ISIS/ISIL conflict in Syria/Iraq (No OpEd, No Politics)

Today at 11:42 AM
Today at 6:46 AM
nothing from the Kremlin/Mr. Assad yet (assuming I didn't miss anything, of course), which is interesting
and later:

SANA called in "a war crime, a crime against humanity, and the direct support of terrorism"
(in the beginning of the third paragraph of
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),

and
Russia to ask US to explain strike on pro-government forces in Syria — UN ambassador

More:
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plawolf

Lieutenant General
Jan 29, 2018
while
On Northern Syria Front Line, U.S. and Turkey Head Into Tense Face-off
A correspondent and a photographer of The New York Times, traveling with American generals in northern Syria, visited a city where armed conflict is now possible between the United States and Turkey.
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The two generals might be putting out though soundbites, but I suspect the real purpose for their frontline inspection is to put local US commanders and troops on a tight leash.

American special forces have always enjoyed a high degree of operational autonomy, and have a very strong and unique warrior code. A core component of that warrior code is brotherhood.

Those American special forces have fought and bled with the Kurds for potentially years, and would have a high degree of respect and comradery with the Kurds probably boardering on the bond of brotherhood they have with each other.

The Turkish attack on the Kurds would not have sat well at all with those American special forces.

The gruesome stories and pictures/video surfacing of what the ‘good’ terrorists the Turks have brought with them have done to captured and dead Kurdish fighters, especially the female ones, is enough to turn the stomach and boil the blood of neutrals, so one could only imagine at the kinds of emotion those stories must be stirring up in the barracks of the US special forces operators who personally knew and are friends with those Kurdish fighters involved.

With drones and military satellites as well as other assets available to them, those American special forces probably saw some of those incidents live and maybe worse the mainstream media does not know or could not verify to report on.

I would bet good money it would not take much ‘provocations’ for those American special forces to open up with extreme prejudice on the Turks given half a chance, which is probably why those generals are there in person to make sure no one gets that chance.
 
about three weeks ago
Jan 17, 2018
how you doing Equation?

in September of last year Government encircled ISIL in
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area, and what happened then was ISIL ended up in the area (in black below) previously taken by Insurgents:
d9898b86948d8ee045ceaf87a417fdb5.jpg

until recently, that development had been convenient to the Government;
now ISIL took it into the recently gained Government protrusion extended toward
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and it's unclear what's going to happen next
and I'll just use the same map, with blue color for ISIL again etc.; since then
  • ISIL, with its pocket shrinking, now took it into Insurgents territory through for example
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    ("Niha" marked in the map below);
  • Goverment took over the previously Insurgents-held areas to the northeast, the line of contact is now straighten there, let's say up to
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    south to Aleppo
84762377cdf8e74953382022aa8cb098.jpg


now a map from Internet:
DVlbU6OXcAAhk4M.jpg:large
 
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Today at 9:53 AM
now noticed
Israeli F-16 jet shot down by Syrian fire, military says
Updated 0843 GMT (1643 HKT) February 10, 2018
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and now noticed in Twitter (
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) pictures purporting to show the missile(s) involved in downing that F-16;
if those pictures showed what they said they're showing, to my untrained eye the missile would look like an SA-3 Goa
reportedly it's in Jordan:
DVqNQuJWAAAERfw.jpg


(the F-16 fell back to Israel, and Israel retaliated, but by now this is info available like everywhere for example on a Czech site through which I check my emails EDIT just in case:
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)
 
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now will update also Jan 21, 2018
Today at 9:28 AM
by now it's started on the ground

so, assuming it's true what I read now, zooming in a little bit:

bb5ebb27056f1b75a9084bbd3408bafd.jpg

Turks first entered in the areas marked as #1 and #2 above;
in my comfortable chair #1 should mean a push right to the interior (towards
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), and have no idea about #2

...
... actually back then I just confused with WW2 Eastern Front;

in fact it's a slow, containment operation (the Turkish strategy here probably is to connect "the dents" around the border first):
427qx3vu14g86fzzg.jpg

the map should be "clickable"; it's
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found in Twitter:
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the view is consistent with what
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is showing
 
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now, Government against Kurds in
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area;

some background:
US Scrambles Firepower to Defend SDF Against Pro-Assad Forces
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from what I figured, the sides are separated by the railway highlighted below, Government pushes for what's marked as "Tabiya (Conoco) gas field":
91cf903944c1bfb2a2be5e47a21aab8a.jpg


as for the scale ... use the runway of
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if you want

maybe it'll get quiet after the US action from the air Thursday at 8:49 PM
Today at 11:42 AMand later:

SANA called in "a war crime, a crime against humanity, and the direct support of terrorism"
(in the beginning of the third paragraph of
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),

and
Russia to ask US to explain strike on pro-government forces in Syria — UN ambassador

More:
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as of now, Government-held area in the eastern bank is pretty small

let's wait and see
 
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