{"id":263273,"date":"2016-08-23T03:36:05","date_gmt":"2016-08-23T03:36:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=263273"},"modified":"2016-08-23T19:55:48","modified_gmt":"2016-08-23T19:55:48","slug":"u-s-invades-syria-warns-russia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/u-s-invades-syria-warns-russia\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Invades Syria, And Warns Russia"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Eric Zuesse<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">On Monday, August 22nd, the United States government \u2014 which demands the overthrow of the internationally-recognized-as-legal government of Syria \u2014 officially announced that America\u2019s military forces in Syria will continue to occupy Syrian land, no matter what the Syrian government says, and will shoot down any Syrian planes that fly over U.S. forces there and attack them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">As reported on Monday by\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.almasdarnews.com\/article\/pentagon-us-ready-syrian-russian-jets\/\"><span class=\"s2\">Al-Masdar News<\/span><\/a>:<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>The Pentagon has announced that the USA is ready to down\u00a0Syrian and Russian planes that they claim threaten American\u00a0advisers who by international law are illegally operating in\u00a0northern Syria.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>On Friday, Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff Davis claimed\u00a0that US jets attempted to intercept Syrian planes to protect\u00a0the American advisers operating illegally with Kurdish forces in\u00a0Syria after Syrian government jets bombed areas of Hasakah\u00a0when Kurdish police began an aggression against the National\u00a0Defense Force.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>On Monday, another Pentagon spokesman, Peter Cook, said,\u00a0\u201cWe would continue to advise the Syrian regime to steer clear\u00a0of those areas.\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>\u201cWe are going to defend our people on the ground, and do\u00a0what we need to defend them,\u201d Cook told reporters.\u00a0<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">This means that the U.S. government will not allow the Syrian government to expel or otherwise eliminate U.S. forces in Syria. The Syrian government never invited U.S. forces into Syria, but the U.S. now officially dares the Syrian government to assert its sovereignty over the areas where America\u2019s troops are located.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Al-Masdar continued:<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>When pushed further about Russia, Cook made it clear that\u00a0the US would make the same aggression against Russian jets\u00a0who are operating legally with the Syrian government\u2019s\u00a0approval and coordination.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>\u201cIf they threaten US forces, we always have the right to\u00a0defend our forces,\u201d Cook said.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">This means that the U.S. not only is at war against the legitimate government of Syria, but that the U.S. government will also be at war against Russia if Russian forces (which the Syrian government <i>did<\/i> invite into Syria) defend Syrian forces from attacks in Syria by U.S. forces \u2014 forces that are illegally there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">These U.S. forces number only 300, of whom\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.wsj.com\/article_email\/u-s-to-send-250-additional-military-personnel-to-syria-1461531600-lMyQjAxMTE2MTI5NTcyMTUyWj\"><span class=\"s2\">250 were sent to Syria on April 24th<\/span><\/a>\u00a0to serve as advisors to other illegal military forces in Syria.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The vast majority of the illegal military forces in Syria are jihadists who had been hired by the Saudi government and the Qatari government, and supplied with U.S. weapons, to overthrow the Syrian government. Most of the other illegal forces in Syria are Kurdish forces, supported by the U.S. government to break Syria apart so as to create a separate Kurdish state in the majority-Kurdish far north-eastern tip of Syria.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The primary U.S. goal in Syria is to overthrow the Syrian government, which is led by the Baath Party, Syria\u2019s secular Party. Many Arabs insist upon Sharia, or Islamic law, but <i>Syria\u2019s<\/i> Arabs are an exception; the Baath Party is and has always been supported by the majority of the Syrian people, including by most of Syria\u2019s Arabs. Most Syrians are strongly opposed to Sharia law. Syria is the most secular nation in the Middle East.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">For example, when Western-sponsored polls were taken in Syria, after the start in 2011 of the importation of jihadists into Syria, those polls showed that\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/commentisfree\/2012\/jan\/17\/syrians-support-assad-western-propaganda\"><span class=\"s2\">55% of Syrians want Bashar al-Assad (the current leader of the Baath Party) to remain as Syria\u2019s President<\/span><\/a>, and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.globalresearch.ca\/polls-show-syrians-overwhelmingly-blame-u-s-for-isis\/5476717\"><span class=\"s3\">&#8220;82% agree \u2018IS [Islamic State] is US and foreign made group\u2019.\u201d<\/span><\/a> Furthermore, only &#8220;22% agree \u2018IS is a positive influence\u2019,\u201d and that 22% was the lowest level of support shown by Syrians for any of the presented statements, except for, &#8220;21% agree \u2018Prefer life now than under Assad\u2019\u201d \u2014 meaning that Syrians believe that things were better before the U.S.-sponsored jihadists entered Syria to overthrow Assad.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Clearly, when\u00a0&#8220;82% agree \u2018IS [Islamic State] is US and foreign made group\u2019,\u201d very few people in Syria support the 300 U.S. forces there. Not only is the U.S. an invader, but it (and especially the forces that the U.S. supports in Syria \u2014 most especially the jihadists, who are the vast majority of these forces) made life far worse (and far shorter) for virtually all Syrians.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Furthermore, that same poll found: \u201c70% agree \u2018Oppose division of country\u2019.\u201d Consequently, the Kurdish separatists are likewise opposed by the vast majority of Syrians.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The Syrian government, from now on, is in the uncomfortable position of having invaders on its territory, and of being warned that one of them \u2014 the U.S. \u2014 will be fully at war against Syria if Syria tries to expel them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Russia too is now under warning from the United States, that, if Russia, an ally of Syria, takes any action to expel or kill any of the U.S. invaders in Syria, then the U.S. will also be at war against Russia.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The U.S. government is now also daring the Russian government. Perhaps the U.S. strategy here is to force Russia\u2019s President, Vladimir Putin, either to back down, and abandon its Syrian ally, or else to launch a nuclear strike against the United States. If Putin backs down, that would greatly diminish his support from the Russian people, which is above 80% in all polls, including Western-sponsored ones. Perhaps this is the strategy of U.S. President Barack Obama, to drive Vladimir Putin out of office \u2014 something that might occur if the U.S. drives Bashar al-Assad out of office.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">As\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.lrb.co.uk\/v38\/n01\/seymour-m-hersh\/military-to-military\"><span class=\"s2\">Seymour Hersh reported, on 7 January 2016<\/span><\/a>, \u201cthe\u00a0Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, then [in the summer of 2013] led by General Martin Dempsey, forecast that\u00a0the fall of the Assad regime would lead to chaos and, potentially, to Syria\u2019s takeover by jihadi extremists, much as\u00a0was then happening in Libya,\u201d and so Dempsey quit, and\u00a0Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, director of the DIA between 2012 and 2014, was fired over the matter. &#8220;The DIA\u2019s reporting, he [Flynn] said, \u2018got enormous pushback\u2019 from the Obama administration. \u2018I felt that they did not want to hear\u00a0the truth.\u2019\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Flynn is now a foreign-affairs advisor to the Republican Presidential candidate, Donald Trump, who is being criticized by the Democratic Presidential candidate, for being soft on Russia and insufficiently devoted to the U.S. goal of overthrowing Assad.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s4\">Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Theyre-Not-Even-Close-Democratic\/dp\/1880026090\/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1339027537&amp;sr=8-9\"><span class=\"s5\"><i>They\u2019re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010<\/i><\/span><\/a><i>,<\/i> and of<\/span><span class=\"s6\"> <i>\u00a0<\/i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B007Q1H4EG\"><span class=\"s7\"><i>CHRIST\u2019S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity<\/i><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Eric Zuesse On Monday, August 22nd, the United States government \u2014 which demands the overthrow of the internationally-recognized-as-legal government of Syria \u2014 officially announced that America\u2019s military forces in Syria will continue to occupy Syrian land, no matter what the Syrian government says, and will shoot down any Syrian planes that fly over U.S. forces [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1254,"featured_media":263274,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,461,18],"tags":[115,30,1036,96,1035,535,698,907,59,1023,543,524,754,92,49,76,40,1024],"class_list":{"0":"post-263273","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"category-editorials","9":"category-latest-news","10":"tag-barack-obama","11":"tag-big-brother","12":"tag-breaking-news","13":"tag-cover-up","14":"tag-daily-news","15":"tag-global-news","16":"tag-hillary-clinton","17":"tag-isis","18":"tag-military","19":"tag-nuclear","20":"tag-putin","21":"tag-russia","22":"tag-syria","23":"tag-terrorism","24":"tag-usa-news","25":"tag-warfare","26":"tag-white-house","27":"tag-ww3"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263273","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1254"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263273\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}