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Written by Ahmed Adel, Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.
Ukraine’s military intelligence agency developed plans to conduct covert attacks on Russian forces in Syria using Kurdish help, according to a document leaked to a Discord chatroom and published by the Washington Post. Although Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky halted the planning in December, the leaked document is based on intelligence gathered as of January 23. It describes how the planning progressed and how such a campaign could proceed if the Ukrainian president decides to activate it.
The Ukrainian Defence Ministry’s military intelligence service has plans for deniable attacks to avoid implicating Kiev and to divert Russian resources from Ukraine to Syria. The document details an “alternative analysis” of potential targets and the “likelihood of escalation” from Moscow “if Kyiv decided to advance the plan.”
Despite this revelation, Maj. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, the chief of Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence, declined to comment, suggesting that Ukrainian authorities are trying to keep this leak under wraps.
According to the document, Ukrainian military intelligence officers favoured striking Russian forces using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and starting “small,” or possibly limiting their strikes only to Wagner. The document also mulled whether to train operatives of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) to conduct “unspecified ‘direct action’ activities along with UAV attacks” against Russian forces.
Demonstrating the Kurd’s consistent duplicitous position, the SDF reportedly offered support for Ukrainian operations so long as Russian positions in Kurdish areas were not targeted and for training, air defence systems and a guarantee that its role would be kept secret. However, its role has been exposed, even if SDF spokesperson Farhad Shami denies the document, describing it as “not real” and claiming that “our forces have never been a side in the Russian-Ukrainian war.”
Given that the Kurds were critical for the execution of the plan, Turkey suggested that Ukraine stage its attacks from Kurdish areas instead of those held by Turkish-backed jihadist groups in north and northwest Syria so that Ankara could “avoid potential blowback.”
The Turkish Foreign Ministry and embassy in the United States did not return requests for comment, The Washington Post reported. The outlet also cited a former US official, who worked in the region and spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the intelligence, as saying that “while it is not clear how much Ankara knew about Kyiv’s plan, having Ukraine help arm its enemy may not have been intolerable if Turkey thought it might draw a violent response from Moscow.
“Turkey’s goal in the region is to eliminate the military capability and leadership of the SDF,” the former official said. “If Turkey were to be greeted with such a plan, it would be in their interest to bait the Ukraine-SDF alliance into drawing the wrath of Russia.”
In addition to the SDF and Turkey being unwilling to allow strikes against Russian forces on territory they control, Ukrainian military intelligence officers identified “issues with intra-Kurdish border controls and establishing a base of operations.”
Nonetheless, on December 29, the intelligence officers found out that Zelensky had halted their planning for unclear reasons, but the document assesses that it could have been for a variety of reasons, such as US pressure, Ukraine’s limited supply of drones or doubts about whether the attacks could succeed.
Just as importantly, the document highlights that such an audacious attack by Ukraine could “incur a Russian response targeting US interests in the region if support for an operation is attributed to the United States.”
Although the Russian military and Wagner operate internationally, Ukraine selected Syria as it “provides deniability options.” The document states Ukraine could attack Russian positions previously struck by Syrian rebels, launch attacks from rebel or even government-held areas, and attribute attacks to “front, defunct or active nonstate groups.”
The leaked assessment acknowledges the risk that Russia could “more aggressively” police Syrian airspace or move air defence weapons, which would “complicate” US interests in eastern Syria, if such an attack occurred.
Effectively, the planned attack had to be reined in. This was because it was not only audacious and would have no bearing on the conflict in Ukraine, but would ultimately weaken US interests in Syria as their Kurdish assets would be quickly neutralised for participating in such aggression. If successfully carried out, it would have served as a morale boost for Ukraine and the West; in practice, the long-term effects towards its war effort would be negative.
For this reason, the plan had to be scrapped. Still, it does demonstrate the desperateness of the Kiev regime since its intelligence agents are wasting time and resources in formulating plans that have little prospect of success or changing the course of the war.
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pido a los lectores máximo respeto a zelenski por muy homosexual que sea.
the zionist enslaved, filthy secessionist, pkk-ypg-sdf kurdish terrorists know better than to to mess with wagner. if they do they will face utter and total destruction. viva prigozhin. viva wagner. viva bashar hafez al-assad.
‘you’ believe southfront and merdolfgan? poor beast! shitturks are the very ogres to be targeted by putin’s wrath!
god bless the axis of resistance!
they won’t do it. only hts will do such thing.
ukraine : can we borrow some of your local terrorists to bomb russians in syria ?
turkey : only the ones we labels as terrorists. akp have an election to win : here’s pkk phone number :)
so just to make things clear.
the country whose army is basically controlled and commanded by us and uk cause it can’t do it on it’s own would have come up with a plan to use other us assets to attack russia.
i guess thats just like with north stream. the us does it and just needs someone else to blame.
i see only a us plan to use kurds to attack russians and to blame it on kurds and ukrainians if things get to hot.
this won’t be productive because the sdf “kurds” will have 4 enemies like turkish, syrian, iraqi and iranian forces against them and they would be a thing of the past soon, like the tplf in ethiopia.
najvyšší čas poriadne vyzbrojiť sýrsku armádu a urobiť poriadok z okupačnými vojskami usa v sýrii!!! a to zlikvidovať ich a to okamžite!!!
the idea of the war going global so that russia gets to sink ukrainian ships, destroy ukrainian aircraft and kill ukrainian officials across the coasts of nato and in international waters and airspace is pretty good
it also shows how terrorists in syria and nazis in ukraine are parts of the same army. created by us and nato, supplied by the us and nato, and trained by the us and nato. maybe that is why their proxies aren’t fairing very well in either place.
desperateness is incorrect, it is said as desperation.
you are welcome, for your english lesson.
god is great, he has won lets claim our victory in prayer.
the funny part is people believing ‘the plan was stopped’ before executed to fruition. hilarious, thinking that these things weren’t going on in the past or continuing into the future. sure, logistics plays a part, but to think that yukropsians weren’t operating inside syria is silly beyond peradventure. then again, many people don’t know the kkk were best friends with caucasus jihadists, aka isil.