WW3 Buildup: Did Russia Just Threaten Turkey With Nuclear Weapons?

WW3 Buildup: Did Russia Just Threaten Turkey With Nuclear Weapons?

The latest news as it relates to the "big dance" buildup...

Russia Insider

The US investigative journalist Robert Parry has made an astonishing claim - and one that has gone completely unnoticed.

He is reporting that the Russian government has warned Erdogan that Russia is prepared to use tactical nuclear weapons to defend its Syrian strike force from Turkish attack.

Parry’s exact words are as follows:

“A source close to Russian President Vladimir Putin told me that the Russians have warned Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that Moscow is prepared to use tactical nuclear weapons if necessary to save their troops in the face of a Turkish-Saudi onslaught.
Since Turkey is a member of NATO, any such conflict could quickly escalate into a full-scale nuclear confrontation.”

Generally I would be skeptical of such a story from an anonymous source. However Parry is a journalist of the highest reliability and integrity so there can be no doubt he actually has been told this by a real source.

Of course it is possible the source is making the story up, or that he is not as close to Putin as Parry believes.  

However on 11th February 2016 Russia’s Security Council held a meeting the public report of which is unusually terse, whilst on the same day the Russian military reported to Putin about a series of military exercises arranged at short notice in their southern military district, which look like they were intended to prepare the Russian military for rapid action at short notice against Turkey should the need arise.

If a warning really was given it might have been given either on that day or possibly on the day after, to coincide with the military exercises whose meaning in that case would not be lost on either the US or the Turks. 

The meeting of the Security Council (whose importance I discussed here) would in that case have been convened to discuss and authorise it.

The fact Obama telephoned Putin a day later on 14th February 2016 might also be connected to the warning, if it really was given.  

Both the Turks and the Russians would surely have informed the US of such a warning. It would be entirely understandable in that case that the US President would want to discuss it with the Russian President. In fact it would be astonishing if he did not want to.

If it was the warning Obama and Putin discussed, then that might explain why the US and the Russians are giving such completely different accounts of the conversation.  

Neither side would want to make the warning public - something which would escalate the crisis to stratospheric levels - and each would want to concoct a cover story to hide what was really discussed, which given the circumstances and the urgency they might be unlikely to coordinate with each other. That might explain why the accounts of the conversation differ so much.

Against that it must be said that it is by no means unusual for Russian and Western governments to publish radically different accounts of conversations Russian and Western leaders have with each other. 

All this it should be stressed is speculation, though as is apparent it is consistent with some of the diplomatic and military moves.  

If such a warning really was given it would not be the first time the US or Russia have threatened to use nuclear weapons.  

The US for example warned Saddam Hussein in 1990 that it was ready to retaliate with nuclear weapons if he used chemical weapons against their troops in the First Gulf War.  

However a threat to use nuclear weapons is one that is never made lightly. If it really was made it shows how fraught the situation in Syria has become.

If the Russians really did make such a threat then it would be a further reason why the US and its European allies would be urging Erdogan to act with restraint, and would be counselling him against plunging into a war with the Russians in Syria.

I had already guessed this was the case (see here and here) and in the same article in which he reports the Russian threat Parry discusses this issue extensively.

Confirmation that the Western powers are warning Erdogan against an invasion of Syria has now also come from the Financial Times (see “Turkey and Saudi Arabia consider Syria intervention”, Financial Times, 18th February 2016):

“The US is seeking to rein in its allies Turkey and Saudi Arabia from military action in Syria if a ceasefire planned for today in the bloody civil war fails.
Despite mounting regional frustration over Washington’s allegedly passive stance on the five-year-old conflict the Obama administration and other western powers are worried that direct military interventions could lead to an escalation of the conflict and a dangerous clash with Russia.
“Are they going to deploy troops there? Not if we can help it,” said one senior Nato diplomat.””

Each day now provides further news of advances by the Syrian army and its allies in northern Syria.  

The very latest information is that the last major rebel held town in Latakia province has been recaptured by the Syrian army, and that the Syrian army is just a few kilometres away from the city of Idlib.

Slowly but surely the trap around the jihadi rebels in Aleppo is closing.

Meanwhile - whether because of warnings from Moscow or Washington or for some other reason - the Turks and the Saudis have so far not matched their rhetoric with action.

The much discussed Saudi aircraft deployment to the US airbase at Incirlik has turned out to be much smaller than initially reported, and may not actually have taken place.

The Turks are publicly sticking to their position that they will not send their troops into Syria unilaterally - which could be taken to mean they will not invade Syria unless they have US agreement and unless the US contributes ground troops to the invasion force.

Turkish action so far has been limited to cross-border shelling of Kurdish forces near Azaz and demands the Kurds stay away from Azaz, which is near the Turkish border and which the Turks say they want to make part of a buffer zone.

Even these moves have been too much for some of Turkey’s NATO allies, provoking criticism by some NATO states of Turkey for its shelling of the Kurds, though claims the UN Security Council has passed a Resolution condemning Turkey’s actions are untrue.

Interestingly the Western powers seem reluctant to endorse Turkey’s claims the Kurds of Iraq and Syria - as opposed to the Kurds of Turkey - were behind Wednesday’s terrorist attack on a military convoy in Ankara (see this discussion here), whilst Turkey’s response to the attack was to bomb Kurdish targets in Iraq rather than in Syria.

The situation is still very tense and it is premature to say that the crisis - if one exists - is past.

Whether because of Russian threats to use nuclear weapons or because of calls of restraint from the West and possibly from his own military or for some other reason, the signs for the moment however point to Erdogan backing off.  

With every day that passes without a Turkish ground invasion the prospects of it happening grow less. The next few weeks should decide the issue.

The next COLD WAR? Russia and the US in chilling STAND OFF over Iran fighter jet deal

US Officials have warned Moscow to “be fully aware” that selling fighter jets to Iran would violate a UN arms ban, as global tensions escalate to near Cold War levels. Iran’s defence minister General Hossein Dehghan confirmed he would sign a contract with Russia to buy the Sukhoi Su-30SM fighter jets as sanctions set up in the wake of the nation’s nuclear deal with the West start to loosen. But US officials have said they will raise the matter with Russia, sparking yet another potential dead-lock between the two international superpowers.
The Obama administration issued an official statement to remind Russia that, after the Iran nuclear deal, Moscow are forbidden from selling the fighter jets to the Shiite Muslim nation as it fights proxy wars in the powder keg of the Middle East. However Russia could be able to send the Sukhoi jets on to Iran, who are also fighting on their own turf against sick jihadi group ISIS, if they receive UN approval. The consent must be given “in advance on a case-by-case basis.” General Dehghan did not specify how many fighter planes Iran will buy, or give a timeline for the signing of the deal. READ MORE

‘No ifs and buts’: Turkey demands US support against ‘Kurdish terrorists’ 

Ankara has urged Washington to unconditionally support the expansion of its battle against the terror threat, in particular Kurdish militias, warning that those hindering Turkey’s right to self-defense will be considered terrorists and acted upon accordingly.  

“The only thing we expect from our US ally is to support Turkey with no ifs or buts,” Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told a news conference after a five-hour security meeting with cabinet and state officials.
Following the car bomb attack on a military convoy in Ankara this week which left 28 people dead, a breakaway faction of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) claimed responsibility for the attack, and Turkey has vowed to intensify its fight against the Kurds both at home and in Syria.
“If 28 Turkish lives have been claimed through a terrorist attack we can only expect them [the US] to say any threat against Turkey is a threat against them,” Davutoglu stated.
The US however considers the Syrian Kurdish YPG to be one of the main fighting forces against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) in Syria. Yet on Friday, during a phone conversation between President Barack Obama and his Turkish counterpart, the US leader stressed that “YPG forces should not seek to exploit circumstances in this area to seize additional territory,” in northern Syria where the Syrian army and the Kurdish militia, aided by Russian air power, have been making large gains.
Turkey in the meantime views all Kurdish militia that are also spread widely throughout Syria and Iraq as a direct national threat. Following on his earlier promise this week Recep Tayyip Erdogan has once again reiterated on Saturday that Turkey will strike Kurds everywhere.

 

 US 'concerned' about Syrian Army & Kurdish Syria gains, urges stopping actions upsetting Turks

 

“Turkey will use its right to expand its rules of engagement beyond [responding to] actual attacks against it and to encompass all terror threats, including PYD and Daesh in particular,” Erdogan said at a UNESCO meeting in Istanbul.
Furthermore, Erdogan warned that those opposing Ankara’s fight with the Kurds will be deemed as “terrorist” by the Turkish state.
“Whoever prevents us from using our right of self-defense, we will recognize it as a terrorist and act accordingly,” he added.
Turkey’s presidential spokesman meanwhile said that supporting YPG in Syria against the Islamic State is making the situation worse.
“Those who are supporting terrorist groups in the name of fighting Daesh are only contributing to an already-worsening situation,” Ibrahim Kalin said in an opinion piece in Turkey’s Daily Sabah newspaper.

READ MORE: Turkey’s shelling of Syria amid ‘unique’ intl peace effort unacceptable – Russia’s UN envoy

He accused the YPG of manipulating the war in Syria: “In the name of fighting Daesh, it is acting as a client organization to the US, Russia and Syrian leader Bashar Assad’s regime at the same time," the spokesman wrote.
Kalin said that Ankara has “rightly reacted” to continued US support to the YPG, without elaborating further. But he did criticize the way events are unfolding in Syria presenting the Turkish version of the discourse of the war.
“While the YPG attacks the other opposition groups fighting against Daesh, Daesh remains as powerful and operational as before and the Assad regime gets stronger by the day,” Kalin said.
Earlier this week, the UN Security Council president released an unofficial warning to Ankara over its actions in the region, urging it to comply with international law and to stop the shelling the Syrian Kurds.

READ MORE: US, France say Russia’s draft resolution on Syrian sovereignty has ‘no future’

On Friday however Washington rejected a Russian draft resolution which condemned any plans for foreign military intervention in Syria. Russia’s latest concerns are related to a dangerous escalation on the Syrian Turkish border amid Ankara’s alleged plans to put boots on the ground in northern Syria, which Damascus has called a violation of Syria's sovereignty.

Saudis Claim to Have Nuclear Bomb

Pakistan has agreed to deliver nuclear weapons to Riyadh

Dahham Al-‘Anzi made the claim while saying Saudi Arabia is engaged in an effort to “minimize the Iranian threat in the Levant and Syria.”

Although Saudi Arabia has officially denied it has a nuclear weapons program and has publicly stated it opposes nuclear weapons in the Middle East, it has funded a military nuclear program and received scientific assistance from the United States and Pakistan.

Despite this cooperation, US Secretary of State John Kerry told the Saudis in January there would be “all kinds of NPT consequences” if Riyadh received a nuclear weapon from Pakistan.

The Saudis began financing Pakistan’s atomic weapons project in 1974. “Our achievements are yours,” the Pakistani president, General Zia-ul-Haq, told the Saudis in the 1980s.

In the late 1980s the Saudis secretly bought dozens of CSS-2 ballistic missiles from China. The CSS-2, also known as the Dong Feng, is based on the Russian 9K720 Iskander missile. The intercontinental ballistic missile is designed to carry a 3 megaton nuclear warhead to a distance up to 12,000 kilometers.

“I do think that the Saudis believe that they have some understanding with Pakistan that, in extremis, they would have claim to acquire nuclear weapons from Pakistan,” said Gary Samore, Obama’s former counter-proliferation adviser.

In 2013 a senior NATO spokesman told the BBC nuclear weapons made in Pakistan on behalf of Saudi Arabia are ready to be delivered. In 2009 King Abdullah warned visiting US special envoy to the Middle East Dennis Ross Saudi Arabia “will get nuclear weapons” if Iran pursued a nuclear weapons program.

Following the P5+1 nuclear deal with Iran, the Saudis reasserted their desire to obtain a nuclear weapon.

“I think Saudi Arabia would seriously try to get the bomb if Iran did. It’s just like India and Pakistan. The Pakistanis said for years they didn’t want one, but when India got it, so did they,”said Jamal Khashoggi, the head of a Saudi news channel owned by the Saudi royal family.

 

Russia warns Assad on vow to retake all of Syria

Russia’s envoy to the UN on Friday warned long-term ally President Bashar al-Assad over his vow to retake all of Syria, saying he faced dire consequences if he did not comply with Moscow over the peace process. “Russia has invested very seriously in this crisis, politically, diplomatically and now also militarily,” Vitaly Churkin told Kommersant daily, referring to an international agreement to cease hostilities sealed in Munich last week.
“Therefore we would like Assad also to respond to this,” he said, adding that the Syrian leader’s stance “is not in accord with the diplomatic efforts that Russia is making.” At their meeting in Munich, the 17-nation group backing Syria’s peace process agreed to work for a ceasefire, the lifting of starvation sieges and the resumption of talks. READ MORE

 

The anatomy of a third World War: Neocon style

Various members of IS, ISIL, Al Qaeda, Al Nusra, FSA, and Thuwwar al-Sham.The Washington neocons have managed to muck things up in Syria blurring and confusing boundaries between who's who amongst warring factions in its now half decade old regime change proxy war that the US has been losing. With the US Empire's agenda to destabilize every potential threat to US-Israel hegemony in the region, the latest highly disturbing developments unfolding within this last week in Syria paint a very grim yet clear picture of America's revised regional strategy. The key lens by which to analyze and understand what the US Empire does geopolitically in the Middle East, North Africa or anywhere has everything to do with maintaining US-Israel regional hegemony and its obsessive, relentless strategy opposing the greatest threat to America's unipolar global hegemony - Russia, China and Iran. Underlying this neocon insanity behind US foreign policy's global agenda has been destabilization of the entire world through chaos and destruction militarily achieved through either direct Empire invasion-occupation war or more recently indirectly through the latest installment of Empire's manufactured war on terror deploying its created ISIS-al Qaeda terrorists as proxy war allies doing Empire's blood-soaked bidding by proxy. But when that strategy fails as it has in Syria recently, now the neocons are resorting to sending in its Islamic nation state puppets Turkey and Saudi Arabia as yet more proxy war allies to do yet more of their dirty work.

Consistent with control over the geopolitics chessboard is the imperialistic self-interest of controlling the earth's money, drug and oil supply also designed to promote war while isolating and weakening America's manufactured cold war 2 enemies of the East - Russia and Iran - that includes reversing a thwarted US Empire pipeline strategy. Assad's rejection in 2010 of Qatar's proposed gas pipeline through Syria to Turkey in an effort to supply Europe and seriously hamper Russia's export revenue made Assad vulnerable as declared enemy #1 in the Middle East to both the West and Arab Gulf States. Further making himself an even higher profile target was choosing the proposed gas pipeline that would be the largest in the region shared with its strongest ally and neighbor Iran and Iraq. Loyalty to Iran long deemed an outcast by the US-Israeli-Saudi axis-of-evil sealed Assad's fate for renewed Western targeted regime change skullduggery. The so called internal protests against the Assad government were quickly escalated into civil war in 2011 by US imperialistic interests further aggravated by US deploying an influx of foreign mercenary proxy terrorists.

Starting back in late 2010 in Tunisia with the CIA-neocon inspired "Arab spring uprising," a mere propaganda campaign exporting this same destabilizing scourge unleashed across the MENA nations just as the longest running wars in American history were winding down in Iraq and Afghanistan, the covert CIA operations were masqueraded by US touted lies supporting a spontaneous, contagious movement spreading long awaited freedom and democracy throughout the Muslim world. The truth was anything but as the US was merely launching its latest covert campaign in its never-ending aggressive regime change assault on independent nations designed to install weak, corrupted, bought and sold puppet governments throughout the region [and world] where puppet Arab states didn't already exist. The botched pipeline proposal had already placed Syria in Empire crosshairs.

In keeping with the US tradition of backstabbing treachery, our psychopath-in-chief Obama has regularly turned on once close and even longtime 30-year allies like Egypt's Mubarak tumbled over by the Obama supported Muslim Brotherhood (with Obama's half-brother Malik Obama linked to Muslim Brotherhood's investment finances and alleged ties to a Sudanese organization the US State Department lists as a terrorist group since 1993). Then of course there was the already neocon deposed casualty of US imperialism Saddam Hussein whose antiterrorism stance possessing zero weapons of mass destruction made him innocent of neocon charges used as deliberate lies to deceitfully gain support for invading and destroying his country. But if the truth be known Saddam became a marked man as soon as he switched trading from US petrodollar to the Euro having led a far more prosperous, peaceful, secular nation that maintained Sunni-Shiite unity than at any time since Empire came, divided, conquered and left it a failed state to be reinvaded by US delivered barbarians that still occupy Iraq.

And then as part of that same "Arab uprising" came days of NATO's nonstop brutal 2011 bombing to soften up Libya for the West's proxy invasion by al Qaeda terrorists followed by the Obama and Hillary-directed plunder and assassination of its leader Muamar Kaddafi who was busily promoting the pan-African gold backed dinar as currency bringing autonomous prosperity to North Africa. Prosperity and autonomy are dirty words in any part of the world not already controlled by the centralized Western banking cabal that Obama and Hillary serve. Upon learning of Gaddafi's death while being interviewed, Hillary exulted, "We came; we saw; he died."

On 9/11/12 shortly before Obama's reelection, he and Hillary were caught deep in their crime cabal enterprise by those same al Qaeda terrorists they used to overthrow and murder Kaddafi as part of the White House's illicit arms smuggling operation funneling guns and terrorists from Benghazi through allied Turkey to fight their proxy war in Syria. But on that fateful 9/11 night to save their own Faustian skins, Obama flew out west for a fundraiser and Hillary issued her stand down order to US military forsaking her Libyan Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other murdered Americans killed by those same Benghazi terrorists they were in bed with the night before. Under damage control administration staffers were then shamelessly blaming it on that bogus anti-Muslim video. Presidential ambitions kept the sleazy war criminals barely concealed under another scandalous cover-up. But the dark sinister truth surrounding Hillary's catching up to her faster than November.

Then a decade earlier recall that infamous Bush-Cheney memo rooted in the neocons' PNAC "new Pearl Harbor" playbook calling for regime changes in 7 nations within 5 years leaked a half dozen years later by fellow war criminal and then presidential hopeful retired General Wesley Clark that to this day still has two targeted nations conspicuously left on that infamous list - Syria and Iran. With this contextual historical overlay that features the US and Israel's plan for a reconfigured redrawing of the Middle East, Syria's latest breaking developments and US led machinations become far more readily and clearly comprehended. Connecting the dots puts the latest events escalating the war in Syria into crystal clear perspective as merely the diabolical evolution of neocon policies spun decades ago.

Up until last fall all had been going smoothly according to the globalist/neocon plan. ISIS terrorism was wreaking havoc throughout Syria and Iraq and rapidly expanding far beyond the Middle East and North Africa to all corners of the globe. The globalist orchestrated mass migration crisis designed to destroy Europe was already well underway with a million MENA refugees pouring into Europe every which way. The US was secretly airdropping arms, ammo, food and medical supplies to the terrorists and the allied coalition was doing its job conducting thousands of airstrikes pretending to bomb ISIS and few of us outside alternative media hardly even noticed. The status quo of American Empire spreading chaos and destruction worldwide to keep the neocons' confabulated war on terror raging, is all part of the plan, every so often dramatically stoked by another "new Pearl Harbor" event following the granddaddy of modern false flags 9/11, then came Spain's 3/11/04 train disaster, London's 7/7/05 train disaster and 2015's two-packaged Parisian deal with January's Charlie Hebdo and November's Friday the 13th mass killing spree. Throw in a few more false flag mass shootings at home and the people are worried about terror, more so after last December's San Bernardino attack since right after 9/11. Terror was kept alive and well, banksters were happily running the economy into the ground getting ready for the next bubble collapse and the military-security-prison complex was still booming.

So at the end of last September when Putin took center stage at the UN to publicly out Obama's secret alliance and protection of ISIS terrorists and Putin's subsequent destruction of terrorist forces in Syria, unexpected delivery of his decisive blow took all the treasonous bad guys lined up on the wrong side of history by total surprise. As a recognized world leader Putin was standing up like no other and directly confronting evil and as a result, his take charge policy in Syria had the evil neocons reeling. Ultimately still deceitfully playing dangerous lethal games with humanity, the US Empire along with its vassals from Europe, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the Arab Gulf monarchy states have all decided to invade tiny little Syria to protect their darling monsters they've so heavily invested in creating, nurturing, steadily feeding arms, ammo and fresh recruits, training and coddling them for a year and a half since another one of Obama's infamous lies of how he was vowing to track down and root out every last one of those evil terrorists.

As the one regional power that stands to gain the most from a multination attack on Assad's forces, Israel ironically is the only US ally that has not joined the recent fray to fight terrorists in Syria. But then since when have you ever heard of ISIS attacking Israel or Israelis? Never. Instead we see photos of Netanyahu displaying his best fellow terrorist bedside manner in photo op sessions visiting jihadists in Golan Heights hospitals.

Meanwhile overwhelming evidence has surfaced by the former Defense Intelligence Agency commanding General Michael Flynn blaming Obama for willfully defying all the agency's warnings about the jihadist militant threat when in 2012 before ISIS even became ISIS Obama was backing the terrorists in his vendetta to get to Putin by removing Assad from power. And then came Obama's fake red line and false flag chemical weapons attack that Obama blamed Assad for when it was Hussein Obama's own backed terrorists who killed those children in the Damascus suburb. Had the British parliament not turned down Obama's "humanitarian" call for airstrikes on Syria in September 2012 and then Putin's prudent move to broker the last minute deal that had Assad turning in his chemical weapons cache thereby saving face for the paper tiger Obama, with Russian and Chinese warships poised at the ready in Syria's defense, World War III may well have broken out several years ago. But now with Obama's five year war policy in Syria to oust Assad in complete shambles, once again he and his desperate neocons and allied stooges are threatening yet another WWIII showdown.

On October 1st last year Russia began bombing the Islamic State's infrastructure including command centers, supply depots and destroying enormous truck caravans of ISIS' stolen oil shipments traveling north toward the border to neighboring Turkey delivering to its biggest buyer a Turkish company owned by President Erdogan's son. As pushback on November 24th with US-NATO approval, Turkey then illegally shot down a Russian SU-24 jet that was not even flying inside Turkish air space killing the pilot. But Putin was clearly upsetting the West's rigged, criminal proxy war operation and as a NATO member Erdogan took full advantage to justify and get away with his uncalled for, highly provocative act of war. Obama immediately rushed to Turkey's aid defending his ally's blatant aggression by maintaining it had a right to defend its airspace. And that incident occurred less than a month after 224 Russians were killed by a planted bomb that exploded inside a Russian airliner flying over the Sinai desert with suspected culprit ISIS immediately taking credit for that murderous misdeed.

In both Ukraine and Syria the West and its proxy war terrorist allies have been deliberately attempting to provoke Putin into retaliation amidst a relentless ongoing campaign of lies and propaganda demonizing him for his defensive stand in Crimea two years ago. The neocon led West's reckless aggressions toward both Russia and China in recent years have willfully and unilaterally resurrected a second installment of the cold war clearly indicating it's gunning for a direct military confrontation with the Eastern powers, pushing for inevitable war that could easily quickly turn nuclear that we'd all lose.

After recent months with direct Russian air support combined with increasing ground troop coordination, the Syrian forces have been turning the tide, moving to seal off the border with Turkey to cut off the terrorists' supply line and gradually closing in on a decisive victory defeating the world's largest terrorist organization once and for all. Rather than do the right thing by humanity with assisting Russia rid the planet of evil killing thugs, the US and its allies have instead decided to go on the offensive announcing massive troop interventions converging on Syria all using the fake excuse of eradicating the terrorists when the whole world watching already knows it's just another conspired boldface lie.

Having the audacity to pretend to actually still be waging war against the terrorists, the US is leading what will be the biggest multinational coalition force to date in Syria in order to illegally invade a sovereign nation while still trying to deceive the world that it alongside all the very same players regularly guilty of financing and supporting the terrorist enemy will be fighting together against the terrorists. Everyone who has followed any of the events in the Middle East knows that the true agenda of the US led invasion is to still pursue Assad for regime change, and if that longstanding objective cannot be attained with Russia and Iran's military presence directly assisting Syria's defense, the US Empire's primary agenda will be to create a West controlled safe haven for the Islamic State occupying eastern Syria to further undermine and weaken Assad's power. The race to capture the ISIS stronghold city of Raqqa will be the prize that each warring coalition is gunning for. If the Russian-Syrian forces win that race, they'll have beaten back ISIS from Syria and won the war. However, if the US backed Arab forces that all support the terrorists link up with their fellow terrorist buddies, that means the US and their terrorists will be in a position to create their own autonomous caliphate within eastern Syria and continue Empire's longtime agenda to eliminate Assad.

Several years ago globalist Henry Kissinger revealed that the elite's true intention behind US interventions in Syria is to partition it off into "balkanized" pieces in the same way the US dismembered Yugoslavia with its proxy war in Kosovo and Bosnia using Osama's al Qaeda terrorists in the 1990's. The same goal is planned for Iraq as part of the redrawing of the Middle East. All along the US-Israel imperialistic modus operandi throughout the Middle East, North Africa and beyond has been to break up Arab nations into fractured, sectarian conflicted, weakened failed states in order to guarantee both Israel and Empire's continued unchallenged dominance while simultaneously undercutting and weakening Russia's growing influence and power.

Russian Major General Konashenkov, a the Russian Defense Ministry spokesman, announced a few days ago in his latest briefing that from February 4-11 Russia flew 510 sorties over Syria attacking 1,888 ISIS terrorist targets. The Syrian forces subsequently made significant gains along the Turkish border as well as pushing on ISIS near northern Aleppo. The air assaults on terrorist encampments were so pounding that a number of the jihadists attempted to disguise themselves amongst displaced northern Syrian villagers heading towards the Turkish border.

Syria's Foreign and Expatriates Ministry has already sent notification to the UN Security Council citing ongoing multiple violations of international law including UN Charter objectives and Security Council's terrorism war crimes currently being committed starting last weekend with Turkey's artillery firing long range rockets from the border into Syria targeting civilian villages, Syrian National Army and particularly Kurdish forces (YPG) operating near the Turkish border. The US politely asked Turkey to stop firing on forces that the US is arming. It's a little confusing because the US supports the Kurds inside Syria but sides with Ankara's brutally oppressive anti-Kurd policy in Turkey. But then that's just the typically convoluted mess the US Empire is notorious for causing. In the meantime, the loose cannon Erdogan isn't listening to his imperial master as the shelling that started on Saturday has persisted in reckless defiance every day since. If it's not the neocons playing Russian roulette with humanity, now it's the foreign demagogues with a screw loose. Syria also charged Turkey with sending 100 armed Turkish provocateurs riding in 12 heavy machine gun mounted pickup trucks across the border into Syria to instigate more conflict.

Pravda reports that a Russian advisor on February 1st was already the first Russian ground casualty in the Syrian war killed by a Turkish mortar attack fired from the Turkish side of the border into a town liberated by the Syrian army that was previously held by militants that fled to Turkey. More shelling was reported in the same area of northern Syria near the border again the 3rd as well, indicating that Turkish artillery attacks have been occurring throughout February.

In response to Turkey's shelling of Syria, the UN Security Council is meeting in closed session on Tuesday to discuss the broader implications and what actions it may take or may not take to deter further violence. This comes simultaneously with 18,000 Turkish troops amassing at Syria's northern border for a planned invasion. Erdogan's invasion will be his desperate attempt to restore the terrorist supply line and again as of last Thursday he reiterated his desire to establish a no-fly zone over Syria.

Several days ago Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu stated that Turkey and Saudi Arabia could launch a ground force invasion in Syria "if there is a strategy," meaning that if the US Empire signs off on it. It was also just confirmed that Turks and Saudis have sent a huge shipment of ground to ground "Grad" missiles to their terrorist allies in Syria. These recent warmongering announcements were also immediately joined by claims by other pro-terrorist Gulf States Qatar and United Arab Emirates that they too will commit sending their own troop contingents to "fight against" the terrorists in war ravaged Syria. In fact Qatar and Turkey just declared they have signed a mutual defense pact sharing the common enemy (the Syria-Russia-Iran coalition) whereby each plans to have a military base in each other's country. It's as if all the terrorist supporting nations are now openly competing to stake the largest war role in Syria to overturn recent advances made by Syria, Russia, Iran, Hezbollah and the Kurds by rescuing their longtime investment in the Islamic State terrorists.

Meanwhile in response to the declared joint invasion threat, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev warned that if Saudi Arabia and Turkey move forward sending military to Syria in a ground operation, World War III will be virtually unavoidable, stating it "draws everyone taking part in it into a war," and further elaborating:

The Americans and our Arab partners must consider whether or not they want a permanent war.

Syrian Ambassador to Russia Riad Haddad stated the obvious:

They [Turkish authorities] claim they will enter Syria to attack Daesh. In reality, they want to interfere in Syrian affairs to save Daesh, to save terrorism in our country.

It's been said that Erdogan envisions Turkey one day returning as glorious head of another Ottoman Empire with the same delusional grandiosity and ambition that Israel's been scheming with partner-in-crime America doing its dirty bidding to vastly extend Israel's remapped borders. As the staunchest supporters of ISIS terrorism, this mutual arrangement between Turkey and Qatar facilitates future terrorist training at each other's military outposts. Likewise the Saudi monarchy has its eyes on the prize of using the Islamic State terrorists similar to the US to establish its own Sunni empire... the insatiably crazed lust for naked power is rabidly spreading throughout every Middle Eastern nation the US Empire's in bed with. As the overextended, morally crumbling US Empire fades, its even more morally corrupt puppet states have taken on the same character flaws as their master.

A month ago the Saudi Minister of Defense Mohammed bin Salman announced that Riyadh would headquarter the newly formed 34 nation Islamic Anti-Terror Coalition. In his official press release the narcissistic, self-serving Salman stated that his 34 Sunni states will act to "counteract terrorism" in Syria as well as Iraq and elsewhere. Conspicuously absent from this "Islamic state" coalition are the same three Shiite nations that pissed everybody off building their own renegade pipeline - Iran, Iraq and Syria. The disingenuous phony transparency of Saudi grandstanding along with Sultan Erdogan as the Islamic headmasters anointed by Washington to be the big cheeses of their Sunni peer group uniting it against Shiite Arabs nauseatingly comes straight out of the globalist Divide and Rule 101 handbook. Bottom line - they see war as a means to an end land, grabbing the Kurds' oil rich fields in northern Iraq and leading an ever-expanding Islamic State caliphate throughout the Middle East and beyond.

Demonstrating that old imperialistic predatory habits are hard to break, Colin Powell's former chief-of-staff retired Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson recently said that the United States plans to occupy resource-rich Afghanistan for another half century. Forget those bandied about exit dates, once addicted to plundering and stealing earthly treasures from stolen lands, always addicted. What's left of genocided Native American people throughout both Western Hemisphere continents have been forever learning this painfully sobering lesson. And now US Empire has spread this same imperialistic fever lust for power and control to the likes of such despotic nations supporting terrorism Turkey and Saudi Arabia.

This week Turkey and Saudi Arabia are also currently conducting joint military air exercises in central Turkey in preparation for their apparent joint coordinated offensive into Syria. As part of their war prepping, the day before the air exercises began, a Saudi general acting as military spokesman confirmed that Saudi Arabian jets have been dispatched to southern Turkey's Incirlik Air Base, the same one used extensively in recent years by US Empire to do its earthly destruction in the region. Not surprisingly, the Saudis of course are claiming that their planes are moving into place to fight against ISIS. It's all too obvious that the Saudi warplanes will be used to provide air cover support for their launched Turkish-Saudi invasion.

A senior Iranian air force commander general in response to Turkey and Saudi Arabia's planned invasion stated that if Damascus asks, the Iranian air force is committed to defending Syria's air space. He warned that any military presence in Syria without Assad's express permission would end in defeat. These escalating saber rattling decries are not unlike a game of chicken played amongst schoolboys preparing for a playground brawl, except instead of a few bloody noses it could be the end of humanity and all life on planet earth.

Turkish warplanes would outnumber Russia's 10 to 1 (200 to 20) despite the advanced generation of Russian fighter aircraft protected by its highly sophisticated S-400 missile air defense systems. The Moscow advantage is its long range bombers are capable of taking out airfields anywhere in Syria or Turkey. But the risk of striking air bases in Turkey could draw NATO into the war. That's the trap that the West has diabolically set. In the coming months you can bet that the West will attempt to split Russia on two fronts, the other one of course being Ukraine where with Empire backing yet another major Kiev military offensive will be unleashed in Eastern Ukraine fighting the Russian backed rebels.

Russian diplomats are feverishly trying to arrive at a peace proposal that's been tacitly agreed to in two or three days while buying more time to realistically prepare for the all-out world war that appears eminent. Neither side actually believes peace is at hand. Russia's only buying more time in an effort to stall the momentum being pushed by the impending Turkish-Arab multiple nation attack with full US-NATO blessing that's all but forthcoming. Because both warring sides are madly scrambling and jockeying for last minute advantageous positioning for when the larger scale war is launched, and neither side is backing down or suspending hostilities or present engagement, the peace talks are emptily just buying a little more time. At this moment a real peace breakthrough appears rather bleak.

Since it's now obvious that Obama's choice of backing ISIS to defeat Assad will clearly not happen with Russia's presence in Syria, US Empire will now use Turkey and Saudi Arabia as its latest proxy war allied puppets to protect their collective vested interest in keeping terrorists on this planet alive and well in order to keep their "endless" war on terror endless. However, should the Turkish-Saudi coalition forces directly engage in attacking the Russian task force or the Iranian contingent, a Pandora's Box will quickly open that could unravel and in a flash lead to a major world war with far-reaching nuclear implications. The neocons in charge are convinced that Empire's unipolar hegemony cannot be maintained without the scourge of terrorism and their mercenary ISIS thugs to blame as their designated patsies around the globe. And as such, they appear to be willing to risk plunging humanity headlong into a catastrophic third world war scenario. Their provocative acts of aggression toward both Beijing and Moscow over the last couple years especially have led directly to this ever-so dangerous faceoff we're witnessing today.

Despite such grave risk to life on earth, sending an Erdogan led invasion and engaging in a protracted deadly ground war clearly violates international law that according to the Nuremberg Tribunal constitutes a "supreme international crime." But Turkey, the United States and all their war crime allies will use the same old worn out deception as its flimsily false excuse to justify its criminal aggression in Syria claiming "humanitarian reasons" for rushing to the "defense of civilians" rescued from war crimes and even ethnic cleansing committed by Assad and Russian forces. All total fabricated bullshit. It happened in the 90's in Kosovo and Bosnia, and in this century in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, Ukraine, over and over again these same lies have been used to commit yet more mass murder and atrocities in our name. Despite being a pathological liar who never fails to hypocritically attempt to justify violence while pretending to speak from some nonexistent moral perch, we can be guaranteed more of the same hot air in the coming weeks and months. And if the neocons push for US boots on the ground in a similar urgent need to help the proxies helping the proxies, Obama will be front and center rooting them on.

The Western mainstream media in its efforts to justify escalating interventions in Syria have increased its outrageously bogus accusations that the Russian bombing isn't targeting real terrorists but indiscriminately killing civilians, destroying hospitals, basically all the same hypocritical offenses the US Empire does regularly engage in and invariably gets away with. The propaganda machine has gone wild in recent weeks painting Putin as a murderous assassin and the most evil villain on the planet as the standard customary buildup of lies just like the WMD lies used against Saddam Hussein prior to launching the 2003 Iraq invasion.

History keeps repeating itself because in the past it has all worked out so dastardly well for the true villains of the ages - the ruling elite. Once again the globalists and their governing pawns are counting on the short attention spanned, dumbed down, kept in the dark public to passively acquiesce in going along with yet more war, carnage and destruction. But with Americans neither trusting their leaders nor their MSM propaganda machine, the feds will not get away with it this time. Americans are finally beginning to wake up and join the rest of the world long painfully aware of the evildoers in Washington and the puppet masters pulling their strings. War has always been for the banksters and the military industrial complex to profit from and no one else. If the elite has its way yet again, America is fast headed for its downfall by its insane, treasonous government willfully igniting World War III in Syria.

We must not be fooled by the grand deception this time around but confront the deceitful evildoers in our treasonous government both past and present, and like the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that the great Nelson Mandela spearheaded in 1995 in South Africa to help encourage those individuals in our government to be forthcoming to tell the truth that will bring those most responsible for past war crimes against humanity to justice. We must hold those in our government accountable for their criminal transgressions that include treason against our nation and people, ultimately sending the message to every nation that we citizens of the world demand that war, violence and mayhem be stopped on our planet. The choice is either life or death and as a human species we must choose life.

Joachim Hagopian is a West Point graduate and former US Army officer. He has written a manuscript based on his unique military experience entitled "Don't Let The Bastards Getcha Down." It examines and focuses on US international relations, leadership and national security issues. After the military, Joachim earned a master's degree in Clinical Psychology and worked as a licensed therapist in the mental health field with abused youth and adolescents for more than a quarter century. In recent years he has focused on his writing, becoming an alternative media journalist. His blog site is at http://empireexposed.blogspot.co.id/. 
 
Comment: As any regular reader of Sott.net would have noticed in recent weeks, months, and even years, this site has been very closely following all the pathological carnage that the US, Israel, and its allies have been inflicting in their drive to rape and plunder the world. Though taking an objective view of what's at work may not prevent further disaster, we can, at the very least least, bear witness to the increasing horrors rapidly unfolding, and choose to condemn them in any way we can. To not do so in some way, shape, or form would seem to be an opportunity lost.