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

Again, what needs to be factored in is that Gulen has enjoyed cordial equations with Saudi Arabia. “Green money” has played a big part in the AKP’s ascendancy. The so-called “Anatolian tigers” – business elites from Anatolian region – who financed the AKP have been major beneficiaries of “green money.”

Of course, Saudis have kept their dealings with Gulen under the wraps, and it remains to be seen what impact the failed coup attempt would have on Erdogan’s uneasy equations with the Saudi regime.

The Saudis have been watching with unease the nascent signs of shift in Erdogan’s interventionist policies in Syria. (By the way, Iran’s Fars news agency, which is close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, reported Saturday that Turkish intelligence officers deployed in Aleppo in Syria have begun evacuating on instructions from Ankara, signalling disengagement from the rebel groups fighting the government forces in that region.)

Thus, it is not without significance that the Iranian statements on the coup attempt in Turkey have been strongly supportive of Erdogan. Without doubt, one can hear a sigh of relief in the corridors of power in Tehran.

Ali Shamkhani, secretary of Iran’s National Security Council, made a hugely meaningful remark on Saturday that both Tehran’s vehement condemnation of the coup attempt in Turkey and the role that Iran itself plays in Syria fundamentally stem from the same considerations.

Ambassador MK Bhadrakumar served as a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service for over 29 years, with postings including India’s ambassador to Uzbekistan (1995-1998) and to Turkey (1998-2001). He writes the “Indian Punchline” blog and has written regularly for Asia Times since 2001.

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US Remington XM2010 sniper rifle in Syria
June 17, 2016.300 Winchester Magnum, 7.62 x 51, AAC, Aleppo, AN/PAS-13G, Badger Ordnance, Enhanced Sniper Rifle, ESR, Harris, L3 Insight, Leupold, M2010, M24, New Syrian Army, Remington, Remington Defense, sniper rifle, Sniper Weapon System, suppressor, Syria, TiTAN-QD, US, US Army, XM2010
The ARES Team

An image shared via Twitter on 17 June shows a member claiming to be affiliated with the New Syrian Army (NSyA) or an allied group operating in Syria’s Aleppo governorate. The combatant in the picture is armed with a US-made Remington XM2010 sniper rifle, adopted by the US Army as the M2010. Previously, images from the same twitter account purported to show a delivery of arms parachuted to besieged rebel forces inside the town of Mare, in the north of Aleppo governorate. These were likely provided on an emergency basis in the hopes of preventing rebel forces holding the town from being overrun by Islamic State forces, and to support the arrival of NSyA reinforcements. These supplies included significant quantities of ammunition, including mortar projectiles.

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The XM2010 sniper rifle pictured is fitted with an AAC TiTAN-QD suppressor, Harris bipod, Leupold MK4 ER/T 6.5 x 20 scope with Badger Ordnance rings, and an L3 Insight AN/PAS-13G(V)1 Light Weapon Thermal Sight (LWTS). All of these accessories are part of the standard package for the US Army’s M2010 Enhanced Sniper Rifle, an upgrade and replacement program for the existing M24 Sniper Weapon System that began to be delivered in January 2011. The M24 SWS is chambered for the 7.62 x 51 mm calibre, whilst the M2010 is now chambered for .300 Winchester Magnum. The adoption of the new rifle and calibre has resulted in a weapon system with approximately 50% greater range than the M24 SWS.

This is one of the first sightings of a US military-grade thermal optic delivered to Syrian rebel groups. The combination of the longer range of .300 WM ammunition, the ability to engage targets with the help of a thermal clip-on optic, and the discretion of a suppressor will be very helpful in the sniper-contested scenario of Aleppo.

Technical Specifications
Calibre: .300 Winchester MagnumXM2010_2
Overall length: 1135 mm (without suppressor)
Barrel length: 610 mm
Weight (unloaded): 5.5 kg
Weight (loaded + optic & suppressor): 7.95 kg
Effective range: 1200 m
Feed device: 5-round detachable box magazine

H/T to @BosnjoBoy & @AbraxasSpa. Note header image edited for clarity (original at link).

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Iranian directional anti-personnel mines in Syria
June 29, 2016Ajnad al-Sham, Claymore, Iran, Iraq, Jaish al-Fath, Jund al-Imam, landmine, M18A1, M18A2, mine, PMU, popular mobilisation unit, Syria, YM-III, Zeitan, Zorbeh
Galen Wright

During an offensive southwest of Syria’s Aleppo on 17 June 2016, anti-government fighters from Ajnad al-Sham recovered an unknown number of Iranian M18A2 directional anti-personnel landmines. Images of these were posted to the group’s Twitter account the next day. These are only the latest Iranian arms to be captured on this front, underscoring the degree to which this fight is increasingly the responsibility of Iran and its militias, rather than Damascus. This is also one of only a handful of cases in which Iranian landmine transfers has been documented by ARES, including transfers identified by the analysis of open-source media, as well as the use of traditional human intelligence techniques.

The mine(s) were recovered from what was recently the front-line, between the villages of Zeitan and Zorbeh, before Ajnad al-Sham and others from the Jaish al-Fath operations room overran it. Additional video evidence suggests these mines were placed by Afghan fighters from Liwa Fatemiyoun, or Iraqi fighters from Harakat al-Nujaba.

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The Iranian M18A2 is a command-operated, directional anti-personnel landmine, comparable to the M18A1 ‘Claymore’, developed in the United States in the 1950s. Although the two designs are similar – the M18A2 is even advertised as a “Claymore” – they remain visually distinctive. The former can be recognised by its flat rather than concave face, tripod rather than scissor-type legs, and circular rather than rectangular peepsight. The M18A2 is also considerably larger, with nearly 300% more explosive filler. Markings indicating the year of manufacture and lot number are found on the reverse of the mine. The example documented by Ajnad al-Sham was produced in 2008 (see image above). In some cases, packaging may be marked ‘M18-2’ rather than ‘M18A2’ (see image below).

Iran has also been producing their own M18A1 type mines since before the 1979 revolution. Around 2,500 of these were exported to Bangladesh sometime before the early-2000s and may remain in the country’s inventory. Although visually similar to US-made examples, Iranian M18A1 models contain approximately 100 g less explosive composition (682 g vs 550 g), and a smaller number of steel spheres for fragmentation, which are larger in diameter (700 x 3.2 mm vs 510 x 6 mm).

Although Iranian landmines are only been infrequently documented in current conflicts, their use remains noteworthy. In July 2015, Iraqi popular mobilisation units (PMUs) recovered a large quantity of M18A2 type mines from an Islamic State arms cache in Saqlawiyah (see image below), suggesting that they had first been captured from either the Iraqi Army, or other PMUs. In March 2016, fighters from the Jund al-Imam PMU in Iraq were observed laying YM-III anti-tank mines – an Iranian copy of the Chinese Type 72 – between Baiji and Haditha. In both cases, the landmines documented appear to date from 2007.

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Technical Specifications 5

Body material: ABS plastic
Weight: 5.7 kg
Dimensions: 300 x 190 x 100 mm
Explosive Fill: 2,700 g Composition B
Fragmentation: 2,300 6 mm steel balls
Effective Range: 50 m

Images and technical specifications taken from now-defunct MoDAFL export catalog. Iranian M18A1 and M18A2 shown. H/T to @green_lemonnn.

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The ARES Team

Images and video of FSA-aligned Syrian rebel units fighting in the Aleppo area, shared on social media platforms, as well as images of weapons

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during the advance to Fallujah, have shown the use of the Bulgarian

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revolver-type grenade launcher by various groups in the region. In addition to the MSGL, Iraqi security forces also seized a Sterling type submachine gun (at right in above photo) in one recent incident. This is likely to be either a modified Mk.4 model or a craft-produced copy, and is fitted with a large, craft-produced suppressor.

The Arsenal MSGL is a low-velocity revolver-type grenade launcher feeding from a 6-round cylinder, with an integrated ladder-style sight and removable front grip. With a weight of 6.53 kg (unloaded) and an overall length of 764 mm with the stock unfolded, the MSGL provides a relatively lightweight capability to rapidly employ multiple munitions of various types out to 400 meters. It is capable of firing a wide range of low-velocity 40 x 46SR mm ammunition up to 105 mm in overall length, including high explosive, high explosive fragmentation, screening/marking smoke, riot control agents, sound/flash, less-lethal impact, and more. The MSGL are packaged and shipped in boxes containing 5 units.

Arsenal also produces a variant of the MSGL, the

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, which has a longer chamber length and is thus capable of accepting 40 x 46SR mm cartridges with an overall length of up to 135 mm. As a result, it is capable of firing specialised rounds such as the Arsenal 40 x 46SR mm

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which features a thermobaric projectile. Whilst the perspective of some of the imagery makes positive identification of every example difficult, the models pictured in this post appear to be the standard MSGL.

It remains unclear how these weapons found their way into Syria and Iraq. The abundance of Bulgarian weapons in use by US-supported FSA units may suggest that the examples documented in Iraq were obtained by IS via battlefield capture from FSA forces in Aleppo, and later transported to IS positions in Iraq. Arsenal 40 x 46SR mm fired cartridge cases – marked to indicate production in 2014 – were

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, which may further indicate that MSGL grenade launchers documented in Iraq originated in Syria.

Technical Specifications – MSGL
Calibre: 40 x 46SR mm

Overall length: 764 mm (530 mm with buttstock folded)
Barrel length: 230 mm
Weight (unloaded): 6.53 kg
Maximum range: 400 m (dependent on ammunition type)
Feed device: 6-round revolving cylinder (semi-fixed)

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delft said:

Ambassador Bhadrakumar has another article in Atimes, wholly interesting:

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of which I copy only the last parts:

See also

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with many remarks on Syria.

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Turkish pilots who downed Russian warplane taken into custody — Bloomberg

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July 19, 8:33 UTC+3

ANKARA, July 19. /TASS/. The two Turkish pilots who downed Russia’s Sukhoi Su-24 bomber over Syria in November 2015 have been taken into custody, the Bloomberg news agency reported on Monday, citing a senior Turkish official.

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SampanViking said:

..... or not, as the case may be.

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SampanViking said:

...
One evening of chaos in Turkey and the situation in Syria near the Turkish border changes dramatically.

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...
It did always seem likely that the Turkman rebels in Latakia and Aleppo were being heavily supported by the Turkish state and military. The contrast in fortune over the last 24 hours is I think, highly suggestive.

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1. the coup in Turkey foiled, and
2. Kinsibba lost again by the Government)

SampanViking said:

Latest news is that SAA have withdrawn from recent gains following a massive suicide VBIED attack

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Battle is clearly not over yet. SAA are touting this as a tactical withdrawal, so presumably planning to retake this morning?

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SampanViking said:

..... or not, as the case may be.
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SampanViking said:

There is no official confirmation of this except claims from a few Jihadi websites and bloggers.
The most recent item on Kinsibba is from FARS today and it claims that the SAA have repelled all counter attacks.

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