In case of an official address from Iraq to the Russian Federation, the leaders of our country would study the political and military expediency of our Air Force's participation in an air operation. Presently we have not received such an address. ... I want to emphasize that Russia has no other political objectives and no interests other than the defeat of ISIS [formerly ISIS/ISIL] and that differs us from other nations that participate in another coalition.Meanwhile, the situation in Afghanistan worsens by the day, with Taliban forces capturing province after province. Yesterday, Vice President of Afghanistan, Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum, met with Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. In addition to discussing economic, trade and cultural cooperation, Kadyrov said afterwards that Dostum told him Kabul needs Russian help in the fight against ISIS:
Dostum noted that ISIS is trying to make Afghanistan into a bridgehead. In order to prevent this threat, Kabul needs Russia's support, as in Syria. We expressed confidence that the leadership of Russia will make a positive decision in response to this request.Dostum, a general in the Afghan army during the war against the mujahideen in the '80s and the Taliban in the '90s, noted the common ground he and Kadyrov have in fighting terrorism:
Both Ramzan Kadyrov and I have been waging the struggle with international terrorism. And in this field we can make a substantive coalition. We can learn from each other. We don't have concrete projects of cooperation yet, but that doesn't mean there won't be any in the future.Dostum is an interesting character, to say the least. A drug warlord, murderer and former (or possibly current) CIA asset, Russia would do well to question his motives. With the USA so desperate to thwart Russia's new foothold in the Middle East, it is possible that Dostum is on a CIA mission to try and entice Russia to expand it military moves to Afghanistan and thereby weaken its position.
Indeed, Kadryov recently offered to send Chechen units into Syria to fight ISIS:
"This is not idle talk, I am asking for permission to go there and participate in special operations," Ramzan Kadyrov said in the Friday interview with the RSN radio. "Being a Muslim, a Chechen and a Russian patriot I want to say that in 1999 when our republic was overrun with these devils we swore on the Koran that we would fight them wherever they are," the Chechen leader said.At this point it seems unlikely that Putin will take Kadyrov up on his offer, but he's got the right idea. And it's not just ISIS. The so-called 'moderate opposition' is no better. In fact, there isn't any moderate opposition.
"But we need the Commander-in-Chief's decision to do this," he emphasized. According to the Russian Constitution, the president is also the commander-in-chief of the military forces.
Kadyrov also noted that Chechen special forces units were at a very high level of combat readiness and promised that "as soon as the terrorists in Syria understand that we are heading there they will very quickly get out," adding that terrorists have little experience of real warfare.
"We know them because we have destroyed them here, we have fought them. And they also know us."
Not-so-moderate Opposition
As ex-DIA chief Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn told RT recently, the very term implies that some kind of political structure is capable of taking control of state functions in Syria. The 'moderate rebels' have no such structure. Yes, they have weapons and CIA training, but that is all they have. The real Syrian opposition doesn't roam Syrian provinces in Toyota trucks shooting civilians and committing massacres (that's the job of the so-called Free Syrian Army). No, they are politicians with whom Assad talks and even makes deals.
Russia isn't "bombing the opposition", but it is bombing armed groups that are no different than the NATO-trained terrorists that sacked Libya. In fact, many of them are the same terrorists! As Tony Cartalucci wrote in 2012:
It is now confirmed that Saudi Arabia is shipping arms to foreign fighters and Syrian rebels operating out of Jordan. The Australian reports in their article, "Bombs in Syria as Saudis 'send arms to rebels'," that "Saudi military equipment is on its way to Jordan to arm the Free Syrian Army," quoting an Arab diplomat. Of course, as reported below, the "Free Syrian Army" is led not by Syrians, but by NATO-backed Libyan militants from the US State Department-listed terrorist organization, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.After showing that the US made a willful decision to back the acknowledged terrorist group MEK in Iran, and to foment a color revolution in Syria, Catalucci points out that the FSA had the direct support of the NATO-backed Libyan terror group. In fact, that is where many moderate 'Syrian' rebels came from! As Dmitry Peskov put it to Rossiya 1 TV:
I don't think anybody has yet explained what 'moderate opposition' is, and Putin demonstrated quite active interest in the issue and asked in which way the moderate opposition was different from the immoderate opposition.Even US VP Joe Biden admitted as much back in October 2014:
The fact of the matter is the ability to identify a moderate middle in Syria was - there was no moderate middle because the moderate middle are made up of shopkeepers, not soldiers - they are made up of people who in fact have ordinary elements of the middle class of that country.Of course, it actually goes deeper than that. The FSA, Al Nusra Front, ISIS - they're all mercenary terror groups, culled from the death squads of Iraq and Libya, made and trained by the good ol' USA. This Russian colonel and military expert, Alexander Zhilin, knows the score:
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