unusual break – for a week or so, outraged at this development. This needs, oughta be, screamed loud. Syria is the frontline, US awoke libertarians aside (with their guns and defiance) – press on soldier
Mark
Thank you very much for those kind words Mark.