The Kurdish dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are reporting today that US troops have taken over control of the Rmeilan airfield in northeastern Syria’s Hasakeh Province, the first US military base inside Syria.
The SDF reported that the Kurdish YPG, their largest faction, previously controlled the base and handed sole control over it to the US, as a route for the US to bring them weapons and to launch warplanes from.
Rmeilan Airport is not a military airfield by design, and was primarily for crop-dusting and agriculture. It is unclear, then, the extent to which it’ll really be used by the US as a base for warplanes. The US generally launches such planes from Turkey, though Turkey has loudly objected to the US aiding the Kurds.
Some reports from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights suggest that work is underway to expand the runway, and that US attack helicopters have been seen going in and out of the base for weeks.
Pentagon spokesman Col. Steve Warren confirmed that there is an operation “ongoing” in the area, but refused to discuss the matter, citing the “special nature” of the US ground troops who are deployed in Syria. Officials previously confirmed a handful of troops were sent to Syria, but never suggested they were going to establish their own bases.
The operation appears legally dicey, at best, as while the base was nominally under the control of the Kurdish YPG, who are closely allied to the US, the Obama Administration has refused all coordination with the Syrian government, and certainly doesn’t have Syrian permission to establish military bases on Syrian soil.
Did the USSA obtain permission from the Syrian gov’t to take over any Syrian airbase? The only foreign nation the Assad gov’t granted permission to establish an airbase within its territory or station troops was Russia, not the USSA, not Turkey.
Jason’s correct in saying that the Obama regime refused all coordination with the Assad regime, and doesn’t have permission to establish bases on Syrian soil .. only Russia was granted that permission. Therefore, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) .. with Russian assistance .. has every right to drive the USSA invaders out, as they’re doing to Daesh,
“A rose by any other name”. Without Russia/Assad’s authority US moving in on Syrian land is an illegal invasion/occupation, by another name
And just as they did for the “illegal invasion/occupation” of Iraq, the American people will cheer for the “warriors” and go along solidly wrapped in their flag and ooze moral indignation for those who throw “international law violations” at them.
Well the black and brown americans who support our colored brother Obama will. Only the racist white tea bagger types who will boo.
Do you support Obama’s annihilation of Libya, an African country?
Whatever Israel wants, is what we do
Sad, when one considers how many brilliant minds there are in the States and how many among Americans remain people of the utmost integrity. Reminds me of this quote….
“A society whose citizens refuse to see and investigate the facts, is a society that chooses and deserves the Police State Dictatorship it is going to get ~ Ian Williams Goddard.
Just like russia carpet bombing syrian civillians is no different. Gotta love the double standards of you Obama hating racist types.
Russia is in Syria at the invitation of the legitimate Syrian govt. and we mustn’t forget ISIS is Israel.They’ve been arming and training the Kurds, stealing and selling Syrian oil long before it became common knowledge and long before Russia became involved.
OBAMA’s dilemma however is having morphed the Syrian ground feeders dissatisfaction with Assad into a full blown civil war any US boots on the ground now, without Assad/Russia agreement, will be perceived like ISIS as an illegal foreign invasion
the kurds are the ones fighting isis so how can they and isis both be connected with Israel genius? You western fake leftists blow my mind with your ignorance of my part of the world ya know that.
Ameer, please name five of the Islamic groups fighting in Syria, and who their foreign sponsors are? What areas do they control and where do their supplies and Captagon come from? Then name just 25 towns recently liberated from foreign-backed terrorists and name the forces that liberated those towns. This should be very simple for you to do.
how can something be liberated by a tyrant that half the population hates? I’m curious about that.
what does this have to do with the fact that it was the kurds and sayrian rebels fighting isis long before most of u first world block heads even heard of isis.?
Actually, Ameer, Russia is only bombing US-sponsored terrorists like the Islamic State, Jabhat al Nusra and other radical Islamic groups. Read http://syrianperspective.com
Where on Earth do you get your so-called information??
yes that would explain why the US is bombing isis i take it right. It would explain why even before russian involvement my African brother Obama’s intervention helped take back a massive amount of isis held territory. And don’t give me that Putin is bombing isis bs. Putin is bombing the opposition not isis. The same opposition that was fighting them long before anyone else did.
also i’d like to point out that syrianperspective was created to be the mouth piece of the Assad regime. Making it propaganda and no different then RT or fox news.
The hapless, worthless, corporate media has its own spin on the
USG illegal occupation of this Syrian airbase. We (masses) are
expected to believe the USG takeover will stabilize the region,
and deal a blow to boogeyman (terrorists) operating in the area.
I also know where we can find some cheap California beachfront
property in Nebraska.
Why does Ditz keep using Syrian Observatory for Human Rights as a source? It is widely know to be bogus as even the NYT has conceded.
This is the second time he has done so.
The last time there were a number of objections in Discussion.
Now it is done again.
This erodes the credibility of AW.C.
Not good.
Jason has referred to material sourced from SOHR far more than two times.
And readers have objected to that sourcing as many times as he’s done it.
So, here’s the deal:
If you want to pack a suitcase, go to Syria and cover things there firsthand, I strongly suspect that Jason will give top priority to your reports from the ground there instead of relying on the obviously biased existing sources.
Otherwise, we will just have to continue gleaning as much information as we can from the sources available to us, and trusting our readers to add as many grains of salt as they think any particular source requires.
Oh, come on: there are many good English souces. This isn’t rocket science. Read Syrian Perspective, SANA or Global Research for a start.
I was mistaken in my assessment of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights based on what I have learned this morning. For example, contrary to Western media reports the SOHR has correctly pointed out that the majority of casualties in the Syrian civil war have been sustained by pro-Assad forces!
And as Thomas Knapp points out below, we have no choice but to try to separate the wheat from the chaff in reports on Syria as best we can.
Certainly, Jason and AW.C have been among the most effective at doing that.
When the SOHR mentions that an event has taken place, then I’ve seen no reason to doubt it. Where it has proved unreliable is with the number of jihadist and civilian dead as it assumes that jihadists who are neither foreigners nor deserters from the SAA are civilians, The number of male civilian dead reported by the SOHR seems disproportionate with the numbers of women and child dead they report.
John sure you also check out: http://sana.sy/en/?p=63857 — and or presstv? There is another really reliable site I found for first hand genuine and constantly updated news, if I find it will share it with you. Thanks
Syrian Perspective.
Yes.The Syrian perspective should rightfully also be heard, but because Syrians have been at war, defending their country against “orange” revolution invaders in the form of USG supported terrorists, for on 5 years now, their media voice suffered and has all but been drowned by the shrill, lying tirade of the western puppet media — as John pointed out.
You have to admit this is a refreshing change from the litany of malefactions laid at the doorstep of the jihadis. We’ll probably hear next, how they’re using the blood of newborn Christians to make pita bread.
Did you all catch 60 Minutes this week on Syria? Want to see/hear lies–see it to believe it.
I suspect this story is BS.
Search Google Images on Rmeilan airfield, and the first result is a satellite image of the Syrian town of Rmeilan. The next two results are of an American-looking airbase that is supposed to be Rmeilan airfiled but searching on Google for similar images shows that it’s Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia.
Next week US will hand it to turkey, just wait and see.
Democracy — Rule by the most wealthy
Four facts: neither Russia nor Syria voicing the slightest objection and Syria has for over half a century been most pro-USA. High point being Syria an essential part of the torture-rendition program.
So, as every single terrorist in the Middle-East is funded by the Western powers or Middle-East dictators, surely all this terrorism stuff is to keep the lower-half enslaved by the privileged upper-half of society.
Purpose of this world being to reach the ultimate conclusion of majority rule, the 51% most wealthy ruling a democracy being the greatest of all stupidity.
That sort of counters the other cottage sophistry that an Islamic population of 51 percent majority is ‘morally bound’ to install a caliphate and change any culture to a muslim one..
Syria should be raising the issue at the UN.
A clear act of war.
Far more to this than meets the eye? Is it possible that US mission is to finally prepare for all out war? As usual not fazed about international law as it has its UN lackey taped, one just wonders whether the US, supported by Turkey/NATO, plans a full scale invasion of Syria. Definitely they’re doing this with a strategy in mind and it looks ugly. Some incident or other will be blamed on Russia to ensure they have their excuse for war and for taking out Assad. See Tony Cartalucci essay on NEO – http://journal-neo.org/2016/01/22/syrian-peace-will-be-decided-on-the-battlefield-not-in-vienna/
500 POUND ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM — Western war materials industry loves Saudi oil
For the way I see it, this issue will never be resolved if we keep talking about how best to end the war, as this is most upsetting to all the combatants except the Russian-Syria collation. For all the Western nations involved are ruled by the heads of their war materials industry and oil industry, all the Middle-East oil-rich dictators need Western war materials to keep their people enslaved and the moment that the people of our Western world were made aware of the fact, the trading of Western war materials for oil would come to a screeching halt.
For Peter Lavelle of the Russia Today CrossTalk show, he said it all, “As the war-hawks refuse to talk, a military solution with a decisive victory is what will kick-start the peace talks.”
When one of Peter Lavelle’s guests stated that USA had given up all desire for an Iraq type military invasion, Daniel of the Ron Paul Institute pointed out that the U.S. invasion had already started, yesterday as a matter of fact, as U.S. troops with bulldozers have invaded a Syrian airport and are busy improving the landing strips.
The corporate media does not report it this way,
but we are at war with Syria.