[blind-democracy] The US-Russia Proxy War in Syria

  • From: Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Tue, 01 Dec 2015 22:30:46 -0500

Common Dreams
The US-Russia Proxy War in Syria
The risk of Syria becoming a proxy war between the U.S. and Russia became
real last week when Turkey and Syrian jihadists used U.S.-supplied weaponry
to shoot down a Russian warplane and rescue helicopter, killing two Russians
by
Ray McGovern

President Barack Obama meets with President Vladimir Putin of Russia on the
sidelines of the G20 Summit at Regnum Carya Resort in Antalya, Turkey,
Sunday, Nov. 15, 2015. National Security Advisior Susan E. Rice listens at
left. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
Belatedly, at a sidebar meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the
Paris climate summit on Monday, President Barack Obama reportedly expressed
regret for last week's killing of a Russian pilot who was shot down by a
Turkish air-to-air missile fired by a U.S.-supplied F-16 and the subsequent
death of a Russian marine on a search-and-rescue mission, apparently killed
by a U.S.-made TOW missile.
But Obama administration officials continued to take the side of Turkey, a
NATO "ally" which claims implausibly that it was simply defending its air
space and that the Russian pilot of the SU-24 warplane had ignored repeated
warnings. According to accounts based on Turkish data, the SU-24 may have
strayed over a slice of Turkish territory for 17 seconds. [See
Consortiumnews.com's "Facts Back Russia on Turkish Attack."]
Immediately after the incident on Nov. 24, Obama offered a knee-jerk
justification of Turkey's provocative action which appears to have been a
deliberate attack on a Russian warplane to deter continued bombing of Syrian
jihadists, including the Islamic State and Al Qaeda's Nusra Front. Turkey's
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, an Islamist, has supported various jihadists
as his tip of the spear in his goal to overthrow the secular regime of
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
In his first public comments about the Turkish attack, Obama gracelessly
asserted Turkey's right to defend its territory and air space although there
was never any indication that the SU-24 - even if it had strayed momentarily
into Turkish air space - had any hostile intentions against Turkey. Indeed,
Turkey and the United States were well aware that the Russian planes were
targeting the Islamic State, Al Qaeda's Nusra Front and other jihadist
rebels.
Putin even complained, "We told our U.S. partners in advance where, when at
what altitudes our pilots were going to operate. The U.S.-led coalition,
which includes Turkey, was aware of the time and place where our planes
would operate. And this is exactly where and when we were attacked. Why did
we share this information with the Americans? Either they don't control
their allies, or they just pass this information left and right without
realizing what the consequences of such actions might be. We will have to
have a serious talk with our U.S. partners."
Putin also suggested that the Turkish attack was in retaliation for Russia's
bombing of a truck convoy caring Islamic State oil to Turkey. On Monday, on
the sidelines of the Paris summit, Putin said Russia has "received
additional information confirming that that oil from the deposits controlled
by Islamic State militants enters Turkish territory on industrial scale."
Turkey's Erdogan - also in Paris - denied buying oil from terrorists and
vowed to resign "if it is proven that we have, in fact, done so."
Was Obama Angry?
In private, Obama may have been outraged by Erdogan's reckless actions - as
some reports suggest - but, if so, Obama seems publicly more afraid of
offending the neocons who dominate Official Washington's opinion circles and
who hold key positions in his own administration, than of provoking a
possible nuclear confrontation with Russia.
On Nov. 24, even as Russian emotions were running high - reacting to the
killing of one Russian pilot and the death of a second Russian marine killed
after his helicopter was shot down apparently by a U.S.-supplied TOW missile
fired by Syrian jihadists - Obama chose to act "tough" against Putin, both
during a White House press conference with French President Francois Holland
and later with pro-Turkish remarks from U.S. officials.
During the press conference after the Turkish shoot-down and the deliberate
fire from Turkish-backed Syrian jihadists aiming at two Russian airmen as
they parachuted to the ground, Obama chose to make disparaging remarks about
the Russian president.
Obama boasted about the 65 nations in the U.S.-led coalition against the
Islamic State compared to Putin's small coalition of Russia and Iran
(although Putin's tiny coalition appears to be much more serious and
effective than Obama's bloated one, which includes countries such as Turkey,
Saudi Arabia and Qatar that have been implicated in supporting jihadist
elements, including Al Qaeda and the Islamic State).
By delivering these anti-Russian insults at such a delicate time, Obama
apparently was trusting that Putin would keep his cool and tamp down public
emotions at home, even as Obama lacked the integrity and courage to stand up
to neocon criticism from The Washington Post's editorial page or from some
of his hawkish subordinates.
The administration's neocons who keep demanding an escalation of tensions
with Russia include Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian
Affairs Victoria Nuland. Then, there are the officials most identified with
arms procurement, sales and use, such as Defense Secretary Ashton Carter.
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford recently volunteered to
Congress that U.S. forces "can impose a no-fly zone" for Syria (a dangerous
play advocated by presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and Sen. John
McCain). Dunford is the same hawk who identified Russia as the "existential
threat" to the U.S. and said it would be "reasonable" to send heavy weapons
to Ukraine on Russia's border.
Meanwhile, NATO commander Gen. Philip Breedlove keeps up his
fly-by-the-pants information warfare campaign citing Russian "aggression,"
"invasions" and plans to do still more evil things. One is tempted to
dismiss him as a buffoon; but he is the NATO commander.
Lack of Control
It does not appear as though Obama has the same degree of control over
foreign and defense policy that Putin enjoys in Moscow - or at least one
hopes Putin can retain such control since some hard-line Russian
nationalists are fuming that Putin has been too accommodating of his Western
"partners."
Perhaps the greatest danger from Obama's acquiescence to the neocons' new
Cold War with Russia is that the neocon hopes for "regime change in Moscow"
will be realized except that Putin will be replaced by some
ultra-nationalist who would rather risk nuclear war than accept further
humiliation of Mother Russia.
Meanwhile, back in Washington, the U.S. establishment is such that the
generals, the arms manufacturers and weapons merchants, the Defense
Department, and most of Congress have a very strong say in U.S. foreign
policy - and Obama seems powerless to change it.
The model of governing in Washington is a far cry from Russia's guiding
principle of edinonachaliye - by which one supreme authority is in clear
control of decision-making on defense and foreign policy.
Even when Obama promises, he often fails to deliver. Think back to what
Obama told then-President Dmitry Medvedev when they met in Seoul in March
2012, about addressing Russian concerns over European missile defense. In
remarks picked up by camera crews, Obama asked for some "space" until after
the U.S. election. Obama can be heard saying, "This is my last election.
After my election, I have more flexibility."
Yet, even after winning reelection, Obama has remained cowed by the
influential neocons - even as he has bucked some of their more aggressive
demands, such as a massive U.S. bombing campaign against Assad's military in
summer 2013 and bomb-bomb-bombing Iran; instead, in 2014-15, Obama pushed
for a negotiated agreement to constrain Iran's nuclear program.
Ideally, Obama should be able to show some flexibility on Syria during his
last year in office, but no one should hold their breath. Obama appears to
have deep fears about crossing the neocons or Israel regarding what they
want for the Middle East and Eastern Europe.
Besides the neocons' close ties to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu, the neocons are intimately connected to the interests of the
Military-Industrial Complex, which provides substantial funding for the
major think tanks where many neocons hang their hats and churn out new
arguments for more world conflict and thus more military spending.
Unlike Obama, Pope Francis addressed this fact-of-life head-on in his Sept.
24 address to members of the U.S. Congress - many if not most of whom also
are lavished with proceeds from the arms trade and then appropriate still
more funding for arms production and sales.
"Why are deadly weapons being sold to those who plan to inflict untold
suffering," Francis asked them face-to-face. "Sadly, the answer, as we all
know, is simply for money: money that is drenched in blood, often innocent
blood."
An Old Epithet
From my days as a CIA analyst covering the Soviet Union, I'm reminded of the
epithet favored by the Soviet party daily Pravda a few decades ago
-"vallstreetskiye krovopitsiy" - or Wall St. bloodsuckers. Propaganda-ish as
that term seemed, it turns out that Soviet media were not far off on that
subject.
Indeed, the banks and corporations involved in arms manufacture and sales
enjoy immense power - arguably, more than a president; unarguably more than
Obama. The moneyed interests - including Congress - are calling the shots.
The old adage "money makes the world go round" is also apparent in
Washington's velvet-gloves treatment of the Saudis and is nowhere better
illustrated than in the continued suppression of 28 pages of the 2002 Joint
Congressional Inquiry on 9/11. Those pages deal with the Saudi role in
financing and supporting some of the 9/11 hijackers, but both the Bush and
Obama administrations have kept those pages hidden for 13 years.
One reason is that the Saudis are the primary recipients of the U.S. trade
in weapons, for which they pay cash. American manufacturers are selling the
Saudis arms worth $100 billion under the current five-year agreement. Oddly,
acts of terrorism sweeten the pot. Three days after the attacks in Paris,
Washington and Riyadh announced a deal for $1.3 billion more.
And yet, neither Obama, nor any of the candidates trying to replace him, nor
Congress is willing to jeopardize the arms trade by insisting that Riyadh
call an abrupt halt to its support for the jihadists fighting in Syria for
fear this might incur the wrath of the deep-pocket Saudis.
Not even Germany - already inundated, so far this year, by a flood of
950,000 refugees, mostly from Syria - is willing to risk Saudi displeasure.
Berlin prefers to pay off the Turks with billions of euros to stanch the
flow of those seeking refuge in Europe.
And so, an unholy alliance of Turkey, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states
continues to fuel the war in Syria while Obama pretends that his giant
coalition is really doing the job of taking on many of those same jihadists.
But Obama's coalition has been woefully incompetent and indeed compromised,
bumbling along and letting the Islamic State seize more territory along with
Al Qaeda and its affiliates and allies.
Russia's entry into the war in September changed the equation because -
unlike Obama's grand coalition - Putin's puny coalition with Iran actually
was serious about beating back the jihadists and stabilizing Assad's regime.
Turkey's shoot-down of the Russian warplane on Nov. 24 was a crude message
from Erdogan that success in defeating the jihadists would not be tolerated.
As for the United States and Europe, myopia prevails. None seems concerned
that the terrorists whom they support today will come back to bite them
tomorrow. American officials, despite their rhetoric and despite 9/11, seem
to consider the terrorist threat remote from U.S. shores - and, in any case,
dwarfed in importance by the lucrative arm sales.
As for the Vienna talks on Syria, the speed with which they were arranged
(with Iran taking part) raised expectations now dampened. Last week, for
example, Secretary of State John Kerry bragged about how a meeting of
"moderate" rebels is to convene "in the next few weeks" to come up with
principles for negotiating with Syrian President Assad's government. The
convener? Saudi Arabia!
Obama knows what has to happen for this terrorist threat to be truly
addressed. The Saudis and Turks have to be told, in no uncertain terms, to
stop supporting the jihadists. But that would require extraordinary courage
and huge political - perhaps even physical - risk. There is no sign that
President Obama dares bite that bullet.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
License
Ray McGovern

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical
Church of the Saviour in Washington, DC. During his career as a CIA analyst,
he prepared and briefed the President's Daily Brief and chaired National
Intelligence Estimates. He is a member of the Steering Group of Veteran
Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).
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The US-Russia Proxy War in Syria
Published on
Tuesday, December 01, 2015
by
Common Dreams
The US-Russia Proxy War in Syria
The risk of Syria becoming a proxy war between the U.S. and Russia became
real last week when Turkey and Syrian jihadists used U.S.-supplied weaponry
to shoot down a Russian warplane and rescue helicopter, killing two Russians
by
Ray McGovern
. 19 Comments
.
. President Barack Obama meets with President Vladimir Putin of Russia
on the sidelines of the G20 Summit at Regnum Carya Resort in Antalya,
Turkey, Sunday, Nov. 15, 2015. National Security Advisior Susan E. Rice
listens at left. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
. Belatedly, at a sidebar meeting with Russian President Vladimir
Putin at the Paris climate summit on Monday, President Barack Obama
reportedly expressed regret for last week's killing of a Russian pilot who
was shot down by a Turkish air-to-air missile fired by a U.S.-supplied F-16
and the subsequent death of a Russian marine on a search-and-rescue mission,
apparently killed by a U.S.-made TOW missile.
. But Obama administration officials continued to take the side of
Turkey, a NATO "ally" which claims implausibly that it was simply defending
its air space and that the Russian pilot of the SU-24 warplane had ignored
repeated warnings. According to accounts based on Turkish data, the SU-24
may have strayed over a slice of Turkish territory for 17 seconds. [See
Consortiumnews.com's "Facts Back Russia on Turkish Attack."]
. Immediately after the incident on Nov. 24, Obama offered a knee-jerk
justification of Turkey's provocative action which appears to have been a
deliberate attack on a Russian warplane to deter continued bombing of Syrian
jihadists, including the Islamic State and Al Qaeda's Nusra Front. Turkey's
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, an Islamist, has supported various jihadists
as his tip of the spear in his goal to overthrow the secular regime of
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
. In his first public comments about the Turkish attack, Obama
gracelessly asserted Turkey's right to defend its territory and air space
although there was never any indication that the SU-24 - even if it had
strayed momentarily into Turkish air space - had any hostile intentions
against Turkey. Indeed, Turkey and the United States were well aware that
the Russian planes were targeting the Islamic State, Al Qaeda's Nusra Front
and other jihadist rebels.
Putin even complained, "We told our U.S. partners in advance where, when at
what altitudes our pilots were going to operate. The U.S.-led coalition,
which includes Turkey, was aware of the time and place where our planes
would operate. And this is exactly where and when we were attacked. Why did
we share this information with the Americans? Either they don't control
their allies, or they just pass this information left and right without
realizing what the consequences of such actions might be. We will have to
have a serious talk with our U.S. partners."
Putin also suggested that the Turkish attack was in retaliation for Russia's
bombing of a truck convoy caring Islamic State oil to Turkey. On Monday, on
the sidelines of the Paris summit, Putin said Russia has "received
additional information confirming that that oil from the deposits controlled
by Islamic State militants enters Turkish territory on industrial scale."
Turkey's Erdogan - also in Paris - denied buying oil from terrorists and
vowed to resign "if it is proven that we have, in fact, done so."
Was Obama Angry?
In private, Obama may have been outraged by Erdogan's reckless actions - as
some reports suggest - but, if so, Obama seems publicly more afraid of
offending the neocons who dominate Official Washington's opinion circles and
who hold key positions in his own administration, than of provoking a
possible nuclear confrontation with Russia.
On Nov. 24, even as Russian emotions were running high - reacting to the
killing of one Russian pilot and the death of a second Russian marine killed
after his helicopter was shot down apparently by a U.S.-supplied TOW missile
fired by Syrian jihadists - Obama chose to act "tough" against Putin, both
during a White House press conference with French President Francois Holland
and later with pro-Turkish remarks from U.S. officials.
During the press conference after the Turkish shoot-down and the deliberate
fire from Turkish-backed Syrian jihadists aiming at two Russian airmen as
they parachuted to the ground, Obama chose to make disparaging remarks about
the Russian president.
Obama boasted about the 65 nations in the U.S.-led coalition against the
Islamic State compared to Putin's small coalition of Russia and Iran
(although Putin's tiny coalition appears to be much more serious and
effective than Obama's bloated one, which includes countries such as Turkey,
Saudi Arabia and Qatar that have been implicated in supporting jihadist
elements, including Al Qaeda and the Islamic State).
By delivering these anti-Russian insults at such a delicate time, Obama
apparently was trusting that Putin would keep his cool and tamp down public
emotions at home, even as Obama lacked the integrity and courage to stand up
to neocon criticism from The Washington Post's editorial page or from some
of his hawkish subordinates.
The administration's neocons who keep demanding an escalation of tensions
with Russia include Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian
Affairs Victoria Nuland. Then, there are the officials most identified with
arms procurement, sales and use, such as Defense Secretary Ashton Carter.
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford recently volunteered to
Congress that U.S. forces "can impose a no-fly zone" for Syria (a dangerous
play advocated by presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and Sen. John
McCain). Dunford is the same hawk who identified Russia as the "existential
threat" to the U.S. and said it would be "reasonable" to send heavy weapons
to Ukraine on Russia's border.
Meanwhile, NATO commander Gen. Philip Breedlove keeps up his
fly-by-the-pants information warfare campaign citing Russian "aggression,"
"invasions" and plans to do still more evil things. One is tempted to
dismiss him as a buffoon; but he is the NATO commander.
Lack of Control
It does not appear as though Obama has the same degree of control over
foreign and defense policy that Putin enjoys in Moscow - or at least one
hopes Putin can retain such control since some hard-line Russian
nationalists are fuming that Putin has been too accommodating of his Western
"partners."
Perhaps the greatest danger from Obama's acquiescence to the neocons' new
Cold War with Russia is that the neocon hopes for "regime change in Moscow"
will be realized except that Putin will be replaced by some
ultra-nationalist who would rather risk nuclear war than accept further
humiliation of Mother Russia.
Meanwhile, back in Washington, the U.S. establishment is such that the
generals, the arms manufacturers and weapons merchants, the Defense
Department, and most of Congress have a very strong say in U.S. foreign
policy - and Obama seems powerless to change it.
The model of governing in Washington is a far cry from Russia's guiding
principle of edinonachaliye - by which one supreme authority is in clear
control of decision-making on defense and foreign policy.
Even when Obama promises, he often fails to deliver. Think back to what
Obama told then-President Dmitry Medvedev when they met in Seoul in March
2012, about addressing Russian concerns over European missile defense. In
remarks picked up by camera crews, Obama asked for some "space" until after
the U.S. election. Obama can be heard saying, "This is my last election.
After my election, I have more flexibility."
Yet, even after winning reelection, Obama has remained cowed by the
influential neocons - even as he has bucked some of their more aggressive
demands, such as a massive U.S. bombing campaign against Assad's military in
summer 2013 and bomb-bomb-bombing Iran; instead, in 2014-15, Obama pushed
for a negotiated agreement to constrain Iran's nuclear program.
Ideally, Obama should be able to show some flexibility on Syria during his
last year in office, but no one should hold their breath. Obama appears to
have deep fears about crossing the neocons or Israel regarding what they
want for the Middle East and Eastern Europe.
Besides the neocons' close ties to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu, the neocons are intimately connected to the interests of the
Military-Industrial Complex, which provides substantial funding for the
major think tanks where many neocons hang their hats and churn out new
arguments for more world conflict and thus more military spending.
Unlike Obama, Pope Francis addressed this fact-of-life head-on in his Sept.
24 address to members of the U.S. Congress - many if not most of whom also
are lavished with proceeds from the arms trade and then appropriate still
more funding for arms production and sales.
"Why are deadly weapons being sold to those who plan to inflict untold
suffering," Francis asked them face-to-face. "Sadly, the answer, as we all
know, is simply for money: money that is drenched in blood, often innocent
blood."
An Old Epithet
From my days as a CIA analyst covering the Soviet Union, I'm reminded of the
epithet favored by the Soviet party daily Pravda a few decades ago
-"vallstreetskiye krovopitsiy" - or Wall St. bloodsuckers. Propaganda-ish as
that term seemed, it turns out that Soviet media were not far off on that
subject.
Indeed, the banks and corporations involved in arms manufacture and sales
enjoy immense power - arguably, more than a president; unarguably more than
Obama. The moneyed interests - including Congress - are calling the shots.
The old adage "money makes the world go round" is also apparent in
Washington's velvet-gloves treatment of the Saudis and is nowhere better
illustrated than in the continued suppression of 28 pages of the 2002 Joint
Congressional Inquiry on 9/11. Those pages deal with the Saudi role in
financing and supporting some of the 9/11 hijackers, but both the Bush and
Obama administrations have kept those pages hidden for 13 years.
One reason is that the Saudis are the primary recipients of the U.S. trade
in weapons, for which they pay cash. American manufacturers are selling the
Saudis arms worth $100 billion under the current five-year agreement. Oddly,
acts of terrorism sweeten the pot. Three days after the attacks in Paris,
Washington and Riyadh announced a deal for $1.3 billion more.
And yet, neither Obama, nor any of the candidates trying to replace him, nor
Congress is willing to jeopardize the arms trade by insisting that Riyadh
call an abrupt halt to its support for the jihadists fighting in Syria for
fear this might incur the wrath of the deep-pocket Saudis.
Not even Germany - already inundated, so far this year, by a flood of
950,000 refugees, mostly from Syria - is willing to risk Saudi displeasure.
Berlin prefers to pay off the Turks with billions of euros to stanch the
flow of those seeking refuge in Europe.
And so, an unholy alliance of Turkey, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states
continues to fuel the war in Syria while Obama pretends that his giant
coalition is really doing the job of taking on many of those same jihadists.
But Obama's coalition has been woefully incompetent and indeed compromised,
bumbling along and letting the Islamic State seize more territory along with
Al Qaeda and its affiliates and allies.
Russia's entry into the war in September changed the equation because -
unlike Obama's grand coalition - Putin's puny coalition with Iran actually
was serious about beating back the jihadists and stabilizing Assad's regime.
Turkey's shoot-down of the Russian warplane on Nov. 24 was a crude message
from Erdogan that success in defeating the jihadists would not be tolerated.
As for the United States and Europe, myopia prevails. None seems concerned
that the terrorists whom they support today will come back to bite them
tomorrow. American officials, despite their rhetoric and despite 9/11, seem
to consider the terrorist threat remote from U.S. shores - and, in any case,
dwarfed in importance by the lucrative arm sales.
As for the Vienna talks on Syria, the speed with which they were arranged
(with Iran taking part) raised expectations now dampened. Last week, for
example, Secretary of State John Kerry bragged about how a meeting of
"moderate" rebels is to convene "in the next few weeks" to come up with
principles for negotiating with Syrian President Assad's government. The
convener? Saudi Arabia!
Obama knows what has to happen for this terrorist threat to be truly
addressed. The Saudis and Turks have to be told, in no uncertain terms, to
stop supporting the jihadists. But that would require extraordinary courage
and huge political - perhaps even physical - risk. There is no sign that
President Obama dares bite that bullet.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
License


Other related posts: