Russian airstrikes in Syria

[The Alexanderians]

Of course America is run by Jews, dearie.

Oy vey...

It's always the Jews fault.

made me think of this

[Socialist Czechia]

It's always the Jews fault.

made me think of this

i will never understand concept of antisemitism. sure, historical animosity is one thing (Chinese will never love Japs, Greeks will never love Turks etc.), but this 'jew-fault' concept seems incredibly silly.

[The Qeiiam Star Cluster]

While both sides are disgusting murderers, Assad is undeniably the one that is preferable. I'd prefer a secular dictator over a ultraconservative dictator, myself.

Some bleeding hearts here will undeniably whine "how about no dictators at all", of course, but I prefer dismissing them as people disconnected from the grim reality of the Middle-East. Think of Warhammer 40K and change all references to Warhammer with the word "Middle-East". Do you think democracy can function in Syria without any radical restructuring? Do you think that any one of those opposition groups who have the slightest chance of power against Assad will be a peace-shitting, rainbow-puking vortex of love and friendship?

Like I said, complete naivety and Western liberalism. Buck the fuck up and accept that Syria, or the Middle-East, won't be getting any better. Especially by not your hand.

Thank you.

Finally someone who speaks some sense.

Your Warhammer 40K comparison is very apt. I swear, some of these bleeding-heart liberals would think it a good idea to promote democracy on Cadia if they had the chance. I can see the arguments now: "Why do we have to choose between Chaos or the Imperium? Why can't we have freedom and blah blah blah?"

I'll take the Imperium, thank you very much.

Or we could install a text-to-speech device into the Golden Throne, thus making the Imperium alot less shitty.

[West Aurelia]

Russia has been allowed to strike IS convoys entering Iraq. At least Russia will definitely be bombing IS this time instead of anti-Assad rebels.

[Seraven]

Of course America is run by Jews, dearie.

Oy vey...

It's always the Jews fault.

So you want to blame the Muslim?

[Cartagine]

Interesting.....Russia is ready to assist FSA rebels

[The Nuclear Fist]

It's nice that Russia is bombing ISIS and not just anti-Assad rebels. I wish that the US would focus less on training rebels that will inevitably backfire in our face and focus more on bombing ISIS.

[Cartagine]

It's nice that Russia is bombing ISIS and not just anti-Assad rebels. I wish that the US would focus less on training rebels that will inevitably backfire in our face and focus more on bombing ISIS.

I don't think Russia has bombed as many rebels as people claim. Russian airstrikes mainly took place in Al Nusra territory and its surroundings. Now sure you can argue that those are rebels if you're just considering three sides but Al Nusra should be bombed just as hard as IS and any other extremists groups.

[Gauthier]

Interesting.....Russia is ready to assist FSA rebels

Either Russia is bullshitting and waiting to unload on the rebels, or Assad Done Fucked Up.

[Socialist Czechia]

People should stop to think about some imaginary 'moderate opposition'. What's left of FSA, merely stands in the way to defeat much more powerful Al Nusrah-Al Qaeda and ISIL. If you can even think seriously about few outposts and villages as an 'opposition'.
Most of them are already in Germany

Westerners should actually thank Putin, to solve this mess with no solution. They couldn't support Assad, they couldn't bomb so called 'opposition', land invasion was unthinkable for anyone.
So they simply waited until somehow ISIL will collapse Which is unlikely, since, again, from political reasons, NATO won't bomb convoys with food supplies, for example, or won't burn 'civilian areas'.
'Limited war' like that is just very expensive nonsense.

[Geilinor]

People should stop to think about some imaginary 'moderate opposition'.

A moderate opposition exists, but Russia and Syria have done their best to crush it. Putin's priority is to prop up Assad, not to make peace.

[Socialist Czechia]

People should stop to think about some imaginary 'moderate opposition'.

A moderate opposition exists, but Russia and Syria have done their best to crush it. Putin's priority is to prop up Assad, not to make peace.

nope. they are so marginal, that anyone could say they doesn't exist anymore

someone could even say, that whole myth about 'moderate opposition' exists from the start. as 'FSA' westerners counted even Al Nusrah and various tribal militias. there was no united front, no actual leadership.
just many warbands supported by Turks or Saudis.

[Gauthier]

People should stop to think about some imaginary 'moderate opposition'. What's left of FSA, merely stands in the way to defeat much more powerful Al Nusrah-Al Qaeda and ISIL. If you can even think seriously about few outposts and villages as an 'opposition'.
Most of them are already in Germany

Westerners should actually thank Putin, to solve this mess with no solution. They couldn't support Assad, they couldn't bomb so called 'opposition', land invasion was unthinkable for anyone.
So they simply waited until somehow ISIL will collapse Which is unlikely, since, again, from political reasons, NATO won't bomb convoys with food supplies, for example, or won't burn 'civilian areas'.
'Limited war' like that is just very expensive nonsense.

Need more Shirtless Putin posters?

[Uxupox]

People should stop to think about some imaginary 'moderate opposition'. What's left of FSA, merely stands in the way to defeat much more powerful Al Nusrah-Al Qaeda and ISIL. If you can even think seriously about few outposts and villages as an 'opposition'.
Most of them are already in Germany

Westerners should actually thank Putin, to solve this mess with no solution. They couldn't support Assad, they couldn't bomb so called 'opposition', land invasion was unthinkable for anyone.
So they simply waited until somehow ISIL will collapse Which is unlikely, since, again, from political reasons, NATO won't bomb convoys with food supplies, for example, or won't burn 'civilian areas'.
'Limited war' like that is just very expensive nonsense.

Need more Shirtless Putin posters?

Nah his daily does of Putinism crack is enough.

[Neu Leonstein]

How come we are operating in this thread under the assumption that Putin is successful in fighting ISIS, or even in supporting Assad to a significant degree? Last I checked, which admittedly was a few days ago, the campaign wasn't going all that well...

[Baltenstein]

Man, Russia surely does have ISIS on the run.

[Cartagine]

People should stop to think about some imaginary 'moderate opposition'.

A moderate opposition exists, but Russia and Syria have done their best to crush it. Putin's priority is to prop up Assad, not to make peace.

Like there's any outside power that wants peace in Syria *nods*
On the other side, all powers want peace in Syria, just only on their conditions.

Interesting.....Russia is ready to assist FSA rebels

Either Russia is bullshitting and waiting to unload on the rebels, or Assad Done Fucked Up.

Not sure, FSA proposes Russia to hold talks on Syrian crisis in Cairo and Syria's President Assad ready for early elections - Russian delegation to Damascus.
It looks more like Russia has put some pressure on Assad to deal with the "moderate" rebels while killing off the rest.

[Cartagine]

How come we are operating in this thread under the assumption that Putin is successful in fighting ISIS, or even in supporting Assad to a significant degree? Last I checked, which admittedly was a few days ago, the campaign wasn't going all that well...

It does have effect, but yeah, the effects are indeed overrated even though they still are more effective than those of the coalition.
See here the maps of Syria between October 7th and October 23rd.
You must understand though that we're not even a month in and battles can take up a long time. I think its best to review the Russian success in Syria again somewhere around newyear, that way plenty of time has passed for the Syrian army to make some proper advancements.

[Socialist Czechia]

Nah his daily does of Putinism crack is enough.

people like you should consider possibility, that someone can be on russian side but not be supporter of Putin
in this case, of course.
it's sad how Great Powers plays with minor nations exactly the same games like hundred and two hundred years ago, but western citizens fails to see this game, or worse, supports it.

no matter if there are emperors or presidents on either side, west will be always obsessed by anti-russian fears.

russophobia historically doesn't even make sense. sure, they wanted to conquer and control, like any other empire, French or British one, but never did such horrific things like Turks or Germans.
Or Belgians.

[Trumpostan]

People should stop to think about some imaginary 'moderate opposition'. What's left of FSA, merely stands in the way to defeat much more powerful Al Nusrah-Al Qaeda and ISIL. If you can even think seriously about few outposts and villages as an 'opposition'.
Most of them are already in Germany

Westerners should actually thank Putin, to solve this mess with no solution. They couldn't support Assad, they couldn't bomb so called 'opposition', land invasion was unthinkable for anyone.
So they simply waited until somehow ISIL will collapse Which is unlikely, since, again, from political reasons, NATO won't bomb convoys with food supplies, for example, or won't burn 'civilian areas'.
'Limited war' like that is just very expensive nonsense.

What do you suggest then, carpet bombing the area? Nuking it? Firebombing it? Because that would never backfire, would it?

And when is the western world going to realize that maybe not everyone in the world is receptive to western ideas of the nation-state?

Remember how they sold support to Afghani rebels in the 1980s as support for the moderate opposition? And how did that turn out? Did any of the jihadist groups that fought the Soviet Union with US materials end up rebranding itself as... say... the Taleban or Al Qaeda? Surely that didn't happen? Or did it?

http://www.amazon.com/Jihad-The-Trail-Political-Islam/dp/0674010906

As well as money, Muslim countries provided thousands of volunteer fighters known as "Afghan Arabs", who wished to wage jihad against the atheist communists. Notable among them was a young Saudi named Osama bin Laden, whose Arab group eventually evolved into al-Qaeda.

I wonder which of the Syrian 'moderate rebels' is going to be the next 'Osama'.

[Messeren]

USA intervenes in Middle East, it's called peace-keeping.
Russia intervenes in Middle East, it's called aggressive manoeuvring.

Everyone is going ape-shit over nothing. The running argument is that Russia is also targetting rebel groups who oppose al-Assad. I'm sorry but in the eyes of a state that makes them terrorists as well. If a group wanted to overthrow a government in the West they'd be treated as a terrorist organization. It is completely irrelevant whether or not a country is democratic. Fighting against a dictatorship doesn't excuse "terrorism".

Freedom fighting, terrorism; it's the same, it depends what side your on, and everyone is going crazy against Russian air-strikes simply because they are hopping on the hate-Russia bandwagon, when all Russia is doing is eliminating ISIS outposts whilst also assisting their ally in dealing with other terrorists.

[Uxupox]

Nah his daily does of Putinism crack is enough.

people like you should consider possibility, that someone can be on russian side but not be supporter of Putin
in this case, of course.
it's sad how Great Powers plays with minor nations exactly the same games like hundred and two hundred years ago, but western citizens fails to see this game, or worse, supports it.

no matter if there are emperors or presidents on either side, west will be always obsessed by anti-russian fears.

russophobia historically doesn't even make sense. sure, they wanted to conquer and control, like any other empire, French or British one, but never did such horrific things like Turks or Germans.
Or Belgians.

Well sure the Russians never did any genocide, it was alien that took them!

[Socialist Czechia]

people like you should consider possibility, that someone can be on russian side but not be supporter of Putin
in this case, of course.
it's sad how Great Powers plays with minor nations exactly the same games like hundred and two hundred years ago, but western citizens fails to see this game, or worse, supports it.

no matter if there are emperors or presidents on either side, west will be always obsessed by anti-russian fears.

russophobia historically doesn't even make sense. sure, they wanted to conquer and control, like any other empire, French or British one, but never did such horrific things like Turks or Germans.
Or Belgians.

Well sure the Russians never did any genocide, it was alien that took them!

actually, more people died in US during Great Depression due to effects of sickness and hunger. but hey, it was democracy, everyone was free to die as a free unemployed man with no healthcare or welfare

considering how Ottomans traited it's subjects, be it Greeks, Kurds or Armenians, population transfers ordered by Tsars (or by comrade Stalin) were always considerably more humane than all those random massacres and genocides ordered by Sultans and Pashas during ages. Population transfers, by the way, were seemed as legit and necessary by ALL Allied Powers still in 1945.

and just a note, famines in ukranian part of Russian Empire were actually recurring events, that one during USSR was simply the last one. Tsars were no less ruthless, when they needed resources for conquests, sometimes even more than 'Uncle Stalin'.

[The Ben Boys]

Well sure the Russians never did any genocide, it was alien that took them!

actually, more people died in US during Great Depression due to effects of sickness and hunger. but hey, it was democracy, everyone was free to die as a free unemployed man with no healthcare or welfare

High estimates of the Great Depression is seven million in a country with 130 million people. Meanwhile at least ten million people died in the Ukrainian Famine (according to the Court of Appeal in Kiev) with a population of ~28 million. .5% of the US population died of famine in the Great Depression. 35% of Ukraine was starved.

It's called statistics. You have to take it to get out of high school.

Try not to fall out of your ivory tower, it's a long way down.

[Uxupox]

Well sure the Russians never did any genocide, it was alien that took them!

actually, more people died in US during Great Depression due to effects of sickness and hunger. but hey, it was democracy, everyone was free to die as a free unemployed man with no healthcare or welfare

considering how Ottomans traited it's subjects, be it Greeks, Kurds or Armenians, population transfers ordered by Tsars (or by comrade Stalin) were always considerably more humane than all those random massacres and genocides ordered by Sultans and Pashas during ages. Population transfers, by the way, were seemed as legit and necessary by ALL Allied Powers still in 1945.

and just a note, famines in ukranian part of Russian Empire were actually recurring events, that one during USSR was simply the last one. Tsars were no less ruthless, when they needed resources for conquests, sometimes even more than 'Uncle Stalin'.

Population transfers humane? Are you kidding me. The expulsion of the Germans on modern day Kaliningrad was not humane at fucking all.