Syria Disintegrating: Part 2

[KRonn]

A General of a Republican Guard brigade and one of Asad's personal friends has fled the country.

I still have to say that if Assad does go, I can't be too enthused about who or what factions may fill the void,  and come to power. Jury is still out on Libya and Egypt, as the more radical elements often have the organisation to fill such voids. I have no idea of what the political landscape looks like in Syria but there certainly can't be any democratic type organisations very active there now.

[jimmy olsen]

Fantastic video showcasing the rebels and their Mad Max style.

http://video.msnbc.msn.com/nightly-news/48127315/#48127315

[KRonn]

The interesting things I got out of that video is that the rebels have gained a lot of momentum and are controlling areas that the army no longer can easily take back. Most significantly, the reporter who was there strongly feels that if the rebels had more weapons and ammo then the Assad regime would be finished. It's that bad for the Assad regime. I've heard that some Arab nations and  maybe Turkey are supplying some arms to the rebels. I also read today something about Russia ending arms shipments to Syria, but I only saw that headline, so don't know how comprehensive it is.

[Razgovory]

Any truth to the Rumors that the Mahdi army is sending people over?

[citizen k]

Psychologically battered, Syrian soldiers abandon Assad


ANTAKYA, Turkey (Reuters) - As one of the Sunni Muslim soldiers who form the bulk of the Syrian army, Lieutenant Adnan Suleibi kept being pushed to the front of units fighting in the rebellious city of Homs.

Alawite personnel - members of the same minority sect as President Bashar al-Assad - remained in the rear. Alawites control the military through their domination of the officer corps and, crucially, direct the Soviet-style intelligence and secret police apparatus entrusted with preventing dissent.

"The Sunnis are cannon fodder and morale has been sapped. There are 75 men left in my brigade out of 250. The rest were killed, injured or deserted," said Suleibi, a slim 23-year-old in jeans and striped t-shirt.

"As soon as the chance came, I made a run for it," he said after crossing to the safety of Turkey last week with a comrade.

They are among a new wave of Sunni defectors who have abandoned the military in recent weeks as the army, short of gung-ho infantry, relies more on heavy artillery to batter Sunni towns.

The opposition says at least 17,000 people have been killed in a 16-month uprising against Assad, who says he is defending his country against foreign-backed terrorists.

Assad loyalists in the military use classic Soviet techniques to keep the men in the front line from running away, including the threat of death.

"In Homs I was afraid more of the military intelligence behind me that of the rebels in front," Suleibi said.

"The military has become a murder and theft machine. The priority of the officers is for us to bring them big-screen televisions from the homes we enter," he said. "I would have defected earlier if not for concern for my parents' safety."

Suleibi, who is from the coastal province of Latakia, served inland in Homs, part of a long-standing Syrian army policy of never using troops in their home regions.

After coordinating through Facebook using coded language with comrades who had defected, he flitted through the olive groves and vineyards of northern Idlib province and made a dash across barren land to Turkey.

"THE HATRED OF OTHERS"

Syrian military aircraft drop fliers near the border carrying barely veiled threats to defectors on the last stage of their escape, telling them that loved ones left behind will suffer.

"This is your last chance for you to save yourself. You are helpless in front of the Syrian Arab Army," says one. "Go back to your folks and to the people you love, and do not become fuel for the hatred of others."

Thousands of soldiers have been killed or imprisoned because they tried to flee and failed, or were suspected of planning to do so. Around 2,500 officers and lesser ranks are imprisoned in the notorious Seidnaya jail north of Damascus, which has been emptied of political prisoners to make way for military personnel, according to opposition sources.

A Syrian army pullback in the last two weeks from areas in rural Idlib and Aleppo bordering Turkey's Hatay province, following Turkish army reinforcement on part of the frontier, has given rebels more room to operate.

The frontier terrain is a mixture of rolling hills and flat farmland planted with olive trees, vineyards, wheat and vegetables. The Orontes River, which turns in several parts into a muddy stream in the summer, separates the two countries at Hacipasa.

Hundreds of refugees are crossing to Turkey daily to join more than 30,000 already there. They include military personnel who surrender to Turkish authorities and then are sent to special camps, or who go directly to join activists or relatives.

Opposition campaigners say it is difficult to know exactly how many soldiers have defected or the total number of rebels fighting back against Assad's crackdown. They estimate that tens of thousands out of the 300,000-member army have deserted.

Syria's military fell under Alawite sway in the early 1960s, when Alawite officers took control of the best armed divisions and of intelligence units. That ushered in five decades of domination, strengthened by Assad's late father Hafez al-Assad, who co-opted key Sunni merchants and tribes to cement his power.

With the officer corps overwhelmingly Alawite, most of the deserters have been Sunnis of lower rank, although lately religious minority soldiers, particularly Druze, have also been trickling out, Free Syrian Army sources say.

SHOOT OR BE SHOT

Abu Suhaib, a non-commissioned officer in the Syrian navy at Latakia, defected at the beginning of this year after being imprisoned for six months in Seidnaya.

"I was lucky. Arab observers visited Seidnaya and the authorities decided to release nine of us. We were told to go back to our units. Eight of us defected," said Abu Suhaib, who goes by his nom de guerre and is now leading a platoon fighting Assad's forces in the province of Idlib.

"I was beaten and tortured and hauled in front of a field court where I was not allowed even a defense. I had to sign everything they wanted, including admitting a charge that I had planned an attack on Qerdaha," he said, referring to Assad's hometown in the mountains overlooking the Mediterranean.

The battle-hardened 28-year old, who had moved his wife and baby boy to Turkey, said he became pro-revolution after he witnessed the killing of unarmed protesters, whom his Alawite officers later described as "terrorists" who deserved to die.

One Friday in April last year, he went down to Sheikh Daher Square in Latakia, where about 200 demonstrators had broken through barriers set up by pro-Assad militiamen and tried to bring down a statue of Hafez al-Assad.

"Military Intelligence snipers shot dead nine demonstrators, including two boys. I decided then that I could be useful to the revolt by staying on the inside," he said.

Others wanted to flee early but could not.

Abdelilah Farzat, a Lieutenant Colonel now defending the rebel town of Rastan in the central Homs province, said he was itching to defect after Assad's forces killed dozens of demonstrators in Rastan early in the uprising.

But Farzat's son, a conscript, was being held at an army camp along with relatives of other military personnel from Rastan, to discourage defections.

"It was not easy. We were even being forced to shoot at protesters," said Farzat, who was stationed in the eastern Ghouta suburbs of Damascus, conservative Sunni Muslim areas that were among the first to erupt in pro-democracy protests.

Farzat said Sunni soldiers were ordered to deploy at roadblocks and fire at the demonstrations while Alawite Military Intelligence personnel stood to the back or on the balconies of apartments, ready to shoot the soldiers if they disobeyed orders.

As soon as his son was freed, he crossed sides.

"It took a year before I managed to defect," Farzat said. "I am not proud of this, but the regime has many ways to hurt our families, which is the main reason many are still hesitant to desert."

[KRonn]

Wow, that article on the Syrian military shows things to be even more amazingly bad for Assad and his regime. The regime won't hold out for long now, which is quite different than I thought a few months ago. Back then I figured Assad would survive, though be much weakened politically. But now this and other articles I've read or posted here show that the rot is so bad, and the rebels gaining so much, that it's only a matter of time. I'd say it's past the tipping point of where there could be a resolution and Assad or some semblance of his government could remain. They're going to go down, and it'll likely be a blood bath as people get even with those who have been responsible for the slaughter.

[Darth Wagtaros]

Yes. Not a good time to be an Alawite. Or Druze. Or Jew, Christian or Shi'ite.  Or Syrian.

You never know though.  Things may change.

[KRonn]

Yes. Not a good time to be an Alawite. Or Druze. Or Jew, Christian or Shi'ite.  Or Syrian.

You never know though.  Things may change.

Right. I don't expect some nice resolution to all this. I expect those with the power and organization to be first in line to take over. Often it's more exremist groups. And there and elsewhere there are plenty of extremist types waiting in the wings for regimes to fall.

[Darth Wagtaros]

Well this resistance campaign could fizzle out too. 

[MadImmortalMan]

uh oh.

Syria has begun moving its chemical weapons stockpile out of storage, U.S. warns


-Syria has undeclared arsenals of sarin nerve agent, mustard gas, cyanide
-U.S. officials fear Assad may want to use weapons against rebels or civilians
-Others believe he is trying to safeguard stockpile from his opponents

Syria has started to move part of its chemical weapons arsenal out of storage facilities, according to U.S. officials.

The country's undeclared stockpiles of sarin nerve agent, mustard gas and cyanide have long worried the U.S. officials and its allies in the region, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Western nations have looked for signs amid the rebellion against President Bashar al-Assad's government of any change in the location of those weapons, believed to be the world's largest stockpile.

American officials are divided on the reason for moving the arsenal.

Some fear Assad may want to use the weapons against rebels or civilians, while others said perhaps he is trying to safeguard them from his opponents.


    'Every family has had members killed': More than 250 dead after massacre in Syrian village by pro-government forces
    Assad regime suffers major blow as senior Syria ambassador defects from beleaguered government

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland, travelling with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Phnom Penh, said: 'We repeatedly made it clear that the Syrian government has a responsibility to safeguard its stockpiles of (Saddam's) chemical weapons.'

She added that 'the international community will hold accountable any Syrian officials who fail to meet that obligation'.


The Syrian government denied chemical stockpiles have been moved, the Journal said.

Syria is one of eight states - along with Israel and nearby Egypt - that have not joined the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention, which means the world's chemical weapons watchdog has no jurisdiction to intervene there.

The Assad government has in the past denied having weapons of mass destruction.

The development comes a day after more than 250 Syrians were reportedly killed after a village was shelled and stormed by pro-government forces.

The massacre in the Sunni Muslim village Taramseh, Hama province, would be the worst yet since a rebellion against the rule of Assad began 17 months ago.

Civilians were allegedly killed 'execution-style' with shots to the head while others were shelled by tanks and helicopter gunships as their homes were burned down.

The Revolution Leadership Council of Hama said Taramseh was subjected to a barrage before pro-government Alawite militiamen swept in and killed victims one-by-one.

There were reports of bodies scattered in the surrounding fields, rivers and houses, with around 60 corpses were taken to a mosque.

Fadi Sameh, an opposition activist from Taramseh, left the village before the killings but was in touch with residents.

He said: 'It appears that Alawite militiamen from surrounding villages descended on Taramseh after its rebel defenders pulled out, and started killing the people.

'Every family in the town seems to have members killed. We have names of men, women and children from countless families.'

A detailed account by activists said a convoy of 25 vehicles carrying army and security forces, three armoured vehicles and five trucks mounted with artillery passed west through the town of Muharda and headed toward the village of Tremseh.

One reason given for the massacre was that government troops were attempting to take back the village from opposition hands.

Other reports said the village school was destroyed, and one of the victims was a doctor shot dead as he tried to help the wounded.

Death tolls are almost impossible to verify in Syria, but activists say more than 17,000 people have been killed since the uprising began.

You need a subscription to read the WSJ piece, so instead you get the Daily Fail.

[garbon]

Seriously...ugh.

[CountDeMoney]

Bah, they're probably just relocating them for safekeeping.

They wouldn't be that fucking stupid.

[Tamas]

I imagine it worth a lot for saudi-financed (and other rich) terrorists, so those cannisters may pay the way out for many of the leadership?

[Admiral Yi]

[mongers] We've heard this story before.  [/mongers]

[Ed Anger]

Go Bashir. Smash the peasants.