Obama Thinks His Syria Strategy is Right -- And Folks Just Don’t Get It

More Russian FM disinformation and this is the person Kerry "trusts" to comply with Minsk 2 and anything agreed to in Syria...????

BUT WAIT Russia has not complied with a single point of the 11 point Minsk 2 agreement so exactly just how does Kerry believe he can "trust Lavrov" who talks a lot and delivers painfully little to nothing.....???

BTW...a Russian FM should know what is exactly stated in the Budapest Memorandum that Russia signed BUT it seems he does not or ignores some of the exact wording that states definitely something else than what he is alluding to...

"Russia didn't break Budapest memorandum, because it only promised not to nuke Ukraine in it" - #Lavrov

Embarrassing for the so called highly successful Obama Syrian strategy...??

Lavrov on Syria: "Kerry's always having problems with US partners in the region, like Turkey. He always calls on us to find a way out..."

BTW...how does this great Syrian strategy workout with this.....??

The National Security Strategy accurately outlines the responsibility and interest of the United States to respond to and prevent atrocities.

The mass killing of civilians is an affront to our common humanity and a threat to our common security. It destabilizes countries and regions … [and] creates grievances that extremists exploit. We have a strong interest in leading an international response to genocide and mass atrocities when they arise. … [It is] less costly when we act preventively before situations reach crisis proportions.

NOTICE Kerry's responses to the anti Assad negotiating block HNC this weekend was "let's all talk first at Geneva and THEN we will address the bombing and humanitarian aid" when they stated they were not going until the three UNSC resolutions were fulfilled

There are already three joint US/Russian supported UNSC resolution stating stop the bombing and provide aid..SO why would the US "talk about this at a later date"?????

That might explain the HNC's Alloush comment "why do we have to negotiate about our basic humanitarian rights"??????

Actually IMHO an astute question.....

AND the next Russian non linear war is upon the West and where is the Obama NSC and Kerry.....lost somewhere in Syria it seems.....

#Russia Yes, #Putin may be starting to win Georgia away from the West. Here’s why it matters
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/01/25/yes-putin… …
pic.twitter.com/pHJyGeenR9

While Obama and Kerry concern themsleves with Syria that other Russian non linear war is still an onging war...never was a true ceasefire as the Russians are averaging 30 to 70 attacks daily lately........

Russian shellings and attacks started at around 1800 and have been increasing.......

19:50 #Donetsk @PVB40 [fb] 2 Grads went along #Ilyicha towards #Motel about an hour ago

19:41 #Horlivka @tgorlovka #Zaytseve direction: one can hear heavy shots and machine guns

20:07 #Horlivka @gipsogolovij I can hear an AA-gun and smth heavy

20:01 #Horlivka @gipsogolovij Reply fire hasn't cease RU, each 5-10 sec an [outgoing] mortar round

21:58 #Donetsk @funkermanjke #airport=#Opytne: all hell broke loose, very intense small arms shooting and multiple salvos

VOGs, RPGs, AGLs, snipers - nothing changes. Attacks do not cease," - Ukrainian soldiers in Pisky
http://en.censor.net.ua/n370908

22:02 #Avdiivka @LuftGanza #airport direciton: noisy...

Donetk now
There is some serious shooting ongoing in the airport - #Pisky - #Optyne area.

So since Putin has basically never fulfilled his commitments in complying with the full 11 Points of Minsk 2 WHY does Obama and Kerry assume he will do anything for Syria if it means kicking out Assad....Since he holds a full and unrestricted SOFA for Syria....?????

Will not post the corresponding video to this..brutal and where is the voice of the US...lost somehow behind Putin's highly successful Syrian strategy......

Sectarian Shia militants abusing & subsequently executing a 13 year old sunni child.
#Iraq

Diayala area is where this video was taken by a Shia militant via Smartphone.....by the way they were carrying US weapons.....

Simply amazing that more Sunnis are not flooding into the arms of IS...

Not exactly sure how much longer the KSA, Turkey and Pakistan will remain quiet over the unending videos coming out ot the ME depiciting Shia militia torturing, killing and otherwsie committing war crimes on the Sunni populations in both Iraq and Syria.......

Social media comments coming out of the ME...if anywhere close to being true then a PR disaster for the US in the "perception" war that is ongoing.....

No, Kerry is perfecting the art of 'Leading from behind'. It's now 'Leading from behind Iran'.
https://twitter.com/abusamy99/status/691481889689997312 …

#Reports
Reinforced #Assad forces take most of Sheikh Miskeen under 33 Russian airstrikes (just today) while undersupplied rebels withdraw.

#Footage
Another day of #RussianAirstrikes by Su-34 in #SheikhMaskin.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcR_RlBU-Rk …
#Daraa #Syria

Activists report decision to let Assad win the war - at least in the south - was not just met in Moscow but also in Washington

Obama desperately trying to impose a facade resolution to Syrian conflict before his term ends for another chapter to write in his biography

One of the best short comments on Putin by the former DoD Russian expert who after attempting to be heard by Obama and his NSC simply gave up and left DoD.....

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/01/next-president-putin-pen…

Actually in some aspects repeats much of what I have been commenting here for a long number of months but I go a step further and view Putin in his current form an existential threat to the US simply because he in believing
his own coolaid is willing to use nuclear weapons.

Madam/Mr. President-to-be-elected, you will enter office facing Vladimir Putin’s Russia as a potential geostrategic threat to the United States. You will need a strategy to counter and resist this threat, which is only growing. At the moment, Putin appears to be closer to prevailing in Syria and holding steady in Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova. His use of force to protect despots and to render governments hostage to Moscow’s will is working to some extent, as Joint Chiefs Chairman Joseph Dunford tacitly acknowledged last week when he told reporters that because of Russia’s military intervention in Syria, the Assad regime “is in a better place” ahead of scheduled peace talks in Geneva this week. Putin may have helped Assad regain control of enough of Syria to potentially retain power and in Eastern Europe the states with uninvited Russian forces continue to experience limits on their territorial and political sovereignty.

What precisely is the threat from Russia? Putin’s two main objectives—to keep himself in power and to rebuild Russia as a great power—do not in themselves endanger U.S. national interests. The threat lies in the fact that Putin is trying to achieve his goals by rewriting international rules and norms that are critical to U.S. security. Specifically, he seeks to inaugurate a new international order that permits human rights abuses by despotic leaders and invasion, occupation and political subversion of sovereign states. Not to mention assassination: Only last week, a British inquiry led by retired high court judge Robert Owen found that the murder of former FSB agent Alexander Litvinenko in 2006 was “probably” directed by the Russian president.

To permit this behavior to go unchallenged would mean the end of the post-World War II Westphalian, post- Cold War world order, which simultaneously enshrined territorial state sovereignty and human and minority rights. And we certainly can't let Russia weaken or destroy NATO, our most effective operational alliance, and our solidarity with Europe our biggest trading partner.

If Russia wins its aims outright—Ukraine remains ungovernable and territories in Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova remain occupied, and Assad remains in power—Putin’s Kremlin will be emboldened to use military force again and again to achieve its foreign (and domestic) policy objectives. Your administration will need to do more with our allies and partners to prevent a resolution to ongoing or “frozen” conflicts that runs counter to the wishes of the people of those countries. This is not to say that we should not compromise in order to put an end to conflict and human suffering (especially in Syria), but we must structure our compromises so that they contain the path to, or at least, the possibility for future exercise of democratic political and territorial sovereignty.

The United States must counter and resist Russia’s actions though a combination of deterrence, strengthening our allies and partners and communicating the truth about the Kremlin’s actions to the international community. Your administration must strive to convince Russia that neo-Soviet adventurism on its periphery will not advance its interests; Russia cannot be allowed to prevail in Georgia, Ukraine, and Moldova, where its military occupations have led to so-called frozen conflicts that serve as a Russian veto on the policies of those countries. Russia can have influence on those countries, but it should be based on mutual sovereign agreement, not coercion.

This is a propitious moment to shift into a more forward-leaning posture. Despite Moscow’s apparent strength on the world stage, it is dealing from economic weakness. The international sanctions have hurt—last April Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said they had cost Russia $26.7 billion in 2014 and he expected that to rise to $80 billion by the end of 2015. But the real leverage the United States and our allies have is owed to the collapse of oil prices. Over half of Russian government revenues are derived from oil and gas. The Russian government budget for 2016 was predicated on an oil price of $50 per barrel, but the price is now hovering at about $30 a barrel and may fall further. The World Bank estimates that Russian GDP will continue shrinking by 0.7 percent in 2016.

Until now, Russian officials have insisted that the military budget takes priority and will not suffer significant cuts. But if Russia keeps up its military operations in Syria, Ukraine and elsewhere, the accumulating costs may provide ammunition to Russian economists and other officials who are wary of, if not opposed to, the new Russian military adventurism. And if the economic situation worsens for the average Russian due to inflation and the falling value of the ruble, resource realities could, over time, rein in Russian military operations and lead Russia to a more accommodating policy. Former Russian Economic Minister Alexei Kudrin recently reminded Russians that the cost of supporting Crimea and the separatists in eastern Ukraine are far greater than military operations in Syria; these costs include infrastructure, and social support and are estimated to run into billions of dollars.

So is Obama/Kerry throwing the Syrians under the bus in order to get a compromise with Putin at all costs for his legacy OR to set a new global "spheres of influence" into play or what Putin has basically been wanting since 2008 "a new Yalta"..........????

INDICATOR: the suddenly announced unrestricted Russian SOFA for Syrian signed in August 2015 long before the RuAF arrived in Syria.....NOTICE once it was announced not a single comment from Obama and Kerry...

This is coming out of the ME comments....and confirms US pressure on the anti Assad forces in the face of their constant statements that they support them......

QUOTE:
Rebel sources in Latakia tell me TOW missile supply has been almost completely cut off in January as a result of US pressure pre-Geneva.

Entirely possible that Russian de-escalation in Ukraine may lead to face-saving compromises for it in Syria

That's basically what the rebels believe.

I suspect a result of a more complicated calculation about the final borders between each side's sphere of influence

How long until an upset CIA agent spills the beans on this?

So has Kerry now been basically publicly lying about his "no pressure"...??

And that totally successful Obama Syrian strategy is not the same exact strategy as Putin is pushing....come on now...it really is.....

Kerry rejected that he was pressuring the HNC into a unilateral compromise with no reciprocal Russian movements.......yes he certainly did.

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia

Sergey Lavrov & John Kerry called on UN's Special Envoy to announce the start date of intra-Syrian negotiations http://sputniknews.com/world/20160125/1033667074/lavrov-kerry-date-intr… …

Kerry really does seem to believe the Sunni Front States and the HNC "trusts" the US........really......????

WHAT about the fulfilment of the three UNSC resolutions that both the US/Russia supported and have utterly failed to implement????

NOTICE Lavrov mentioned nothing about them did he......?

One of the main JaI negotiators (Alloush..whose brother was recently assassinated for leading JaI)for Geneva stated after the Kerry threats and his statement was interesting but largely overlooked by US MSM and Kerry as well..."we will see how the next few days develop.....might be a surprise to all".

THEN this four hours ago came across Twitter....

Preparation is underway for a major joint Saudi-Pakistani-Egyptian military exercise, code named Northern thunder, in the north of KSA.

THEN this comment three hours ago....

Whenever sectarianism enters a country it destroys it. Iran is working hard to spread this disease because it helps its expansionist policy.

This is the current Syrian reality and all of the Obama/Kerry words spoken on Syria simply does not change these facts....

300,000 dead 1,200,000 injured 11,000,000 displaced/refugees this is Syria 2016
http://genocideinsyria.org #Syria

UNTIL the three UNSC resolutions on stopping the bombing of civilians and humanitarian aid supported by both the US/Russia are fully implemented doubt seriously if the so called Geneva talks are going to go anywhere fast.....

Just as in eastern Ukraine......nothing will stop the fighting UNTIL Russian fulfills all 11 points of Minsk 2 and that ain't about to happen any time soon regardless of the smooth words of Kerry this last week on Russian "efforts and good faith"......

After following the so called US negotiation positions on eastern Ukraine for 18 months, and the Syrian US positions for over 4 years CAN any SWJ reader actually answer with a honest face the following......

1. does the US ie Obama, his NSC and Kerry have a valid sound and sane negotiation strategy at all for eastern Ukraine??.

2. does Obama, his NSC and Kerry even have one for Syria???

3. is in fact with the US support for the Putin demands in eastern Ukraine and in Syria...has the US become complicit in "war crimes" and in the support of "genocide"

4. is in fact the Kerry positions actually those of Putin and just why is the WH hiding that from the general US public behind a wall of ..."people just do not understand us"...thus we need more info warfare messaging to convince them

5. can the drive to have a super squeaky clean legacy as a President who ended wars and got the US out of the US Marshall's business at the cost of thousands of killed civilians...can it survive the time of historical research???

OR is in fact the so called US position in eastern Ukraine and Syria nothing more or less than the demands placed on the US by Putin and the US caving to those demands....in order to give the perception that the US is doing something---anything at all that looks like a foreign policy.

OR has the US administration basically so retrenched itself in Europe and the ME that one could in fact state the US has all but abandoned Europe and the ME to the Russian "sphere of influence" and pulled the US basically back to it's neutral historical "sphere of influence ending at the US coastline touching the Atlantic....."????

It sure seems so.....as the US has all but openly pressured the Ukraine to unilaterally cave to the Putin demands and it is doing the same unilateral caving to Putin's demands with the anti Assad forces and the Sunni Front States.......

Taken from the Syrian 2016 thread.....

Dedicating this comment to the so called US DoS Kerry approach to negotiations based on Russian demands.....

Syrian opposition ex-chief @hadialbahra: the opposition is committed to the Riyadh formula for entering peace talks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEan...ature=youtu.be …

The opposition is adamant about two delegations, one represents the govt & one represents the opposition; reject any attempt to change that.

Reliable Ibrahim Hamidi writes that Kerry delivered/backed Russian conditions 2 Syrian HNC team n Riyadh on Saturday
http://alhayat.com/Articles/13617136

Humanitarian access & ending sieges aren't part of the talks, all parties agreed to them as per UNSC & the question is re mechanism
NOTICE the former US Ambassador Ford comment fits perfectly...that the US creditability concerning the three previously passed UNSC resolution concerning stopping the bombings and humanitarian aid is badaly damaged by Kerry and Obama.

Okaz also has a report about the US pressure on the Syrian opposition to accept compromises & Russia-driven demands http://www.okaz.com.sa/new/mobile/20...0125821176.htm …

He can't really be this naive –– John Kerry says U.S.-Saudi friendship stronger than ever
http://bit.ly/1ZX3u7Q AP

NOW convince me the touted Obama WH/Kerry successful Syrian strategy...at least they claim it is successful is really just the Putin Assad strategy being repacked and sold as the US position.....

Humanitarian access & ending sieges aren't part of the talks, all parties agreed to them as per UNSC & the question is re mechanism

The report says the opposition rejected these demands & insisted on the Riyadh opposition composition which represents all opposition.

If the opposition doesn't accept, according to the reports, de Mistura will invite them regardless as "consultants and experts".

John Kerry, according to these reports, also told the opposition they have to include PYD's Saleh Muslim & DSC's Haitham Manna to delegation

The report says Kerry told the opposition Assad has the right to run & no timetable for his departure.

Al Hayat says Kerry dictated to the opposition "his understanding with Lavrov" that they have to go & discuss a "national unity government"

Al Hayat also reports on John Kerry's "threats" to the Syrian opposition about the peace talks
http://alhayat.com/Articles/13617136 …
getting out of hand

Can any SWJ commenter suggest this to be the main WH/NSC reading task for the next day or so....

The People are Revolting: An Anatomy of Authoritarian Counterinsurgency
http://warontherocks.com/2016/01/reg...erinsurgency/?
interesting by @DavidUcko

QUOTE:

Scores of dead civilians, smoldering wastelands where villages used to be, a cowering people, and a regime thriving on tyranny and fear — these are the images evoked by the mention of “authoritarian counterinsurgency.” Most recently, in Syria, Bashar al-Assad’s brutal and uncompromising campaign against his own people provides an unnerving illustration of its execution. Russia’s bloody entry into this war, on the side of Assad, has only sharpened the juxtaposition of authoritarian counterinsurgency and the approach attempted, however ineffectively, by Western, democratic states. Whereas democracies strive to win hearts and minds, authoritarian states “waste them in the shithouse,” as Vladimir Putin put it in 1999. Whereas democracies are constrained by law, authoritarian states act with impunity. And whereas democracies contend with a critical media and electorate, authoritarian regimes own both and control the narrative.

Regime-based comparisons such as these often betray frustration with recent Western counterinsurgency campaigns. Be it the Russians in Chechnya or the Chinese in Xinjiang, we face the uncomfortable possibility that authoritarian counterinsurgency is simply more effective. In some circles, such suspicions lead perversely to envy, based on the tantalizing promise of a better, if inconveniently repressive approach. After all, what adversary could withstand the full force of the American war machine, were it let loose? Legitimacy, reform, hearts and minds — this is also where Western counterinsurgency has faltered, so what better solution than to push these concerns aside?

While the Obama WH praises itself for a roaring successful Syrian strategy which largely is the US supporting Iran and her Shia mercenary army inside Syria the US armed Shia militias are steadily committing atrocity after atrocity on unprotected Sunnis in Iraq and Syria.... and the US says nothing just as it says nothing when Obama has been provided video evidence that Iraqi Shia militias armed with US weapons and driving US supplied Humvees are fighting inside Syria...YET again not a single comment by either Obama and or Kerry NOR for that matter the US MSM.

The worst clip I have seen so far of US backed Shia terrorist militias cutting up the bodies of Sunni men in Iraq .....ESPECIALLY what is ongoing in Diyala...and after even the Sunni Tribes have asked for UN help in reigning in the Shia...NOTICE they did not ask for US assistance as the US is now perceived by the Sunni to be fully supporting Iran and her Shia mercenaries.

Countless US commenters have stated multiple times it must be the Sunni's that reign in IS but the atrocities being committed on Sunni's in Iraq and if the US does not reign in Putin's indiscriminate killing/starvation of civilians we will see the Syrian Sunni's edge closer to JaN... in fact the atrocities and genocide is driving them to support IS simply out of self preservation....

BUT hey the WH has a roaring successful Syrian strategy hard at work......

For those SWJ readers who do not believe the Ukraine and Syria are not intertwined one really needs to watch Kerry at work........

In the Ukraine Obama and Kerry basically forced the Ukraine into an unilateral appeasement move without a single Russian reciprocal move...none.... ..meaning they under US pressure Kerry/Nuland demanded the Ukraine pass the from Russian demanded decentralization law against heavy Ukrainian opposition BEFORE any absolutely any of the Minsk 2 military points were fulfilled by Russia and her mercenaries....

This was after a face to face Kerry Russian FM meeting with Putin in Sochi. At this meeting the Russians demanded political changes mentioned in Minsk 2 BEFORE a single one of the military points were carried out by the Russians....ie POW exchanges, withdrawal of heavy weapons and Russian troops and irregulars out of Ukraine, restoration of the border controls to Ukraine.....BUT Russia wanted the decentralization and elections along with a general amnesty......WHICH they are again demanding again after the recent Nuland visit AND the US did not pass on to the Ukraine the gist of that meeting.

AND what about that Kerry "ceasefire" ...attacks are averaging 40-70 attacks per day now while the world looks at Syria...AND Russia is not and nor has been in complete fulfilment of all 11 points of Minsk 2...not a single point and YET you would think from Kerry recent statements that the Russians are truly going to fulfil Minsk 2.......

Now we see the same Kerry actions concerning again Putin and Syria...the UNSC passes three resolutions concerning no bombing of civilians and humanitarian aid to civilians BOTH supported by Russia/US....AND then reinforced again in the latest UNSC resolution driven by and supported by the US AND Russia.

THEN we seen a series of Kerry and Russian FM meetings and NOW we see Kerry demanding unilateral moves on the part of the Sunni Front States and the anti Assad forces without a single reciprocal move by Assad and Putin.

NOW just because the anti Assad forces are basically demanding the US/Russia fulfill that specific recent UNSC resolution Kerry again applies pressure for the anti Assad forces to capitulate and THEN renegotiate for their humanitarian rights.

THIS is the level of that so called highly successful Syrian strategy by the DoS.

John Kerry is apparently putting 'pressure' on Syrian opposition groups to attend peace talks

Reuters

Tom Perry, Reuters

Quote:

BEIRUT (Reuters) - The lead negotiator in the Syrian opposition said on Sunday it was coming under pressure from U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to attend peace talks in Geneva this week in order to negotiate over steps including a halt to air strikes.

The opposition's High Negotiation Committee, which groups political and armed opponents of President Bashar al-Assad, has said it will not attend negotiations until the government halts bombardments, lifts blockades, and releases detainees - steps mentioned in a United Nations Security Council resolution passed last month.

Negotiator Mohamad Alloush said Kerry, who met HNC officials on Saturday, had "come to pressure us to forgo our humanitarian rights ... and to go to negotiate for them".

"There will be a big response to these pressures," he told Reuters, without giving further details. Asked if the peace talks would go ahead this week, he said "we leave this to the coming hours".

The government has meanwhile said it is ready to attend the talks. They had been due to begin in Geneva on Monday, but a Western diplomat said earlier on Sunday that they were unlikely to begin before Wednesday.
Kerry does not appear to fully understand the concept of "perception in the ME"...right now the "perception of the US" is that it basically has sided along with Russia with Iran and their Shia mercenary army inside Syria......

It will take years for the US to recover from this "perception"......

Believe Obama has a far more serious problem than Syria and that is Putin himself.....

EXCLUSIVE: Putin's Kremlin employs assassination abroad as state policy in a manner not seen in Moscow since Stalin

http://observer.com/2016/01/the-return-of-wetwork-kgb-goons-radiated-a-… …

So true for US foreign policy currently........

Risk has become paralyzing instead of something to manage or accept while solving problems. US must go beyond empty reaction or inaction

Let's see the current inaction in Syria although the Obama WH says their strategy is working...

Russian AF killing civilians at rates never seen before...they simply do not care what they kill any more.

Russia kills more than 90 civilians in less than 72 hours in Ma'ar Numan in Idlib
pic.twitter.com/TeIZigF4vX

Cluster munitions being deliberately used against civilian targets with the same results as above

Starvation being used against 450K Syrians and the US says it cannot assist via air drops

Three UNSC resolutions supported by both the US and Russia on stopping bombings against civilians the for humanitarian aid to flow.

YET from the US....absolute silence, not a single utterance yet they somehow think Geneva will work.....????

There is the old IR concept that if one country knows exactly what is ongoing in another ie the ongoing genocide in Syria and says and or does nothing then they are as complicit as those that carry out the genocide.

Somehow US foreign policy has forgotten Nuremburg........But hey that is ancient history to the current Obama NSC.....

Obama and Kerry simply do not get the two non linear wars are connected.....

Russia continues to find ways of sidestepping the Minsk 2 agreements and still maintain control over Ukrainian EU/NATO decisions...just removing two people does not end Russian occupation of the eastern Ukraine does it..NOr does it remove the 8.5K Russian troop and heavy weapons from the Ukraine does it......???

Leak @DT_ua: Russia ready to remove key separatists Zakharchenko, Plotnitskiy in exchange #Ukraine recognize elections on occup. territories

Russia and Iran very busy at hauling more Shia fighters into Syria AND YET Obama and the West are worried about foreign fighters going to IS.....

SyAAF IL-76 [YK-ATA] went 2 Tehran today. busy recently hauling foreign fightrs frm Abadan 2 Damascus (1¾h stopover)
pic.twitter.com/dqiNGlECeg

FSA Division 16 hit a car that allegedly has several #Hezbollah officers in it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PV-3MomW1W8 …
pic.twitter.com/N1FdHhjeok

Just more complications for that roaring successful Obama Syrian strategy and this really does need some messaging done........

Looks as if the US did not learn from the Russian negotiation tactics used in Minsk 2 and there is a major fallacy in the article....the US has proposed a timeline......BUT as far as I have seen in any media...Russia ie Putin has not accepted it....AND it appears from the article that Assad can and might be able to take part in the so called new elections.....remaining in effect still President a title for a genocidal dictator...cannot see just how the anti Assad forces will ever compromise on that.....

The next built in Russian trap will be the demand by Putin that his own proposed opposition group will be the only ones allowed in the voting and they will have a veto over anything to be approved in Geneva...this is the same exact tactic used to grant the so called Ukrainian "separatists" really Russian mercenaries veto rights over the Ukraine and anything to do with Minsk 2.

AND BTW...Russia is still absolutely not in full and complete fulfilment of all 11 Minsk 2 points so how is it possible that Obama and Kerry feel Russia is ready to compromise in Syria WHEN Putin has a formal legal binding SOFA with no specific end date....SO the anti Assad forces are to accept Russia remaining inside Syria after all their killing of civilians?????

Come on Obama and his entire NSC cannot be in that altered state of reality.......

AND pertaining to the so called new elections absolutely no one even the UN has figured out how to hold them in a constant state of war, and will all IDPs and refugee say in Europe also be allowed to participate OR only in the Alewite controlled areas.....meaning only Assad controlled territories will be allowed to vote....in theory even those Syrians living under IS control could vote.

Quote:

Russia and the U.S. are close to reaching a compromise to unlock the start of Syrian peace talks next week, three Western and United Nations diplomats said, averting the threat of a collapse of efforts to end the five-year civil war.

The UN Special Envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, is expected to invite two separate opposition delegations to the negotiations in Geneva, said the diplomats, who asked not to be identified because the matter is still confidential. De Mistura is scheduled to provide details of the peace process at a briefing Monday in the Swiss city.

The UN-sponsored talks between the Syrian government and opposition, previously set to begin Monday, have been delayed by disagreement between the U.S. and Russia over which parties to allow to participate.

More than three months of Russian airstrikes in support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad have turned the tide of the conflict, which has killed 250,000 people and led to Europe’s worst refugee crisis since World War II. Assad’s forces seized a strategic town on the Turkish border last week and are closing in on an Islamic State stronghold near Turkey.

Russia has objected to the inclusion of a radical Islamist militia -- Army of Islam -- in the Saudi-sponsored opposition delegation endorsed by the U.S. It has demanded that Moscow-friendly figures join the negotiations, including Qadri Jamil, a former Syrian deputy prime minister, as well as Saleh Muslim, co-head of the Syrian Kurdish group PYD, Kommersant newspaper reported on Saturday.

Under a compromise solution, Russia won’t block the inclusion of Army of Islam at the talks in return for a separate delegation being invited with the opposition figures it has proposed, a Western diplomat in Moscow said.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said she had no information yet about which opposition delegates will attend the talks in Geneva. A spokeswoman for de Mistura, Jessy Chahine, said a press briefing will be held on Monday to provide more details. A duty press officer at the U.S. State Department declined to immediately comment.

‘Get Going’

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who’s in Saudi Arabia in part to seek a deal on Syria talks, said earlier this week that de Mistura might invite representatives in addition to the main opposition delegation formed in Riyadh in December.

“We are confident that with good initiative in the next day or so, those talks can get going,” Kerry told reporters on Saturday in Riyadh.

The U.S., Russia and other nations have agreed on a timetable to form a transitional government in Syria by mid-2016 and hold elections in 2017. Russia has weakened U.S. opposition to Assad seeking re-election, according to Russian and Western diplomats. While the U.S. still says Assad can’t lead Syria over the long term, the Obama administration has backed off insisting that he go at the start of a transition process.

BTW:.............
There are over 400 democratically-elected local councils in opposition-held Syria that western MSM and western leaders are not talking about.

What is amazing to see with the new highly successful Obama Syrian strategy is his utter lack of understanding in the depth and breadth of the Iranian Shia support to Assad AND the Russian air support to that Shia mercenary army in a nation state that is largely 70% Sunni.

Most of the anti Assad forces are largely Syrian and the outside fighters are streaming in to support either IS or more seldom to JaN.

On the FSA side it is usually all local Syrian fighters.

The massive Iranian increase in Hezbollah Lebanon/Iraq, IRGC, Iraqi Shia militias and Shai mercenaries from 12 countries cannot not be currently matched by the FSA who has been in constant fighting since Russia arrived over 100 days ago.

This came up on the social media side and it is a MAJOR indicator that the Syrian Sunni Shia sectarian fight is going to a global conflict shortly.

Obama and his entire NSC has fully ignored this worst case scenario and has done virtually nothing to stop it.....and from the perception being created now in the ME it appears the US actually does side with Iran......

Faced with a Russian onslaught, Syrian rebels are calling for help from all Muslims:
https://news.vice.com/article/faced-with-a-russian-onslaught-syrian-reb… … via @vicenews

Syrian social media has an answer to the so called roaring successes of the Obama Syrian strategy.........

The U.S can fly & build airports INSIDE Syria but thinks it's 2 dangerous 2 airdrop food over besieged civilians?

⛔103 MARTYRS
[12 children 3 women 2tortured]
43 DeirEzzor
18 Aleppo
18 Damascus
15 Daraa
4 Latakia
3 Hama
1 Idlib
1 Homs
#Syria JAN 23

In some aspects I am amazed that the genocide being committed by now both Assad and Putin on the Syrian Sunni population DAILY has not driven the entire country to support IS.........AND the utter lack of a response by the US is being fully noted by the Sunni civil societies of the entire ME.

Kind of feel sorry for the next incoming US President as Obama is basically leaving he or her a total ME mess.

Pure hypocrisy on the part of Kerry as the US has been either slowing and or halting the resupply to KSA supported anti Assad forces, has utterly failed to halt the bombing/killing of sheer numbers of civilians that even they supported in a UNSC resolution and has uttered not a single word on the use of starvation as a weapon......AND is wavering on the Russian demands as to who can attend the Geneva meetings from the opposition.......and on and on...

BUT I guess in the US.... Obama terms this support as a "solid relationship"..??

With such a solid relationship I would hate to see a "rocky one" looks like....and the KSA response was what again...just smiles for the camera.

Al Arabiya English ✔ @AlArabiya_Eng
Kerry reassures #SaudiArabia of ‘solid relationship’
http://ara.tv/rtekd pic.twitter.com/vLh2yMmYfy

Do not think that an "uptick in messaging" is going to stop Putin from total annexation of eastern Ukraine......WH has yet to fully understand the intertwining of Ukraine and Syria in Putin's non linear war against the US....

Again Russia is in direct and full violation of Minsk 2 and YET not a single comment from Obama, Biden, Kerry and the NSC......

"DPR" announces "local election" in #Donetsk on April 20 via @novostidnua_en http://novosti.dn.ua/details/268104/

SO why is it that Obama "trusts" Putin on anything he states in Syria......???

This is maybe what the Obama WH, his NSC and Kerry need to fully understand and then address Putin in an open and direct fashion......one cannot lead from behind when genocide is ongoing every single day.....

Who Is The Target ?
#Ahrar vid on the real Targets of #Putin & #Assad's air Terror.
https://youtu.be/42kdF6LSBGU

By the way....this is how you pushback on non linear warfare and one does not need "a big government solution".....this "The Daily Beast" article was done incorporation with bellingcat and other social media analysts.....remember the non linear info warfare is being largely fought in the social media in order to legitimatize the info before MSM will look at it for the 24 hour news cycles...

The Fake Facebook News Driving Iraq’s Wars

A group of dedicated journalists is fighting to set the record straight about lies on social media that feed the flames of sectarian hatred.

BAGHDAD — After Saudi Arabia’s recent execution of a leading Shiite Muslim cleric, Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, there was widespread outrage in Shiite Muslim communities across the Middle East, and especially in Iraq.

Protests were organized in Baghdad fed by social media. One video was shared that allegedly showed the last seconds of Nimr’s life and his execution. Another widely shared video showed Nimr’s body being dropped out of a helicopter after the execution. Some Iraqis even said he was thrown out of that helicopter while still alive.

This kind of “news” is common on Iraqi social media. And it’s dangerous because for many Iraqis, social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and to a lesser degree Instagram have become a major source of political- and security-related news. They do not trust mainstream media in Iraq, which is mostly considered to be partisan, with much of it funded by political parties, religious bodies, or other organizations pushing their own agenda.

Many Iraqis say their most trusted source of news is word-of-mouth—relatives, friends, neighbors—so it makes sense that they would turn to social media, basically an expanded word-of-mouth network, to get information they believe they can trust.

However, once again, the country’s ingrained social divisions are playing a part on social media sites too. Manipulated videos, Photoshopped pictures and other false news and disturbing rumors are shared continuously by Iraqis craving information and, in some cases, anything that confirms their own bias.

The story about Sheikh Nimr’s execution was a prime example of this. It’s hard to know who posted the videos originally but it seems clear that the original user had an agenda.

Under the guidance of open source verification experts at the investigative network, Bellingcat, a team of bloggers from the Iraqi Network for Social Media who are also the founders of a Facebook page called Fake Posts, and journalists from NIQASH took a closer look at some of these falsified reports on social media.

Using open source verification techniques like geolocation and reverse image search, the team quickly found that the first video, the one allegedly showing al-Nimr’s execution, had nothing to do with the Saudi cleric. The clip, watched by thousands of Iraqis, was actually the video of the execution of an Indonesian maid in Saudi Arabia and it was four years old.

The other video that supposedly showed al-Nimr’s body being thrown out of a helicopter after his execution was also something else: It was a video showing a member of a Saudi police force falling out of a helicopter, most likely to his death, in 2013.

The investigators then went on to look at several other popular rumors doing the rounds of Iraqi social media.

Another picture that caused a different kind of uproar was that of a bloodied soldier with the remains of a mortar embedded in his arm, alive and sitting on a bed.

Interestingly enough every single group fighting in Iraq wanted to claim this “hero” as one of their own. The Iraqi Kurdish military, known as the Peshmerga, said he was one of their men. The Iraqi army claimed him as their soldier and then the Shiite Muslim volunteer militias, who may or may not fight alongside the Iraqi army, said he was one of their brave volunteers.

Even the extremist Islamic State, or ISIS, got in on the act saying he was actually one of their fighters.

People in Iraq want to believe this kind of story and they gave the soldier with the mortar in his arm nicknames like “Iron man” in honor of his survival.

But once again it turned out that nothing about this picture was correct: the man was in fact a soldier in the Colombian army in South America. The picture dated back to 2000 and the man had been injured while the Colombian army was fighting local left-wing rebels, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

Details on the remains of the mortar in the man’s arm, words on his badge saying Quimbaya, his military rank and other news reports on the incident quickly made it clear that the soldier had nothing to do with Iraq at all.

Another controversy was caused by a picture that seemed to show an officer from the Iraqi Kurdish military consorting with members of the ISIS group, a force that the Iraqi Kurdish are supposed to be fighting.

Back in 2014, when ISIS first took over the northern city of Mosul, there were already rumors that the Iraqi Kurdish were cooperating with the group in order to gain advantage and move toward a long-cherished goal of Kurdish independence. No big surprise then that this picture of supposed enemies together relaunched those rumors in the echo chamber that is Iraqi social media.

Once again though, this was misinformation. The individual who looked like he was a member of ISIS—sporting a long beard and a typical long-shirted ISIS outfit—turned out to be an actor well known in Iraqi Kurdistan but not by Arab audiences in Iraq. He was in an area west of Mosul working on a film about how ISIS had attacked the Yazidi minority in northern Iraq. And the member of the Iraqi Kurdish military pictured with the actor was a real soldier, a member of the security task force assigned to protect the film crew and actors.

It seemed that the picture had been taken as a kind of celebrity souvenir and uploaded in that vein, but had then been taken out of context by those who didn’t recognize the Kurdish actor and who had suspicions about the Iraqi Kurdish military.

It is not just ordinary Iraqis on social media spreading rumors and gossip. The Iraqi media also disseminates these kinds of stories to increase audience share and get more visitors to their sites. They know these controversial reports will do that. For some of the less scrupulous, more partisan media outlets, the false stories may also support their organization’s agenda.

Digital content that sets one sect, or ethnic group, against another in Iraq is seen as popular, a bit like the populist muck raking done by tabloids in the West; it often spreads very quickly—which makes even more professional news outlets want to re-publish or comment on it.

“The best way to confront this kind of news is to better train Iraqi journalists,” suggests Hashim Hassan al-Tamimi, dean of the College of Mass Communication at the University of Baghdad. “Iraqis urgently want news about security and about politics. The real media should be able to provide them with this information, instead of allowing rumors on social media to incite hatred.”

This report was prepared by NIQASH in cooperation with Bellingcat, the Media Academy Iraq and Iraqi members of the Fake Posts page.

OK...now we seem to have adults finally in charge of the WH and it's NSC....this should have been stated a long, long, long time ago ie four years ago...NOW we need to same the same adult state a similar statement for eastern Ukraine......

The concept of a Global Shepard can indeed work if there is an infrastructure in place that allows the regional players to fully understand that they need themselves to figure it out and when they cannot the Global Sheriff will assist.

THAT has been totally missing in the Obama WH for over seven years.

The core Obama problem is that he retrenched immediately after taking office and never put a support mechanism into place that the regional players needed.....basically pushing them to figure it out when the US has been doing it for over 50 years....

BREAKING: US Vice President Joe Biden says his country is prepared for a military solution in Syria if a political solution fails.

In the world of global super power competition one can in fact have both soft and hard power the Obama problem has been largely he is strictly soft power that he needs for his legacy....he ended two wars AND he started NONE...but at sometime when the players seem to be abusing "soft power you have to and or must be fully capable and willing to use "hard power" OR at least your actions must be perceived by the other party that you are seriously contemplating the use of hard power.

Obama has stumbled so many times Putin knows Obama will never resort to "hard power" THUS I am actually surprised by the Biden statement...so in the end is it just "info warfare hype" or is it serious???.......for it to be serious Obama has to let the TOWs flow, and to reign in the Russian deliberate killing via air strikes and the starving of Syrians....largely Sunni's.

If he does not then we all know there is absolutely nothing to the so called successful Syrian strategy......

EXAMPLE...this must end if the Biden statement carries water........
Russia airstrikes targeted Popular Market in #Khasham village,more than 30 civilians killed
#DeirEzzor #Syria JAN23
pic.twitter.com/fkrprkoQz0

NOW more Obama Syrian strategy failures but wait Kerry stated "with effort and good faith we could end Russian sanctions".......????

Putin dictating to Obama and the Sunni Front States is just another great example of that "effort and good faith" that we have seen from Putin since Crimea......and yet this seems to be totally ignored by Obama in his quest for his legacy......

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
There can be no unilateral considerations regarding composition of the Syrian opposition delegation
http://goo.gl/Zw7Pki

AND this is not dictating in the least.......???

Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova answers media question regarding the US State Department’s position on the Syrian opposition delegation

104-22-01-2016

Question: Could you comment on State Department Spokesman Mark Toner’s remarks to the effect that in the ongoing process the Syrian opposition has formed a broadly represented delegation for talks at its own discretion and that this choice should be respected?

Maria Zakharova: We have noted that these remarks came at a State Department briefing yesterday. I believe that the position expressed by my US colleague is a deviation from the position that was agreed upon during meetings of the International Syria Support Group and was unanimously formalised in Security Council Resolution 2254 of December 18, 2015. Let me remind you that this document, which is fundamental for the Syrian settlement, states in no uncertain terms that for the Syrian opposition delegation to be truly representative and inclusive, with a broad circle of opponents to legitimate President Bashar Assad, it should be formed, among other things, by taking into account the opposition meetings that took place in Moscow, Cairo and Riyadh, as well as other initiatives put forward toward this end.

This point was made, in particular, during talks between Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and US State Secretary John Kerry in Zurich two days ago. It may be recalled that Mr Lavrov stressed: “UN Security Council Resolution 2254 requires the Secretary General, through his special envoy on Syria, to send invitations to parties to the talks, who should represent the broadest possible spectrum of Syrian society – both the government and the opposition, taking into account figures and opposition groups that have delegated their representatives to the opposition meetings that took place in the past year to a year and a half in Moscow and Cairo, and recently in Riyadh. This is a mandate and there can be no unilateral considerations regarding first, second or third parties here. So this is up to Special Envoy of the UN Secretary-General for Syria Mr de Mistura, not anyone outside the UN, to decide.”

January 22, 2016

NOTICE that Russia did not go into who they have "declared as terrorist groups" to be kept out of the talks...namely the two largest anti Assad groups fighting Assad right now.....AND Russia has largely kept Hezbollah from being declared a terrorist organization inside Syria which it basically is as it is a paid Shia mercenary force fighting inside a largely Sunni populated nation state.

This is definitely not part and parcel of the Obama highly successful Syrian strategy and it definitely needs some messaging work to be done as it totally contradicts Obama's recent statement that Assad can remain in power until March 2017...BTW After he is no longer President......

Saudi FM al-Jubeir: Removing #Assad Key to Defeating #ISIS
http://ow.ly/3yUX27 #Syria

As part of the Global Shepard thing that the Obama trip is on is the ability to show Europe they are still engaged...in the last few days DC announced that the US IC would look into the Russian influence into the EU Right etc....which social media has been carrying comment after comment on for over 14 months with no t a single comment by the US then suddenly a comment...almost like they woke up and felt they needed "messaging".....

How Russian influence works in Europe, my latest on #Putinism and the European Far Right
http://imrussia.org/en/analysis/world/2500-putinism-and-the-european-fa… …

But not much about this is even in the western MSM......

As part of the Global Shepard thing that the Obama trip is on is the ability to show Europe they are still engaged...in the last few days DC announced that the US IC would look into the Russian influence into the EU Right etc....which social media has been carrying comment after comment on for over 14 months with no t a single comment by the US then suddenly a comment...almost like they woke up.

How Russian influence works in Europe, my latest on #Putinism and the European Far Right
http://imrussia.org/en/analysis/world/2500-putinism-and-the-european-fa… …

But not much about this is even in the western MSM......

Remember the DoS Kerry admitted that he realized an amount of the freed up 100B USD going to Iran will be peeled off for Iranian support to terrorists ie Hamas, IRGC, Iranian supported Shia militias inside Syria/Iraq and Hezbollah.

So with that in mind will actually now Obama and Kerry under their highly successful Syrian strategy formerly in the UNSC call out Iran as a state sponsor of terrorism....? Actually never.....as that would rock the Iran Deal and his legacy....

BUT then there is such a thing called reality on the ground in Syria ......

Hezbollah warned the civilians trapped in #Madaya to evacuate their homes
#Madaya #Syria JAN22

#Hezbollah warned the civilians trapped in #Madaya to evacuate their homes since 30 minutes ago (Local time here now 8:28PM) For those who live on the both sides of the main road crossing #Madaya, starting from #Al_Said Gas Station to #Bouqin Water Factory, all of them have received warnings from #Hezbollah & #SAA to leave their homes, civilians in #Madaya believe that #Hezbollah is planning for major demographic change in the region, as they plan to bring more Shias militias from #Lebanon and #Iran to accommodate them in Madaya, local population of #Madaya call to the International Security Council to enforce the implementation of its resolutions, especially those that are related to protect civilians in #Syria, also call to Mr. Ban Ki-moon and Mr. de Mistura for immediate action to stop this dangerous violation by #Hezbollah militia in #Madaya. #Damascus #Syria JAN 22

So right at this moment in time Obama and Kerry are fully complicit in the Russian deliberate targeting and killing of civilians, complicit in the Russian use of cluster munitions, complicit in the use of starvation and NOW complicit in the use of ethnic cleansing.

WHY complicit??....they are fully aware but chose to say nothing......

BUT hey this is the effect of that roaring highly successful Obama/Kerry misunderstood Syrian strategy hard at work.....

Idea that Russia (a waring party aligned w. Asad) should be listened to re. composition of other side's delegation is ludicrous

YET the US says nothing outside of "hey let's do non face to face negotiations".....???

Another failure of the Obama WH ie his NSC to foresee Russian expansionistic moves....at the beginning of the eastern Ukraine events 18 months ago the Russians made a strong military push into the Artic Shelf with new military bases and more troops and AC....social media warned this WH that the annexation of the areas under Russian expansionism would in effect occur...there was silence out of this WH, the NSC and DoS Kerry...now we see the Russian move.......

RussianEmbassyCanada ✔ @RussianEmbassyC

#Russia Expected to Present Claim for #Arctic Shelf Expansion to UN
See: http://sputniknews.com/russia/20160122/1033552356/russia-artic-shelf.ht… …
pic.twitter.com/aFFavdDQ2u

Hate going back to the link I posted on comments about Obama by the former SecDef Gates....this President and his entire NSC cannot walk, talk and chew gum at the same time.....

There never was a "successful Syrian strategy" other than I hope this will disappear until I leave in 13 months.....

So this is the Obama WH much vaulted and highly successful Syrian strategy.....hard at work.....??

So let's see...if Russia gives back Crimea, withdraws from eastern Ukraine and stops the deliberate targeting and killing of civilians and stops using starvation as a weapon AND kicks out Assad the US is going to again do what??

Come on...just good ole US Obama WH info warfare statements as a way to prepare for lifting Russian sanctions in exchange for the above...in our combined dreams...it will never happen so I am wondering what dream world the WH is currently in??

Kerry says effort and good faith could lead to lifting of sanctions on Russia: #WEF16

Kerry's timeline seems optimistic since world leaders have been pressuring Russia for over a year to abide by the terms of a signed ceasefire agreement..

BTW Russia has not yet fulfilled a single point of the 11 points in Minsk 2 so why is Kerry so optimistic that Russia ie Putin will "display true intent"?

EXAMPLE of Russian "effort and good faith" ongoing at the exact same time as Kerry states this......

Big buildups of Russian missile defenses denying NATO access to air space in parts of Europe very serious-Gen.Gorenc
pic.twitter.com/ZoZgxsOqkO

Wow......finally it appears as if the western MSM "wakes up" about the Russian deliberate killing of civilians.....

Air raids kill scores in ISIS-dominated Syrian provinces, monitor says http://reut.rs/1OEbn9Y

BTW reuthers......not only in the Is controlled zones......

Syrian children are still drowning in the Med due to what???.......air strikes, barrel bombs, starvation and cluster munitions forcing their families into a refugee status......IT is relatively easy to eliminate the cause and kick out Assad and place those committing genocide in the Hague......BUT it requires a serious rocking of the bat, strong leadership and a willingness to call a spade a spade ie Russia and Iran.

BUT that requires a US President who will lead not follow.........and this President has been following history for over four years........remember he is a Nobel Peace Prize winner and with that goes a shared responsibility for the global community at large.....

The image of a drowned Syrian child is shared worldwide. If it's one blown apart by an airstrike, it's not OK.
Why is that AND where is the complete western political leadership and MSM?
pic.twitter.com/Y2HH2Ait3y

The Obama WH, his NSC and the DoS strategy response is again exactly what??....more "messaging".

Former SecDef Robert Gates strikes again on the question of an Obama strategy for anything.......

Gates: Obama Thinks He’s Smartest Guy in Room, Ineffective at Developing and Implementing Strategy
https://shar.es/1h56S1

Is this article in really the same tenor of this article...."our strategy is the greatest---- the problem you all out there do not get it".

We are the smartest ----you all are the dumbest for not getting it.......just listen to our "messaging" and all will be fine.

The administration has been largely built on the drive for a legacy and social media.....info warfare against whom??