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RUSSIA-IRAN-ASSAD COALITION SIGNALS DANGEROUS PHASE IN SYRIAN WAR

NB: Beth Tikvah Synagogue & CIJR Present: The Annual Sabina Citron International Conference:

THE JEWISH THOUGHT OF EMIL L. FACKENHEIM: JUDAISM, ZIONISM, HOLOCAUST, ISRAEL — Toronto, Sunday, October 25, 2015, 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. The day-long Beth Tikvah Conference, co-chaired by Prof. Frederick Krantz (CIJR) and Rabbi Jarrod R. Grover (Beth Tikvah), open to the public and especially to students, features original papers by outstanding Canadian and international scholars, some his former students, on the many dimensions of Emil L. Fackenheim's exceptionally powerful, and prophetic thought, and on his rich life and experience. Tickets: Regular – $36; Seniors – $18; students free. For registration, information, conference program, and other queries call 1-855-303-5544 or email yunna@isranet.wpsitie.com. Visit our site: www.isranet.org/events.

 

AS WE GO TO PRESS: NATO WARNS OF ‘TROUBLING’ RUSSIAN ESCALATION IN SYRIA —NATO’s secretary general warned Thursday of a “troubling escalation” in Russian military activities in Syria, saying the alliance stands firmly behind member Turkey even as Moscow broadens its air and sea attacks. “NATO is able and ready to defend all allies, including Turkey, against any threat,” Jens Stoltenberg said from the alliance’s headquarters in Brussels as defense ministers gathered for a meeting… Stoltenberg accused Russia of violating Turkish airspace during bombing runs against anti-government rebels in Syria earlier this week…The announcement came one day after Russia’s Caspian Sea fleet launched cruise missile strikes against Syrian rebels from nearly 1,000 miles away, a potent exhibition of Moscow’s firepower as it backs a government ground offensive. (Washington Post, Oct. 8, 2015)

 

Beware Putin and His ‘Anti-Hitler Coalition’: Victor Davis Hanson, Washington Times, Oct. 7, 2015 — Contrary to the principles of American foreign policy of the last 70 years, President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry tacitly invited Russia to “help” monitor things in the Middle East.

How to Roll Back Russia: Max Boot, Commentary, Oct. 7, 2015— Every day seems to bring an escalation of the Russian military involvement in Syria.

The Russian-Iranian Gambit in Syria: Maj. Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror, BESA, Oct. 6, 2015 — The Russian airstrikes in Syria, the recent Iranian-Russian arms deal, and the coordination between Tehran, Moscow, Damascus, and Baghdad in the war against the Islamic State group all herald a change in the Middle East.

President ‘Mumbo-Jumbo’: Bret Stephens, Wall Street Journal, Oct. 5, 2015 — David Petraeus testified last month to the Senate Armed Services Committee on U.S. policy in the Middle East.

 

On Topic Links

 

Vlad’s Gone Mad: National Post, Oct. 8, 2015

Everyone is 'Fighting Islamic State' – And They’re All Lying: Seth J. Frantzman, Jerusalem Post, Oct. 3, 2015

Putin in New York: A Tactical Win, But at What Price?: Aurel Braun, Globe & Mail,  Sept. 29, 2015

Putin and the West’s Moral Vacuum: Melanie Phillips, Jerusalem Post, Oct. 1, 2015

 

                   

BEWARE PUTIN AND HIS ‘ANTI-HITLER COALITION’                                                                  

Victor Davis Hanson

Washington Times, Oct. 7, 2015

 

Contrary to the principles of American foreign policy of the last 70 years, President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry tacitly invited Russia to “help” monitor things in the Middle East. Now they are learning that there are lots of Middle East scenarios far worse than the relative quiet Iraq that the Obama administration inherited in January 2009 — and soon abandoned. Russian President Vladimir Putin liked the American invitation so much that he now has decided to move in permanently. Mr. Putin now wants the West to join his new Syria-Iran-Hezbollah-Iraq axis against the Islamic State — or to at least sit back and allow Russia to straighten out the Middle East as it sees fit.

 

To fight the Islamic State, Mr. Putin has called for something similar to the “anti-Hitler coalition” of World War II that once saw the Soviet Union and the West unite to defeat Nazi Germany. Certainly, the Islamic State, like Nazi Germany, is a savage regime. So far it has grown unchecked at the very center of the Middle East. Yet under the cloak of fighting the Islamic State, Mr. Putin has two greater visions.

 

One, he is intervening to save his client in Syria, strongman Bashar Assad — and with him a new Middle East Shiite axis of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Russia. Mr. Putin says he wishes to destroy the terrorists of the Islamic State. But for now he is bombing moderate opponents of Mr. Assad and bolstering the anti-Western terrorists of Hezbollah and perhaps Hamas as well. Two, Mr. Putin is sending a warning to the oil-exporting Sunni monarchies of the Persian Gulf, who are as rich as they are militarily weak: Russia, not the United States, is the new cop on the Middle Eastern beat. If oil-rich and nuclear Russia and a soon-to-be-nuclear Iran can bully the Sunni monarchies, Mr. Putin’s new cartel may control the spigot of some 75 percent of the world’s daily export of oil.

 

Mr. Putin’s recall of history is as fishy as his proposed coalition. Since he has invoked the “anti-Hitler” alliance of World War II, we would all do well to remember the circumstances that led to the totalitarian Soviet Union of Josef Stalin joining with democracies to defeat Hitler. Stalin, remember, was originally a de facto ally of Adolf Hitler. Stalin signed a nonaggression pact with Nazi Germany on Aug. 23, 1939. That devil’s agreement greenlighted the start of World War II just over a week later. Germany invaded neutral Poland on Sept. 1, 1939. It was joined soon after by Russian troops attacking from the east. With a now-friendly Russia at his rear, Hitler was then free to turn westward against the European democracies.

 

Russia still seems embarrassed by its 1939 sellout. Stalin would supply the Third Reich for 22 months with key resources that helped Hitler to attack Belgium, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Greece, Holland, Luxembourg, Norway and Yugoslavia. There is no reason to believe the Soviet Union would ever have flipped to join Great Britain against Nazi Germany had Hitler not double-crossed Stalin and invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941. After all, Stalin’s communist regime had liquidated more than 15 million of its own citizens during the 1920s and 1930s, and was a kindred genocidal state to Hitler’s National Socialist Third Reich.

 

That embarrassing deal with Hitler still haunts Russia. Poland has complained bitterly about absurd statements made by a Russian ambassador who recently claimed that Poland was partly to blame for the outbreak of World War II because it blocked the formation of a coalition against Germany. Russia’s dalliance with Hitler proved nearly suicidal. Russia lost nearly 30 million soldiers and civilians on the Eastern Front during its four-year struggle against its onetime Nazi partner. True, the Red Army was responsible for more than two-thirds of the German casualties in World War II and helped to wreck the Wehrmacht. Yet cynical and opportunistic Russia at one time or another cut some sort of friendship deal with every major combatant on both sides of the war: America, Britain, Germany, Italy and Japan.

 

Ironically, Stalin kept his word to the Axis alliance of Germany, Italy and Japan far better than he later did to the Allied partners, Britain and the United States, who helped save him. The Western allies provided nearly 20 percent of all Russian wartime resources. Without key Anglo-American resources like aluminum and heavy transport trucks, Russia might well have been knocked out by Hitler. Yet after the war, Stalin renounced all his prior commitments to hold free and fair elections in those countries liberated from Nazism by the Red Army.

 

Mr. Putin’s sloppy historical perspective on World War II is a window into his soul. And we should be as distrustful of him as our disillusioned forefathers finally were of Stalin’s Soviet Union. The way to end the murderous rampage of a savage, radical Islamic State is not by joining a Russian-Iranian cartel propping up Shiite terrorists and lapdog dictatorships in the Middle East as it seeks to strong-arm moderate Sunni states and oil-exporting monarchies.                                                                   

                                                                       

 

Contents                                                                                      

   

HOW TO ROLL BACK RUSSIA                                                                                                   

Max Boot                                                                                                             

Commentary, Oct. 7, 2015

 

Every day seems to bring an escalation of the Russian military involvement in Syria. First it was airstrikes from more than 30 warplanes that Russia has positioned in Syria. Now it’s cruise missile strikes from warships in the Caspian Sea. Soon, if hints from Moscow are to be believed, Russian “volunteers” — a.k.a. “Little Green Men” — will be showing up in Syria to engage in ground combat alongside Iranian and Assad forces.

 

President Obama can pretend that this is no big deal and that Russia is getting sucked into a quagmire, but this is a serious geopolitical disaster and a major humiliation for the United States. Putin, in fact, seems to be going out of his way to target American-backed rebel groups and to send his aircraft to violate the airspace of Turkey, a NATO ally, as if to demonstrate how powerless mighty American has become and how once-weak Russia can again strut on the world stage.

 

Throughout the Cold War, a central American objective was to keep Russia out of the Middle East, which was then and remains now a strategically and economically vital center of energy production. Jimmy Carter launched a covert program to aid the Afghan mujahideen resist a Soviet invasion — a program subsequently expanded under Ronald Reagan — because of American fears (overblown, as it turned out) that Russia viewed the occupation of Afghanistan as a stepping stone toward invading the Persian Gulf region. Now, however, the U.S. seems to be conceding Russia’s growing military role in the Middle East with nary a whimper – or, to be exact, with nothing but whimpers. Is a more robust response possible or desirable?

 

We can rule out the possibility of American aircraft shooting down Russian aircraft. That’s simply too provocative. Even buzzing Russian fighters with our own aircraft or painting them with fire-control radar runs an unwelcome risk of escalation and miscalculation. Perhaps there are electronic-warfare or cyberwar measures that the U.S. could covertly implement to disable Russian aircraft. It is, however, important to keep such action below a kinetic threshold. Throughout the Cold War, the U.S. and the Soviet Union avoided direct combat between their forces because of fears that such hostilities could escalate into World War III. The danger of fighting with another nuclear-armed state remains too great to risk today.

 

Slightly less provocative is the proxy option, which Obama has predictably if needlessly already ruled out. Throughout the Cold War both sides fought the other through Third World allies: the Soviets backed North Korean and North Vietnamese attacks on U.S. forces, while the U.S. backed Afghan attacks on Soviet forces. If we apply this model to Syria, the U.S. and its allies (e.g., Turkey and Saudi Arabia) would supply arms and training to Syrian fighters who would be delighted to take a shot at the Russian forces which are battling to keep the oppressive and bloodthirsty Assad regime in power.

 

The most effective and most risky option would be to supply Stingers or other portable air-defense systems to the rebels so they could shoot down Russian aircraft as the mujahideen did in the 1980s. Of course the American experience in Afghanistan, when we indirectly backed Islamist groups like the Haqqanis that later came to fight us, shows some of the risks of this approach. This is all the more risky in Syria because of the close links between “moderate” rebels and the al-Nusra Front, the -alQaeda affiliate in Syria: We do not want Stingers to wind up in the hands of terrorists who would use them to shoot down a civilian airliner.

 

Nevertheless, this is an option worth exploring if safeguards could be instituted to control access to the missiles and if the ultimate source of the missiles can be disguised. Risky as the Stinger option might be if carried out by the CIA, the risk would grow greatly if the Saudis or Qataris decide to do it on their own, because they would be likely to support Islamist groups.

 

It’s important to keep in mind that we don’t have to counter Russia’s power grab in Syria itself. Remember that Russia is already guilty of aggression against Ukraine, which, unlike Syria, has an internationally recognized, pro-Western democratic government. It is well past time for the president to overcome his qualms about “escalating” the Ukraine conflict by providing weapons to the Ukrainians to defend themselves.

 

If the Ukrainians can fight back effectively against Russian aggression, Putin will have a big problem on his hands. Already the Kremlin autocrat has gone to great lengths to conceal the casualties that Russian forces have suffered in Ukraine. That’s because he knows that Russian public opinion, while stirred up into a nationalist frenzy by his foray into Ukraine, will lose enthusiasm for the intervention if it proves too costly. Supplying arms to the Ukrainians will increase the pain of Putin’s Ukrainian offensive and divert his attention away from Syria.

 

So would stationing substantial American combat forces in Poland and the Baltic Republics. Putin would scream bloody murder because the U.S. had previously promised not to do so. But then Putin has violated numerous international pledges, including Russia’s commitment to respect Ukraine’s borders (the 1994 Budapest Memorandum). Putting NATO combat forces on Russia’s doorstep would be a humiliation to Putin akin to the humiliation he is inflicting on the West in Syria.

 

How would Putin respond? It’s hard to know for sure, but his whole pattern is that of a bully who throws his weight around when he senses weakness and pulls back when he is afraid of getting into a fight he cannot win. Note, for example, how he has scaled back his aggression in Ukraine after the West imposed serious sanctions.

 

Unless the U.S. does more to respond to Putin’s aggression in Ukraine and Syria, which follows his previous attack on Georgia, he will keep right on going. The Baltic States, which are NATO members, could be next in his sights, and at that point the U.S. could be facing the unenviable choice of acquiescing in NATO’s dissolution or risking a major war with Russia. Better and safer to show Putin now that there are certain red lines even he cannot cross with impunity.
                                                                       

 

Contents                                                                                      

   

THE RUSSIAN-IRANIAN GAMBIT IN SYRIA                                                                              

Maj. Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror                                                                                      

BESA, Oct. 6, 2015

 

The Russian airstrikes in Syria, the recent Iranian-Russian arms deal, and the coordination between Tehran, Moscow, Damascus, and Baghdad in the war against the Islamic State group all herald a change in the Middle East. The age of the Arab Spring, the disintegration of several regimes in the region, and the introduction of various organizations into the subsequent vacuum has come to its end, and this is the dawn of a new era, the nature of which is still uncertain.

 

Russia and Iran are taking advantage of the weakness displayed by world leaders and are both trying, through their joint efforts, to expand their global influence and dominance, at least across as much as they can of the Fertile Crescent, which spans Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Cyprus, and Egypt. Russia brings its considerable international political clout and advanced military capabilities, mainly air defense systems, intelligence, and a modern air force to this equation, while Iran brings funds, imperative knowledge about the lay of the land, and Hezbollah — a large, trained, and well-armed fighting force, dedicated to doing its patron’s bidding.

 

Hezbollah has lent the Syrian regime’s war a considerable number of operatives, who have been able, is some areas, to tip the balance in Syrian President Bashar Assad’s favor, preventing the rebels from dealing his army crushing defeats.

 

What could be the outcome of a situation in which this coalition remains unchecked? The Shiites will most likely come to power in Iraq, and as the majority, they will exclude the Sunnis, whose community is concentrated in Baghdad and northwest of the capital, from the government. The Sunnis, who will feel marginalized, will then bolster the only other Sunni force in the area — Islamic State — and the jihadi terrorist group will find that it has a larger number of local, albeit reluctant, recruits at its disposal.

 

The war in Syria will escalate to a fight to the death, because contrary to the hope expressed by external elements, no compromise can be brokered between the Sunnis and the Alawites, namely the rebel forces and Assad’s regime. The leverage the Iranian-Russian alliance will lend the embattled president will meet a forceful pushback from the rebels, aggravating the volatile situation further. Both the Syrians and the Iranians, I believe, understand that the bloody war waged in Syria is truly a fight to the death, and therefore there can be no compromise. The hatred between the Sunnis and Alawites is so intense that the chance of launching a true negotiation, one that could breed an actual agreement, is nonexistent.

 

I assume that if a solution could be devised in Syria, even one by which the country would be divided into de facto spheres of influence, and even at the price of toppling Assad’s regime, both Tehran and Moscow would be willing to endorse it. Iran and Russia are more concerned with installing peace and quiet in Syria and ensuring the regime is sympathetic to their regional interests, than they are with the identity of the individual heading this regime. Unfortunately, this alternative does not exist. The rebels want more than to just bring Assad to his knees — they want to end the Alawite regime itself, and that is something neither the Alawites nor Russia and Iran will ever abide.

 

For Tehran, a solution that excludes the Alawites from power in Syria spells the end of the dream of seeing the Fertile Crescent become a Shiite spectrum stretching from Baghdad to Beirut under Iran’s leadership. Russia, for its part, believes that forcibly ousting Assad would be repeating the mistake made in Libya, where Moammar Gadhafi’s regime met a violent end. The results of that uncontrolled collapse are evident today: Libya has become the main arms dealer for every extremist organization, and a gateway for mass migration from Africa to Europe. Why repeat the same mistake again, Moscow wonders, especially when the alternative to Assad is radical Sunni forces, who are unabashedly trying to increase their influence among the many Muslims living in Russia. Reward these nefarious forces would be imprudent, Russia asserts…                                                                                                                                                           

[To Read the Full Article Click the Following Link—Ed.]                                                                                                                                                                     

 

Contents                                                                                      

   

PRESIDENT ‘MUMBO-JUMBO’                                                                                                          

Bret Stephens

Wall Street Journal, Oct. 5, 2015

 

David Petraeus testified last month to the Senate Armed Services Committee on U.S. policy in the Middle East. Regarding Syria, the former general and CIA director urged a credible threat to destroy Bashar Assad’s air force if it continues to bomb its own people. He also recommended “the establishment of enclaves in Syria protected by coalition air power, where a moderate Sunni force could be supported and where additional forces could be trained, internally displaced persons could find refuge, and the Syrian opposition could organize.”

 

But Barack Obama does not agree. At his Friday press conference, the president described such views as “mumbo-jumbo,” “half-baked ideas,” “as-if” solutions, a willful effort to “downplay the challenges involved in the situation.” He says the critics have no answers to the questions of “what exactly would you do and how would you fund it and how would you sustain it.” America’s greatest living general might as well have been testifying to his shower drain for all the difference his views are going to make in this administration.

 

So it is with this president. It’s not enough for him to stake and defend his positions. He wants you to know that he thinks deeper, sees further, knows better, operates from a purer motive. His preferred method for dealing with disagreement is denigration. If Republicans want a tougher line in Syria, they’re warmongers. If Hillary Clinton thinks a no-fly zone is a good idea, she’s playing politics: “There is obviously a difference,” the president tut-tutted about his former secretary of state’s position, “between running for president and being president.”

 

You can interpret that jab as a sign Mr. Obama is urging Joe Biden to run. It’s also a reminder that Mr. Obama believes his Syria policy—the one that did nothing as 250,000 people were murdered; the one that did nothing as his own red lines were crossed; the one that allowed ISIS to flourish; the one that has created the greatest refugee crisis of the 21st century; the one currently being exploited by Russia and Iran for geopolitical advantage—is a success.

 

That’s because the president’s fundamental conviction about American foreign policy is that we need less of it—less commitment, less expense, less responsibility. Winston Churchill once said that the U.S. could not be “the leading community in the civilized world without being involved in its problems, without being convulsed by its agonies and inspired by its causes.” Mr. Obama sees it differently. He is the president who would prefer not to. He is the Bartleby of 21st century geopolitics.

 

As for what a serious Syria policy might look like, the U.S. proved it was capable of creating safe havens and enforcing no-fly zones in 1991 with Operation Provide Comfort, which stopped Saddam Hussein from massacring Kurds in northern Iraq the way he had butchered Shiites in southern Iraq. This is how we wound up preventing what might otherwise have been a refugee crisis that would have rivaled the current exodus from Syria. It’s how we got an Iraqi Kurdistan—the one undisputed U.S. achievement in the Middle East in the past 25 years. It’s how we were later able to stop ISIS from swallowing northern Iraq and eastern Syria whole…

[To Read the Full Article Click the Following Link—Ed.]                           

 

Contents                                                                                                                                               

 

On Topic

 

Vlad’s Gone Mad: National Post, Oct. 8, 2015—Has Vladimir Putin, president of the Russian Federation, gone mad? Up until now, we hadn’t thought so, seeing his provocative moves across Europe and the Middle East as a product of deliberate, and depressingly accurate, assessments of Western weakness. But the reports now emerging from the Turkish-Syrian border suggest the Russian dictator is less ruthless than reckless.

Putin in New York: A Tactical Win, But at What Price?: Aurel Braun, Globe & Mail,  Sept. 29, 2015—Russian President Vladimir Putin’s first appearance at the United Nations General Assembly in a decade, and his meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday, appear to have been clear tactical wins. He put to rest the notion that Russia has been isolated in the wake of its widely condemned military actions in Ukraine or that he was personally ostracized. He presented Russia as an indispensable strategic player. He also boosted his personal political power. There is a question, though, whether despite all of this the Kremlin has a viable and sustainable international strategy.

Putin and the West’s Moral Vacuum: Melanie Phillips, Jerusalem Post, Oct. 1, 2015 —Any lingering doubt about the lethal weakness of America and the West has been brutally shot down in the skies above Syria.

Research on the Islamic State, Syria, and Iraq: Aymenn Jawad al-Tamimi, Middle East Forum, Aug., 2015

             

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