A Mediterranean Battlefield - Syria

[Magda Hassan]

I haven't had a chance to watch this. Hope to tomorrow but wanted to post it in case it gets deleted.

[Peter Lemkin]

Syrian Internet just went down.....for how long and who done it - no one knows....

[Lauren Johnson]

Posted without comment:

The US-funded training supposedly aimed at teaching rebels to secure chemical weapons stockpiles

by John Glaser, December 10, 2012


The US and some of its European allies "are using defense contractors to train Syrian rebels on how to secure chemical weapons stockpiles in Syria," according to "a senior US official and several senior diplomats," CNN reports.

The US-funded training is going on inside Syria, as well as in neighboring Turkey and Jordan and "involves how to monitor and secure stockpiles and handle weapons sites and materials," according to CNN.

Last week, Washington began warning about the possibility that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad might use his chemical weapons stockpiles against the armed rebellion trying to overthrow his regime.

But top Syrian officials vehemently denied this would ever happen, and it appeared obvious that US officials were less concerned with Assad's unleashing the chemical weapons, and more concerned with the possibility that Islamic jihadists fighting on behalf of the Syrian opposition might get their hands on them.

Islamic extremists make up the great bulk of Syria's rebel fighters, and this is widely acknowledged by official Washington. Indeed, the State Department recently designated Jabhat al-Nusra, one of the most prominent Syrian rebel factions, as a Global Terrorist organization.

The US decision to hire unaccountable defense contractors to train Syrian rebels to handle stockpiles of chemical weapons seems dangerously irresponsible in the extreme, especially considering how inept Washington has so far been at making sure only trustworthy, secular rebels to the extent they exist receive their aid and the weapons that allies in the Gulf Arab states have been providing.

It also feeds accusations that the Syrian Foreign Ministry recently made that the US is working to frame the Syrian regime as having used or prepared for chemical warfare.

"The U.S. administration has consistently worked over the past year to launch a campaign of allegations on the possibility that Syria could use chemical weapons during the current crisis," the Syrian Foreign Ministry wrote in letters to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

"What raises concerns about this news circulated by the media is our serious fear that some of the countries backing terrorism and terrorists might provide the armed terrorist groups with chemical weapons and claim that it was the Syrian government that used the weapons," the letters said.

http://news.antiwar.com/2012/12/10/us-de...l-weapons/

[Peter Lemkin]

Syria is known to have enormous amounts of highly lethal chemical and biological weapons. It really doesn't matter who uses them...any use will kill huge chunks of life - human and otherwise in such a relatively small country....and perhaps beyond. The whole thing is madness and the whole Middle East is in a very precarious situation [more than I can remember]. Add to that there are NO 'big powers' I trust and we have a formula for some very ugly scenarios. As a matter of fact, I can't see any really good ones - in Syria or any of the surrounding countries. What started out as an 'Arab Spring' could well [I hope not] descend into an 'Arab Winter'.....or worse. While there is plenty of blame to lay at the feet of many of those in power in the Middle east, much of the blame has to be born by those outside powers playing 'chess' with the region for decades....and still.

[Magda Hassan]

For whom the Syrian bell tolls
By Pepe Escobar

The top geopolitical tragedy in 2012 is bound to remain the top geopolitical tragedy in 2013: the rape of Syria.

Just as once in a while I go back to my favorite Hemingway passages, lately I've been going back to some footage I shot years ago of the Aleppo souk - the most extraordinary of all Middle Eastern souks. It's like being shot in the back; I was as fond of the souk's architecture as of its people and traders. Weeks ago, most of the souk - the living pulse of Aleppo for centuries - was set on fire and destroyed by the "rebels" of the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA).

In this Syrian tragedy, there is no Hemingway young hero, no Robert Jordan in the International Brigades fighting alongside

Republican guerrillas against the fascists during the Spanish Civil War. In the Syrian civil war, the international brigades are mostly of the mercenary, Salafi-jihadi, beheading and car-bombing type. And the (few) young Americans in place are basically high-tech pawns in a game played by the rapacious NATOGCC club (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and its Arab puppets of the Gulf Cooperation Council).

The tragedy continues. The Syrian state, political and military security apparatus will maintain its mini-blitzkriegs - with no second thoughts for "collateral damage". On the opposing side, "rebel" commanders will be betting on a new Saudi-Qatari-encouraged Supreme Military Council.

The Salafis and Salafi-jihadis of the al-Nusrah Front - 7th century fanatics, beheading enthusiasts and car-bombing operatives who do the bulk of the fighting - were not invited. After all, the al-Nusrah Front has been branded a "terrorist organization" by Washington.

Now check the reaction of a Muslim Brotherhood (MB) bigwig, Hama-born deputy comptroller general Mohammed Farouk Tayfour; he said the decision was "too hasty". And check the reaction of the new Syrian opposition leader, Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib, at a "Friends of Syria" meeting in Morocco; the decision must be "reexamined". Virtually all "rebel" outfits publicly declared their undying love for the hardcore al-Nusrah.

So with the al-Nusrah fanatics probably disguising their Islamically correct beards under a prosaic hoodie, expect plenty more "rebel" advances on Damascus - despite two major beatings (last July and then this month), courtesy of Syrian government counter-offensives. After all, that lavish training by US, British and Jordanian Special Forces has got to yield some results, not to mention the loads of extra lethal weapons provided by those paragons of democracy in the Persian Gulf. By the way, the al-Nusrah Front controls sections of devastated Aleppo.

Sectarian hatred rules
Then there's the Orwellian, brand new National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces - a Washington-Doha co-production. Meet the new boss, same as the old (lousy) boss, which was the Syrian National Council (SNC). It's just rhetoric; the only thing that matters for the "National Coalition" is to get more lethal weapons. And they love al-Nusrah, even if Washington doesn't.

Qatar unloaded tons of weapons "like candy" (according to a US arms dealer) in "liberated" Libya. Only after the Benghazi blowback did the Pentagon and the State Department wake up to the fact that weaponizing the Syrian rebels may be, well, the road to more blowback. Translation: Qatar will keep unloading tons of weapons in Syria. The US will keep "leading from behind".

Expect more horrible sectarian massacres as the one in Aqrab.Here is the most authoritative version of what may have really happened. This proves once again that what the NATOGCC "rebels" are actually winning is the YouTube war. So expect more massive, relentless waves of spin and propaganda - with Western corporate media cheerleading of the Syrian "freedom fighters" putting to shame the 1980s jihad in Afghanistan.

Expect more major distortions of context, as when Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov said, "The fighting will become even more intense, and [Syria] will lose tens of thousands and, perhaps, hundreds of thousands of civilians... If such a price for the removal of the president seems acceptable to you, what can we do? We, of course, consider it absolutely unacceptable."

Ergo, Russia is trying to do everything to prevent this from happening. And if NATOGCC "rebels" carry out their threats to attack the Russian and Ukrainian embassies in Damascus, they had better trim their beards and run for cover from the no-nonsense Spetnatz - Russian Special Forces.

Expect more sectarian hatred, as in Sunni Sheikh and al-Jazeera star Yusuf al-Qaradawi casually issuing a fatwa legitimizing the killing of millions of Syrians, be they military or civilian, as long as they are Alawites or Shi'ites.

Sectarian hatred will rule, with Qatar in the lead, followed by Saudis with large pocketbooks and assorted hardcore Islamists. Agenda; war against Shi'ites, against Alawites, against secularists, even against moderates, not only in Syria but all across the Middle East.

A Patriot vs Iskander face-off
The new Syrian Army strategy boils down to a major pull back from countryside backwaters and bases, concentrating their troops in cities and towns.

Expect the overall strategy of the NATOGCC club to remain more or less the same; bog down the Syrian Army in as many areas as possible; demoralize them; and keep oiling the terrain for a possible North Atlantic Treaty Organization intervention (the chemical weapons hype and the relentless carping over a "humanitarian catastrophe" are part of the extensive psy ops package).

The Syrian Army may have the heavy weapons; but when confronting a tsunami of mercenaries and Salafi-jihadists fully trained and weaponized by the NATOGCC club, the whole thing may take years, Lebanon civil war-style. That leads us to the next "best" option - which is in fact a spin-off; the death of the Syrian state by a thousand, make it a million, cuts.

What's certain is that the "coalition of the willing" against Syria will have no trouble unraveling once the endgame is reached. Washington bets on a post-Assad regime run by the MB. No wonder King Playstation in Jordan is freaking out; he knows the MB will also take over Jordan and expel him to permanently shop at Harrods.

Those paragons of democracy - the medieval petro-monarchies in the Persian Gulf - are also freaking out; they fear the popular appeal of the MB like the plague. Syrian Kurdistan - now definitely on its way to total autonomy and eventually freedom - already keeps Ankara freaking out. Not to mention the future prospect of a tsunami of unemployed Salafi-jihadis merrily ensconced in the Syria-Turkish border and ready to run amok.

And then there's the complex Turkey-Iran relationship. Tehran has already warned Ankara in no uncertain terms about the just-to-be-deployed NATO missile defense system.

That's got to be the newspeak masterpiece of late 2012. Pentagon spokesman George Little has been adamant that "the United States has been supporting Turkey in its efforts to defend itself... [against Syria]."

Thus the deployment of 400 US troops to Turkey to run two Patriot missile batteries, to "defend" Turkey from "potential threats emanating from Syria".

Translation; this has nothing to do with Turkey, it's all about the Russian military in Syria. Moscow has given Damascus not only very effective, hypersonic Iskander surface-to-surface missiles (virtually immune to missile defense systems) but the ground-to-air, multiple target defense system Pechora 2M, a nightmare to the Pentagon if ever a no-fly zone is imposed over Syria.

Welcome to the Patriot vs Iskander face-off. And right in the line of fire, we find Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan - an outsized egomaniac harboring a deep inferiority complex in relation to the Europeans - left in the cold under NATO's master plan.

Turkey's Achilles heel (apart from the Kurds) is its self-promoted role of being a crossroads of energy between East and West. The problem is Turkey depends on energy supplies from both Iran and Russia; unwisely, it is antagonizing both, at the same time, with its muddled Syrian policy.

All I hear is doom and gloom

How to solve this tragedy? No one seems to be listening to Syrian Vice President Farouk Al-Sharaa. In this interview with Lebanon's Al-Akhbar, he stresses "the threat of the current campaign to destroy Syria, its history, civilization, and people... With every passing day, the solution gets further away, militarily and politically. We must be in the position of defending Syria's existence."

He does not have "a clear answer to what the solution may be". But he has a road map:

Any settlement, whether starting with talks or agreements between Arab, regional, or foreign capitals, cannot exist without a solid Syrian foundation. The solution has to be Syrian, but through a historic settlement, which would include the main regional countries, and the members of UN Security Council. This settlement must include stopping all shapes of violence, and the creation of a national unity government with wide powers. This should be accompanied by the resolution of sensitive dossiers related to the lives of people and their legitimate demands.

This is not what the NATOGCC compound wants - even as the US, Britain, France, Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are all engaged in their own divergent agendas. What the NATOGCC war has already accomplished is one objective - very similar, by the way, to Iraq in 2003; it has completely torn the fragile Syrian social fabric to shreds.

That is disaster capitalism in action, phase I; the terrain is already prepared for a profitable "reconstruction" of Syria once a pliable, pro-Western turbo-capitalism government is installed.

Yet in parallel, blowback also works its mysterious ways; millions of Syrians who initially supported the idea of a pro-democracy movement - from the business classes in Damascus to traders in Aleppo - now have swelled the government support base as a counterpunch against the gruesome ethnic-religious cleansing promoted by the "rebels" of the al-Nusrah kind.

Yet with NATOGCC on one side and Iran-Russia on the other side, ordinary Syrians caught in the crossfire have nowhere to go. NATOGCC will stop at nothing to carve - in blood - any dubious entity ranging from a pro-US emirate to a pro-US "democracy" run by the MB. It's not hard to see for whom the bell tolls in Syria; it tolls not for thee, as in John Donne, but for doom, gloom, death and destruction.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/NL22Ak03.html

[Jan Klimkowski]

Magda - very interesting article.

It's clear that the true aim is the Balkanisation of the Middle East. For those not familiar with the term, there's a brief intro at wiki.

The definition there is fine:

Balkanization, or Balkanisation, is a geopolitical term, originally used to describe the process of fragmentation or division of a region or state into smaller regions or states that are often hostile or non-cooperative with each other. It is considered pejorative.

Balkanisation and the Strategy of Tension can be seen as elite bedfellows......

[Magda Hassan]

There is way too much testosterone around....

Because the FSA are not supported by the people of Allepo I am also remeinded of the Brecht quote:

Some party hack decreed that the people
had lost the government's confidence
and could only regain it with redoubled effort.
If that is the case, would it not be be simpler,
If the government simply dissolved the people
And elected another?

'The people of Aleppo needed someone to drag them into the revolution'

Abu Ali Sulaibi was one of the first people to take up arms in Aleppo. Now he controls two shattered blocks on the frontline where he lives with his wife, four children and Squirrel the cat

• Ghaith Abdul-Ahad in Aleppo
  
• guardian.co.uk, Friday 28 December 2012 14.20 GMT
  

The once upper-class Saif al-Dawla Boulevard in Aleppo, Syria. Photograph: Ghaith Abdul-Ahad for the Guardian

The man stands among the blackened, shell-shattered buildings, and reaches up to encompass them in a broad sweep of his wiry arms. "This," he proclaims, "is the state of Abu Ali Sulaibi."
The ruined corner of downtown Aleppo does not, of course, constitute a state and nor does it belong to the man claiming it in his name. But as the Syrian civil war has stagnated and Aleppo has fractured into "liberated" neighbourhoods run by different militias, Abu Ali and commanders like him have become the rulers of a series of mini-fiefdoms. These two blocks of the rebel frontline in Saif al-Dawla are his.
Walking through the once prosperous streets, Abu Ali recalls the life he lived here, pointing out the places where he played as a child, went to school and fell in love. He now lives in a small apartment in the heart of the zone with his wife, Um Ali, three daughters, a son, and a cat named Sanjoob, or Squirrel.
Fifty metres from Abu Ali's sector, across the Saif al-Dawla Boulevard, a similar array of shattered buildings is occupied by government troops. They are close enough that during lulls in the shooting they can continue the conflict by shouting abuse.
Half of the building where his parents used to live has been sheared off by a rocket attack, spilling furniture and a chandelier into the street. The remaining structure serves as Abu Ali's command centre, where some of his fighters sleep. He stands in the middle of a small living room surrounded by fighters resting under thick blankets on the floor.
"I can't believe that this is my mother's living room," he says. Then, to the men: "Wake up, you beasts!"
As no one stirs, he pulls a pistol from his belt and fires into the ceiling, bringing down a chunk of plaster. The men jump from their mats, grabbing their guns. "That was Abu Ali's wake-up call," he says.
Outside, Abu Ali sits on a broken plastic chair set amid the rubble. His fighters, bleary-eyed, sit around him, making Turkish coffee and smoking. There is no food. The men live on one meal a day and many have not eaten since lunch the day before.
A trickle of civilians who braved the sniper fire to reach Abu Ali's headquarters now come forward, as they do each morning, to ask favours of the chief. Some are trying to salvage their food or furniture, others come to ask permission to scavenge or squat in the empty apartments.
On this morning, six civilians stand sheepishly in front of him: a man in his 50s and his teenage son; a lanky man in a coat that is too big for him; a young engineer in rimless glasses and a bald man with his sister, who wears a black hijab. The civilians stay at a distance out of respect or fearing his unchecked anger.
"What do you want?"
"We want to collect some of our stuff, Abu Ali," the older man says.
"Not today. Come back on Saturday."
"But you told us to come on Wednesday."
"I changed my mind. You should know that this is the state of Abu Ali Sulaibi." He roars out his catchphrase as much for the benefit of his men as the civilians.
"You are all informers," he tells the scared civilians. "I know you cross back to government side and report on us."
"We are not," says the bald man. "Our hearts are with you."
"When you say that, I know you are an informer." Turning to one of his men he says, half-joking: "Wasn't he the one who was chasing us when we were out demonstrating?" The bald man's face turns pale.
Abu Ali keeps the civilians waiting for two hours. Then, like a true autocrat, he quickly changes his mind and summons two of his men to take them where they want to go.

Tough neighbourhood

Abu Ali's neighbourhood is a nest of snipers, and to reach the frontline you must run across streets that are covered only by curtains to hide from the gunmen's view. Elsewhere fighters have punched holes through deserted apartments to make protected routes to the front.
The returning civilians register that their homes have become sniper positions, and that everything of value has been stripped.
One man stops in his children's bedroom. It is a mess, the window blown in and toys scattered on the beds. He starts sifting through papers in drawers and rearranging the books on shelves.
The walls are blackened, and broken pipes have flooded the floors. Gripped by a strange fervour, the man and his teenage son start to pack everything they can find into plastic bags and suitcases. Their faces are lit by slits of light that filters through the bullet holes in the blinds.
"Get some sweaters for your brother," the father says.
"Is there any money left?" asks the son.
"No, everything has been stolen."
The two fighters wait in the staircase watching the street and urging the people to move quickly. "I know they hate us," one says. "They blame us for the destruction. Maybe they are right, but had the people of Aleppo supported the revolution from the beginning this wouldn't have happened."
The wind blows hard, and shards of glass from the broken windows cascade on to the street below, sending up a faint jingling sound.
In the kitchen, the son finds a half-empty bag of lentils, a bag of rice and some stock cubes. He picks up a jar, opens it, sniffs and places it back on the shelf, making a disgusted face.
At the sound of heavy machine-gun fire, the civilians hurry out into the stairwell, each carrying bundles of plastic bags. The father is carrying more bags than the others and a flat-screen TV. As they rush back from the frontline, he becomes dizzy and leans against a wall for support, sweating heavily. The group pauses.
"This is all my life," he says to the fighters. "I worked for 30 years to buy an apartment. Will I be around for another 30 years to buy another one?"
When they get back to the command centre, Abu Ali is still in a foul mood. "You were going to kill my men for this?" he says, gesturing at their bags. "All of you, get out of my area. I have a war to run."
"We just wanted to check if anything was looted," the engineer says quietly.
"Every single house has been looted," shouts Abu Ali. "And the [government] army has never been to this area. It is us who looted them!"

Chez Abu Ali

Later, we walk to Abu Ali's house behind the frontline. He stops at the bottom of a flight of stairs and stands for a while in the cold next to a huge pile of rubbish, watching the distant bombs flashing over the dark city. Then he climbs up to his apartment. "Girls!" he shouts. "Girls!"
The shrieks and screams of children carry out of the apartment. They come running to meet him, and he lifts the smallest on to his shoulder while another clings to his legs and the elder pulls him into their bedroom.
"Father, we made a house for Squirrel," they shout excitedly. Squirrel the cat is shivering and scared, either from the continuous sounds of gunfire or from the bath the girls subject him to daily.
Abu Ali sits on the floor, the three girls hanging from his neck like three little limpets. Um Ali arrives with a tray of food. Her kind, round face is wrapped in a pink scarf. Apart from the sound of shooting from down the street, it could be a typical Syrian family scene, with Abu Ali playing the harassed dad to a tee. The adult conversation is interrupted constantly by requests from the girls. The boy watches TV silently.
"The kids live in the most dangerous area, but I feel safe. She makes me feel safe," he says, indicating his wife.
"Daddy, make me a sandwich," says one of the girls.
"Can't you get it yourself? I'm trying to talk to your mother."
"Baba, can I talk into your radio?"
Abu Ali's brothers had actively opposed the rule of Bashar al-Assad's father, Hafez, joining the Muslim Brotherhood in the 80s. In their fight against the state, one of the brothers was killed and another spent 15 years in jail.
Abu Ali chose a different path, training to be an assistant engineer. He got a job with the government. Life was good. "I had a good income, my own car and my own house," he says. "My kids used to go to the best schools and we had a perfect family life.
"When Bashar [al-Assad] came to power I disagreed with my father and brother. I said he would be good, that things would change."
But little did change, and when the revolution came in 2011, Abu Ali was one of the first people to take up arms in Aleppo. With a group of friends he formed a small armed unit to target security forces.
"See this pistol," he says, pulling the weapon from his belt and placing it on the floor. "The first bullet in Aleppo was fired from this pistol."
The small girl grabs at the shiny gun but he snatches it away. "I knew there wouldn't be a revolution without violence, and the people of Aleppo needed someone to drag them into the revolution."
"He was the first who carried weapons and I encouraged him," says Um Ali, who trained as a mechanical engineer. "His parents and family blamed me and still blame me. He was hesitant in the beginning because he had three children, but I encouraged him.
"He used to go out without telling me where, but I knew it was to do with the revolution. I used to pray for him and felt ashamed in front of God because I was praying only for him."
He has been hit several times in the fighting: he shows two shrapnel wounds on his head and pulls up his T-shirt to reveal a depression under his right shoulder blade where a machine gun bullet struck him. He is often referred to as the "majnoon" the madman for his reckless bravery.
"Revolution, ah, what do you know of the revolution?" he asks her. "I said from the start that it wouldn't finish until the whole country was turned into ruins."
He stirs his tea with the sugar spoon, and she admonishes him. "Sorry, sorry, I forget that here I am not the military commander any more."
"This is what I know of the revolution," says Um Ali in her quiet, deep voice. "You run from shop to shop looking for things. But the pharmacies are empty. The grocery stores are empty. We toured half of Aleppo to try to find a bucket of yoghurt. This is revolution.
"You don't have to work for the regime to be a shabiha," she says, referring to the hated pro-government militias. "The grocer who raises the price of the vegetables is a shabiha.
"The fighting is there," she nods her head towards the window, "but how do you feed your kids and give them a normal life in the middle of this? We used to know how our days started and ended. Now I can't afford to think ahead. We just want to end the day alive."
Her voice is calm but her hands tremble as she fetches another cigarette. The children are now mesmerised by the TV.
"War is a moment of life frozen. Our lives have stopped. They haven't been to school, but life is moving on for them. Even before the fighting started I used to go to sleep waiting for the security forces to come and arrest him. I gave the kids cough medicine to sleep so they wouldn't wake up when they stormed into the house."
Sarah, the little daughter, is asleep in her mother's lap, wrapped in a brown shawl. Abu Ali lifts her and carries her to bed. "I deserve a rest," says Um Ali. "I am too tired."
Abu Ali goes to the small kitchen and squats before a small stove, boiling another pot of thick Turkish coffee. "Now I will sit with her," he says. "We will lie on the mattress, turn off the light and talk about what happened today. This my favourite moment of the day."
He goes back to the room carrying the pot. Um Ali is staring at the floor, her cigarette burning slowly between her fingers. Outside, the pop-pop sound of gunfire has ceased.
"I am scared of the silence," she says. "I feel something bad will happen. When they are shooting, I know we are safe."

Two enemies

Abu Ali decides to attack the government forces, not only to give the impression they are strong and not lacking ammunition, but also to show the other battalions he is still active. "I tell you I face two enemies now the battalions and the government."
He stands with five of his gunmen behind a wall. He is carrying a heavy machine gun, its bandolier of bullets wrapped around his chest. The plan is simple and bold: attack the government forces face to face. They will not be expecting that, he says. "All our fighting had been with snipers for the past two weeks."
As the battle rages and the volume of gunfire rises to deafening levels, Abu Ali stands in the middle of a window, exposed to the army, and fires his machine gun. His men are hiding behind walls trying to support him. Bullets fly all around him.
Afterwards, back in his parent's half-ruined house, the men's morale is sky-high. In his adrenaline rush Abu Ali jokes and laughs with them. He sits on the floor listening to old Syrian musicians singing love songs, and the men talk about the battle.
"I still can't believe that this was my mother's room, and now look at all of the men sitting there," Abu Ali says.
"Ah, how I jumped when a bit of exploded bullet hit my ass," he laughs. "I swear we killed at least four."
The Taliban and al-Qaida should employ him, he jokes, because of his experience. "Mullah Omar and [Ayman al-] Zawahiri should buy me for all the battles I have been through, just like Barcelona bought Messi."
He continues in a serious tone: "For a week I told them not to shoot, but to preserve their ammunition. Now when they see we have burned 500 bullets in half an hour, they will think we have new supplies. It's a game of poker."
By the time he reaches home, Abu Ali's elation has left him. He sits with one leg on the ground, the other resting on the sofa, lost in thought. Sarah comes up to him and he pushes her away.
"We had a fight today," he tells his wife, like someone reporting the day's work.
"I know, my love. I know the sound of your bullets."
After dinner he becomes reflective: "I mix everything. Filth with honesty. Street language with religion. I have mixed all the revolutions in me. I am the Bolshevik revolution, the French revolution. I am the modern Guevara.
"Do you know, I am so special. My wife hates it when I say this, but I have had angels fight with me. Many times. In battle, I can feel myself flying," he says. "Flying above the ground."

[/url]

Aleppo's Deadly Stalemate: A Visit to Syria's Divided Metropolis

By [url=http://world.time.com/author/raniaabouzeid/]Rania Abouzeid / AleppoNov. 14, 20122 Comments

SEBASTIANO TOMADA / SIPA USAFree Syrian Army fighter Mohammad Jaffar patrols a street in Bustan Al Basha, one of Aleppo's most volatile front lines, Oct. 22, 2012.

The neighborhood is called Bustan al-Basha and used to be the place a lot of Aleppo's citizens would bring their cars for repair. It was a mixed Christian-Sunni working class district, bordering the Kurdish district of Sheikh Maksoud. That is in e the past tense because, of the thousands of residents who once lived here, only three remain. The trio live on Rawand Street, which is in rebel hands. The street behind them belongs to the regime. Marie, a Christian Armenian, is retired kindergarten teacher; gray-haired Abdel-Latif is a retired civil servant; and cherubic young Abdel-Maten is a baker who hasn't been to his workplace for months even though it is less than two kilometers away because it is in Midan, a neighborhood under regime control. "I've been living here for 20 years," says Marie as she peeks out from her balcony, wiping her soapy hands on a dishcloth. "I'm still here because where am I going to go? This is my home. We are counting on God and staying, but you know, honestly, it's like I went to bed one night and the next morning everyone was gone. When and how they left, I don't know. It happened very suddenly."Only stray cats have the courage to roam the streets of this part of Syria's largest city. As felines freely pick their way through rubble and garbage, human beings dart from corner to corner, anxious bands of rebel fighters dashing between the bullets of regime snipers.
(MORE: Syria's Body County: Meet the Exile Tracking the Death Toll)
Syria's grinding civil war swept into its largest city in late July. A proud and ancient cosmopolis, Aleppo is home to more than two million of Syria's 23 million people but it has now been been crudely carved into pro- and anti-regime pockets, the edges of which occasionally change hands. It is the deadliest sort of stalemate, with international diplomacy struggling to find a solution as the government of President Bashar Assad pursues a course of survival-via-atrocity; and the Syrian opposition in exile once again changes leadership in another attempt to weave its disparate ideological and military strands together. The grinding war of attrition has turned parts of Aleppo like Bustan al-Basha into wastelands.
The street warfare isn't winning the rebels any more friends. The urbane Aleppans have never really warmed to the opposition fighers, most of whom come from religiously conservative Sunni Muslim small-townsand there is growing concern that the rebels are turning more sectarian. The rebels know they're not really welcome. "The Aleppans here, all of them, are loyal to the criminal Bashar, they inform on us, they tell the regime where we are, where we go, what we do, even now," says Abu Sadek, a defector from Assad's military now with Liwa Suqooral-Sha'ba, one of the three rebel units in Bustan al-Basha. "If God wasn't with us, we would have been wiped out a long time ago."
Assad's assault has certainly been ferocious. Many of Bustan al-Basha's four- and five-storey residential buildings have been partially sliced open, their concrete floors pancaked atop each other, their contentsdining tables, children's toys, washing machinesspewed into dusty mounds onto the streets below. Apart from the gentle sound of water gushing from burst pipes, there's a heavy silence here, punctured by sporadic sniper fire, the occasional roar of a warplane overhead unleashing its payload in another part of Aleppo, or the more frequent hair-raising whistle of an incoming mortar. Shorn power lines dangle over the streams of water cascading through the streets that have flooded many basements. The danger of electrocution would be high if the neighborhood had power, but it hasn't had that since armed rebels rumbled in from Aleppo's countryside this summer, intent on swiftly wresting Aleppo from the regime's firm grip.
That of course has not happened. Instead, the rebels have set up camp in abandoned apartments, stealing electricity from a spot about a kilometer away, and sharing it with the neighborhood's three remaining residents. Former residents who return briefly to check on their properties are not always treated as warmly. They are asked for ID and paperwork to prove that they lived in thearea. Some rebels say it's to guard against looting. Others have different concerns. "Some of these people toss electronic taggers at our bases that notify warplanes of our location," says one young rebel, explaining why the rebels distrust returning residents. He hadn't seen the devices, or had any proof, but was certain it was true.
(MORE: Syria Opposition Wins Western Backing)
On a recent morning, a young man in a thick gray sweater and tight shiny gray dress pants knocked on an apartment that is now the headquarters of Liwa Suqoor al-Sha'ba. He was accompanied by several armed rebels from the Grandsons of Hamza Brigade in the Karam al-Jabal neighborhood of Aleppo, who said they could vouch that he lived in this home and that the furniture washis. The young man showed an ID and other paperwork to back his claim. "I just came to get a few things," he said.
"You're welcome," one of the rebels said. "Take what you want, we will help you."
The young man, who told TIME his name was Abu Ghaybar (a Kurdish name) but later told the rebels it was Abu Mohammad, was from Afrin, a Kurdish town north of Aleppo city, although he didn't share that information with the rebels in his home. He and his family had moved into an unfurnished apartment in Haydariye, a safer neighborhood in Aleppo. "I am now less than zero. I don't even have a pillow to offer a guest," he said. "We are sleeping on bare tiles."
Quickly and methodically, Abu Ghaybar moved through his four-room home, shoving clothesinto black plastic rubbish bags provided by the rebels, and stacking white goods at the door. He unplugged the hot plate in the kitchen as several rebels emptied the fridge of eggs, yoghurt, grapes, jam and a bowl of cooked rice. The rebels weren't happy to be doing so, rolling their eyes as they completed their task, but they said nothing to Abu Ghaybar.
"Do you mind if I take this blanket?," Abu Ghaybar told a portly rebel known as the teacher' because he taught primary school before he picked up a gun a few months ago.
"Leave that for us please," the teacher said. It was.
(PHOTOS: Syria's Year of Chaos and Photos of a Slow-Motion War)
"My son slept here," Abu Ghaybar said, standing in his only child's room. He spotted a blue tricycle atop a small four-door pine dresser. "My son keeps saying baba, are the free army playing with my toys?" (The rebels had their own toys in the room, including a BKC machine gun in one corner.)
Abu Ghaybar moved into the living room, unplugging the TV and removing a few colored pencils from a drawer in the TV cabinet. He gathered up family photos, including a baby picture of his now five-year-old son. He pointed to a bare wall with two nails protruding from it. "My family portraits were here, where are they?" he asked.
"We burnt them," said one of the dozen or so rebels in the room. "You know, if we come into a house and there are pictures of uncovered women we burn them."
Abu Ghaybar didn't respond. He just stood there for a moment. He moved into the corridor, but his mood had clearly changed. "You could drink (alcohol) here, there were prostitutes, everything," he whispered to me. With tears welling in his eyes, he turned to the teacher: "Do you think I am happy living in somebody else's home?" he said. The teacher responded, "We have families, we have honor, we understand. My family had to flee too."
Some 35 minutes after he had entered his home, Abu Ghaybar was on his way out, having loaded up all that he could carry into a small white Suzuki pick-up truck. "Well, it looks like we need a new place now," one of the rebels said. "We don't have a TV any more, what are we going to do for entertainment?"
The others laughed but the fact is, in Bustan al-Basha, as in many other frontline neighborhoods in Aleppo, the deep stalemate led many of the rebels to say they are bored. The fight in these areas has morphed into a war of the snipers, with fewer opportunities to engage the enemy.
(MORE: How the Saudis and Qataris are arming Syria's rebellion)
But that doesn't mean the danger isn't there. Crossing the length of Rawand Street involves running a gauntlet of sniper fire. Blue-and-white canvas curtains have been strung up at several intersections along the street, while bullet-riddled school buses have been dragged across other junctions in a bid to block theview of the regime's sharpshooters. Rebel snipers are always on the lookout for new positions to establish.
They have punched holes through thick apartment walls, creating maze-like safe passages they traverse in the dark. They shout "Allah Akbar" as they approach the holes, lest one of their comrades mistake them for the enemy and open fire. The two sides are so close to each other that it's a possibility.
Some rebels are clearly growing impatient, itching to move to other more active fronts in other areas. Others reflect on why their push has stalled. "It wasn't the time to enter Aleppo, honestly," says Abu Sadek. "I'm not saying this with regret, it was a battle that had to happen, Jihad for the sake of God, but the lack of coordination between thebrigades hurt us. we weren't ready for it." Liwa Suqoor al-Sha'ba says it's planning a major push in the next week or so to try and break the stalemate.
The group is an Islamist brigade under the loose umbrella of the Free Syrian Army. The other two rebel units in the neighborhood are Liwa al-Fateh, which part of the FSA but is not as religiously conservative; and Ahrar al-Sham, a nationwide mini-army of adherents of the conservative Salafi interpretation of Sunni Islam. Ahrar al-Sham is not part of the FSA.
Ahrar al-Sham and Liwa Suqoor al-Sha'ba partly blame Liwa al-Fateh for the rebels' misfortune. They look derisively at the group, not because of its weak Islamist credentials, but because it has allegedly been looting homes and harassing citizens. It mans a checkpoint that stops cars coming from the adjacent Sheikh Maksoud neighborhood. "Look at those shabiha," says a member of Suqoor al-Sha'ba, using the term for the marauding paramilitary gangs of thugs associated with the regime. Abu Tayeb, a member of Liwa al-Fateh at the checkpoint concedes without prompting that "our reputation isn't good." Still, he says, "this is war, and things happen in war. I'm still proud to be a part of this group.
(MORE: The Anti-Assad Offensive: Can the West Oust Syria's Strongman?)
Other rebels say it's that kind of attitude that has stalled their push into the city, just as much as the lack of heavy weapons and regular resupply of ammunition. Any insurgency needs the support of the local population, and looting homes andharassing citizens obviously doesn't help. "The problem is how can you hold a man with a gun accountable?" says Khaled, a second-year history student at Aleppo university who now totes a Kalashnikov. "You must raise your gun against him. It isn't the time for this now, we don't want to open another front among ourselves. We can't afford to do this now."
The way forward, according to the two Islamist groups, is to become more religious,more like the extremist Jabhat al-Nusra units that operate in other parts of Aleppo and across Syria. "You have seen the destruction to homes, and the looting that is happening. How are we supposed to win this fight when some people are stealing, how will we win if the boots we are wearing are stolen?" says Abu Sadek. "How will God make us victorious? He won't. We don't have the power of weapons, so we must return to God to win this fight."
These rebels speak admirably of Jabhat al-Nusra, of their fearlessness on the battlefield which they say stems from their strong faith. Many say they aspire to either join them, or become more like them. Toward that end, a significant number of Suqoor al-Sha'ba fighters in Aleppo have taken to wearing black shalwar kameezes and black headdresses. "Yes, this is Pakistani but they are strong mujahedin (holy warriors)," Ammar, a young fighter says, referring to his dress. "We are an Islamic brigade, we take inspiration from them," he adds, "besides, it's really comfortable, it's good for fighting in." Others say they have discarded their mismatched military uniforms in favor of the Islamic dress because they believe it is similar to that worn by the Sahaba (companions of the Prophet Muhammad), not because it is from the Subcontinent.
"Faith," says one of the rebels "Faith will make us victorious, not weapons or ammunition or large numbers of people." The problem is, in cosmopolitan Aleppoand Syria at largea religious solution may be part of the problem. On a recent night in one unit's headquarters here, fighters pealed with laughter when they recalled an encounter between a member of Jabhat al-Nusra operating in Aleppo and a secular FSA commander. The pair were in a meeting when a mortar landed nearby. The FSA commander jumped up to leave, according to several men who were present in the meeting. The Jabhat fighter grabbed his companion's knee, saying excitedly. "Heaven awaits." "Go by yourself," came the reply.



Read more: http://world.time.com/2012/11/14/aleppos-deadly-stalemate-a-visit-to-syrias-divided-metropolis/#ixzz2Gxgen69o

[Magda Hassan]

Death Squads in Iraq and Syria. The Historical Roots of US-NATO's Covert War on Syria

Image: El Salvador Death squads
The recruitment of death squads is part of a well established US military-intelligence agenda. There is a long and gruesome US history of covert funding and support of terror brigades and targeted assassinations going back to the Vietnam war.

As government forces continue to confront the self-proclaimed "Free Syrian Army" (FSA), the historical roots of the West's covert war on Syria which has resulted in countless atrocities must be fully revealed.
From the outset in March 2011, the US and its allies have supported the formation of death squads and the incursion of terrorist brigades in a carefully planned undertaking.

The recruitment and training of terror brigades in both Iraq and Syria was modeled on the "Salvador Option", a "terrorist model" of mass killings by US sponsored death squads in Central America. It was first applied in El Salvador, in the heyday of resistance against the military dictatorship, resulting in an estimated 75,000 deaths.
The formation of death squads in Syria builds upon the history and experience of US sponsored terror brigades in Iraq, under the Pentagon's "counterinsurgency" program.

The Establishment of Death Squads in Iraq



US sponsored death squads were recruited in Iraq starting in 2004-2005 in an initiative launched under the helm of the US AmbassadorJohn Negroponte, [image: right] who was dispatched to Baghdad by the US State Department in June 2004.
Negroponte was the "man for the job". As US Ambassador to Honduras from 1981 to 1985. Negroponte played a key role in supporting and supervising the Nicaraguan Contras based in Honduras as well as overseeing the activities of the Honduran military death squads.

"Under the rule of General Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, Honduras's military government was both a close ally of the Reagan administration and was "disappearing" dozens of political opponents in classic death squad fashion."

In January 2005, the Pentagon, confirmed that it was considering:

[B]" forming hit squads of Kurdish and Shia fighters to target leaders of the Iraqi insurgency [Resistance] in a strategic shift borrowed from the American struggle against left-wing guerrillas in Central America 20 years ago".[/B]
Under the so-called "El Salvador option", [B]Iraqi and American forces would be sent to kill or kidnap insurgency leaders, even in Syria, where some are thought to shelter. …
[/B]
Hit squads would be controversial and would probably be kept secret.
The experience of the so-called "death squads" in Central America remains raw for many even now and helped to sully the image of the United States in the region.
Then, the Reagan Administration funded and trained teams of nationalist forces to neutralise Salvadorean rebel leaders and sympathisers. …
John Negroponte, the US Ambassador in Baghdad, had a front-row seat at the time as Ambassador to Honduras from 1981-85.
Death squads were a brutal feature of Latin American politics of the time. …
In the early 1980s President Reagan's Administration funded and helped to train Nicaraguan contras based in Honduras with the aim of ousting Nicaragua's Sandinista regime. [B]The Contras were equipped using money from illegal American arms sales to Iran, a scandal that could have toppled Mr Reagan.[/B]
[B]The thrust of the Pentagon proposal in Iraq, … is to follow that model …[/B]
[B]It is unclear whether the main aim of the missions would be to assassinate the rebels or kidnap them and take them away for interrogation. Any mission in Syria would probably be undertaken by US Special Forces.[/B]
Nor is it clear who would take responsibility for such a programme the Pentagon or the Central Intelligence Agency. Such covert operations have traditionally been run by the CIA at arm's length from the administration in power, giving US officials the ability to deny knowledge of it. (El Salvador-style death squads' to be deployed by US against Iraq militants Times Online, January 10, 2005, emphasis added)

While the stated objective of the "Iraq Salvador Option" was to "take out the insurgency", in practice the US sponsored terror brigades were involved in routine killings of civilians with a view to fomenting sectarian violence. In turn, the CIA and MI6 were overseeing "Al Qaeda in Iraq" units involved in targeted assassinations directed against the Shiite population. Of significance, the death squads were integrated and advised by undercover US Special Forces.
Robert Stephen Ford subsequently appointed US Ambassador to Syria was part of Negroponte's team in Baghdad in 2004-2005. In January 2004, he was dispatched as U.S. representative to the Shiite city of Najaf which was the stronghold of the Mahdi army, with which he made preliminary contacts.
In January 2005, Robert S. Ford's was appointed Minister Counsellor for Political Affairs at the US Embassy under the helm of Ambassador John Negroponte. He was not only part of the inner team, he was Negroponte's partner in setting up the Salvador Option. Some of the groundwork had been established in Najaf prior to Ford's transfer to Baghdad.



John Negroponte and Robert Stephen Ford were put in charge of recruiting the Iraqi death squads. While Negroponte coordinated the operation from his office at the US Embassy, Robert S. Ford, who was fluent in both Arabic and Turkish, was entrusted with the task of establishing strategic contacts with Shiite and Kurdish militia groups outside the "Green Zone".
Two other embassy officials, namely Henry Ensher(Ford's Deputy) and a younger official in the political section, Jeffrey Beals, played an important role in the team "talking to a range of Iraqis, including extremists". (See The New Yorker, March 26, 2007). Another key individual in Negroponte's team was James Franklin Jeffrey, America's ambassador to Albania (2002-2004). In 2010, Jeffrey was appointed US Ambassador to Iraq (2010-2012).
Negroponte also brought into the team one of his former collaborators Colonel James Steele (ret) from his Honduras heyday:

Under the "Salvador Option," "Negroponte had assistance from his colleague from his days in Central America during the 1980′s, [B]Ret. Col James Steele. Steele, whose title in Baghdad was Counselor for Iraqi Security Forces supervised the selection and training of members of the Badr Organization and Mehdi Army, the two largest Shi'ite militias in Iraq, in order to target the leadership and support networks of a primarily Sunni resistance. Planned or not, these death squads promptly spiralled out of control to become the leading cause of death in Iraq.[/B]
Intentional or not, the scores of tortured, mutilated bodies which turn up on the streets of Baghdad each day are generated by the death squads whose impetus was John Negroponte. And it is this U.S.-backed sectarian violence which largely led to the hell-disaster that Iraq is today. (Dahr Jamail, Managing Escalation: Negroponte and Bush's New Iraq Team,. Antiwar.com, January 7, 2007)

"Colonel Steele was responsible, according to Rep. Dennis Kucinich for implementing "a plan in El Salvador under which tens of thousands Salvadorans "disappeared" or were murdered, including Archbishop Oscar Romero and four American nuns."
Upon his appointment to Baghdad, Colonel Steele was assigned to a counter-insurgency unit known as the "Special Police Commando" under the Iraqi Interior Ministry" (See ACN, Havana, June 14, 2006)
Reports confirm that "the US military turned over many prisoners to the Wolf Brigade, the feared 2nd battalion of the interior ministry's special commandos" which so happened to be under supervision of Colonel Steele:
"US soldiers, US advisers, were standing aside and doing nothing," while members of the Wolf Brigade beat and tortured prisoners. The interior ministry commandos took over the public library in Samarra, and turned it into a detention centre, he said. An interview conducted by Maass in 2005 at the improvised prison, accompanied by the Wolf Brigade's US military adviser, Col James Steele, had been interrupted by the terrified screams of a prisoner outside, he said. Steele was reportedly previously employed as an adviser to help crush an insurgency in El Salvador." (Ibid)
Another notorious figure who played a role in Iraq's counter-insurgency program was Former New York Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik [image: Bernie Kerik in Baghdad Police Academy with body guards] who in 2007 was indicted in federal court on 16 felony charges.



Kerik had been appointed by the Bush administration at the outset of the occupation in 2003 to assist in the organization and training of the Iraqi Police force. During his short stint in 2003, Bernie Kerik who took on the position of interim Minister of the Interior worked towards organizing terror units within the Iraqi Police force: "Dispatched to Iraq to whip Iraqi security forces into shape, Kerik dubbed himself the "interim interior minister of Iraq." British police advisors called him the "Baghdad terminator," (Salon, December 9, 2004)
Under Negroponte's helm at the US Embassy in Baghdad, a wave of covert civilian killings and targeted assassinations had been unleashed. Engineers, medical doctors, scientists and intellectuals were also targeted.
Author and geopolitical analyst Max Fuller has documented in detail the atrocities committed under the US sponsored counterinsurgency program.
The appearance of death squads was first highlighted in May this year [2005], …dozens of bodies were found casually disposed … in vacant areas around Baghdad. All of the victims had been handcuffed, blindfolded and shot in the head and many of them also showed signs of having been brutally tortured. …
The evidence was sufficiently compelling for the Association of Muslim Scholars (AMS), a leading Sunni organisation, to issue public statements in which they accused the security forces attached to the Ministry of the Interior as well as the Badr Brigade, the former armed wing of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), of being behind the killings. They also accused the Ministry of the Interior of conducting state terrorism (Financial Times).
The Police Commandos as well as the Wolf Brigade were overseen by the US counterinsurgency program in the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior:

[B]The Police Commandos were formed under the experienced tutelage and oversight of veteran US counterinsurgency fighters, and from the outset conducted joint-force operations with elite and highly secretive US special-forces units (Reuters, National Review Online).[/B]
…[B]A key figure in the development of the Special Police Commandos was James Steele, a former US Army special forces operative who cut his teeth in Vietnam before moving on to direct the US military mission in El Salvador at the height of that country's civil war. …[/B]
Another US contributor was the same [B]Steven Casteel who as the most senior US advisor within the Interior Ministry brushed off serious and well-substantiated accusations of appalling human right violations as rumor and innuendo'. Like Steele, Casteel gained considerable experience in Latin America, in his case participating in the hunt for the cocaine baron Pablo Escobar in Colombia's Drugs Wars of the 1990s …[/B]
Casteel's background is significant because this kind of intelligence-gathering support role and the production of death lists are characteristic of US involvement in counterinsurgency programs and constitute the underlying thread in what can appear to be random, disjointed killing sprees.
Such [B]centrally planned genocides are entirely consistent with what is taking place in Iraq today [2005] …It is also consistent with what little we know about the Special Police Commandos, which was tailored to provide the Interior Ministry with a special-forces strike capability (US Department of Defense). In keeping with such a role, the Police Commando headquarters has become the hub of a nationwide command, control, communications, computer and intelligence operations centre, courtesy of the US. (Max Fuller, op cit)[/B]

This initial groundwork established under Negroponte in 2005 was implemented under his successor Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad. Robert Stephen Ford ensured the continuity of the project prior to his appointment as US Ambassador to Algeria in 2006, as well as upon his return to Baghdad as Deputy Chief of Mission in 2008.
Operation Syrian Contras: "Learning from the Iraqi Experience"
The gruesome Iraqi version of the "Salvador Option" under the helm of Ambassador John Negroponte has served as a "role m0del" for setting up the "Free Syrian Army" Contras. Robert Stephen Ford was, no doubt, involved in the implementation of the Syrian Contras project, following his reassignment to Baghdad as Deputy Head of Mission in 2008.
The objective in Syria was to create factional divisions between Sunni, Alawite, Shiite, Kurds, Druze and Christians. While the Syrian context is entirely different to that of Iraq, there are striking similarities with regard to the procedures whereby the killings and atrocities were conducted.
A report published by Der Spiegel pertaining to atrocities committed in the Syrian city of Homs confirms an organized sectarian process of mass-murder and extra-judicial killings comparable to that conducted by the US sponsored death squads in Iraq.
People in Homs were routinely categorized as "prisoners" (Shia, Alawite) and "traitors". The "traitors" are Sunni civilians within the rebel occupied urban area, who express their disagreement or opposition to the rule of terror of the Free Syrian Army (FSA):

[B]"Since last summer [2011], we have executed slightly fewer than 150 men, which represents about 20 percent of our prisoners," says Abu Rami. … But the executioners of Homs have been busier with traitors within their own ranks than with prisoners of war. "If we catch a Sunni spying, or if a citizen betrays the revolution, we make it quick," says the fighter. According to Abu Rami, Hussein's burial brigade has put between 200 and 250 traitors to death since the beginning of the uprising." (Der Spiegel, March 30, 2012)[/B]

The project required an initial program of recruitment and training of mercenaries. Death squads including Lebanese and Jordanian Salafist units entered Syria's southern border with Jordan in mid-March 2011. Much of the groundwork was already in place prior to Robert Stephen Ford's arrival in Damascus in January 2011.


Ambassador Ford in Hama in early July 2011

Ford's appointment as Ambassador to Syria was announced in early 2010. Diplomatic relations had been cut in 2005 following the Rafick Hariri assassination, which Washington blamed on Syria. Ford arrived in Damascus barely two months before the onset of the insurgency.
The Free Syrian Army (FSA)



Washington and its allies replicated in Syria the essential features of the "Iraq Salvador Option", leading to the creation of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and its various terrorist factions including the Al Qaeda affiliated Al Nusra brigades.
While the creation of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) was announced in June 2011, the recruitment and training of foreign mercenaries was initiated at a much an earlier period.
In many regards, the Free Syrian Army is a smokescreen. It is upheld by the Western media as a bona fide military entity established as a result of mass defections from government forces. The number of defectors, however, was neither significant nor sufficient to establish a coherent military structure with command and control functions.
The FSA is not a professional military entity, rather it is a loose network of separate terrorist brigades, which in turn are made up of numerous paramilitary cells operating in different parts of the country.
Each of these terrorist organizations operates independently. The FSA does not effectively exercise command and control functions including liaison with these diverse paramilitary entities. The latter are controlled by US-NATO sponsored special forces and intelligence operatives which are embedded within the ranks of selected terrorist formations.
These (highly trained) Special forces on the ground (many of whom are employees of private security companies) are routinely in contact with US-NATO and allied military/intelligence command units. These embedded Special Forces are, no doubt, also involved in the carefully planned bomb attacks directed against government buildings, military compounds, etc.
The death squads are mercenaries trained and recruited by the US, NATO, and its Persian Gulf GCC allies. They are overseen by allied special forces (including British SAS and French Parachutistes), and private security companies on contract to NATO and the Pentagon. In this regard, reports confirm the arrest by the Syrian government of some 200-300 private security company employees who had integrated rebel ranks.
The Jabhat Al Nusra Front



The Al Nusra Front which is said to be affiliated to Al Qaeda is described as the most effective "opposition" rebel fighting group, responsible for several of the high profile bomb attacks. Portrayed as an enemy of America (on the State Department list of terrorist organizations), Al Nusra operations bear the fingerprints of US paramilitary training and terror tactics. The atrocities committed against civilians by Al Nusra are similar to those undertaken by the US sponsored death squads in Iraq.
In the words of Al Nusra leader Abu Adnan in Aleppo: "Jabhat al-Nusra does count Syrian veterans of the Iraq war among its numbers, men who bring expertise especially the manufacture of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) to the front in Syria."
As in Iraq, factional violence and ethnic cleansing were actively promoted. In Syria, the Alawite, Shiite and Christian communities have been the target of the US-NATO sponsored death squads. The Alawite and the Christian community are the main targets of the assassination program.

Christians in Aleppo are victims of death and destruction due to the fighting which for months, has been affecting the city. The Christian neighborhoods, in recent times, have been hit by rebel forces fighting against the regular army and this has caused an exodus of civilians.
Some groups in the rugged opposition, where there are also jiahadist groups, "fire on Christian houses and buildings, to force occupants to escape and then take possession [ethnic cleansing] (Agenzia Fides. Vatican News, October 19, 2012)
"The Sunni Salafist militants says the Bishop continue to commit crimes against civilians, or to recruit fighters with force. The fanatical Sunni extremists are fighting a holy war proudly, especially against the Alawites. When terrorists seek to control the religious identity of a suspect, they ask him to cite the genealogies dating back to Moses. And they ask to recite a prayer that the Alawites removed. The Alawites have no chance to get out alive." (PA) (Agenzia Fides 04/06/2012)

Reports confirm the influx of Salafist and Al Qaeda affiliated death squads as well as brigades under the auspices of the Muslim Brotherhood into Syria from the inception of the insurgency in March 2011.
Moreover, reminiscent of the enlistment of the Mujahideen to wage the CIA's jihad (holy war) in the heyday of the Soviet-Afghan war, NATO and the Turkish High command, according to Israeli intelligence sources, had initiated"

"a campaign to enlist thousands of Muslim volunteers in Middle East countries and the Muslim world to fight alongside the Syrian rebels. The Turkish army would house these volunteers, train them and secure their passage into Syria. (DEBKAfile, NATO to give rebels anti-tank weapons, August 14, 2011).

Private Security Companies and the Recruitment of Mercenaries



According to reports, private security companies operating out of Gulf States are involved in the recruiting and training of mercenaries.
Although not specifically earmarked for the recruitment of mercenaries directed against Syria, reports point to the creation of training camps in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
In Zayed Military City (UAE), "a secret army is in the making" operated by Xe Services, formerly Blackwater. The UAE deal to establish a military camp for the training of mercenaries was signed in July 2010, nine months before the onslaught of the wars in Libya and Syria.
In recent developments, security companies on contract to NATO and the Pentagon are involved in training "opposition" death squads in the use of chemical weapons:

[B]"The United States and some European allies are using defense contractors to train Syrian rebels on how to secure chemical weapons stockpiles in Syria, a senior U.S. official and several senior diplomats told CNN Sunday. ( CNN Report,December 9, 2012)[/B]

The names of the companies involved were not revealed.
Behind Closed Doors at the US State Department
Robert Stephen Ford was part of a small team at the US State Department team which oversaw the recruitment and training of terrorist brigades, together with Derek Chollet and Frederic C. Hof, a former business partner of Richard Armitage, who served as Washington's "special coordinator on Syria". Derek Chollet has recently been appointed to the position of Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs (ISA).
This team operated under the helm of (former) Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern AffairsJeffrey Feltman.
Feltman's team was in close liaison with the process of recruitment and training of mercenaries out of Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Libya (courtesy of the post-Gaddafi regime, which dispatched six hundred Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) troops to Syria, via Turkey in the months following the September 2011 collapse of the Gaddafi government).
Assistant Secretary of State Feltman was in contact with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal, and Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim. He was also in charge of a Doha-based office for "special security coordination" pertaining to Syria, which included representatives from Western and GCC intelligence agencies well as a representative from Libya. Prince Bandar bin Sultan. a prominent and controversial member of Saudi intelligence was part of this group. (See Press Tv, May 12, 2012).



In June 2012, Jeffrey Feltman (image: Left) was appointed UN Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, a strategic position which, in practice, consists in setting the UN agenda (on behalf of Washington) on issues pertaining to "Conflict Resolution" in various "political hot spots" around the world (including Somalia, Lebanon, Libya, Syria, Yemen and Mali). In a bitter irony, the countries for UN "conflict resolution" are those which are the target of US covert operations.
In liaison with the US State Department, NATO and his GCC handlers in Doha and Riyadh, Feltman is Washington's man behind UN special envoy Lakhdar Brahmi's "Peace Proposal".
Meanwhile, while paying lip service to the UN Peace initiative, the US and NATO have speeded up the process of recruitment and training of mercenaries in response to the heavy casualties incurred by "opposition" rebel forces.
The US proposed "end game" in Syria is not regime change, but the destruction of Syria as a Nation State.
The deployment of "opposition" death squads with a mandate to kill civilians is part of this criminal undertaking. Terrorism with a Human Face is upheld by the United Nations Human rights Council. The atrocities committed by the US-NATo death squads is casually blamed on the government.
Washington's "unspeakable objective" consists in the breaking up of Syria as a sovereign nation along ethnic and religious lines into several separate and "independent" political entities.

Prof. Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal and Editor of the globalresearch.ca website. He is the author of The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order (2003) and America's "War on Terrorism"(2005). His most recent book is entitled Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War (2011). He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His writings have been published in more than twenty languages.
http://www.4thmedia.org/2013/01/05/terro...th-squads/

[Magda Hassan]

BRITAM DEFENCE HACKED, CONFIDENTIAL DOCUMENTS LEAKED, SITE OFFLINE!
...
Email between David Goulding who is the Business Development Director of BRITAM and Philip regarding a new offer about an operation in Syria.

"
Phil

We've got a new offer. It's about Syria again. Qataris propose an attractive deal and swear that the idea is approved by Washington.
We'll have to deliver a CW to Homs, a Soviet origin g-shell from Libya similar to those that Assad should have.
They want us to deploy our Ukrainian personnel that should speak Russian and make a video record.
Frankly, I don't think it's a good idea but the sums proposed are enormous. Your opinion?

Kind regards

David
"
Note "CW"--> Chemical Weapons

http://www.cyberwarnews.info/reports/a-l...eak-files/

http://www.cyberwarnews.info/2013/01/24/...ow=gallery

[Bill Kelly]

BRITAM DEFENCE HACKED, CONFIDENTIAL DOCUMENTS LEAKED, SITE OFFLINE!
...
Email between David Goulding who is the Business Development Director of BRITAM and Philip regarding a new offer about an operation in Syria.

"
Phil

We've got a new offer. It's about Syria again. Qataris propose an attractive deal and swear that the idea is approved by Washington.
We'll have to deliver a CW to Homs, a Soviet origin g-shell from Libya similar to those that Assad should have.
They want us to deploy our Ukrainian personnel that should speak Russian and make a video record.
Frankly, I don't think it's a good idea but the sums proposed are enormous. Your opinion?

Kind regards

David
"
Note "CW"--> Chemical Weapons

http://www.cyberwarnews.info/reports/a-l...eak-files/

http://www.cyberwarnews.info/2013/01/24/...ow=gallery

They don't need a fake provocation or reason to go into Syria. There's a very good reason why they - NATO or Ruskies haven't gone in full force on either side.

bk