Skip to main content

INTERNATIONAL MILITARY REVIEW – SYRIA-IRAQ BATTLESPACE – NOV. 16, 2015



The SAA, the National Defense Forces (NDF) and the Palestine Liberation Army (PLA) made several advances in the northern of the Dara’a province after making another push to reenter the town of Sheikh Miskeen on Saturday. According to the field reports, the Syrian forces captured the northern farms of Sheikh Miskeen, and the Water Resource Facility after a series of intense firefights against of the vestiges of the Free Syrian Army’s “Southern Front Brigades”. Now, the government’s forces are in position to launch an advance on the town of Sheikh Miskeen. The town of Nawa will likely become the next target of the SAA if Sheikh Miskeen is captured.

The Syrian forces are continuing operations in Southern Aleppo. Considering the reinforcements noted by SouthFront: Analysis & Intelligence on Nov. 13, the government’s spearhead at the sector consists of the SAA, Hezbollah, the NDF, the Ba’ath Battalions, the Iraqi paramilitary groups of Harakat Al-Nujaba and Kataeb Hezbollah, and a joint Iranian and Afghani paramilitary force of Firqa Fatayyemoun.

Over the last 3 days, the joint pro-government forces have captured the towns of Al-Hadher and Tal Al-‘Eiss aiming to approach the Damascus-Aleppo highway from the eastern flank. They captured approximately 408 square kilometers of territory in southern Aleppo. The SAA and their allies are now approaching the northeastern part of the Idlib province. The Syrian government lost this area during the militants’ offensive in summer 2012.

On Saturday Syrian moderate terrorists’ sources claimed that they had killed Iranian al Qods chief, the commander of Iranian forces in Iraq and Syria, Gen. Qassem Soleiman, in the fighting east of Aleppo. This statement isn’t confirmed by any other sources. The terrorists say they located the Iranian general’s movements by means of intelligence and struck his car with a TOW missile, killing him and three other Iranian officers, Masoud Askari, Mahmud Dahakan and Ahmed Rajai. If it’s confirmed it would count as a significant lose for the pro-government’s officer personnel at the battlefield.

The US think tanks argue that the “Syrian Democratic Forces” offensive along the Syria-Iraq border, toward the town of al-Hawl has become an epic success for the US-backed forces. Accordin to them, the SDF captured more than 36 villages and six border posts and partially surrounded al-Hawl. The push toward al-Hawl is part of a broader attempt by U.S.-backed forces to squeeze ISIS out of large swaths of the border region and reduce the number of border crossings in the group’s control. The effort should complicate ISIS logistics.

Considering the so-called “Syrian Democratic Forces” is, de-facto, Syrian Kurds partly supported by separate US-backed Sunni units, it becomes hard to confirm the victorious statements which support the Kurds offensive. In previous reports, SouthFront: Analysis & Intelligence noted that the White House urgently needs a significant success at the Syrian-Iraq battlespace. So, we should expect some “extravagance” in description of the US-backed efforts by main stream media and think tanks.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why States Still Use Barrel Bombs

Smoke ascends after a Syrian military helicopter allegedly dropped a barrel bomb over the city of Daraya on Jan. 31.(FADI DIRANI/AFP/Getty Images) Summary Barrel bombs are not especially effective weapons. They are often poorly constructed; they fail to detonate more often than other devices constructed for a similar purpose; and their lack of precision means they can have a disproportionate effect on civilian populations. However, combatants continue to use barrel bombs in conflicts, including in recent and ongoing conflicts in Africa and the Middle East, and they are ideally suited to the requirements of resource-poor states. Analysis Barrel bombs are improvised devices that contain explosive filling and shrapnel packed into a container, often in a cylindrical shape such as a barrel. The devices continue to be dropped on towns all over Syria . Indeed, there have been several documented cases of their use in Iraq over the past months, and residents of the city of Mosul, which was re...
Post a Comment
Read more

Russia Looks East for New Oil Markets

Click to Enlarge In the final years of the Soviet Union, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev began orienting his foreign policy toward Asia in response to a rising Japan. Putin has also piloted a much-touted pivot to Asia, coinciding with renewed U.S. interest in the area. A good expression of intent was Russia's hosting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in 2012 in Vladivostok, near Russia's borders with China and North Korea. Although its efforts in Asia have been limited by more direct interests in Russia's periphery and in Europe, Moscow recently has been able to look more to the east. Part of this renewed interest involves finding new export markets for Russian hydrocarbons. Russia's economy relies on energy exports, particularly crude oil and natural gas exported via pipeline to the West. However, Western Europe is diversifying its energy sources as new supplies come online out of a desire to reduce its dependence on Russian energy supplies . This has ...
Post a Comment
Read more

LONDON POLICE INDIRECTLY ENCOURAGE CRIMINALS TO ATTACK RUSSIAN DIPLOMATIC PROPERTY

ILLUSTRATIVE IMAGE A few days ago an unknown perpetrator trespassed on the territory of the Russian Trade Delegation in London, causing damage to the property and the vehicles belonging to the trade delegation , Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said during the September 12 press briefing. The diplomat revealed the response by the London police was discouraging. Police told that the case does not have any prospects and is likely to be closed. This was made despite the fact that the British law enforcement was provided with video surveillance tapes and detailed information shedding light on the incident. By this byehavior, British law inforcements indirectly encourage criminals to continue attacks on Russian diplomatic property in the UK. Zakharova’s statement on “Trespassing on the Russian Trade Mission premises in London” ( source ): During our briefings, we have repeatedly discussed compliance with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, sp...
1 comment
Read more