Syrian forces backed by Russian airpower have made major advances across the battlefield along multiple fronts.
Around Aleppo, Syrian forces have
cut supply lines from Turkey that were for years, supplying terrorists
operating inside the country. Just east of a growing encirclement of the
city of Aleppo, a secondary encirclement of so-called “Islamic State”
(ISIS) forces is forming as the offensive to relieve Kuweris Airbase has
evolved into a northern advance toward Al Bab – a critical logistical
hub used by US-NATO-GCC backed terrorists during the initial invasion of
Aleppo in 2012 and onward.
Deeper within the interior of Syria,
Syrian forces have advanced eastward into the Al Raqqa Governorate,
approaching the Tabaqa Airbase. The airbase is a crucial waypoint toward
seizing back the city of Al Raqqa itself, which has become the defacto
capital of ISIS.
Advances Against ISIS in East Only Possible After Cutting NATO-Fed Supply Lines in North
This second operation aimed at ISIS in
Al Raqqah has only been made possible because of successes amid the
first operation around Aleppo and along the Turkish-Syrian border. It is
now demonstrably clear that the source of ISIS’ fighting capacity
originated almost exclusively from NATO-member Turkey’s territory and
more specifically, from between the Afrin-Jarabulus corridor.
So far, NATO has been unable to account
for this obvious fact, or explain why it has been unable to secure the
Turkish border from the Turkish side, particularly when nations
including the United States and United Kingdom have for years been
conducting military and intelligence operations precisely in the same
locations ISIS supplies have been crossing over into Syria from.
As Syrian and Kurdish forces backed by
Russian airpower close one logistical corridor after another along the
border, the fighting capacity of ISIS has withered to the verge of
collapsing.
As ISIS Folds US-NATO-GCC Mount Rescue
For several days now, Turkey has been
firing across the border at the pivotal Syrian city of Azaz. The city is
on the verge of being overrun by Kurdish fighters who will for all
intents and purposes shut down one of ISIS’ last remaining logistical
hubs supplying their fighters in Syria from Turkey.
Turkey has vowed not to allow the city
to fall and has implied that it is willing to go as far as invade Syria
to ensure that it doesn’t.
While Turkey poses as an enemy of ISIS
and has not mentioned its presence in the city of Azaz or why it would
attempt to protect them, it would be in 2013 that the BBC itself would
declare Azaz “seized” by the terrorist group. In their article, “
Isis seizure of Syria’s Azaz exposes rebel rifts,” the BBC would report:
…the
Free Syrian Army lost the town of Azaz to the Islamic State in Iraq and
Syria, or Isis, the most hardline group linked to al-Qaeda on the rebel
side. As a measure of the grip the jihadis have in Azaz, one eyewitness
inside the town said no-one was smoking on the streets – tobacco is
forbidden according to strict Islamist doctrine.
Other
reports from last year indicated that ISIS was either near or in the
city – suggesting not that it had ever lost control of Azaz – but that
at various moments during the conflict, it suited the West and its
regional allies better to pretend “moderate rebels” held it instead.
It should be noted that in all Western
media stories, it is never precisely mentioned who the Kurds are
fighting in Azaz – because it is ISIS.
Considering this, Turkey would be quite
literally intervening to save ISIS and other hardcore terrorist groups
sharing the city with it.
Saber-Rattling or Wider War?
An
invasion into Syria would constitute an act of war – and beyond that –
affirmation that NATO was behind the ISIS menace from the beginning.
While leaks like that of the United States’ own
Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) in 2015 have
exposed this rhetorically, a NATO invasion of Syria to save an ISIS
stronghold from destruction would prove it demonstrably.
The fact that the US is attempting to
distance itself politically from both Turkey and Saudi Arabia – who has
also pledged to carry out ground operations in Syria amid the collapse
of terrorist fronts across the country – indicates a possible attempt to
produce plausible deniability ahead of a much larger provocation or
intervention.
Just as US policymakers had plotted in
2009 to use an apparent “unilateral” attack by Israel upon Iran to
provoke a retaliation the US could then use as a pretext to
“reluctantly’ go to war, a similar strategy appears to be materializing
along Syria’s borders today.
While the US and Europe attempt to
distance themselves from Turkey, they have at the same time committed to
a campaign of disinformation attempting to frame ongoing security
operations moving ever closer toward Turkey’s border as “targeting
civilians” and attacking “moderate rebels” at the expense of fighting
ISIS. This is to lend Turkey and Saudi Arabia rhetorical cover, however
tenuous, ahead of any actual intervention.
What will ultimately determine whether
this remains mere “saber-rattling” or transforms incrementally into
wider war, will be the actual deterrence Syria and its allies, including
nuclear-armed Russia, are prepared to meet continued provocations with.
The next few days pose a critical test
to Syria and its allies – a test that may determine whether or not this
conflict passes through the gateway toward greater war.
Tony Cartalucci is a Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine“New Eastern Outlook”.
Harald
Mahrer is one of the people warning about the move, and he’s not just
your average Joe. He’s a Deputy in the Economic Ministry of the Austrian
government. “We don’t want someone to be able to track digitally what
we buy, eat and drink, what books we read and what movies we watch,” he told
Austrian public radio station Oe1 last week. He argues that the ability
to use cash should be a constitutional right for Austrians.
On
this front, at least, it seems like Mahrer and the forces of common
sense might actually be beating back the banksters. Draghi for his part
had to almost immediately back off of his cash demonizing comments. He came out on Monday
to clarify that the potential scrapping of the 500 euro bill is only
about cracking down on money laundering and has nothing to do with an
attempt to limit cash transactions.
