Syrian War: News #12

^For argument's sake let's say that's true, and nearly all 59 of the launched missiles hit the base. It's still undeniable that the damage done was fairly inconsequential. Base was up and running next day, airstrip wholly in tact, etc. In a way, it's even worse than if 60% of the missiles went astray. Feeble result either case.

Qatar paid 20 million to AQ friends, they failed.

Toll of death reaching 76 until now of which 39 children: in 2 years of siege, only 6 children died in Fua & Kfarya.

It seems the tens of millions of dollars paid by Qatar for the success of this exchange were not convincing enough.

Qatar
-enjoys good relationship w/ AQ in Syria
-has VIP prisoners in Iraq to exchange in Syria
-is willing to act positively unlike Saudi

first time the Syrian gov trusts the FSA terrorists to evacuate civillians from gov held areas, gov honoured the deal the FSA blew ppl up.
https://twitter.com/tarek_oo7/status/853275858794156032
Our children Before and after we foolishly trusted the terrorists of the FSA and #alqaeda. RIP little ones
https://twitter.com/tarek_oo7/status/853257048540237825

BKP wrote:^For argument's sake let's say that's true, and nearly all 59 of the launched missiles hit the base. It's still undeniable that the damage done was fairly inconsequential. Base was up and running next day, airstrip wholly in tact, etc. In a way, it's even worse than if 60% of the missiles went astray. Feeble result either case.

There are reports that although it is up and running activity is half what it was, which is perhaps no surprise given the destruction of the support and storage areas, especially fuel. Its just easier to operate from somewhere else and the Mig-23s haven't been back, just the Su-22s.

BKP wrote:^For argument's sake let's say that's true, and nearly all 59 of the launched missiles hit the base. It's still undeniable that the damage done was fairly inconsequential. Base was up and running next day, airstrip wholly in tact, etc. In a way, it's even worse than if 60% of the missiles went astray. Feeble result either case.

The strike was just an American PR gag, nothing more! Showing that they are doin something and keep the antirussian falcons in senate quiet.

KiloGolf wrote:

Planning the TLAM route so that the missiles would avoid those Russian SAMs and yet hit hardened shelters and other targets in a major airbase where Russian personnel are stationed, is just smart and proves that USN capability is comfortably superior.

Tomahawks missiles designed in the 80s , pose a threat to Russia.
HAHAHAHA. What an idiot.  According to the Russian defense ministry
who recorded with a drone the attacks , only 23 of the missiles managed
to reach the perimeter of the base from 59!!!!  

And that was because Syrian soviet era air defenses managed to shot down
the majority of them.     So much for USN shit capability. If Russia wanted to counter such attack , all that it needs is create a density of cheap Tor and Pantsirs missiles in the area of Homs and in Syrian borders ,and not a single one will have enter. lol    But Russia can't do that  ,because 75% of the territory of Syria is under control of the ISIS and Alqaeda buddies that your lovely Israel Support. This means that very early defeat of the missiles before they enter in Syria air space was not possible. Because Syria territory most of it is occupied by the head choppers Israel and NATO support. So it was NOT a techonology problem IDIOT. If it was a technology problem they will have not missed so many. Syria shut down most of them. but it had the limitation ,that could only start to intercept them ,when they were already in sight of the base. and why is that? Because Syria does not control 75% of its territory. And the military base under attack was almost in the front line. is a base that ISIS attacked before and could shell with artillery. when they tried to over run it. Russia S-400s were about 200km away in Latakia , So it doesnt matter if the cruise missiles were launched from 10,000 km away or from another galaxy. they will have only be detected when they are withing 30km-40km of the military airforce base. Because that is the range you can intercept them if the terrain is flat. if there are hills and mountains could be even less. Is not a technology problem but a geography limitation ,that All systems of defenses have.  Had Syria had control of its borders ,as they had in 2011,2012 when NATO wanted to do a No fly zone, they will have earned an additional 100km early detection and interception position. IDIOT. So those cruise missiles will have failed miserably ,since already they lost majority of them to Syrian air defenses.. even with all the limitations in lost terrain.  

And Russia did not used its S-400s ,they are for exclusive defense of its military base. If a major war start , they dont want to be low on supplies of long range missiles. So far the goal of the attack was to destroy the runways
and the military base.. Does Americans achieved any of this? NO.. less than 24 hours , they base was again flying planes.

So Sorry for you idiot , the attack was a close to total failure , because it failed to destroy the base ,to halt Syrian operations. the jets it hit were damaged ones , that were under repairs some of them. If any it proof that US navy is a paper tiger. this is the first time a nation in middle east intercept american cruise missiles using old soviet sams. lol  I have no idea ,what makes you believe Tomahawks are state of the art missiles ,they are total crap.
1)they are subsonic.. very SLOW ,VERY EASY to intercept. either by manpads ,or planes.
2)They can be jammed easily its GPS guidance. hence why none hit any runway and the few ones that manage to reach the base hit the sand. lol
3)Tomahawcks missiles does not have counter defenses. they just flight
in a straight line ,very slow ,so that later idiots like you praise them.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arq5u9j7jEc

Russia train its military to shoot them down not only with air defenses ,
or Planes. but even with manpads.  

So i dont know what shit you eat , tomawacks are not a problem for Russia.
They are the easiest things to defeat under normal conditions. but in Syria
conditions are anything but normal , since as i said ,they dont control 75% of its territory ,which is A LOT. So Syria in 2017 ,do not have the capability to deploy density and early interception system ,because it does not controls its borders. So effectively the military base the missiles attacked was the real effective border of Syria from their eastern side. So they did an amazing job in defeating more than half of American attack with such limitations. Because the missiles can only be detected 30km to 50km distance for flying low. Then it means you need to deploy air defenses as far as possible from the base you defending ,so if some of them escape the first row of defenses, the second row will finish them , but Syria can't do that. So it was not technology the problem for Syria,Since crappy tomahacks can be defeated even by world war 2 machine guns..since fly so slow. and this is why Americans needs to fire 60 or 100 to hit any target. very poor performance. Syria and Russia problems in Syria are territorial limitations instead. Because Syria do not controls most of its borders and only 25% of its territory , then they cannot deploy density in air defenses .  But in Russia Russia have plenty of territory . lol  Will not have such problems. neither IRAN.  Moral of the story , you have been duped. Syria shot down more than half of the tomahawks and only using soviet era defenses ,even with all the disadvantages they had in lost territory. The attack was clearly a failure ,of zero military benefit and is only seen as a victory for idiots like you that understand nothing of Cruise missiles or air defenses. Russia cruise missiles did not failed its target ,and they travel more than 2,000 km distance from caspian sea. Americans missiles launched from 300km away failed to hit most of its missiles its targets. lol

Another thing to consider is that in a real war between US and Russia, Russia will have sinked those warships ,so they will not even had a chance to try.

So  you are confusing Russia Rules of engagement + Syria geography limitations , with Performance of Russia air defenses. Again in case of war ,
Russia will have sink those warships with a nuclear warhead. one tactical nuke to blind the radars and another nuke to destroy an entire naval battle group.    in short you are an IDIOT.

If US and Russia were at war ,Those warships will have been sink right there in their military bases in Spain and Italy, and take the fight to them using super long range cruise missiles Russia have with 10,000km distance.

here is Russia defeating very low flying cruise missiles. Had Russia had their
warships in front of the flight path of the tomahawks ,none of them either will
have penetrated ,Russia navy air defenses.

to defeat American missiles? Not a problem. S-400s or S-300s not needed.



Any cheap short air defenses will do the job.

Well Block IV is not that terrible, but it needs to retired and I hope USN will bring something competitively close to Kalibr.
And cruise missiles are not stand alone weapon. They are nice implementation to striking force. So far Russia has the edge in cruise missiles, but US is leading in other areas. This rivalry is what makes it interesting.

I would check the baby milk factories in the region before we talk about how many missiles actually hit the air field.

The US claimed it warned the Russians two hours before the attack but the Russians say there were no details of what they were doing... just that an attack would take place.

The fact that these US missiles took out old antiquated aircraft suggests the best solution for Russia is to replace the lost MiG-23s and Su-22s with MiG-29SMTs with electronic upgrades to allow dumb bombing from medium altitudes with accuracy.

I would also restart production in Russia of the two seater Su-25 and provide that aircraft to Syria, Iraq, and Iran... with upgrades to make it effective in both the CAS and other ground support roles.

A basic radar would allow all weather air to ground and basic air to air capability so it can be used as a light interceptor too. Loading it up with Igla missiles... four to eight per pylon would make it a potent anti UAV/cruise missile platform too.

Early model Igla was tested against the AT-3 anti tank missile. In the 9 launches only 4 hit the targets because of the small size of the targets involved. As a result the Igla-S had a proximity fuse added to allow kills against small targets it does not make contact with during an interception.

Igla-S would therefore be the ideal missile for use against cruise missiles and small UAVs and UCAVs.

So far Russia has the edge in cruise missiles, but US is leading in other areas. This rivalry is what makes it interesting.

Does not really matter whose missiles are the most effective when one side is aiming for empty airfields and baby milk factories and the other is hitting real terrorist targets...

I find absurd that still now someone attempt to defend the truly horrible performance ,literally under theirs eyes, shown in actual combat mission by the most advanced version of TLAM (block IV) against a trivial target

By now almost anyone is accustomed to the self-embarrassing lies, uttered with straight face, by US military officials or political figures only to promote theirs schizophrenic agenda or try to maintain -at least in theirs controled media - a somewhat "cool" image.


What instead i find strange is that even outside that controled media circle someone is in some way "influenced" by those bollocks openly colliding with what them can see under theirs eyes.

The poor showing of TLAM Block IV begin literally at its shooting moment ; some time ago i had already pointed out to the very large mean time between missile launch (one of the most critical features for cruise missiles, having deep effect on salvo cohesion and concentration).

Those images give a clear picture of the dramatic difference with a immeasurably more up-do-date and advanced specimen.







Naturally the latter have also much greater range, bigger and significantly more powerful warhead, lower cruise altitude, higher average speed, can be delivered by ships with very low tonnage and even diesel submarines or containers (something over-ocean designers have failed to achieve in spite of truly titanic investements.....distributed lethality anyone ?....) have true universal nature having capability to attack any kind of tagets ,land tagets of any kind, surface ships and submarines.

About the very poor effects on the ground that this strike have achieved it is under anybody's eyes......58 missile impacts straight-face bollock-wise ..... probably them was true US stealth detonations; almost as invisible and secret as the undeniable proofs of the chemical attack by part of Syrian Air Force, them exist but nobody can see them

Obviously that last statement is partcularly aimed at the poor souls forced at design yellow circles around old satellite images, with integer air base, only to attempt to lure some naive people in believing that the hit targets was even only near to the 58 figure bollock.

As rightly noticed by Gen. I. Konashenkov those garbage informations are surely not conceived to deceive professionals but only gullible public opinion.

Mean time between missile launch can be altered and tailored. There is nothing inherently superior in a small gunboat with x8 VLS cells that has little impact on the battlefield and a proper destroyer wrecking an entire airbase. One such destroyer can launch twice or three times as much the entire Caspian fleet launched back in late 2015.

So it comes down to budget, ship-building capability and most importantly, military capability.

KiloGolf wrote:Mean time between missile launch can be altered and tailored. There is nothing inherently superior in a small gunboat with x8 VLS cells that has little impact on the battlefield and a proper destroyer wrecking an entire airbase. One such destroyer can launch twice or three times as much the entire Caspian fleet launched back in late 2015.

So it comes down to budget, ship-building capability and most importantly, military capability.

Which is quite positively pointless if such a large amount miss, not wrecking the entire airbase as you claim, and not even warranting an AD response. Besides, your point is nullified given respective costs of the platforms. The Russians openly derided the strike by literally having drones observe the attack practically as it happened, I really don't think they were worried, nor would they be, considering the era of both the ships and their weapons.

OminousSpudd wrote:

KiloGolf wrote:Mean time between missile launch can be altered and tailored. There is nothing inherently superior in a small gunboat with x8 VLS cells that has little impact on the battlefield and a proper destroyer wrecking an entire airbase. One such destroyer can launch twice or three times as much the entire Caspian fleet launched back in late 2015.

So it comes down to budget, ship-building capability and most importantly, military capability.

Which is quite positively pointless if such a large amount miss, not wrecking the entire airbase as you claim, and not even warranting an AD response. Besides, your point is nullified given respective costs of the platforms. The Russians openly derided the strike by literally having drones observe the attack practically as it happened, I really don't think they were worried, nor would they be, considering the era of both the ships and their weapons.

Large amount did not miss at all. If ones accounts for double strikes it was a great job. The airbase was wrecked, HAS and other installations. Significant % of SyAAF is out of action as of a single strike.

Is KiloGolf just trolling in here? Considering the 'justification' for this was a text book false flag 'gas attack'. Just to waste 60 tomahawks on some air defenses that shot at the jews. This is the jew lobby in Washington complaining that they cannot create a greater israel in Syria. This is a bunch of old women in tel aviv having a tantrum. Anybody who knows the first thing in the Russian government is quietly amused by all this.

Grazneyar wrote:Is KiloGolf just trolling in here? Considering the 'justification' for this was a text book false flag 'gas attack'. Just to waste 60 tomahawks on some air defenses that shot at the jews. This is the jew lobby in Washington complaining that they cannot create a greater israel in Syria. This is a bunch of old women in tel aviv having a tantrum. Anybody who knows the first thing in the Russian government is quietly amused by all this.

Not really. I'm only emphasizing Russia's inability to hinder or stop USN TLAMs from striking their ally's critical military infrastructure.

PapaDragon wrote:I don't remember USA being able to hinder or stop VKS from going Rolling Thunder on their allies for two years and running.

Although in both cases it has less to do with "being able" and more to do with "not giving any shits for expendable meat".

Large sharks don't feed on other large sharks, they go after small fish.

That's the difference between Obama and Trump.

With Trump Tabqa airbase is under US control, Tabqa city is next and Raqqa is beginning to be surrounded. Meantime Hama attack is delaying Assad in all imaginable ways, half of Daraa has fallen and swathes of territory in Suwayda, Damascus and Homs rifs are under "green" control.

Remember the last time SAA & co tried to push on to Tabqa? They got positively humiliated and chased by IS. Then they lost Palmyra for a second time and now the "green" insurgents are so far north as to threaten the Damascus-Palmyra road.

The Russian posture in Syria now seems defensive, passive and very low profile. Lets see how long it takes them to come out of their shell.

KiloGolf wrote:

Grazneyar wrote:Is KiloGolf just trolling in here? Considering the 'justification' for this was a text book false flag 'gas attack'. Just to waste 60 tomahawks on some air defenses that shot at the jews. This is the jew lobby in Washington complaining that they cannot create a greater israel in Syria. This is a bunch of old women in tel aviv having a tantrum. Anybody who knows the first thing in the Russian government is quietly amused by all this.

Not really. I'm only emphasizing Russia's inability to hinder or stop USN TLAMs from striking their ally's critical military infrastructure.

this was already explained Mr engineer as to why they couldn't take it down. Physics has a bit (more like lot) to do with it in terms of placement of systems. I suppose if Russia and Syria were operating SHORADS at the base then we would all be saying something else but you know, there wasn't. Unless you are saying Russia should have sunk the ships then that is a bit overboard considering those shitting tomahawk failed to do much.

And as Papadragon said, didn't seem like US did much when VKS was BBQing US proxies.

PapaDragon wrote:

.......
That's the difference between Obama and Trump. With Trump Tabqa airbase is under US control, Tabqa city is next and Raqqa is beginning to be surrounded. Meantime Hama attack is delaying Assad in all imaginable ways, half of Daraa has fallen and swathes of territory in Suwayda, Damascus and Homs rifs are under "green" control
.......

And how does any of this affect Russia's strategic interests in the Mediterranean?

You are again conflating Russian with Syrian or Iranian interests.

And big difference between Trump and Obama is that Trump does not have affirmative action shielding him from media criticism. Hence he has to create loud but ultimately insignificant distractions overseas to boost his ratings.

He did song and dance routine in Syria but it turned out to be a bit too loud for comfort. That is why Tillerson was making nice in Moscow and Mattis was nixing regime change option couple of days later. Does anyone even mention it anymore?

And it is also reason for MOAB kabuki in Afghanistan that media still rant about even though it is completely insignificant compared to Syria. And why we had our annual Korea festivities before schedule this year.

C'mon, did anyone really believe that anything would happen in Korea? Please, they are already cooling off the whole circus.

I don't disagree that Trump's TLAM fireworks were also (if not mainly) for internal consumption. But he brushed everyone on the side in the process and came out on top.

This is proper four-dimensional chess in-progress, with Putin sitting on sidelines baffled.

miketheterrible wrote:And as Papadragon said, didn't seem like US did much when VKS was BBQing US proxies.

The SDF was hardly touched, same for the Turkish FSA in Al Bab or the South Front (despite some random bombardments counted for the latter).
The core US-aligned groups were hardly touched. The Gulf-supported groups did indeed get trashed and rightfully so.

KiloGolf wrote:

PapaDragon wrote:

.......
That's the difference between Obama and Trump. With Trump Tabqa airbase is under US control, Tabqa city is next and Raqqa is beginning to be surrounded. Meantime Hama attack is delaying Assad in all imaginable ways, half of Daraa has fallen and swathes of territory in Suwayda, Damascus and Homs rifs are under "green" control
.......

And how does any of this affect Russia's strategic interests in the Mediterranean?

You are again conflating Russian with Syrian or Iranian interests.

And big difference between Trump and Obama is that Trump does not have affirmative action shielding him from media criticism. Hence he has to create loud but ultimately insignificant distractions overseas to boost his ratings.

He did song and dance routine in Syria but it turned out to be a bit too loud for comfort. That is why Tillerson was making nice in Moscow and Mattis was nixing regime change option couple of days later. Does anyone even mention it anymore?

And it is also reason for MOAB kabuki in Afghanistan that media still rant about even though it is completely insignificant compared to Syria. And why we had our annual Korea festivities before schedule this year.

C'mon, did anyone really believe that anything would happen in Korea? Please, they are already cooling off the whole circus.

I don't disagree that Trump's TLAM fireworks were also (if not mainly) for internal consumption. But he brushed everyone on the side in the process and came out on top.

This is proper four-dimensional chess in-progress, with Putin sitting on sidelines baffled.

pray tell how Putin is baffled? More like laughing at US incompetence and providing free training to Russian crew with the launch of those fire crackers.

Reality states that US looked horrifically stupid for multitude of reasons:
1) they looked as if supporting jihadists
2) showed failure of the fire crackers in their ability to do much damage
3) Potus looking like bumbling idiots with having no consistency in anything each individual has been saying where everyone contradicts each other
4) with US having to send the idiot Tillerson to go and beg Russia to get the joint contact back up and running since they couldn't use their air force in Syria for a bit afterwards with being painted by AD.
5) them trying their best to use NK as a measure to get the media backlash off of them for Syria to only be called out on their bluff.

miketheterrible wrote:pray tell how Putin is baffled? More like laughing at US incompetence and providing free training to Russian crew with the launch of those fire crackers.

Sure, like the Russian helicopter crews and support staff in Shayrat were laughing about it too.

Good thing your not a politician cause you would suck. Yeah, strike turkey would have been great. All the while Turks were getting roasted in Syria.

Anyway, good luck with your political career.

miketheterrible wrote:2) showed failure of the fire crackers in their ability to do much damage

PapaDragon wrote:He came out on top in US internal policy that is definitely correct.

But what makes you think that Russians did not get anything out of this? Just because they make some stink in media? Well of course they do, words cost nothing.

And given that they keep fortifying that place even more and digging in for very long haul in would say that they definitely got some sweet fruits out of that media performance.

Remember what Tillerson said at NATO conference? "Why should we care about Ukraine?" You are not only one who doesn't remeber and it is precisely because we had nice loud show in Syria.

As for "sitting on the sidelines" part, I would argue that Tartus port, Hmeim airbase and entire Syrian coast are on the sidelines of this whole thing. In that case we can all say that Russia is sitting exactly where they want to be.

I agree with all these points. And say that Russia should work on dismantling Idlibistan and then call it a day in that war.

Russian optimal position was months ago before the large American troop deployment to "retake Raqqa". Everything else since then have been largely setbacks - on all fronts. Lets not kid ourselves by playing a game of perspectives here. A "before and after" analysis from that juncture is better.

Ukraine shouldn't be mentioned around these parts as a sort of "backroom deal". The sole fact that it may be a backroom deal reeks of Russian weakness and ineptness. Nothing to celebrate in having a failed state next to your border (and such a brotherly state at that), your economy sanctioned and set back 3-4 years + the death of Russian lives. It's a modern disgrace for Russia. Anyone that doesn't see it that way needs a new pair of lenses. The U.S failing to achieve ALL of its objectives in Ukraine does not mean it did not achieve many objectives - at a relatively cheap price compared to harm done.

That damage is barely anything for 59 cruise missiles. They flew out no more than, 40mins later from that airbase as well. A lot of aww and little of bang and real damage. A few aircrafts and some shelters, etc. With the airbase still operational.

But what you Greeks can do to help the Russians out, is keep shooting down any more Turks who enter your airspace please.