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

while several helos reported to be flown back to russia,
forward deployment base is set up at palmira afb: first helicopter gunships just arrived, among them mi-28n.
the next goal might be as-sukhnah on the way to deir-az-zor

Here is a link to video posted on Liveleak that has some good combat footage of the Palmyra operation.




Still interesting to review the numbers of combatants involved. The SAA concentrated some 6000 men for the operation and this included bringing elite forces from other fronts which subsequently went into Hiatus. Press is saying that some 600 ISIS militants were killed.

This is rather supporting the idea that the majority of forces on all fronts and all sides, are little more than militia, manning static checkpoints and that only a relatively small number of units are actually able to mount major offensive operations.

I wonder if anyone else has some insight on this?

I read this morning ( where? Military Maps? ) that several brigades were taken from the Palmyra area to Daesh held areas near Damascus.
BBC website cites AFP in this article:

Syrian military sources quoted by AFP news agency said the army was targeting IS-held towns including al-Qaryatain, south-west of Palmyra, and Sukhnah towards the north-east.

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Syria has been taught by Hezbollah to organize local defence forces to be able to make optimal use of its mobile forces. After Daesh has been destroyed there will be no place in Syria where 'foreign sponsored armed politicians' can hide.

It's a wonder that the CIA openly admits that they support a group called "Knights of Righteousness" to terrori.. I mean put pressure on assad. It just gets more comical when they fight the Pentagon supported Syrian Democratic Forces.

delft said:

I just listened to a BBC Radio 4 program about Jihadies returning from Syria. You can find it at:

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Well worth a listen. The official attitude is rather incoherent, but certainly there is no thought of the mayhem caused in Syria. As an extreme (?) example it presents one mother who it said cooperated fully with the authorities and now complains: he went out with full support of NATO and Britain and is now serving seventeen years in prison.

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To be fair, I don't think anyone suggested the guy had official sanction, which is the problem. He went to fight because of all the anti-Assad and pro-rebel propaganda in the western media, and joined a movement which the British and key NATO governments championed if not covertly supported and assisted, but he didn't go as part of some official or even unofficial British government programme.

That BBC piece was interesting as a human interest piece, but is serverly lacking as a policy examination in how to tackle the problem of returnees in that it does not address the glaringly obvious fact that not all EU nations are equal in the eyes of terrorists.

Britian and France, through their military actions and diplomatic choices, have made themselves far more of a target for terrorists than other less trigger happy EU and NATO nations.

Thus what works for them is unlikely to work for the UK or France.

withdrawal continues, yet something still stays

From Military Maps, 2016-03-29 11:34:01:

operational-tactical missile system Iskander-M (PTRC) "is placed at the airbase Hmeymim in Latakia.

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I thought I would never post in this Thread again but yeah, never say never, now as anonymous I noticed the post right above, reported it as Hacker Attack

another serious find
"Jane's Strategic Forces" Rick Grimes
"Russian Yars ICBM system secretly delivered to Syria"