Tag: Aleppo

fourteen months ago, I said that Aleppo would very shortly fall. Eight months ago I said that it had fallen for certain values of fallen, and its fall indicates that asymmetric warfare only works when the stronger side is fighting with one hand tied behind its back – usually tied by the State Department. My prolific commenter B complained that Aleppo had not actually fallen yet, therefore this failed to …

The US is theoretically aiding the “Moderate Muslims”, the free Syrian Army, the FSA, which theoretically controls a small and rapidly shrinking patch of Aleppo. In actual practice, those that control Aleppo will murder any male non sunni Muslim on sight, regardless of age, which makes them less moderate than Islamic State. The US is, as Putin observes, aiding terrorists. Stuart Ramsay was in Aleppo when those moderate Muslims of …

Rebel held Aleppo is currently entirely surrounded, and is about fourteen kilometers by four kilometers, meaning every inch of it is within mortar range of Assad’s troops.  It will fall shortly unless there is a rescue mission from outside to relieve the siege.  There have been rescue missions before, each of which ever more blatantly involves some new foreign power directly intervening in Syria ever more directly against the legitimate …

In war, the stronger party prevails. Asymmetric warfare only works when the weaker party has political protection.  Perhaps like the Taliban, the weaker party is fighting soldiers required to operate as heavily armed nursemaids.  Perhaps like Mao after the long march or the communists in Greece, the weaker party is launching raids from across a border that the stronger party is reluctant to cross. The usual scenario where asymmetric warfare …

Russia informed the US approximately when and where Russia would be bombing terrorists, as part of their agreement to avoid incidents over Syria that might lead to World War III. According to Russia’s account, shortly before the pre-announced Russian bombing near the border, Turkey put up two F16s which loitered near the border, awaiting the bombing run near the border. When the bombing began, one of the Turkish F16s crossed …

Where you have a substantial Islamic minority, the only stable solution is for Islam to rule or to be violently and brutally crushed. Nothing in between works, despite over a thousand years of governments, peoples, cultures, and religions trying to find something in between, and endlessly failing. Where you have several different substantial Islamic factions in a single country, the only solution is a brutal dictatorship to keep the Islamics …