Yesterday at 8:06 PM
this:
is reportedly (
) "from about 10:45 a.m." [of yesterday] so
Yes or No: would this damage be consistent with the claim of 57 TLAMs and 19 JASSMs hits? Yesterday at 8:06 PM
LOL I love maps so couldn't resist to go to maps.google.com to see that place 'before' ...:
EDIT it's at something like [33.55775, 36.31619]
Unless the smoke is hiding anything, its the large building in three blocks and few annexes.
So would it take one third of the missiles launched to achieve that damage? that would be what 35 missiles?
I would have thought that half a dozen precision strikes and the resultant fires would do the job very well.
Based on this it suggest a high interception rate was at least anticipated by NATO forces, which is why the otherwise massive overkill quantity of missiles were launched.
As to what happened, who knows for sure. It was widely reported before the strikes, that Russia had connected their S-400 systems into the Syrian National AD network and it seems most likely that the S-400's were supplying identification, tracking and maybe even targeting to the Syrian batteries. I agree with Wolfie that given AD were not targets and that Cruise Missiles are relatively simple to target, once found, so a high knock down rate is certainly credible. I also wonder how much jamming was also being done on Saturday morning.
All of which fascinating though it may be, is in the event, largely irrelevant, as it is now clear that this has been as much a pantomime as anything else and one that appears primarily to save face and allow Trump to withdraw US forces from Syria with the appearance of grace.
