Once the Russian military intervened on September 30th 2015, however, ISIS and the assorted other jihadi 'rebel' groups saw their territory and numbers rapidly reduced, US government aid and support for ISIS and the rebels notwithstanding. After the liberation of Aleppo by Russian forces late last year, several more dramatic victories by the Syrian Army (backed by the Russian air force) have followed with the most recent, and perhaps definitive, victory coming in this week's liberation of the Syrian city of Deir ez Zor.
It may have escaped your notice, but over the course of the last two years, the Western media and Western governments have consistently ignored or criticized the victories of the Syrian Army backed by the Russian air campaign. This is, of course, not surprising given that ISIS is nothing more than a US and Gulf State proxy army, specifically designed to wage war on the Syrian people, destroy Syria as a nation and remake it in the West's image of a vassal of Empire. On the occasions that the Western press saw fit to comment on the achievements of the Syrian and Russian militaries, they chose to cynically condemn them as 'Russian aggression' or 'Assad killing his own people'.
This week's liberation of Deir ez Zor is a case in point. While there have been no specific condemnations, you'll find it difficult to find even one American mainstream media outlet report on the most recent news that a Russian air strike on an underground command center near the city killed 40 ISIS members, including four field commanders. Among the senior militants killed is internationally wanted Abu-Muhammad al-Shimali, the self-proclaimed "emir of Deir ez-Zor."
An Iraqi-born Saudi citizen (surprise, surprise!) and a former Al-Qaeda member, al-Shimali pledged his allegiance to ISIS in 2015 (in return for a fat check) and became notorious for smuggling terrorists into Syria (on behalf of the USA and Saudi Arabia). But just to keep the charade going, Al-Shamali was designated a 'high profile target' by the US State Department, which offered a bounty of up to $5 million for information leading to his capture in 2015. Several European intelligence agencies also claimed that Al-Shimali was involved in the November 2015 Paris attacks. Now you might think that, with the news that this brutal killer responsible for so much carnage in Syria and France has been taken out of action, the US State Dept. and the French government might put aside their ridiculous anti-Russian ideology and make a public statement of congratulations to the Russian and Syrian militaries and governments for this admirable achievement. But you'd be wrong. They have nothing to say; in fact, they are probably having a hard time controlling their urge to scream bloody murder that Russia just killed some of their favorite assets.
But hold their tongues they will, and for good reason, lest the name of another 'ISIS commander' killed in the same compound gets too much attention: Gulmurod Khalimov, a Tajik and Islamist military commander who 'defected to ISIS' in 2015 after he had received years of training in the USA through the US State Dept.'s Diplomatic Security/Anti-Terrorism Assistance program. After 'defecting', Khalimov said that he planned to return home to establish Sharia Law in his Central Asian nation and to take jihad to Russia. What a coincidence. Of course, the Pentagon and CIA are no strangers to spending $$billions of US taxpayers' money on training and arming jihadis.
There is also the little matter of the claim by an unnamed 'diplomatic source' that at least a dozen ISIS field commanders, including two of 'European origin' were evacuated from Deir ez Zor by a US Air Force plane at the end of August when it became clear the city would fall to the Syrian army. I'm usually skeptical of claims by 'unnamed diplomatic sources', but on this occasion the allegation is credible given what is known about US direct support to jihadis in Syria. In June this year, the commander of Russian forces in Syria, Col. Gen. Sergei Surovikin, said that ISIS fighters were allowed to leave two villages southwest of Raqqa and move toward Palmyra. Surovikin said that the U.S. coalition, along with allied Kurds, "collude with the leaders of ISIS, who surrender the areas under their control and head to provinces where Syrian government forces operate."
But I suppose I shouldn't complain too much, or expect too much from the psycho warmongers in the Pentagon and the CIA, their disgusting headchopper friends in Saudi Arabia, and the Western media that is a propaganda arm of all three. Their little plan for phony civil war-induced regime change in Syria has fallen flat on its face thanks to the Russian military under the stewardship of Vladimir Putin and the stellar efforts of Lebanese Hizb'allah and the Iranian militias. Nothing can change that now, not even the US' 'plan b' to carve out a Kurdish state in northern Syria.
While the reality-creators in Washington might like to think that a US-allied Kurdish enclave in northern Syria and Iraq can secure continued American 'ownership' of the Middle East and prevent the rise of Russia and Iran as the dominant powers in the region, this is a literal and figurative pipe dream. If a Kurdistan is cut out of Syria and Iraq, it will only be with the consent of Iran, Turkey, Syria and Iraq, all of whom have very good reasons (and effective means) to prevent the establishment of a Kurdish homeland. Both the geopolitical and geographic reality of the situation therefore means that an official Kurdish state would be allied with its immediate neighbors, not imperial warmongers and blow-in headchoppers.
As an essayist and print author, Joe has been writing incisive editorials for Sott.net for over 10 years. His articles have appeared on many news sites and he has been interviewed numerous times by Sputnik News and Press TV. His articles can also be found on his personal blog JoeQuinn.net.
Reader Comments
And the US is losing it!
As to the U.S. losing, I guess it's kinda like a shorter, less painful* (no draft) mini* version of Vietnam. Russia just happens to be a more capitalistic and democratic country than it was then so that its aid was more efficaciously used.
If the U.S. leaders do not see this as a major paradigm shift for the view the rest of the world has of the US, then they are as close minded as they seem.
In this war, however, we have had incredible access to independent of MSM PTB BS. You guys at SOTT have played a major role too. Maybe not so much as Putin nor even RT, but on a cost vs. result analysis, you should ALL take a bow for the role you've played! (I say what I mean and mean what I say.)
Keep up the good fight.
R.C.
* Not for the huge numbers of killed and wounded and their loved ones.
P.s., As someone noted the other day, Assad best be careful lest he find himself whacked by the PTB ... as has happened too many times. But I bet that Russia has quietly advised the West that if that crap starts happening, then two can play at that - and they're no novices; but nor is the UK.) Over all, the Western players in this sad charade have mostly been acting per Israel's long ago stated goals of splitting up countries they perceived as existential threats. They lost this hand in Syria, thank God.
RC
If the U.S. leaders do not see this as a major paradigm shiftBut the US is use to losing wars .. it's what they do - it keeps the MIC in business and justifies finding small far-off countries like N Kora and threat to "national security"
Is there anywhere the US is not at war with?
Is the US itself an asset or proxy force?
Do we look on the code or does the code run our thinking?
Compartmentalized 'consciousness' (I mean how conscious is that!) fragments to operate conflicting goals as a sort of 'timeshare' under a narrative continuity of seemingly unified 'self'.
What induces such a fragmentation?
War.
What is the patterning of the fragment identities?
War.
They may not seem like war - for many operate as a denial and dissociation from war, or the fear and evasion of war. Or the crusade to end all war.
War is so pervasive that it is generally invisible.
DONT TOUCH MY CAR!
But its just under the surface 'reality'.
As the controlled opposition to Peace.
The Day Peace broke out
Except Peace has no need to break anything.
War has to break or divide in order to seem to exist.
Broken promise.
Broken lives. Broken hearts.
Broken minds.
Everything is broken.
But - wait a bit - you are still here.
And no matter the noise
you are still, here.
Peace in the heart is a mind restored to natural service.
It doesn't matter how you forgot.
It matters how you re-Member.
They thought with GWB counter-signing their oil contracts with US oil majors they had the makings of a nation state and have expended great efforts to carve out parts of Iraq and Syria as their traditional homeland.
If the Syrian government had collapsed they should have become sovereign in that area to give affect to US intentions to break up the big and powerful countries in Middle East and North Africa into small inconsequential places. That now seems unlikely. Erdogan will never give them anything.
Its another in a long list of examples warning against giving any measure of trust to imperialist powers.
At the conclusion of WWI, colonial powers Britain and France divided up the Ottoman Empire along today's national borders, with malice aforethought.
The Kurds were deliberately denied a national state, but instead were distributed by the newly-drawn borders among four new nations: Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria. Why? So that in any future conflict with the colonial powers, those four countries could be destabilized by stirring up their Kurdish minorities with promises of an independent homeland.
There is no hard evidence that this was the motive of Britain and France in denying the Kurds a homeland, but given the vicious and pernicious treachery and criminal proclivities of the British Colonial Establishment in dozens of other documented instances, I have little doubt that this was a deliberate act, condemning millions in future generations to lives of deprivation, persecution and enslavement.
The British Empire may be dead and gone, flushed down the sewers of history, but its crimes live on all over the world, in India/Pakistan, Nigeria, Ireland, Palestine, Syria, and especially in this instance, Turkey.
One hopes sincerely that Cecil Rhodes and a few score of his friends are writhing in torment in the deepest nether regions of Hell.
I believe that this expended macro effort is the same as the smaller micro by local power authorities. We are ruled by power. Have something you cannot defend and power wants and you'll find your kids in the endless loop of arrests and court appearances. You'll be divorced and your hard-earned property gone. It's the American Way. If the world's people could see behind the curtain of OZ, they would ........................What? Anything they haven't done? Stay in a bombed out town? See their children starve? Beg for the war supporters to go home? Is there any evil action we powers haven'i coated in righteousness and purity?
Is not the 'right' to judge and rule upon others the nature of supremacism and self specialness - whether British or any other brand?
And is 'feeling sorry' not a looking down in pity?
By all means have compassion for others in whom you recognize yourself.
Birds of a feather, flock together.
If you focus in the what horrifies and disgusts you - it will become you. I agree we need to look past where fear would stop - but not to then fixate and fry in torment that can never be escaped.
You can see that 'Britain' was a vehicle through which a power agenda operated and then seemed to flip to the US which had seemed to become independent and another flip comes in the pivot to the East. Nations are concepts imposed upon peoples. Nationalism operated the usurping of living culture. Globalism is the same thing.
I hold you in Life because by sharing it - I have it.
The illusion of the 'judge' is self-righteousness.
Do you not see that Rhodes at al operated out from belief they are right - regardless whether they were misguided.
The belief in inescapable torment will generate a powerful drive to escape it - and that is ruled by terror.
If that IS the world and all else is vain. As was pointed out in comments above - when the end justifies the means, a fear-defined goal becomes the basis for the sacrifice of Life. A self-righteousness goes forth in destruction - as the necessary price. Hidden fears operate denial and deceit agenda.
Why not unhide such fear?
Because fear tells you, you will be destroyed, rejected, unsupported, vilified, ridiculed, invalidated, humiliated, shamed and NEVER get your life back.
If you know how to 'read' through the deceits of the MSM et al - you can see that the voice for fear is a liar.
I find it amazing that a dedicated bunch of individuals, with great determination and human suffering, also the military protecting them can turn the tide of US hegemony.
Who would have thought that in 2 Years, a country could be liberated from the scourge of the most vile creatures to inhabit the planet.
All brought to you thanks to the vested interests of certain cabals, the CIA and it's affiliates, sounds like a TV endorsement for a program, but then again that is exactly what it was, the destruction of a Nation state.
But thankfully because of "friends" that have also accepted the risks of that friendship, the Nation survived.
Now with "friends" like that, I think the EU should take a moment for reflection.
Another excellent and well-researched article, brimming with factual information. The Western media is a tool of the Zionists and the CIA/State Department, which all work in concert with the braying Neocons, to use the ignorant American people to further their foul ends and spread their filth and lies all over the Western world.
Let me give you one fact from the horse's mouth. The CIA has recently implemented an internal policy that no employee may remain in any of its myriad offices for more than three years, but must rotate out to other offices with a new set of co-workers.
No reasons given, but my conjecture is that this is to make it more difficult for criminal cabals and enterprises to form among small sub-groups in the Agency. Since all inter-office and outside phones are tapped, and all email correspondence is read, this makes it far more difficult for small criminal groups to pursue their criminal enterprises without detection, when the plotters are physically separated.
So far, it does not seem to have curtailed the CIA drug-running operations, which have gone on uninterrupted since the Vietnam War. The pre-Alzheimer's patsy, Trump, has even been conned into sending more troops to Afghanistan, to secure the poppy fields and protect the poppy farmers from the Taliban. No other reason.
But maybe the covert arming of terrorists, and various operations detrimental to the peace of America and the world, but agreeable to Israel and the MIC, will be curtailed. One can only hope.
-LG.
to make it more difficult for criminal cabals and enterprises to form
... or to make them harder to uncover?
[Link]
Whenever you make a purchase, you are supporting the deep state. Virtually, everything you do supports the deep state.
The deep state is everywhere, it is every modern government. It is west, east, north and south. It is up and it is down. It is over there and it is over here.
The best thing you can do, to fight it, is to support those things which were in existence prior to the deep state.
What were those things?
Try to remember.
That is my advice.
ned, out
Thanks for looking at the link, Niall.
I think aangirfan is quite anti-American (anti-West), for sure.
And you may be right, there may be some smallish governments somewhere (no, not China and not Russia), with a few scattered 'leaders' (of a sort) who are doing their damnedest to oppose the deep state, which I generally refer to as 'the technocracy'.
It is a very hard thing hard to do, for any of us. We are generally fucked, no matter what we try.
Try to 'remember', though.
Try!
Thanks again.
your friend,
ned
Demonizing gives power away. Simply know and be your purpose. If joy in being is not your purpose - what do you expect to get from misery? There must be something or you wouldn't persist in it.
Where is joy in 'such a mess?' Ask in true desire and it will alight in you - but it is not IN the mess. Nor is true desire. But recognition of a meaninglessness can break the spell to let something true in.
Fear and hate trigger reaction - and we let reaction run and elicit allegiance and thus give power away. But noticing that is the recognition that you are responsible for where you focus your attention. Not blame - but freedom.
I watched Lustig on Mercola - and something you write prompts me to point it out.
The Hacking of the American Mind with Dr. Robert Lustig
You may not wish to fight the deep state.
This would make you a 'peace-keeper'.
You will be given a certificate and a medal of highest honor.
And quite possibly, a corporation and a broadcast station, of you very own!
Have a nice day, citizen(s).
ned,
OUT
Poor MSM dependents miss a very affecting event.
There is not much hope in a globalists world.