Government forces, led by the Syrian Army Tiger Forces, have been advancing towards the province of Raqqah after the liberation of the strategic Jirah Military Airbase in the province of Aleppo.
Last night, the Tiger Forces retook the Jirah Military Airbase after few days of heavy clashes with ISIS terrorists. On Saturday, government troops continued their operations against ISIS south of the airbase advancing along the road to the ISIS self-proclaimed capital of Raqqah.
The town of Maskaneh will be the next major target of the government forces advance in the province of Aleppo. If the town is liberated, ISIS will have no strongholds in the southeastern part of the province of Aleppo and will be pushed to withdraw from the area.
Click to see the full-size map
Well done SAA. Syrian government should call all men and women to join the SAA forces and organize themselves to protect their own cities in their own regions. They would be provided proper military training.
Exactly! Seasoned soldier should be on the front line, internal checkpoints should be maintained by local recruits. Now, since the conditions seem right to expand territorial control, there should be a massive recruitment for this purpose.
russia could do that by deploying 15 thousand troups stationed in key positions
“Protect their own cities”
This is why Syria is a shambolic nation, they have no sense of national identity nor cohesion, they literally identify themselves by sectarian and local means.
A real nation at a time like this would have hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people, flocking to the army, not have only about 80,000 troops that are nearly impossible to replenish due to cowardice and 100-150,000 fighting under NDF or tribal groups, it’s a joke. And this is without even talking about how, by Southfront’s own numbers, the Syrian forces outnumber their enemies by at least 3 to 1!
The SAA had 300k soldiers before the war. Also, not many people dare to fight against terrorists as they are extremely brutal. It’s not as easy fighting against foreign countries such as let’s say the US where if they capture u, you would become a prisoner. People are afraid. Many people have joined the SAA since the war, many militias but the majority are scared to fight because it usually results in death. And regarding the outnumbering, everything isn´t about soldiers. There are more than 100k terrorists fighting in Syria. They all possess advanced equipment to defend against tanks and air support. The SAA holds the most important strongholds. The goverment forces are not well trained and we saw that before russia intervened. The jihadis are well trained and armed to the roof.
And then the war happened, and few bothered signing up. Like I said, even now they have massive numbers but not in the army.
“Also, not many people dare to fight against terrorists as they are extremely brutal”
Are you serious? Your country gets invaded and you don’t fight back and defend your people because you’re scared?? You just let them blow you up and take over your home?
Militias, yes, and this is WRONG, like I said. No national loyalty at all.
100,000 at the most, probably not even that many. And as I said, Syrian forces outnumber them 3 to 1. Air support is still almost entirely effective though! We’re talking well over 99% success rates.
How can an army be poorly trained? It’s mostly because of a total lack of morale due to the lack of national pride. That’s why they retreat at the sight of an outnumbered enemy, because they have little loyalty to their brothers because they’re probably not of the same denomination as them! Because they don’t care about defending the lives of those in regions far away from their homes. If you outnumber an enemy and have air support, easy success should be guaranteed.
If you’re anti Syria then just shut the fuck up and get the fuck away from this website. Spew that anti Syria rhetoric of yours somewhere in Saudi Isrelia where they love it.
Right, so if you complain at all then you’re a fucking terrorist, go eat shit Samuel.
I totally disagree with you here.
That is, unless SF states that it is a partisan SAA website and only Assadists are welcome here.
As they, as far as I know, did not, and say they are impartial (with a pro Russia tendency in my view) a counterweight against mindless pro Assadism is very usefull.
I find A7 to be rational and thoughtfull. His comments about the SAA are valid, even if you do not like it.
I appreciate that Dutch; Southfront isn’t like Masdar, which is mindlessly Assadist to the point of the extreme aggression that the likes of Samuel Boas demonstrate, we can actually have reasonable discussions on SF threads. And I like Assad, I want the SAA to win! But apparently beyond that, mentioning their shortcomings and how they could improve and so on, that’s supposedly unacceptable, it’s ridiculous. I don’t know where these people come from, but being Western I grew up around the principle of freedom of expression, of healthy debate. It makes us smarter and more informed.
shut up, fascist!
Ya, I know what you mean. But don’t let it get to you, we have some pathetic, miserable(are there ever any happy ones?) Jews crawling around posting nonsense here and there.
Hahahaha I know what you are referring to but war doesn´t work like that. When you are fighting terrorists compacted in cities, it´s hard to use air strikes as a method to reinforce outnumbered troops in the area. Also, Yes, syria is multinationality but doesn´t mean people are not loyal. Is loyality to go out and wage war? Some of those fighting in Syria are in fact Syrians. Let’s not forget that. There were 24 million people in Syria, 40% of those are children, incapable of fighting. That leaves 14 million people left. Let’s say 4 million of those are old, handicapped or suffer from diseases that makes them unable to fight. It leaves us with 10 million people capable of fighting. Probably less but let’s assume that. Out of these 10 million, many people have fled the country while they were sieged and threatened by multiple groups, more than 10 million have fled but assuming my calculations, from the 10 million eligible to fight, 5 million stayed. At least 3 million people align themselves with the terrorists and many more live under jihadi controlled areas. Do you see your lack of logic? If your country went to war with ISIS in your country, would you really risk dying and losing your family? Many of these have families they don´t want to leave. Everyone isn’t like Russia, where during ww2, the russians themselves picked up arms to fight the Nazis. This is different as modern age wars are more complicated and we’ve grown to realize that life is more valuable to us than death.
But it’s not just cities, it’s mostly open plains and deserts. There is no valid excuse for their failures.
Loyalty is to go out and defend your nation, on your own soil no less.
59% of Syrians are within fighting age (15-54). Assad controls about 2/3s of the population, maybe more after Aleppo, Damascus gains etc. There are about 14 million people within Syria, so Assad has a total of 9-10 million or so within his territory. So he has up to 6 million people of fighting age that can and should join the army.
100%, absolutely, because the alternative is insanity; if no-one fights because they share your attitude, no-one’s going to stop the enemy! That’s how Aleppo and Damascus were almost lost! It’s either don’t fight and almost certainly die or fight, see your family safe and maybe you’ll survive too. The fact that I have to explain this is unbelievable.
You raise issues which have been raised before. You may want to go to SANA and look up the many interviews (especially those with Russian media) with President Al-Assad as he has been asked and answered this question (why do not more Syrians join the army) more than once.
I would also like to suggest that you may be applying your ethnocentric viewpoint on the Syrian situation. As you have said, the Syrians are more tribal than nationalistic. That is their culture. It is why the only way to end this is for the Syrians to decide what the answers are. Remember, Syria has withstood an enormous pressure from outside sources and is still standing. They are and will do fine. Most likely even better than before, as it has given them a sense of national pride that was not there before.
President Al-Assad was asked if dividing up Syria, (Federalism), was the only/best way to end this insanity. His reply was, look, all these divergent groups have been living together within what is now Syria with few problems for millennia. Therefore he felt there was no reason that Federalism was the answer.
Please keep giving us your viewpoint. I have no problems with them.
I’ve seen them, what they say and what the reality is are two different things. By your own admission, it’s all tribal.
And a tribally divided culture is not a nation, clearly. Syria is only still standing because Russia can’t afford to have that Qatari pipeline bypassing Europe’s need for Russia’s oil/gas and Iran can’t afford to see the Shia Crescent disintegrate; without Russian and Iranian help (air support, funding and troops respectively, whether Hezbollah or other militias), Syria would be screwed, and were before the Russians intervened, at which point they already had Iranian help.
There’s still barely anyone signing up, they need Iran to fund militias and bring in Shia foreigners, where’s this national pride?
Syria hasn’t been a country for even a century. Syria itself is a recent invention, it hasn’t stood the test of time and what time it has lasted for, it’s been under the necessity of a pretty brutal dictatorship (by that I mean more his father than him, still, it’s not a real democracy, and I say this as someone who supports their effort in this war, as that moron Samuel Boas found out; how often do I comment on this site ffs…).
A war on home soil was the first true test of national integrity and its peoples disintegrated. Alawites are motivated by wanting to keep power and not be wiped out, Sunnis stay in the army for the money but hate their Alawite leaders and therefore aren’t disciplined, there’s no national motivation.
Federalism, or at least, giving up the north to the Kurds has to happen, the game has changed and that’s the only way forward; it creates a buffer with Turkey, focuses Turkey’s hatred on them and not Assad anymore plus it makes the Kurds dependent on Assad’s support, so it’s not a true breakaway situation. Syria’s size and population being weakened allow Syria’s enemies to save face and drop out of the war, it’s the only viable solution.
Good of you to say, because having a discussion on Syria can be so difficult (the aforementioned clown Samuel being an example of why).
Gotta love your passion and your response. :-)
This will be just a quick response as I’m about to step out to hear a concert.
Not sure I agree with many of your individual points: nobody signing up today, the Qatari pipeline being the major point you seem to feel it is, etc., but to address the issue of what to do?
How do you take a long standing tribal culture and give it the framework so it can withstand all this craziness push onto it? Is the answer a firm dictatorship, which the West tried in the 50-90s? Don’t think so.
Is it Democracy like the Americans tried in Iraq. Obviously not.
I also disagree with your assessment that the Kurds should be Federalized. They are a unique Marxist/Feminist political culture that would most likely would not make it in a Capitalist world economy. I see that their culture needs to be respected, and that they should be allowed to teach and use their own language, similar to the French in Canada, but it would never work to give them much autonomy. Turkey would never allow it, and they have good reasons to not want it to occur.
No, the 2012 Constitution which was changed to better address the legitimate issues of the opposition, while moving Syria more towards a Democracy, is still not quite there. Russia in their draft proposals to the existing constitution takes it even further toward a true Democracy. But who do they negotiate such changes with?
The armed jihadist must be disarmed or killed as they have no place in Syria or elsewhere. That to me is the dilemma. There are so many of them and with families that to kill them all is going to be a bit weird for everyone to watch.
Got to go, so I’ll get back and write a more coherent answer. :-)
Who’s playing?
What do you suppose are the main reasons for this war if not Sunni domination and the pipeline? Israel’s interventions are paltry compared to Turkey’s, America’s, the Saudis, Qataris etc.
Well then if democracy and a dictatorship don’t work, what’s the only option left? Splitting the country up based upon the sectarian lines that it already operates under.
The Iraqi Kurds are having an independence referendum, there’s not much that Turkey could do at this point. With ISIS getting weakened more by the day with no resupplies available, the Kurds aren’t as liable to be pincered as they used to be, and in a month or two ISIS might lose Raqqa. Turkey are going to have a tough time invading a group backed by the US.
You said that a dictatorship wouldn’t work but you want to force the Kurds under a rule which they oppose?
I say to the Kurds(who are the new darlings of Israel/Jews) that if you don’t like Syria, its government or elected President, simply get out. Move along to another country, like Iraq or Iran or under Turkey’s boot.
Its simple for the Kurds, when you are a guest at someones home, you don’t try to take a part of it and dictate how someone should run their home.
You see, that’s where miserable Jews and Kurds have some traits in common, a wandering people, always have been, always will be. And both want to steal other peoples land, through back-stabbing, dishonesty, violence arrogance and you name the vice.
Both pathetic ventures will end miserably for both the Kurds and Jews of Israel.
Does your small, unsophisticated brain not comprehend that Syria, Iran, Russia and Iraq will not allow Syria to be federalized, or taken over in chunks by some stateless tribal wanderes like the Kurds? Come on. The Arabs of the Levant, Iraq and Iranians will put the Kurds in their place very soon.
Kurds and their despotic cousins , the Jews , will be asked in no uncertain terms to leave the Middle East someday soon, I hope.
How can these fuckin Kurds treat the people who were hospitable to them in their hours of need like shit? Who do they think they are? Kurds are in serious danger of making a bad crucial move. One that they cant undo, or take back. Silly short-sighted fools. Kinda reminds me of you.
You certainly get spirited responses.
“What do you suppose are the main reasons for this war if not Sunni domination and the pipeline? Israel’s interventions are paltry compared to Turkey’s, America’s, the Saudis, Qataris etc.”
The pipeline is not a primary reason for this war. Pipelines in this area are proposed all the time and few have actually been built. President Al-Assad was asked this question to which he replied, No to the pipeline, and then stated the real reason was because SA, etc. wanted him to split from Iran which he wouldn’t do. The Qatar pipeline was a minor element at best back in 2011, but by now is irrelevant. As soon as President Erdogan gave permission to Russia for the Turkish Stream last year, any natural gas pipeline from Qatar was made mute. Europe only needs so much natural gas.
Russia is in Syria to defeat the terrorists and rightfully so so they don’t have to fight them in Russia like they did in Chechnya. They have stated that enumerable times. If it had anything to do with stopping the Qatar pipeline they would have left last year.
While each player had their own reason(s) for wanting President Al-Assad removed, for the Middle Eastern countries (especially Israel) it is to weaken all the Arab countries and reduce any Pan-Arabism. Yes, SA has a Sunni dominance thing going with Iran. For the US it was to support all it’s ME allies including Israel, and for themselves to better surround Russia with radar and missiles. Nobody did anything against Syria without the US’s acknowledgement and support.
The Iraqi Kurds independence referendum does not have much to do with the Syrians as far as I can tell, and Turkey is not opposed to it as they already have a strong economic relationship (transporting oil) with one element of them. The Iraqi Kurds are not homogeneous nor that supportive of each other.
Personally, the Syrian Kurds are not in a powerful position. If the US really wanted to support them long term they would be giving them the needed tanks, armored personnel carriers, and much heavier firepower than that which they have stated they are going to give them. The best they can hope for is more accommodation from Damascus. Syria is not going to be split apart.
As to what form of government Syria is going to have when it’s all done, that is up to the Syrians (those who are not at war with Damascus) to decide. At this point the Syrian government is in the drivers seat as they have shown they can destroy all the various armed groups. Only those with skin in the game who are looking for an accommodation with the existing government are going to be at the final table. The outstanding question is what do you do with those who won’t lay down their arms?
There is a most interesting article on the benefit for pushing for a new United Arab Republic here:
https://sputniknews.com/columnists/201705041053264833-new-united-arab-republic/
Syria is very much interested in pursuing some form of a UAR. You see it in all the SANA articles where the Syrian government meets with various northern African Arab states including Egypt, etc. This is Israel’s worst nightmare but so what. Israel needs to figure out how to live in peace with it’s Arab neighbors or they won’t likely live out the century as a country, and they can go back to Europe and West.
Good talking to you but no, the Qatar pipeline is not an issue.
From my point of view, the only reason of this war and the next one with Iran (whichever be involved) is the destruction of the whole Syria infrastructure as it was the wish of Israel. All the economical advantages of this fact is just a secondary result. The main goal was to eliminate Syria from possible danger to Israel. Next country is Iran, and Russia later on. I guess USA-NATO-Israel idea of creating terrorists to destroy Iran will not work this time, maybe it has to produce a war, say against Saudis or Tukey or USA, let us see what happen. Of course, also depends on what Russia is willing to do, but as we have seen in Syria, Russia will do nothing against Israel or USA.
the game is over:
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/breaking-us-british-forces-enter-southern-syria-rebels/
The Game is very much in play.
If 150 American and British soldiers is all it takes to end the game then it wasn’t much of a game to start with.
I believe the ending for the war has been decided by all the major players and we are simply seeing it unfold before us. I don’t see a partitioning of Syria as neither Syria, Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, nor Russia want it, nor will there be any International law which supports such a partition. That only works with a change in government friendly to the US.
At this point, all the major players (including Turkey) are focused on defeating ISIS. To the degree possible, everyone (including the US) are working together towards this end. We can thank the PMU and Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi who are securing the border between the two countries. That was a game changer as the original American plan under President Obama was to leave western Mosul open and simply push ISIS into Syria. Syria would have had an almost impossible time defending Deir Ezzor if that had occurred.
There is still a lot to unfold. Syria and it’s allies did not pay this much price in blood and treasure to let 150 soldiers take it all away. :-)
Thanks for the reply.
I don’t fundamentally disagree. Maybe some nuances. The USA definitely supports the Israeli positions, but does have its own geopolitical wants/needs as does NATO. Israel wants a weak and divided Arab world (reunited they are back to the 60s when Egypt and Syria almost broke them), the US and NATO wants a weak Russia.
The idea of creating terrorists/fighters for $150/mo/person seemed like a good idea as it worked somewhat in the Russian/Afghan war. For a mere $1 million per year you can hire 550 locals. It costs the US around $1 million per soldier per year currently in Afghanistan. The capital costs (munitions and arms) to fight in Syria probably costs more than the labor costs. It’s a very cheap way to fight a war with little initial downside as there are no body bags or damaged soldiers coming home. The fatal flaw is the US and Allies lost control of their hired soldiers (especially ISIS) and therefore the whole situation. Even if they won militarily the US would still have lost politically. Finally, it was never going to work with Iran, as it is too large of a country.
Finally, don’t sell Russia short. Last year they brought down everything they had and stopped the US from implementing a No-Fly Zone (per Hillary Clinton) which was to stop all Syrian and Russian military air flights. A true game changer. They were willing to go toe-to-toe.
The launch of ground to air missiles against Israel this year was no accident. The Russians are playing the long game here. Their relationship with Israel is somewhat complicated as they have no desire to see Israel fail, but also want to support their long time Arab allies. Tough fence to sit on.
Thanks for the reply.
I was with you right up until the end, we’ll get to that later.
I seem to have implied too much priority over the pipeline being the major cause of the war; breaking up the Shia Crescent and splitting general Arab control is to me the biggest cause but energy did play a part of it too I think, for the West at least. And once they were mired in the conflict, if that was their only objective (it wasn’t but humour me), pulling out and saving face was a problem that didn’t have a real answer. Making an enemy of this Shia Alliance couldn’t follow with allowing them to strengthen.
Having a Kurdish independence referendum across the border is absolutely a big factor here, regardless of the Iraqis’ relationship with Turkey. It emboldens Syrian Kurds and will doubtless occur there too.
I agree that US support for the Kurds is limited in supplies and support against Turkey, the question is how free the north will be after this war. Whether autonomous or independent but backed up by Syria. I’m not sure there’s much of a difference there.
Interesting article but it won’t happen again any time soon. Everyone’s too divided, it would end up like the EU and too many Europeans hate it.
It’s Israel’s neighbours that need to learn to get along with Israel that’s the major problem here. Syria is useful to Iran because Syria stops Hezbollah from being completely isolated. Iran and Hezbollah, with Syria’s complicity, want the total destruction of Israel, and this is why Israel is aggressive in return. If Iran could accept the fact that Israel exists then there might be peace in the region. Israel has persisted and continued to strengthen for all of these years, it’s there to stay and dissolving the country is just not going to happen. The two options for peace are to accept this as I say or keep smuggling arms to Hezbollah which in turn causes Israel to seek to weaken Syria and therefore this supply chain. If Syria wasn’t Iran’s lapdog then Israel would have had little need to intervene, just like they didn’t during Jordan’s internal strife with Palestinians back in the day. Until Muslims accept Israel, the violence won’t end.
We’ll have to agree to disagree on this one. Each to their own. :-) I believe Israel is going to be a loser on this war.
As to the long term viability of Israel, I’m mostly going on both Zbigniew Brzezinski and Henry Kissinger’s stated thoughts on the matter.
Syria, Lebanon, Iran and to some extent Iraq are not tribal, like say, Yemen, SaudiArabia, Libya. Egypt is not, neither is Algeria. Neither is Tunisia.
You say tribalism doesn’t work? Well, the most exclusively tribal country in the world happens to be Israel, with 85% of the Israeli Jews there Khazarian decent.
Your posts still crack me up.
In this you are totally incorrect.
The peoples within Syria have been fighting for milennia, mostly as part of other nations with their scenter outside of Syria.
As for living together, that was only possible because there was an informal federalism. Each group was, fi, autonomous within under Turkish ruse.
Only the arab hegemonism of the last decades has provided the tension that sought its release in the present civil war.
Point seems to be valid, except that was not the reason for the war.
In the end, it was all orchestrated by Angloamerican empire.
They use these situations but no one can say that the war would
have ever happened like this without meddling.,
Might be correct. However, there are no important geopolitical regions where “great powers” are not meddling. Not now, not ever.
you are the one who is totally incorrect. Syria
Well explained.
My woman would own a hand gun if I lived there , and know how to use it .
This type of evil must be stopped . Life is more valuable that death , so “we” all need to stop these angels of death .
When you are fighting terrorists compacted in cities, it´s hard to use air strikes
aha! like failed tabqa offensive, tha attacking isis jihadists on palmyra were also in cities… i am surprised.
I wish to deflect your post. :)
FSA is now looking for a fight in the south.
Could be that SY/RU air power can teach them a lesson.
Jordan and US support have no legal rights in Syria.
Unless they wish to declare war against the SAA.
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/video-us-backed-rebels-launch-grad-rockets-syrian-army-positions-east-damascus/
And: they will enter without 1 word, like in east syria. thegood time is over. russians and saa gave them enough time to deploy large forces. and be sure, the RuAF will be not involved in these battles.
americans entered syria close to palmyra. mow you can dream your wet dreams abour russian and syrian bombing of fsa and americans and brits. the border is lost, no PMu will come help. these units ar faster then saa and will block deir ez zor. but you and trustin judou an open champagne. now you canb be really happy. today are the fruits of politcs which you celebrated…
Of course most of the border is lost. Try not to be so pessimistic.
FSA will head east to T2 airfield. But they do not hold up well in a real fight against SAA or ISUS (they only take desert vacated by ISUS)
Or are you their cheerleader ?
i am not pessismist, but realist. and the reality is, that the SAA and rusian help is a disaster. :( week, months do nothing. the enemy will not wait…
Very good response, but don’t even try to ‘educate’ this moron Aquartertoseven. He/she is very angry about the tenacious and brave performance of the Syrian Arab Army, who for 6 years have fought on 300+ fronts against a myriad of terror groups and their network of international backers. For 4.5 of those years Syria stood alone, until the gallant Russian intervention on behalf of her friend Syria and her people.
This moron also doesn’t understand that a nation loses big time if it calls for ‘full mobilization’. Who then is going to work, so the country can function where the government is in control. This moron also doesn’t understand the principle that more doesn’t always mean better.
What really gets to Aquartertoseven the most is that an Arab country, Russia, Hezbollah and Iran are allies to the determent of the global bastard, Israel, He cant stand that, and burning up inside.
Aquartertoseven, why did Israel get its ass whipped in 2000 and 2006 by a militia, Hezbollah, when Israel has a big(what a joke)army and kick ass air force? What happened then? Israeli armored columns got shredded by guys on foot. It was beautiful, still tickles me to death.
Aquartertoseven is a racist idiot who doesn’t know very much nor is he sophisticated to understand the nature of modern warfare.
The mentally ill Hisham strikes again! As I said above, I’m a regular at this site and anyone with a brain cell can see from my comments that I support Syria. That said, the army is pretty pathetic as history shows. They’re dependent on the Russians, Iranians and Hezbollah, because their troops, save the Tigers, aren’t worth shit (even against an outnumbered enemy that lacks air support).
Using easily found facts, I stated above that there are 6 million people that are able to be called upon, taking just 5% of them wouldn’t stop the country functioning, it would end the war quicker and save the country money, not needing to fight for 6 years.
We went through this before, Hezbollah’s casualties in 2006 were far greater than the Israelis’ (at LEAST 4 times greater, by the most conservative estimates, up to 6 or 7 times greater possibly), they were just less than the embarrassment of the prior invasions of Israel by Egypt, Jordan, Syria etc. so you act like they kicked ass. They didn’t, losing at least 4 to every 1 of your enemy is atrocious.
Racist to who?
“doesn’t know very much nor is he sophisticated to understand the nature of modern warfare.”
4. 1. Four. One.
Russians took 10-1 losses compared to the Nazi’s and still prevailed. At Stalingrad, 800,000 Russians died(soldiers mind you) and they prevailed, causing the turning point in the eastern front and eventual doom of the third Reich.
2006 Hezbollah lost 4-1 against the ‘mighty’ Israeli army, with their much touted ‘Chariot of God’ Merkava MBT and one of the best equipped air forces in the world. Yet they couldn’t seize small little villages along the border, so lashing out they just bombed civilians and towns indiscriminately. As usual.
2006 was the turning point in the Middle Eastern conflict between Arabs, Persians against Israeli European Ashkanazi Khazars.
And the thing that makes 2006 so breathtaking and beautiful, is Hezbollah only had ‘regulars’ on the border region during the 33 day conflict, while their special forces were stationed north of the Litani line. Now imagine if the special elite Hezbollah squads were there at the border, the fight would have been one fought inside the belly of the beast, Israel. With Israel crying for help from the U.S
حالم
The Russians had a numerical superiority over the Nazis, so even though they lost so many men, they had more than the Nazis after the war. Hezbollah cannot boast that against Israel. They’ve lost a lot of men in Syria, many of their best.
Israel weren’t trying to invade Lebanon, they responded only to a Hezbollah attack. That’s the 2nd time Hezbollah have instigated a conflict with Israel, they’re at fault. Israel could easily use its strength to destroy Lebanon but they’re one of the most reserved armies in the world; look at the last Gaza war, their civilian casualties ratio to Hamas soldiers was unbelievable. Whereas Hezbollah mostly tend to target civilians first and foremost. The former is cautious and the latter are cowards.
Real bravery would be fighting with everything you have, especially when you have the numbers and air force, whereas the SAA consistently cower to inferior enemies because they lack bravery.
it wpould be enough if go fight 100-150 000 more people. becasue they do not go, they are cowards
Shut up. Nobodys talking to you. In fact, nobody likes you you Zionist blowjob, just like your sword-swallowing cousin Aquartertoseven.
but ia ma toalking to you, weak man
and you are aimply fascist, idot arab, who thinks, that is somenboody criticises the saa, is zionist. therefore are you losers :DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
go back to your porn sites, leave the critical thinking to adults.
The jihadis are not that well trained, as proven by the very weak performance in North Aleppo both against IS and SDF.
They are somewhat armed, better than the SDF, worse than the SAA with its heayy resupplying by Russia.
What is important is morale, command and leadership. SAA has not excelled in this. There are some pockets of well trained man, but most is rather weak in morale, training and command. For this, see other reports by SF.
IS has its weaknesses too. Where they excell is inventivity, morale and sheer barbarism.
interesting, that the arabs under us patronate does not fear to fight isis… something is not corresct in this philosophy.
The SDF are essentially Kurds – there are Arabs, Armenians etc in ranks but in reality is really re-branded Syrian-Kurdish factions under US sponsorship.
How far they will advance south of Raqqah remains to be seen.
no more. americans armed 30 000 arabs and will increase their number up to 100 0000. plus 80-100 000 kurds. and arabs are going and going under american flag. these 200 000 fighters are enough to defeat assad.
Am behind on that news – makes lot of sense as Dier Ezzore is the US’ objective to enable partition of eastern Syria.
Iran has been trying to organize Syrian defense forces this way for a decade at least. Into a Syrian form of Basij forces and other militias adherent to high morality and trained and equipped by the government and tied into SAA communication network for joint security establishment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basij
I found the SouthFront link where advisers to Syria had been trying a long time ago to form Syrian militias tied in with government to provide the most advance security and rapid response forces.
https://southfront.org/iranian-plans-to-reform-syrian-army/
The road from the Jirah airbase in eastern Aleppo to Raqqa province leads directly through areas held by the SDF. The SDF seized a section of Highway 4 as part of the Tabqa attack. Will the Syrian Government be asking for free passage through SDF lines? Would the SFD say yes?
SDF is allied forces of Syrian government.
I believe you are thinking of NDF – SDF (Syrian Democratic Forces) are an artificial proxy “army” created by the US. It is mostly Kurdish YPG, although the US claims that it is made up of a large contingent of Arabs.
The SDF is actually allied with the SAA. They never engage in battle and hold several checkpoints mutual. The SAA provides safe passage and funds and products to flow in goverment held cities and the SDF in return does the same and doesn´t engage with the US. Look at Qamishli and hasake. Also, look at Manbij. There have been numorous of times where the SAA provides air support and ground support to SDF by either air striking ISIS positions or capturing highways and infrastructures to pave way for the SDF.
Once DAESH is defeated, the real test of this cooperation will be seen. I can’t imagine the SAA will green light permanent airbases and an autonomous Kurdish region in NE Syria. I don’t think the Arab population of Raqqa province will take kindly to being controlled by Kurds either.
Once ISIS is defeated the SAA’s focus will shift back to fighting Al-Nusra and its allied ‘moderate’ headchoppers. Dealing with the Kurds is probably a distant last as far as Assad and the Russians are concerned. Don’t forget they also provide a useful distraction in regards to the Turks. As long as Crazy Erdogan is more worried about the Kurds he will not be that interested in implementing regime change in Damascus.
And local Arab populations not being enamored with being controlled by the Kurds would suit Assad just fine.
Russia won’t back it and neither will Iran because that will only strengthen turkey.
the kurds are Israel’s darling. one wondering people loving another. there has never been a Kurdistan, and there wont be one. just like there never has been an Israel, it will never last. an anomaly. nothing more. tik tok, tik tok.
never was iraq, and is iraq. never was turkey (was osman empire!), and it is. never was ôlebanon, and it is. never was aleria and it is. never was ….
They are not allies as they are frenemies.
Potentially they could become allies if Assad accepts some form of federalism.
In practice, they have more important enemies then eachother. Sometimes they work the facto together to a common tactical goal, such as destroying the Azaz corridor to Aleppo early 2016.
They also need eachother for trade. Assad needs oil, wheat, cotton, food. SDF needs medicine, fertilisers, spareparts etc.
If they don’t let SAA go south, SAA would just withdraw from the Manbij front. They are the buffer between Turkish backed terrorist and Kurds. SAA has initiative here.
the SAA has the initiative everywhere. but don’t tell the hasbara jew trolls that.
They aren’t Jewish they are zionist antisemites
SDF would and will say NO. They are US proxies at the moment.
Why not? The Syrians, Russians and US are working together to some degree in Al-Bab and Afrin. The focus now by everyone is in defeating ISIS.
Godspeed SAA!
Americans and brits eneterd syria 90 southest from palmyra. Deir ez zor has finished.