ISIS forces have been launching a counter-offensive in southeastern Syria since Sunday, using a sandstorm as an opportunity to regain lost territory around the town of al-Sousseh. At least 23 Kurdish fighters were killed in the fighting.
Sousseh is one of three towns being contested in the last several months between ISIS forces and US-backed Kurdish fighters. Though the Kurds have repeatedly seized the towns, and adjoining villages, they’ve never held them for more than a few days.
Weather is usually a factor. While the US has provided the Kurds substantial air support, mostly airstrikes against the towns, and despite a lot of civilian casualties resulting, it seems without these, ISIS counterattacks are generally successful.
This likely reflects the large number of ISIS fighters in the deserts around the area. Though the towns only have small defensive forces, most of the ISIS remnant hides in the desert to avoid airstrikes, and comes out for attacks of opportunity.
This is all a joke. And WHO is bankrolling this “ISIS”? Is this another reincarnation of White Helmets, converted into White Turbans? And our belowed Al-Qaeda seems to have gotten some wings lately. Fueled by dollars or pounds? No Gulf country is funding either. Just another taxpayer funded fantasy.
Yeah. IS just suddenly so happens to become relevant again?
At least Kurd collaborators in American Kurdistan are being hit, not innocent civilians in false-flag attacks.
Good article. The weather point was unfinished though.
The Russians were impacted by sandstorms and such, but even U.S. planes and drones are impaired when the weather turns. Perhaps even moreso; Russia’s refurbished Soviet-era gear was always durable, while the U.S. preferred refinement over robustness.
The NATO/IS shadow alliance always struck SAA positions hardest when the Russians couldn’t field air support. The tactic predates air power, so the IS needs only satellite weather reports to be better at it. That’s why boots on the ground are critical. However, only other Arabs can occupy Arabs, and even then just barely if they are not of the same tribe and sect.
Kurds, short of major ethnic cleansing and prolonged mass in-migration with mass they don’t have, can’t impose a new reality. Their own SDF Arab allies probably leak like a sieve to the IS what the Kurds don’t on their own. Vetted or no, the non-Kurdish SDF fight under whatever flag is most convenient.