As we’ve documented extensively over the past several days, Ankara, Riyadh, and Doha have their backs against the wall when it comes to the effort to oust Bashar al-Assad and perpetuate Sunni hegemony in the Arabian Peninsula.
Hezbollah has surrounded Aleppo and their advance is backed by what’s been described as an unrelenting Russian air campaign. The rebels’ supply lines to Turkey have been cut and without a direct intervention by either the US or the Gulf states, the battle for Syria will have been lost for the opposition which pulled out of peace talks in Geneva citing the ongoing aerial bombardment by Moscow.
Now, with time running out, both Saudi Arabia and Turkey are weighing ground invasions.
“What’s going on in Syria can only go on for so long. At some point it has to change,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters on a plane back to Turkey from Latin America over the weekend.
“You don’t talk about these things. When necessary, you do what’s needed,” Erdogan said, when asked if Ankara was considering sending troops into Syria. “Right now our security forces are prepared for all possibilities,” he added.
For Erdogan, there’s only one acceptable outcome: Sunni militants oust Assad and take control of Damascus. Assad’s ouster is the desired outcome for the Saudis as well, but Erdogan has a secondary agenda in Syria: preventing the conflict from strengthening the Kurds. That means he’s against any support for the YPG - even if such support would help facilitate regime change.
Erdogan's frustration reflects the fact that the various groups fighting to take control of Syria are now virtually guaranteed to lose. As we said from the time Russia first flew combat missions from Latakia on September 30, the opposition has virtually no chance of winning a war with Hezbollah and the IRGC as long as Moscow is providing air cover. The rebels have no air presence whatsoever and no anti-aircraft capability and on top of that, there's no advantage to be had in fighting an asymmetric battle with Hezbollah. Hassan Nasrallah's army practically invented urban warfare.
The only option now is a coordinated ground invasion by the rebels' Sunni benefactors.
“With rebels losing ground, Gulf states said they would be prepared to send in ground troops as part of an international coalition battling Islamic State,” Bloomberg reported on Sunday.
Please note: that quote makes no sense. The rebels aren’t losing ground to ISIS, so why should their battlefield losses trigger international calls for ground troops to “battle Islamic State”?
This is a ridiculously transparent attempt to fabricate an excuse to shore up Sunni militants who are about to be relegated to the annals of sectarian history by the combined military prowess of Hezbollah and Russia.
Underscoring just how close the world is to careening into World War III, various reports out over the weekend indicated that the Saudis may be preparing to stage 150,000 troops in Turkey. That comes on the heels of reports out of Russia which indicate that Moscow believes Erdogan is on the verge of sending in troops to prop up the rebels. And then there was this, out earlier today from Reuters:
- U.S KIRBY SAYS WELCOME SAUDI, UAE OFFER FOR TROOPS IN SYRIA
Saudi foreign minister Adel al-Jubeir confirmed that Washington would support Riyadh if the Saudis did indeed decide to invade Syria just as they have Yemen.
For what it's worth, AA denied the Saudi troop reports.
While that particular "rumor" may be unfounded, Turkey and the rest of the Sunni world will need to make a decision in the next few days as to just how they plan to proceed, because as is abundantly clear from the following first-hand account from a rebel fighter, this war is just about over.
Washington’s support for Riyadh’s decision to put boots on the ground in Syria indicates a failure of US policies in the West Asian region, “beyond any doubt,” a top Iranian military commander stated.
Iranian Armed Forces' Chief of Staff Major General Hassan Firouzabadi slammed the US for backing Saudi Arabia’s “malicious” activities, amid Riyadh’s announcement of its preparedness to send ground forces to Syria.
"US Defense Secretary [Ashton] Carter is supporting and provoking the House of Saud to march to the war [in Syria]. This is an indication that he is at a loss. It also proves beyond any doubt that they have failed," Firouzabadi claimed on Monday, in response to the Saudi announcement.
Firouzabadi added that the continuous political defeats of the Saudis in the international arena, alongside their support for terrorism and the current low price of oil, have hit the kingdom hard.
"The House of Saud and the United States have no other option but to let go of aggression, bloodshed and empty threats against the regional states. They should also change course to help restore regional peace and stability," he said.
On February 4 Riyadh announced its readiness to take part in any US-led alliance operations in Syria, including a ground offensive. Shortly after the statement, a US State Department representative praised the Saudi move.
Following the statements, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem condemned the announcement, saying that a “ground intervention on Syrian territory without government authorization would amount to an aggression that must be resisted.”
This is not me being overly dramatic. If you have been following “alternative” news, the liberty movement and preparedness news, this is exactly what we have been discussing for the past several years. It is here and it is happening right now. Are you prepared for a new way of life? Are you prepared for widespread panic, widespread civil unrest and widespread rioting in your neighborhood?
Brandon’s call on the Fed raising the interest rates was a reminder of the Fed’s mandate – steal all the wealth of the nation, kill the host nations economy and move the next system. This is accomplished through federal level policies that are instituted through the U.S. Treasury and made into law by Congress. The lies and corruption that go along with these policies is how these criminals are able to convince societies masses that our economy is in perfect health with rainbow spewing unicorns as far as the eye can see. Once a person simply scratches the surface it becomes all too clear the bank robbers are running the banks.
When monetary policies are thrust upon an ailing economy that run counter to what is happening with the economy one has to take a serious look behind the curtain. Who benefits from an interest rate raise at the wrong time? Why is an interest rate raise, at this time, necessary? How does this benefit the overall economy?
This time it’s different. This time the global banking criminals have made it very clear the current U.S. dollar based system is coming down and it will not return.What will replace it? What new currency will we be using? Special Drawing Rights (SDR) may be a transitional currency. Dollars will still be in circulation, but they may be outlawed – the actual paper dollars. You have been hearing a lot of talk about “cashless societies”, right? What if paper dollars were outlawed, what would you do? What if you had to turn in all your paper dollars and, like in 1934, a few months later your wealth confiscated to the tune of 40-65%? Then what? Its already happened once, why wouldn’t it happen again?
Let’s listen in to Brandon Smith as he explains what the global banking criminals have been telling us about their plans to steal your wealth, implode the current U.S. dollar system and move to their next wealth generating scheme.
We’ve previously noted that polls show that Americans are in a “pre-revolutionary” mood, that less than 1 in 5Americans think that the government has the “consent of the governed”, that government corruption tops the list of Americans’ fears (gee, we wonder why), and that 3 times as many Americans supported King George during the Revolutionary War than support our OWN Congress today.
You might assume that such statements are over-the-top … or that the results come from partisan pollsters.
But a group of Republican and Democratic pollsters and political strategists reviewed polling data last week, and revealed some stunning results:
- 84% of all Americans believe political leaders are more interested in protecting their power and privilege than doing what is right
- 81% percent believe the power of ordinary people to control our country is getting weaker every day as politicians of both parties fight to protect their own power and privilege
- 80% believe the federal government is its own special interest primarily looking out for itself
- 79% of all voters believe we need to recruit and support more candidates for office, at all levels of government, who are ordinary citizens, rather than professional politicians and lawyers
- 78% believe that the Democratic and Republican Parties are essentially useless in changing anything, because both political parties are too beholden to special interests to create any meaningful change
- 76% of Americans agree with the statement that America cannot succeed unless we take on and defeat the corruption and crony capitalism in our government
- 75% believe that the US government is NOT working for the people’s best interest
- 75% believe that powerful interests have used campaign and lobbying money to rig the system for themselves
- 74% see the biased and slanted coverage of the media as part of the problem
- 72% of Americans believe the U.S. has a two-track economy, where most Americans struggle every day, where good jobs are hard to find, and where huge corporations get all the rewards
- 72% believe that the reason families in our middle class have not seen their economic condition improve for decades and economic growth is stalled is because of corruption and crony capitalism in Washington
- 71% believe our government is not only dysfunctional, it is collapsing right before our eyes
- 70% believe the government in Washington does not govern with the consent of the people
- The majority – 56% – say they wish there were a third party with a chance of success to fight for their interests
- Only 15% say the “values and principals of my political party are so important that I strongly prefer to vote for the candidates of my party…”
They concluded:
The country [is] in a prerevolutionary moment.
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This election could mark the beginning of the end of two-party duopoly in the United States.
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The people believe the real struggle for America is not between Democrats and Republicans, but between mainstream America and the ruling political elites of incumbent politicians, lobbyists, big business, big unions, big banks, big special interests and the big media. [The people are correct.]
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The power elite asks, “When will this be over?” Although this is seen as a chaotic and temporary situation by most of the political and media establishment, our research shows a strong, evolving tidal wave of discontent and growing pressure for real and dramatic change.
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Real change is what that the establishment fears most and fights hardest against. It is ultimately a losing battle.
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This, in fact, is a revolution.
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