Qatar Ordered Pakistani Super Mushshak Aircraft

Are Turkey and Saudi Arabia Going to be Busted!?

King Salman and Turkish President Erdogan are about to spark a new war for control over Middle Eastern oil but the plan, which was in fact devised by Washington, will ultimately backfire, F. William Engdahl asserted. Riyadh, assisted by Qatar and Turkey, is striving to bring oil fields and pipeline routes in Iraq and neighboring Syria "under direct Saudi control," the expert on oil politics noted. "Unfortunately, as in all wars, there will be no winners," Engdahl wrote in an opinion piece for New Eastern Outlook. He also named the EU, the Iraqis, Syrians and Kurds as the main losers. 

The historian named four key groupings, which will be involved in the upcoming conflict. Sunnis, including Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Daesh and the recently formed Saudi-led anti-terrorist coalition, make up the first group. The second one consists of Syria, Iran, Iraq and Hezbollah, with Russia also being a factor. The analyst named Israel as the third player. Engdahl maintains that the fourth group, led by the United States, is "playing the most sly, deceptive role" at the moment.

"Washington is preparing a devastating trap that will catch the foolish Saudis and their Turkish and other Wahhabi allies in a devastating defeat in Syria and Iraq that will no doubt then be proclaimed as a 'victory over terrorism' and a 'victory for the Syrian people,'" the historian assumed.

Daesh, according to Engdahl, is instrumental to the Saudi plan. The oil kingdom wants the group to perform "ethnic cleansing of the legitimate Syrian populations" living in oil-rich regions so that it would then be able to transport fuel from Qatar and Saudi Arabia to Turkey through Syria. "Erdogan's Turkish military and most especially his Turkish intelligence, MIT, headed by close crony, Hakan Fidan, is playing a key role in the planned Saudi-Turk-Qatari coalition's move to destroy the regime of Assad and at the same time seize control for them of the rich oil fields of Iraq between Mosul and Kirkuk," the historian explained.

Although many see the recently-adopted UN Security Council resolution on Syria as an achievement that will help to bring lasting peace to Syria, Engdahl views the document as a "a near-perfect deceptive maneuver" designed by Washington to "set the stage for the imminent Saudi-Turk oil wars and subsequent debacle in Syria and Iraq." The agreement paves the way for a ceasefire, which is expected to be followed by the UN-supervised free and fair presidential election. "That ceasefire excludes Saudi and Turkey-backed Daesh, and the al-Qaeda affiliate, al-Nusra Front. At the same time, it calls for an immediate, simultaneous start of a 'political transition' which means completely contradictory things for the United States, Germany, France and the UK as it does for Syria, Iran, and Russia," Engdahl warned.

The expert maintains that Russia, Damascus-led forces, Hezbollah and Iran will abide by the resolution, while Daesh and the like will "have free reign to grab the oil riches" in Iraq and Syria. "At that point, the trap will have been set and Washington will no doubt spring it, with Russia, Iran and Assad … able to do little to prevent it," he observed.

Qatar agrees to buy 24 Rafale fighter jets from France

Qatar has agreed to buy 24 Dassault Aviation-built Rafale fighter jets in a deal worth 6.3 billion euros ($7.05 billion), the French government said on Thursday, as the Gulf Arab state looks to boost its military firepower amid regional instability.

Officials said the accord also provided for the training of a number of Qatari intelligence officers.

Tensions in the Middle East with conflicts in Yemen, Syria and Libya, as well as fears of Iran's growing influence in the area, have fuelled a desire across Sunni Gulf Arab states to modernise their military hardware.

The contract, the third this year for Dassault after deals to sell fighter jets to Egypt and India, also includes MBDA missiles, and the training of 36 Qatari pilots and 100 technicians by the French army, a French Defence Ministry official said.

"The president spoke to Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, the Emir of Qatar, who confirmed his desire to buy 24 Rafale combat planes," President Francois Hollande's office said in a statement.

A French air force Rafale.

Hollande will travel to Doha on May 4 to sign the contract before heading to Saudi Arabia as an honorary guest at a summit of Gulf Arab leaders.

The Rafale sales have lifted French arms exports this year to about 15 billion euros and have been a welcome boost for Dassault, which had been under increasing pressure to sell the plane overseas after years of failures.

Dassault shares were up 2.1 percent at 0912 GMT.

The French government said last year that it would slow the pace at which it takes delivery of Rafale jets to just 26 over the next five years instead of 11 every year.

Dassault is also in talks aimed at supplying 16 of the multi-role combat jets to Malaysia and has resumed discussions over potential fighter sales to another Gulf Arab state, the United Arab Emirates, the official said.

(REUTERS)

Leopard 2A7: An Urban Demon

The Leopard 2A7 main battle tank was developed by German Krauss-Maffei Wegmann in cooperation with the German Army. It is a proposed upgrade package for existing MBTs. It was first revealed in 2010. It is a further development of the Leopard 2A6 MBT. It includes some subsystems of the Leopard 2 PSO. The Leopard 2A7 is intended for urban warfare, low intensity conflicts, as well as conventional military operations. Currently it is one of the best main battle tanks in the world. German Army plans to upgrade about 50-150 Leopard 2 tanks to the 2A7 standard. In 2011 Germany agreed to sell more tank 200 of these main battle tanks to Saudi Arabia. In 2013, Qatar ordered 62 of these MBTs. 

 

Leopard2A7-UrbOps MBT

 

The Leopard 2A7 is a modular upgrade package, so other Leopard 2 tanks can be upgraded to this standard. Combat systems can be optimized depending on customer requirements. Protection of this main battle tank was further improved. The Leopard 2A7 is fitted with additional passive armor. It offers 360° protection against RPG rounds. New side skirts were fitted. Protection of the hull floor was also increased to withstand IEDs and landmines. This MBT has a modular armor, so damaged modules can be easily replaced in field conditions.

This main battle tank is armed with a Rheinmetall 120-mm / L55 smoothbore gun. The same gun is used on the Leopard 2A6. It has better fire accuracy and longer range, comparing with the previous Leopard 2 tanks. The gun is loaded manually and is compatible with all standard NATO ammunition, as well as newly developed programmable HE munitions. These programmeable rounds enable to engage targets behind cover and within buildings. These multi-purpose rounds can be also used against enemy troops, armored vehicles and low-flying helicopters. A total of 42 rounds are carried inside the tank. 15 rounds are stored in the turret bustle and are ready to use. Remaining rounds are stored inside the hull.

Secondary armament consists of a 12.7-mm machine gun. It is mounted in remotely controlled weapon station on top of the roof. There is also a coaxial 7.62-mm machine gun. This main battle tank has a front and rear thermal image system for the driver. Commander and gunner have additional cameras for long-range surveillance. Vehicle also carries advanced command and control equipment and is fitted with battlefield management system. The Leopard 2A7 is operated by a crew of four, including commander, gunner, loader and driver.

The Leopard 2A7 retains the engine of it's predecessor. It is powered by an MTU MB-837 Ka501 turbocharged diesel, developing 1 500 hp. This MBT is also fitted with Steyr auxiliary power unit, which powers all systems, when the main engine is turned off. Despite increase in weight vehicle has increased mobility due to improved suspension components. Cross-country performance is similar to that of the 2A5 and 2A6 tanks. This main battle tank can be fitted with a front-mounted dozer blade for self-entrenching and clearing obstacles. Mine ploughs or mine rollers can also be attached.

MBDA unveils the MARTE COASTAL DEFENCE SYSTEM at DIMDEX 2014

At the DIMDEX exhibition in Doha, Qatar (25-27 March 2014), MBDA is presenting for the first time ever a new coastal defence system based on the Marte missile family. This system, the Marte Coastal Defence System (MCDS), guarantees maritime coastal traffic surveillance and interdiction to hostile ships in territorial waters.

Michele Di Nunzio, anti-ship missile expert at MBDA, introduces the Marte Coastal Defence System during DIMDEX 2014.

The System is Capable of:

» monitoring and picturing sea communication lines;

» detecting and identifying hostile vessels through the use of active surveillance equipment;

» receiving target data via data-link;

» neutralising hostile vessels by using a new generation of anti-ship missiles.

The MCDS is available with different and flexible configurations depending on customer requirements. This system can operate in either a stand-alone mode or integrated within an existing surveillance radar network. 

At the DIMDEX exhibition in Doha, Qatar (25-27 March 2014), MBDA is presenting for the first time ever a new coastal defence system based on the Marte missile family.

In addition, MBDA can offer two different missile options for MCDS; the Marte MK2/N for the control of brown waters and Marte ER, for the control of a more expansive sea area.

The System Configuration Consists of:

» a Command and Control (C2) module, comprising an ISO standard 12 foot shelter that can be connected via data-link with the upper level surveillance system. This module includes consoles to manage the local picture provided by its own radar (stand-alone mode) or to track targets provided by the upper level surveillance system (integrated mode).

» a launcher module, comprising up to four firing units that can be mounted on ISO standard trucks. Each launcher can deploy up to four missiles.

» a logistics module, comprising a logistic and support vehicle, plus a variable number of reloading vehicles.

The all-weather Marte MK2 is a fire-and-forget, medium-range, sea-skimming anti-ship weapon system. The new version of the missile, called Marte ER (Extended Range), keeps the basic characteristics of the Marte family, but extends its range.

The Marte Missile Family

The all-weather Marte MK2 is a fire-and-forget, medium-range, sea-skimming anti-ship weapon system. It is equipped with mid-course inertial and radar-based terminal guidance and is capable of destroying small craft and seriously damaging larger vessels. The missile weighs 310 kg and is 3.85 metres long. Marte was first developed in the 1980s with the 30km range MK/2 version being deployed on helicopters. Subsequent models followed for integration on different platforms and thus a family of missiles came into being.

The Marte MK-2/S, where “S” stands for “Short” and indicates shorter munitions in order to enable simpler on board integration, has already been integrated on AW101 and NH-90 NFH helicopters (Naval/Nato Frigate Helicopter) in service with the Italian Navy. The Marte MK-2/A was then developed for launch from fixed-wing aircraft (fighter or patrol aircraft). Finally, in response to the growing interest for a lightweight, rapid-response surface-to-surface naval missile system for littoral operations, Marte MK2/N was developed.

The new version of the missile, called Marte ER (Extended Range), keeps the basic characteristics of the Marte family, but extends its range. The new product is different from previous versions thanks to two main features: turbojet propulsion (leading to a four-fold increase in range compared to the rocket motor version), and the new ISO-calibre cylinder cell. The missile, equipped with these new important components, still preserves a series of elements that were already present in previous versions of the Marte missile, providing a number of significant commonalities that are widely appreciated by the market.

Thanks to these improvements, the new missile has a range that now exceeds 100 km and a much increased speed, both in the cruise and final attack phases. However, it is shorter than the previous model. Logistic systems, such as the transport and stocking canister in the helicopter version and the trolley for moving and hooking the missile to aircraft, are the same as those used in the Mk2/S model, offering clear user advantages.

The Middle East Facts: An Eye of Jew (Article)

This article states the historical conflicts between the worlds of semetic-west globe-Islamic Worl mostly; deep in through the religion, economy, military impressions of thoughts by their (Jews & their allies) activities. Read carefully, intentions are not hurting some one by above sentences but to re-thought about Palestinian's freedom which is mesmerized by bloody jews of ill-born Israel.  

In complete defiance of United Nations (U.N.) resolutions supported by Russia, China, United States, Britain, France and Germany, Iran continues to enrich uranium and produce plutonium at no less than seven suspected nuclear sites. Seeking cooperation from North Korea and A.Q. Khan, the notorious weapons smuggler from Pakistan, Iran continues to pursue enough fissile material for a basic nuclear weapon by spinning more than 3,000 centrifuges at the Nataz enrichment site from uranium hexafluoride gas. Recent reports from international intelligence agencies such as Israel’s Mossad Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations (HaMossad leModi’in v’leTafkidim Meyuhadim) indicate that Iran has also built a heavy-water facility at Arak, southwest of Tehran for making Plutonium, another way to make material for a nuclear bomb. Other sites include Tabriz, Karaj, Mashhad, Qom, Esfahan and the Russian built electricity-generating reactor at Bushehr.

Claiming the effort is needed to meet peaceful energy needs, and supported by Mohamed ElBaradei, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Iran seems poised to join the club of nation state actors operating outside of the mandate of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (North Korea quit, India, Pakistan and Israel never joined). As the potential for Iran to weaponise with nuclear missiles increases, the possibility of a regional arms race becomes frighteningly real. Middle Eastern rivalries could easily push Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria, and Turkey into development programs, and exponentially increase the risk and consequences of a fatal “miscalculation”.

For quite some time, this threat has received considerable attention by military planners and the international media who have engaged in an often-public debate concerning the justification of a precision air strike on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. President Bush has repeatedly stated that the United States will keep Israel from harm through a military option that if extended to Saudi Arabia and Egypt, could calm rivalries before the region becomes even more volatile.

In fact a ground war with Iran has been envisaged since the mid-1990s as part of a strategic "sequencing" of theater operations. During the Clinton administration, US Central Command (USCENTCOM) had formulated "in war theater plans" to first invade Iraq and then invade Iran.

"The broad national security interests and objectives expressed in the President’s National Security Strategy (NSS) and the Chairman’s National Military Strategy (NMS) form the foundation of the United States Central Command’s theater strategy. The NSS directs implementation of a strategy of dual containment of the rogue states of Iraq and Iran as long as those states pose a threat to U.S. interests, to other states in the region, and to their own citizens. Dual containment is designed to maintain the balance of power in the region without depending on either Iraq or Iran. USCENTCOM’s theater strategy is interest-based and threat-focused. The purpose of U.S. engagement, as espoused in the NSS, is to protect the United States’ vital interest in the region – uninterrupted, secure U.S./Allied access to Gulf oil."

Consistent with CENTCOM’s 1995 "sequencing", the plans to target Iran were activated under TIRANNT (Theater Iran Near Term) in the immediate wake of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. TIRANNT existed in a scenario analysis of a theater war directed against Iran. The analysis, which involved senior military and intelligence experts, consigned to examine different theater scenarios.
"The US army, navy, air force and marines have all prepared battle plans and spent four years building bases and training for "Operation Iranian Freedom". Admiral Fallon, the new head of US Central Command [resigned in March 2008], has inherited computerized plans under the name TIRANNT (Theatre Iran Near Term)."

Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, has said he favors a diplomatic solution to Iran’s nuclear ambitions but has not ruled out military action. Olmert told a German newspaper “Israel always has to be in a position to defend itself against any adversary and against any threat of any kind".



Such a strike-mission scenario has significant historical precedent for Israel and the Israeli Defense Forces Air Force (IDF AF). In 1981, Israeli jets bombed the Osirak nuclear facility in Iraq to thwart Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program. And last September Israel bombed a facility in Syria that US officials have alleged was a nuclear reactor being constructed with help from Pyongyang North Korea (see before and after satellite image at right).

As the anti-Israel rhetoric of Mr. Ahmadinejad and the ayatollahs continues to increase in tempo, the likelihood of an Israel – Iran confrontation grows. The efforts of the Majlis speaker Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel have done little to soften the Khamenei position that “The state of Israel is an unforgivable sin, and all Muslims have a duty to reverse it”. Iran’s anti-Israel stance and nuclear efforts may eventually provoke Israel’s IDF AF to launch a pre-emptive strike.



An Israeli military exercise held this month was most likely a rehearsal for an attack on Iranian nuclear facilities, according to US defense department officials. A Pentagon official told the Associated Press that Israel sent IDF AF warplanes and other aircraft to the eastern Mediterranean for "large scale" exercises, The New York Times quoted defense department officials as saying that more than 100 Israeli F-16s and F-15s took part in the exercises, flying more than 1,450 kilometers – roughly the distance from Israel to Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment facility. The exercises also reportedly included refueling tankers and helicopters capable of rescuing downed pilots. A Pentagon official also told the New York Times newspaper that the exercises were conducted to both practice a prospective Iran air strike and also to show the US and Europe that Israel was prepared to act militarily should diplomacy fail. Israel itself has neither confirmed nor denied the exercises, with an Israeli military spokesman saying only that the country’s air force "regularly trains for various missions in order to confront and meet the challenges posed by the threats facing Israel".

The words of this IDF spokesperson eerily recall when, in 1967, Israel was brilliantly prepared to act militarily by executing the most decisive pre-emptive air strike in the annals of modern military history.



Prelude To War


Israel’s six-day war of 1967 is one of histories decisive victories directly attributed to operation Moked, a military plan built upon a devastating air-strike attack designed to eliminate air space assets and control to the enemy. On the first day of the war, June 5, 1967, the IDF/AF staged what has come to be considered the most successful strategic air attack ever delivered.

It is generally considered that Egypt initiated the crisis leading to the 1967 war by taking actions in April 1967 that forced Israel to plan a preventive war to avoid destruction. In the view of many Middle East specialists, Israel may have instigated the crisis by fooling the intelligence agencies of the Soviet Union with a disinformation campaign regarding Israeli military intentions. Soviet diplomats in turn led both Syria and Egypt to believe that Israel was massing troops to attack Syria, prompting Egypt’s President Nasser to begin preparations to come to Syria’s aid. Nasser obviously overreacted in the spring of 1967 by asking that the United Nations forces in the Sinai Peninsula separating Egyptian and Israeli troops be withdrawn. This suddenly put Egyptian forces back in control of the Strait of Tiran, at the mouth of the Gulf of Aqaba, which Nasser then declared closed to Israeli shipping, a move unacceptable to Israel. It also was unacceptable to the U.S., which had secretly guaranteed – when it forced Israel to withdraw from the Sinai in 1956 – that the strait would remain open.

By June 1967, the Arab‑Israeli situation had deteriorated to the point of no return. After the UN peacekeeping force in the Sinai peninsula had been withdrawn at Nasser’s request, and Egyptian guns blockaded the Gulf of Aqaba to Israeli ships, denying their access to the port of Eilat, Israel attacked Egypt and in six days of combat occupied the entire Sinai Peninsula up to the Suez Canal.

Brigadier General Yeshayahou Gavish, Chief of Southern Command at Beersheba, describes the Israeli strike against Egypt: “The attack of the Egyptians started with the movement of war planes toward Israel, which were detected by our radar, and with the shelling of villages along the Gaza Strip". There is no claim that these blips on a radar grid, allegedly seen to the west over the Mediterranean, ever materialized as an air armada violating Israel’s space. Of the bombardment of numerous frontier villages, however, there is adequate proof. Artillery and mortar shelling from beyond her borders was an affliction with which Israel had had to live more or less patiently for nineteen years.



The Sinai Invasion


When patience ended, plan took over according to a brilliantly conceived timetable. Having been told by the Army Chief of Staff, Major General Itzhak Rabin at 0800 that the Egyptians were coming, Gavish could report at 0815 that three of his divisions were already moving on enemy territory. One column was advancing toward the Gaza Strip; the second was moving against Umm Gataf, a main Egyptian fortress organized around successive sub-ridges anchored on both sides to much higher, unflankable dunes and ridges, 30 miles southeast of El Arish; and the third division was slicing in between them, headed straight west over raw desert, roughing it where no road lay. One independent brigade was sparring toward Kuntilla in the south of Sinai with no intention of getting mauled in full-scale engagement.

To get away that fast, these several formations had to be already drawn up in march order, echeloned according to what combat would require of the columns from front to rear. They must have trained hard at it for some days; an armored division on the road stretches out twenty-five miles.

An air raid warning had sounded at 0755 over Tel Aviv. While the alarm went on, a radio news caster continued his scheduled report, completed it, and then on the stroke of 0800, added quietly: "We are at war." In that way some of the public got the word. Early morning in Tel Aviv was otherwise almost normally calm, except at military headquarters. The sky was bright and cloudless. Following the all clear, men and women proceeded on their routine rounds. Motor traffic had kept rolling, disregarding the alert.

So when the clock struck eight, only one thing was more certain than that a new war had come: it would not be like the last war, in 1956. After that year the balance of heavy armament in the Near East had shifted radically against Israel-through Soviet assistance to Egypt, Iraq, and Syria in the form of modern tanks and military aircraft. Arab strength in tracked fighting vehicles and mobile guns was a lesser menace, although Egypt alone could field more Stalin-3, T-34, T-54, and T-55 tanks than Israel could muster in matching armor. Dramatically altering the problem was the all-around threat from Arab air bases. They could put up enough jet bombers, such as the TU-16 and IL-28, along with MIG-21 transonic fighters and MIG-ITs, to outnumber Israel’s comparable types, like the Vatour bomber-fighter and the Mirage III CJ, by better than two to one. With four air bases in Sinai, two of them new, Egypt could put MIG’s over Tel Aviv in seven minutes, the flight time from El Arish.



The Air Attack


North of Tel Aviv at 0745 that morning there began at the several air bases a great motion and stir: crews scrambling; fighter aircraft moving to the runways, some from underground hangars; planes taking off in formations of two, six, or eight, the numbers varying according to the size and importance of the pre-designated target. Such were the flight paths that farmers afield only a mile or so away might have wholly missed their going. The din and howl of this lift-off must have been deafening as group followed group low and to the west over blue water.

It was 0145 in New York and Washington when the attack order sent Israel’s war planes winging toward the Nile, Suez, and Sinai-fifteen minutes before the armor was directed to roll for the borders. Those cities slept on, not knowing until 0330 that a new war was underway. By then its outcome was already virtually decided. There followed for Israel’s High Command one suspense-filled hour, though not for her pilots. First to take off was a formation of Vatour bomber fighters of the deep penetration group. Theirs was to be the farthest journey, their target the bomber base at Luxor on the Nile, far to the southwest of Sharm-el-Sheikh and almost double the distance to Cairo. The key to the master plan was to coordinate a synchronized attack, directed against eleven bases. The lift-offs were timed and staged so that each formation fronting the first wave would go at its target in the same minute. Thereafter the same eleven bases would be pounded steadily for eighty minutes. Speed had been precisely measured against distance, without the aid of computers. Having tried and tested the mechanics of the staggered take-off, the Israelis knew it could be done.

The Egyptians had set themselves up for such an attack; each aircraft type was concentrated at its own base, allowing the Israelis to prioritize their targets. Proposals for constructing bombproof concrete hangars had been submitted by the air force, but none had been built. Assuming any Israeli attack would come at dawn, the MiGs had already flown their patrols and returned to base at about the same time the first elements of the attacking forces took off. The Egyptians believed the main air bases of Faid and Kibrit were out of range to Israeli aircraft, and jets were parked on the aprons in rows; they were wrong. Many airfields had only one runway; if the Israelis destroyed it, no further operations could take place.

The eleven targeted fields whose destruction was expected to shock Egypt and induce in its air arm a state of near-paralysis were: El Arish, Bir Gifgafa, Bir Tamada, and Jebel Libni in Sinai. Abu Suer, Kabrit, and Fayid in the Canal zone. Imshas, Cairo West, Beni Sueir, and Luxor in the Nile Valley. All eleven were nominated and hit because they were the bases either for bombers or for MIG-21′s, the hard core of the threat to Israel’s interior. With the destruction of the fighter aircraft based on Sinai and the three fields of Suez, such MIG’s as remained whole in Egypt would not have range enough to menace any city in Israel as the MIG is a short-legged aircraft.


Myth, often enough repeated, and especially when supported by arrows on a map, has a way of displacing fact. So it was that in the wake of the instant war, experts hypothesized about how Israel’s airmen contrived the approach to Egypt to achieve full deception and accomplish total surprise. Most of the diagrams purporting to show the air strike have arrows indicating prolonged flight westward over the sea, and then hooking back over the northeast corner of the Libyan Desert to approach the Nile from the west. Some show planes based on Beersheba hitting the Egyptian fields in Sinai.

None of this happened. There is an air base at Beersheba; its planes and pilots supported the armored attack into Sinai from the start. All the planes in the synchronized strike that smashed the eleven main bases took off from the runways near Tel Aviv. They flew west over the Mediterranean for a short distance. Those bound for the targets along the Nile then flew on a direct southwest course to their objectives. The Sinai-bound fighters, which are certain to have staged out last because of the short distance, flew almost due south. They moved out over a glass-smooth Mediterranean, which, for jets moving even at subsonic speed fifty to one hundred feet above the surface, is a far less friendly sea than one a bit choppy. They had to stay dangerously low lest they be picked up by enemy radar. At that level, a smooth sea means monotony, with the blending of water and sky, the loss of horizon, incessant strain in maintaining the proper altitude, and constant vigilance to avoid disaster in the form of ditching due to a slip in judgment.

With radios silent, the June 5 formation flew on toward Egypt. During the approach, as well as in actually striking at the target, the planes flew at maximum speed, although none of the bombers or fighters flew at transonic speed, since the weapons load out would not permit the aircraft to move that fast. A few minutes past eight, and they were crossing the Egyptian coastline, rocketing along at treetop level. Then should have come the first warning to the Egyptians, since, from that point on, direct observation of the Israelis’ passage became unavoidable. Nothing happened.

The Egyptians had one chance to discover what was coming. The Jordanian radar facility at Ajlun was one of the most sophisticated in the entire middle east. The screens were suddenly inundated with blips at 0715. The officer in charge radioed in the prearranged code for war to headquarters in Amman, from whence it was relayed to the Egyptian Defense Ministry – where it sat, indecipherable. The Egyptians had changed their codes on June 4, failing to notify the Jordanians. The Jordanians watched the Israeli aircraft head into the Sinai, repeatedly sending the indecipherable warning.

Without sign of any reaction below them, the planes flew on to Luxor without incident, rose five hundred feet in the air to bomb the runways and strafe the unbunkered TU-16′s, which were neatly, evenly spaced on the apron and alongside the runways. These multimillion-dollar twin-jet medium bombers with a range of three thousand miles and a speed of six hundred miles per hour were cratered right where the attackers had expected to find them. At Luxor the four 30-mm. cannon on the Vatours were the big killers of Egypt’s Soviet-built aircraft. Much the same sort of thing was occurring at the other ten bases by the time the farthest-south Vatours were heading for home. At Israel’s insistence, the French-built Dassault Mirages and Super Mysteres had been modified to carry two 30-mm.guns instead of their original rockets. Thus, Israeli pilots hammered Egypt’s air force to death with cannon fire. It was so accurate that correspondents credited the devastation to a new secret weapon, something that smelled out the vulnerable heart of a sitting aircraft and went right to it. To attribute what happened to expert gunnery skills sounded much too simple.

Thus for eighty minutes, more of the same was delivered against the seven fields in the Canal Zone and along the Nile. It was judged soon after the first strike that the MIG’s based on Sinai were all burned to ash and wrecked metal. There followed a respite of perhaps twenty minutes. Then for eighty minutes more, the air force went at Egypt again. Syrian and Iraqi bases went untouched through the morning. Only twelve fighting aircraft were left at the Tel Aviv bases to defend Israel. None was put up as a screen to the north or east, and when at last that was deemed advisable, only eight took to the air.



A Gutsy Call


The mastermind of this plan, without doubt the greatest gamble with the largest payoff in the history of military aviation, sat in his unpretentious command post at Tel Aviv, supremely confident that it would work. At age thirty-nine, about one year earlier, Brigadier General Mordechai Hod had taken command of an air force that weight-for-weight was probably the most effective fighting machine anywhere, made so largely by his predecessor, Brigadier General Ezer Weizmann, now Deputy for Operations. Weizmann shaped the tools and trained the men. Hod was the man with the big idea. Hod belonged to the first class of pilots ever to win wings in Israel, this on March 14, 1949. A third-generation Sabra (native-born Israeli), he had taken his first flight training in Czechoslovakia in 1948, and then converted to jets in England.

There were some simple reasons for his conviction that he could win the battle for Israel over Cairo. He calculated that it would take the Egyptians one hour to assess what had happened and a second hour to agree on what could be done about it. He was convinced that when hit, they would not tell the truth to their allies. Instead, they would proclaim a victory, disarming in its effect. Syria and Iraq he could not take seriously; they were just an inconvenience. But he made one mistake. Instead of a lag of two hours, the Egyptians gave him four hours. Long before that it was all over. The planes of the first wave had all returned to home base by 0900. It was then that Hod put up the screen to the north.

Knowing by 1100 that he had won the air battle in Egypt, Hod began shifting bombers and fighters to Sinai to support the attack by the armored columns. Around noon he began the air attack on the bases of Jordan and Syria and continued through most of June 5. But they were in effect finished after one hour. The only Iraqi base strafed was H-3, along the pipeline, just east of the border of the Jordan panhandle. One squadron of MI G-21′s had set down there just in time to go out like a light. Habaniya, near Baghdad, was not attacked, being beyond range of Israel’s bombers.


BLU-107 Durandal – The Durandal anti-runway bomb was developed by the French company MATRA, designed solely for the purpose of destroying runways. Once the parachute-retarded low-level drop bomb attains a nose-down attitude, it fires a rocket booster that penetrates the runway surface, and a delayed explosion buckles a portion of the runway. It can penetrate up to 40 centimeters of concrete, creating a 200 square meter crater causing damage more difficult to repair than the crater of a general-purpose bomb.
A third or more of Nasser’s warplanes remained in condition to fight. Well aware of it, Hod had no intention of renewing the assault on the bases. There had been no dogfights; not one MIG had risen to challenge a Mirage.

The air-to-air dueling started that Monday afternoon somewhat west of the Bir Gifgafa-Jebel Libni line and continued into Tuesday. Egypt threw SAM missiles into the air fight from the park west of the Mitla Pass, a fact that went unreported. There are entries in the record; an Israeli pilot said casually: "Hey, one of those blazing telephone poles is after me." The SAM’s did no harm; Israel’s fighters were flying too low.

Some of the victory is told in statistics. The Israelis themselves were stunned by their success, with kill ratios exceeding estimates by 100 percent. Indeed, Israeli HQ refused to believe the initial reports until Hod had conducted personal debriefings with mission leaders. There were thirty-one dogfights near Suez and above the western Sinai; five Egyptian planes were shot down, not one Israeli plane. Hod lost twenty-five pilots, twenty four of them when their ships were shot down by ground fire; the other man died as a forward observer with the army. Yet the 492 sorties were the lesser part of the workload; airmen flew nearly a thousand sorties in support of the armored advance into Sinai.

Of 420 aircraft in the Egyptian Air Force that morning, 286 were destroyed, along with the loss of nearly one-third of their crews. Thirteen bases were rendered inoperable, along with 23 radar stations and anti-aircraft artillery (AAA) sites. At 1035, Hod turned to Moshe Dayan and reported, “The Egyptian Air Force has ceased to exist.”

Hod was above all elated by the performance of the Fougas. The Fouga Magister, built in Israel, is the basic trainer for jet pilots, and this relatively slow schooling craft had been up armed with two machine guns and thirty-six rockets to operate as a tank-killer over Sinai. Older men, El Al pilots and others from civilian life had been called back to man this fleet. These turtles of the air force destroyed more than seventy Egyptian artillery pieces, took on the enemy armor wherever they found it, and softened the base camps before the armored spearheads came up. Their over-all contribution to the quick victory is incalculable.

Hod learned that he had sorely underestimated the resources of his men and their machines. He had expected three to four sorties a day from the average pilot; he got’ an average of seven, and some went as high as ten. He figured the standard of gunnery established in peacetime training would drop during combat; instead, it rose. He anticipated that the serviceability of aircraft would slip steadily downward once fighting started. To begin, it was ninety-nine per cent, and it held that way through six days.

One young pilot shot down four enemy planes. In between number two and number three he was hospitalized for a wound, then ducked back to duty without permission. But for the wasted time, he might have become Israel’s first ace.

The blow dealt to Egypt by General Hod’s men and aircraft on the morning of June 5th doomed President Nassers hopes for any military success against Israel. Defense Minister Moshe Dyan was quick to point out that, for the first time, air power had effectively won a war.

Prowlers of US Marine Corps are redeploy to Qatar

A squadron of US Marine Corps (USMC) EA-6B Prowler electronic warfare aircraft have been redeployed from Afghanistan to Qatar, the US Air Force’s 379th Air Expeditionary Wing (379 AEW) announced on 21 February, reports Jane’s 

 

EA-6B Prowler takes off from Eielson AFB. Note the tint of the gold embedded in the canopy. The gold provides protection from electromagnetic interference and prevents some EM emissions

Marine Tactical Electronic Warfare Squadron 3 (VMAQ-3) ‘Moon Dogs’ arrived at Qatar’s Al-Udeid Air Base on 17 February. While the Moon Dogs will continue to fly sorties over Afghanistan, their main mission will be to “support any contingencies or operations which may need electronic attack” in Central Command’s (CENTCOM’s) area of responsibility, which covers the Middle East, Egypt and Central Asia, the 379 AEW said.

 

'FrankenProwler' during a pre-flight inspection at Al Asad Air Base, Iraq

One of the pilots was quoted as saying: “We are excited to be back at Al-Udeid Air Base and look forward to providing electronic attack for US and coalition forces in the area.”

The USMC’s ageing Prowlers have been used to jam the signals that insurgents use to trigger improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in Afghanistan.

US heads 41-Nation War Games In Gulf, Iran Fears Conflict In Volatile Region

Massive US-led military drills began in the Persian Gulf in a second such show of maritime might in under a year. The US says the exercises are not aimed at Iran, who earlier vowed to close the Hormuz Strait, and now expresses concern over the drills.

The US Navy has issued a statement that the mass exercises are aimed at “enhancing capability to preserve freedom of navigation in international waterways.” The drills will reportedly focus on mine-sweeping and search-and-seizure operations, and some on-shore training.

An S-3B Viking, assigned to the "Scouts" of Sea Control Squadron Two Four (VS-24), is launched from the bow of the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71) in the Persian Gulf (Reuters/Nathan Laird/U.S. Navy photo)

The Pentagon is directing the maneuvers, which will reportedly involve 35 ships, 18 unmanned submarines and unmanned aircraft. The 40 other countries participating in the drills have not yet been named; Britain, France, some Middle Eastern states, and nations as distant as New Zealand have previously participated in similar exercises.


The Obama administration has stated that the maneuvers are not a warning to Iran, and are intended solely to secure a key oil route in the region.

Tehran has said it will be monitoring the exercises, and voiced concerns about how the maneuvers come in the run-up to the Iranian elections.


Iran has previously threatened to close the Hormuz Strait, through which 40 percent of the world’s oil is transported by ship, if "its interests are in serious trouble". The US condemned the threats and warned that such a move would provoke US Military action.


The last drills of this scale were held in September 2012 in the Gulf, with 29 nations participating. At the time, Israel was pushing for a strike against Iran over its alleged nuclear weapons program.


Iran has also been building up its military presence in the area, and plans to deploy submarines to bolster its defenses. In January, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) conducted military exercises in the Strait, stating that it was “prepared for any threat.”


“Our present capabilities are incomparable to the past. Today, our youth, banking on the past experiences and modern science, have managed to show their capabilities to the world and be prepared for any threat,” IRGC Navy Commander Rear-Admiral Reza Torabi was quoted as saying.


The US has punished Iran with heavy economic sanctions for its supposed atomic weapons program. Tehran has denied that it is producing nuclear weapons on a number of occasions, and maintains its atomic program is purely for civilian purposes.
Israel called on the US last year to strike at nuclear sites in Iran, but the Obama Administration refused, preferring to pursue sanctions as a means of curbing Tehran’s supposed nuclear ambitions.

Why the Anti-Syrian War Coalition is losing the War

Damascus, Rally for the Government

Here, in the blog (source is linked below), it is already to read for weeks: the Zionist-Wahhabi war front against Syria has no more a chance to win the terror and propaganda war against Syria due to a number of strategic successes of the Syrian army.

In the first weeks and months after the begin of the NATO and GCC states supported Ramadan offensive “Volcano in Damascus – Earthquake in Syria” by the militias from July 2012 were the successes of the Syrian army mainly of a defensive nature.

The attempt of the storming of Damascus was blocked, in Aleppo and other cities of Syria, the government has kept, if not the whole city, then at least each a significant part of the city under control, and the army has managed to maintain the substantial army bases and civilian as well as military airports in all provinces under their control.

However, the anti-government forces have succeeded, coming from neighbouring states, to push beyond the borders and to conquer border crossings and areas near the borders as well as to have de facto control of the ground in many villages, some smaller towns and neighbourhoods of large cities, but nowhere was the control of the anti-government forces strong enough to establish somewhere in Syria a location for an alternative “government”, which then, according to the model of Benghazi, would have asked the NATO states (from within Syria) for military aid in order to carry out a military campaign on Damascus.

With wide attacks, organized out of neighbouring countries, the anti-government forces admittedly succeeded to conquer further villages and smaller town, to make the roads impassable for the supply of the army and also to force the Syrian army to abandon small posts and military bases, but the Syrian army managed to keep the major military bases and airports as well as its presence in the major cities in all provinces, so that the situation, that the anti-government forces had no territory in Syria strong enough under their control in order to establish a government in exile, nothing has fundamentally changed.

Given the conquests of increasingly more territory by the anti-government forces, their supporters were euphoric and encouraged to carry out their offensives until the victory and to reject any negotiations with the Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad about a peaceful plan for the transitional period up to the democratic elections.

But the superficial image of an increasing territory, which is controlled by the anti-government forces, has deceived them. Driven from their foreign sponsors and cheered on by the permanent propaganda about the imminent fall of the Syrian president, the anti-government forces made mistakes in their impetuous offensives, which now lead to their inevitable defeat.

The most serious mistake of the foreign-backed anti-government forces was, apart from the mistake that they have disdains the democratic path and rejected their participations in elections that would have conferred legitimacy, that they have behaved as a bunch of robber bands and they have carried out endless rows of serious crimes almost everywhere in Syria where they won something or where they occupied it.

The regularly committed crimes by the anti-government forces, everywhere where they have the power, range from kidnapping, highway robbery, looting, and robberies in order to get money up to the establishment of a tyranny, the persecution of members of religious minorities as well as the desecration of sacred religious sites, drug use, spontaneous violence, rapes, senseless vandalism, and the brutal suppression, torture, and killing of arrested government forces and other, somehow not acceptable, persons.

The anti-government forces have perpetrated several bombings, murders and kidnappings in the areas that are controlled by government supporters. The serious crimes of the anti-government forces on their military campaigns were far too numerous and also directly to experience by the population, who supposedly has to be liberated from the yoke of dictatorship in Syria, as it would have been still possible to blame the crimes of the anti-government forces successfully onto the government forces with the help of the propaganda campaign, or to downplay such crimes, carried out by the anti-government forces, as regrettable exceptions.

Generally detested crimes are not carried out by all armed opponents of the government in Syria, but are those among them who commit such crimes in series, and by this, their crimes are correctly blamed on the anti-government forces, which has an effect on the public opinion. With their countless crimes, the anti-government forces have scared away their followers, supported, and the undecided in large numbers, while they encouraged the government forces and supporters in their cohesion and their steadfastness. Of course, the alienation from the people is for a force, which claims about itself to represent a people’s revolution, just devastating.

The criminal behaviour of the anti-government forces ultimately resulted in the situation that the conquests and territorial gains of the anti-government forces at the first sight ended in the result that it became a huge bloody advertising campaign for their opponents, and thus, for the Syrian government and its supporters

Another strategic mistake of the anti-government forces in their military campaign to obtain the power in Syria was to completely bet on a full offense, maximum territorial gains, and on a quick victory with the use of foreign support.

Although the offensive strategy produced many euphoric headlines about the gains on ground by the always victorious rebels, but finally brought the anti-government forces in militarily hopeless positions.

The population fled immediately from many places, where the foreign anti-government forces have appeared on their conquest, whereby it is anyone’s guess whether the population fled from the anti-government forces or from the battles.

The anti-government forces have thus lost in the places where this has happen, at least the possibility to hide themselves as guerrilla fighters between the population and they had instead to fight like an army; and this against an army that has the air supremacy in its operations and that has been trained, equipped and also prepared over decades exactly for such a scenario – namely, to fight against invading armies. In addition, the large-scale conquest campaigns of the anti-government forces had the inevitable result for them that the ways for the supplies from abroad became longer.

The military situation has literally changed into its opposite by the withdrawal of the army in large bases, big cities, and small towns with people who are more likely to be supporters of the army.

Were the military achievements of the anti-government forces based on the situation that they have attacked small military bases and supply lines of the Syrian army by the use of ambushes and with a certain surprise effect in the early days, and thus, they inflicted heavy losses at the army with a kind of “needle stick tactics” on the principle of “hit and run”, so it is now the Syrian army that started to attack the long supply lines of the anti-government forces, leading through many small bases, from the air and by the use of unexpected ambushes, and this has led to the situation that the Syrian army constantly inflicted heavy losses on the anti-government forces.

The soldiers of the army were thereby generally in front of modest but solvable problems, so as to hide in large bases and in areas where the population is likely to support them, and if it is possible, to protect essential infrastructure such as stockpiles for food, power plants, and communication nodes, and to provide transports on ground or by air between the military bases and the population centres that are protected by the Syrian army, while the army units weakened the anti-government forces, depending on the strength and capacity, by surprise attacks and targeted “needle sticks” on their supply routes and bases – and, whenever the army leaders thought it is possible and useful, they have begun with troop concentrations in preferable less populated areas to encircle the anti-government forces – also by the use of the local established material superiority as well as the personnel superiority in order to defeat the groups of the anti-government forces.

Aleppo Souk – Once beautiful and peaceful.

Solvable tasks provide reserves. Those government forces, to which these tasks were insufficiently challenging, and which had the intention to particularly stand out in the defence of the home land against the terrorist war, carried out by foreign powers, were able to do so; for example, by accepting dangerous military operations or missions such as the infiltration of anti-government groups.

The anti-government forces, for which retreats, talks, and ceasefires were and are no options, stood and stand often in front of unsolvable tasks with their long supply routes, the distribution of their fighters on numerous small bases for the securing of conquered territory and the dysfunctional friend-or-foe detection due to their indiscipline and by the infighting.

The failure to solve their duties were often only recognized by the anti-government forces, when they were arrested or were killed; not least because of the relentless propaganda of GCC and NATO countries from the imminent and inevitable “victory” of the anti-government forces.

While the anti-Syrian propaganda rambled nonstop about the imminent victory of the NATO and GCC-supported robbers and terrorist gangs against the supposedly fundamental evil Syrian government forces, and pushed the anti-government forces by this from one devastating offensive operation to the next devastating operation, the defensive strategy of the Syrian governance actually had unique successes on the ground, which were usually overlooked and deliberately concealed by the anti-Syrian propaganda of the West and regional powers.

The success of the Syrian governance, based on a patience defensive strategy, is probably most clearly to see in the central megacity of Homs, which is located in the west of Syria. The finally besieged centre of the city of Homs by Syrian troops was previously called the “centre of resistance” and the “capital of the Syrian revolution” by the BBC and other opponents of Syria in autumn 2011.

The anti-Syrian TV channel “Sky News” reported from Homs after the successful February army offensive in Homs in May 2012, so at the time of a ceasefire, which was overlooked by the UN observers, and as the armed anti-government forces still had the control about “large areas of the city”.

In those days when the anti-government forces controlled areas of the city of Homs, despite some territorial gains of the army in the south of the city centre, they still practically controlled the whole northern city centre of Homs and also some northern and south-western districts, including large parts of the countryside of Homs, for example, the areas of Talbiseh and Rastan in the north and Houla and Husn in the north west, but also the town of Qusair and its surroundings in the south west of Homs.

How it has been proven by many Western journalists, who travelled illegally from Lebanon to the Syrian city of Homs, the anti-government forces also possessed functional smuggling routes for the supply of weapons and ammunition from Lebanese territories under control of the March 14 Alliance to the Syrian city of Homs. Since some months, the anti-government forces and their supporters have stopped to publish maps, in which they have bragged about how much control they would have in the areas of Homs.

In December 2012, the British newspaper “The Independent” confirmed the Syrian reports that the city of Homs is again relatively peaceful and safe and for the most part also under control of the government. Shortly afterwards, the Western media confirmed Syrian reports that the existing neighbourhood security groups, consisting of Syrian men and women, are upgraded to a paramilitary force by the Syrian government with the name “National Defense Force”, whose job it is, in cooperation with the Syrian army and other government security groups, to secure their neighbourhoods against the attacks of the anti-government forces.

Meanwhile the situation in Homs has slowly and steadily improved. While the life in most areas of Homs is already almost back to normal, the remaining anti-government forces in Homs are encircled in a very low populated area in the northern centre of the Syrian city of Homs. And on 3 May 2013, the Lebanese newspaper “Daily Star”, sympathizing with anti-government forces in Syria, reported that the Syrian Arab army managed it to gain more ground after clashes against the armed anti-government forces in Homs and that the already small areas, which are still occupied by the anti-government forces, were divided into two small parts by the successful operations of the Syrian army.

Thus, the city of Homs, a half year ago still referred to by Western media as the “centre of resistance” and “Capital of the Revolution”, has become within one and a half year a stronghold of the government, protected by the “National Defense Force” – and thus, protected by Syrian men and women against the attacks of the US-backed anti-government forces.

In parallel, the Syrian army and the forces of the “National Defense Forces” – how the neighbourhood watch that is cooperating with the army is officially called – have in the south-western region of Homs secured Qusair (Qusayr) and its countryside in recent weeks, and thus, they have cut off the smuggling routes for the supply of weapons across the border to Lebanon.

The situation of the last persevering armed opponents of the Syrian government in the enclaves in the city of Homs is so completely hopeless.

The anti-government forces have mainly failed in Homs because they had overestimated their temporarily acquired position of power by the foreign support in the form of propaganda, money, and weapons, and they have used this temporary position of power in the areas for almost nothing else than to commit heinous crimes, and thus, they made themselves permanently unpopular within the majority of the population of the Syrian city of Homs. Because of this, it is also not unlikely that the current Syrian government in the former “opposition stronghold” Homs will also receive a lot of voices in the forthcoming free and fair elections.

In the suburbs of Damascus, Aleppo, and other cities, which are controlled by the anti-government forces, similar psychological and military processes are taking place currently like in Homs, where they are almost as good as finished.

The anti-government forces, which themselves see them as the “revolutionists of the people”, penetrate into these areas, where an oppositional attitude towards the Syrian government is existent within the population. Afterwards, they behave like hordes of bandits and bloodthirsty extremists. They force the population to flee by their reckless behaviour or they change the stance of the parts of the population who have previously supported them by their heinous crimes in the occupied areas until a clear majority of the population sees the government at least finally as the lesser evil of both sides and starts to actively support the Syrian army in order to get rid of the so-called “revolutionists of the people”.

In Daraya, the hundreds of thousands inhabitants stronghold of the opposition, which is located in the south of Damascus, the anti-government forces have virtually lost the complete support of the population in the time when they started to invite all kinds of anti-government fighters to Daraya in order to storm the centre of Damascus at the end of November 2012.

To encircle several thousand militiamen in a deserted town, even if the militia are very well equipped, is for a large and well equipped army like the Syrian army a tedious but not unsolvable task, especially when they has the air superiority. The task would be unequal more difficult for the army when the armed opponents would be able to hide between a sympathizing population, what is, for example, the main reason for the remarkable stability of the weak Hamas against the strong Israeli army in Gaza.

The support of the population decides in a guerrilla war between a victory and a defeat. A people’s revolution is impossible without the support of the population.

The situation in the rural areas of Syria is slightly different than in the big cities and urban centres of Syria, where the villages have developed based on religious communities over the centuries.

While the neighbourly relations and the circles of friends of the Syrians, despite the emergence of local denominational priorities, are practically interdenominational in all areas of the major cities in Syria, a one-dimensional denominational stance of the population has remained in the many villages and small cities despite the secular ideology of the Syrian state.

This one-dimensional denominational stance of the population of small villages and towns in Syria is still often organized around a house of worship within the community and thus, the importance of religious preference remained stronger than in the major cities of Syria (a good and also sad example is Syria’s Idlib). When a second house of prayer eventually has been built in a village, then it sometimes has been the situation that two faiths live together without problems, but in small villages with only one house of prayer, there is practical often only one denomination.

Whoever relocates into this small village, or marries into a family in this village, or converted (in terms of his religious stance), remains in some ways an outsider. It is possibly that a different denomination (sect) is the dominant denomination in the neighbouring village – this has, over time, established a carpet of villages, and in which is often a different denomination (sect) dominant.

The juxtaposition of villages, each with different denominations, makes communities vulnerable to the sowing of distrust and sectarian incitement up to religious violence (just search for “Salvador option”).

When a crime takes place in a heated atmosphere or something else is destroyed, then it is very convenient to collectively accept that this was not been done by one of the own brothers, sons, or fathers – but that somebody from the neighbouring villages, where the people are mainly strangers because they have a different religion, bears the responsibility for the crime or destruction or whatever..

Well, so it is not surprising at all that the incitement to sectarian hate and rage by the TV preachers from the GCC states and the massacres under false-flag as well as by the use of propaganda against the government and the religious minorities, especially Alawites (Alawis), has shown to be even more effective in numerous Sunni-dominated villages and small towns in rural areas of Syria, than in the large cities, where the religious affiliation of the population has virtually played no important role in recent decades.

Unlike in the major cities in Syria, the local armed anti-government forces have not alienated so much from the population in the villages and small cities than this happened in the larger cities because they did not commit their crimes regularly in their local town but against the residents of other neighbouring villages and cities – and if crimes were committed in their “home towns”, then the residents of other neighbouring cities were blamed for the crimes, and these often had a different faith than the residents of the village, where the crimes were committed by the armed anti-government forces.

The incitement to sectarian hatred has led to the situation that the men of numerous Sunni towns have joined the anti-government forces with the approval of their local communities in order to fight against the government and the believers of a different religion. The motivation by sectarian hatred has so far worked to the result, that many rural anti-government forces have started the fight against the Syrian soldiers.

At the same time, however, they have just committed countless horrible massacres and other crimes of all kinds against people of other faiths, such as against Alawites and Shiites, but also against Christians and Ismailis, in other villages because of their sectarian hatred.

They have spread a founded fear of their sectarian madness of the anti-government forces, due to all of their crimes, in the ranks of people with a different faith, which has led to the situation that the people of other beliefs are working hand in hand with the Syrian army and even with the utmost determination against the anti-government forces.

Wherever it has been possible, mainly in villages inhabited by Alawites, Shiites and Christians, these villages were jointly transformed into areas with heavily armed forces, including the residents, and even into something like fortresses – due to the fear of the sectarian madness of the anti-government forces. The mass executions in villages inhabited by other faiths, also carried out by the anti-government forces, ultimately only lead to the fact that the determination of the other faiths continued to grow to defend themselves against the violence of the anti-government forces, driven by a racist madness.

The war strategy, built on sectarian hatred, is finally only defeating itself. Instead to fetch more and more government supporters on their side in order to strengthen the anti-government forces with each victory, the anti-government forces have only strengthen, with every victory (and the following crimes), the unity of the government supporters and their determination to defend themselves.

Given the fact that virtually all rural areas are a patchwork of villages with different denominations in all provinces of Syria, the anti-government forces had almost nowhere success to completely expel the Syrian from the rural areas in Syria. Everywhere in Syria, there are towns and villages of government supporters and religious minorities, whose inhabitants protect themselves together with the Syrian army against the murderous hatred of the anti-government forces.

With their heavy weapons as well as their better organization and better training, the Syrian army is able to counter all the attacks of the anti-government forces. The villages of other faiths can serve as bases for the army to fight against the armed gangs in the area who are driven by racial hatred. If the anti-government forces carry out assaults on persons or things outside of their villages or areas, the Syrian army eliminates the anti-government forces in this town and if there is no other possibility, they do it by the use of heavy weapons or even by the use of the Syrian air force. In case if there are many anti-government forces in one place, then there will be inevitably many dead by the battles of the Syrian army against the anti-government forces, and usually, much will be destroyed in this place – and this even more, the more aggressive the anti-government forces do represent themselves in the area and the better they are armed. This ultimately leads to the situation that even in the small towns similar painful psychological processes are triggered like in the cities.

The euphoria of the early days of the attempt of an armed overthrow of the government in Syria has long gone. The realization that the armed struggle against the government and its supporters is hopeless and just leads to nothing but more and more death, suffering, and destruction in their own towns, gains more and more space.

The offers of the Syrian government about an amnesty for the ending of the armed struggle is winning, over time, increasingly more acceptance even in smaller villages, although some of the anti-government forces are driven by sectarian hatred and thoughts of revenge for the suffered defeats, and thus, they only agree grudgingly to local peace treaties.

The declining enthusiasm of the parts of the population who supported the anti-government forces initially, is currently also limiting the effects of the outside-led invasion of Syria by the use of irregular forces, which are trained by the anti-Syrian war coalition in the refugee camps in Turkey and Jordan, while they are recruited from prisons and slums in the Arab world.

While the irregular fighting units, were coming from Turkey, from Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, over the Syrian borders in their violent campaigns of conquest, and were able to still find some areas in Syria were at least some significant parts of the population have greeted them as liberators, the population in Syria now regularly quite closed seeks the escape in case if the foreign anti-government fighters arrive in order to invade their town or their district.

Massacre in Khan al-Assal (Source: SANA)

The gangs of mercenaries, who are penetrating on Syrian soil from abroad, have sometimes the success, also by the use of a surprise effect, to conquer some territory in Syria, and because – as it has just happened in Hatla and Khan al-Assal – they carry out gruesome massacres among the government supporters and the pro-government civilians, the gangs of the anti-government forces are missing – as in Daraya – the necessary coverage by the residents in order to keep the control of the occupied areas in the battles against the Syrian army. The gangs of mercenaries are thus not able to protect their occupied areas against the attacks of the Syrian forces. In effect, these attacks result now, in case they do not completely end with the death of the attackers, at most to losses on both sides. Tangible progress for the anti-government fighters are missing since a long time.

Were the previous offensives of the anti-government forces still to considerable conquests such like the conquest of about half of Aleppo and the larger suburbs of Damascus, the current major offensives of the anti-government forces usually have no more success while faced with the bullets of the army. The current major offensives of the anti-government forces lead to nothing else but heavy losses among the attackers.

Not least, this creates the increasing disillusionment of the opponents of the government in regards of their chances of success, which means currently that the anti-Syrian war coalition, despite continuous promises of more and better weapons, has less and less the chance to make use of reserves of “partisan” and mercenaries from the refugee camps in Turkey and Jordan for the war against Syria. Only government forces are currently able to regularly achieve their goals. Virtually no one has changed the side and left the Syrian army / government forces in order to join the ranks of the anti-government forces in recent months, and their combat power and strength through an increasing number of volunteers of all denominations for the neighbourhood militias is also constantly increasing.

Sooner or later, this shift of popularity of the anti-government forces will result in their complete defeat. The anti-government forces have made themselves simply thoroughly unpopular with their criminal behaviour in the Syrian population in the last year.

The rising popularity of the government since the start of the open attack by the anti-government forces in contrast to the sinking popularity leads, via the associated continuous strengthening of the neighbourhood guards, to the fact that the anti-government forces are finally no more able to win this war. The incitement of anti-government forces to sectarian hatred and its associated incitement to atrocious crimes are finally just counterproductive tactics. Without the support of significant parts of the Syrian population, this unconventional warfare, by which the Wahhabi-Zionist war coalition wanted to conquer Syria, just does not work.

The only theoretical option, which remains available for the anti-Syrian war coalition in order to achieve their war goal, the establishment of an anti-Iranian puppet regime in Syria, is an open war of aggression by the use of U.S. units. However, the problem with this direct U.S. military option is still that this option is incalculably expensive. But the costs of about a billion dollars a month, which were recently made ​​available for an open U.S. attack military operations against Syria by the U.S. military chief, are not so much the reason why the United States still have not started to use this option. It is rather the view that, in case of an open war of aggression by the United States against Syria, the Iran will be in its treaty obligations and finally enter the war against the US-led anti-Syrian war coalition and this is a situation, which the U.S. government wants to still avoid.

In this case, a continuous war zone would arise from the Mediterranean up to the Hindu Kush. To wage a war against all U.S. enemies from the Mediterranean to the Hindu Kush at the same time, could become a much more expensive and a more protracted situation than the wars against Iraq and Afghanistan for the United States. Of course, there is still the possibility that the insane warmongers in Washington and Tel Aviv “envisage” such an (horrible) option, despite the high risks. However, they could be hit between the eyes, because such a war could easily become much larger and more expensive.

In case if Russia gives military aid for the protection of Syria against the US-led war of aggression, and China will lock the loan for the United States as a response of their war of aggression against Syria and instead start to provide economic aid for Syria and Iran, a war from the Mediterranean to the Hindu Kush could (in the end) significantly exceed the economic and military possibilities of the so-called “Western community of values”.

This is the reason that the U.S. military aid has not yet happened for their Syrian lackeys, and, as the situation of the U.S. lackeys in Syria deteriorated continuously for months, it is not to expect that something will change in the near future.

This means for the anti-government forces in Syria, that they have no chance to win this war and the main reason for this situation are their own carried out crimes on Syrian soil.