Excellence in Historical Research and Analysis
Excellence in Historical Research and Analysis
We usually stay away from the news of the day, but hard to ignore this one as we were recently blogging about it:
Story: https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-military-killed-apos-couple-181324480.html
In testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Mike Pompeo, currently the CIA Director and nominee to serve as Secretary of State stated that “a couple hundred Russians were killed” by U.S. forces in Syria.
Our discussion of this:
Leaving an unstable country in some regions is an invite to further international problems. This was the case with Afghanistan in the 1990s, which resulted in Al-Qaeda being hosted there. This was the case with Somalia, which not only hosted elements of Al-Qaeda, but also conducted rampant piracy. This was the case with Iraq/Syria, which gave the Islamic State a huge opening and resulted in them seizing the second largest city in Iraq. It seems a bad idea to ignore these areas, even though there is a cost to not ignoring them.
The cost of not ignoring them is one must maintain a presence of something like 2,000 to 20,000 or more support troops, Air Force personnel, trainers, advisors, special operations forces, etc. And they must be maintained for a while. It will certainly result in the loss of a few American lives, perhaps even dozens. It will certainly cost hundreds of millions to pay for deployment, security operations, develop the local forces, and to re-build and re-vitalize these areas. In fact, the bill usually ends up costing billions. Furthermore, these operations go on for a decade or two or more. The annual cost times 20 years gets considerable. We have never done any studies of “security operations” or “advisory missions.” The focus of our work was on insurgencies, but we have no doubt that these things tend to drag on a while before completion.
The cost of ignoring these countries may be nothing. If there is no international terror threat and no direct threat to our interests, then there may not be a major cost to withdrawing. On the other hand, the cost of ignoring Somalia was a pirate campaign that started around 2005 and where they attacked at least 232 ships. They captured over 3,500 seafarers. At least 62 of them died. The cost of ignoring Afghanistan in the 1990s? Well, was it 9-11? Would 9-11 have occurred anyway if Al-Qaeda was not free to reside, organize, recruit and train in Afghanistan? I don’t know for sure…..but I think it was certainly an enabling factor.
I have never seen a study that analyzes/estimates the cost of these interventions (although some such studies may exist). Conversely, I have never seen a study that analyzes/estimates the cost of not doing these interventions (and I kind of doubt that such a study exists).
Hard to do analyze the cost of the trade-off if we really don’t know the cost.
The United States has struggled with what to do in Syria. We never had good relations with the dictatorial Assad family. Their civil war started with civil protests on 15 March 2011 as part of the Arab Spring. The protests turned bloody with over a thousand civilian dead (have no idea how accurate this number is) and thousands arrested. It had turned into a full civil war by late July 2011. Our initial response was to remain disengaged.
It is only when Assad used chemical weapons against his own population, similar to Saddam Hussein of Iraq, that we finally considered intervening. President Obama announced a “red line” on 20 August 2012 against the use of chemical weapons. Assad’s forces violated this on 17 October 2012 in Salqin, 23 December 2012 at Al-Bayadah, most notably in 19 March 2013 in Aleppo and in several other locations during March and April, 29 April 2013 in Saraqib and a couple of more incidents in May, 21 August 2013 in Ghouta and several other incidents in August. All attacks used the nerve agent Sarin. Instead of responding militarily, this then turned into a coordinated international effort to eliminate all the Syria chemical weapons, which was done in conjunction with Russia. This was not entirely successful, as repeated later incidences would demonstrate.
In my opinion, the United States should have intervened with considerable force in March 2013 if not before. This would include an significant air campaign, extensive aid to the rebels, and a small number of advisors. This would have certainly entailed some American casualties. Perhaps the overall results would have been no better than Libya (which has also been in civil war from 2011). But, at least with Libya we did got rid of Muammar Gaddafi in October 2011. Gaddafi had most likely organized a terrorist attack against the United States. This was the 1988 Lockerbie bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 which killed 270 people, including 190 Americans (and was most likely conducted in response to Reagan’s 1986 U.S. bombing of Libya).
Still, an intervention in Syria at that point may well have ended Assad’s regime and empowered a moderate Sunni Arab force that could control the government. It may have also forestalled the rise of ISIL. Or it may not have…it is hard to say. But, what happened over the next eight years, with the rise of ISIL, their seizure of Mosul in Iraq, and the extended civil war, was probably close to a worse case scenario. This was a case where an early intervention may have lead to a more favorable result for us. I suspect that our intervention in Libya probably created a more favorable result than if we had not intervened.
The problem in Syria is that Assad represents a minority government of Shiite Arabs. They make up around 13% of the population (largest group are Alawites). This lords over a population of 69-74% Sunni (most are Arabs but it includes Kurds and Turcoman). In the end, given enough decades and enough violence, the majority will eventually rule. It is hard to imagine in this day and age that a minority can continue to rule forever, although Bashir Assad and his father have now ruled over Syria for almost 49 years. Part of what makes that possible is that around 10% of the population of Syria is Christian and 3% Druze. They tend to side with and support the Alawites, as a dominant, non-democratic Sunni rule would be extremely prejudiced against them. Needless to say, something like an Islamic State would be a nightmare scenario for them. So, for all practical purposes, Assad tends to have the support of at least a quarter of the population. From their central position, and armed by Russia, this makes them a significant force.
So, the question becomes, should the United States now disengage from Syria, now that the Islamic States is gone (but as many as 3,000 of their fighters remain)? Right now, we have at least 2,000 troops in and around Syria, with most of them outside of Syria (mostly based with our fellow NATO member Turkey). We have lost a total of two people since this affair started. We are allied with and supporting small moderate Sunni Arab groups and some Kurdish groups (which Turkey is opposed to and sometimes engages in combat). Turkey is supporting some of its own moderate Sunni Arab groups. Also in Syria is the radical Arab groups, Al-Qaeda and of course, the Islamic State (whose leader is still at large) and Al-Nusrah. So, is it time to leave?
What are the possible outcomes if we leave?
So, where does continued U.S. engagement or disengagement help or hinder in these scenarios?
A few related links:
An article by Christoph Reuter in Spiegel Online adds some new details to the story of the incident between U.S., Syrian, and Russian mercenary forces near the Syrian city of Deir Ezzor on 7 February 2018. Based on interviews with witnesses and participants, the article paints a different picture than the one created by previous media reports.
According to Spiegel Online, early on 7 February, a 250-strong force comprised of Syrian tribal militia, Afghan and Iraqi fighters, and troops from the Syrian Army 4th Division attempted to cross from the west bank of the Euphrates River to the east, south of a Kurdish Syrian Defense Forces (SDF) base at Khusham. The Euphrates constitutes a “deconfliction” line established by the United States and Russia separating the forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from those of the U.S.-supported SDF. The Syrian force was detected and U.S. combat forces fired warning shots, which persuaded the Syrians to withdraw.
After dark that evening, the Syrian force, reinforced to about 500 fighters, moved several kilometers north and attempted to cross the Euphrates a second time, this time successfully. As the force advanced through the village of Marrat, it was again spotted and engaged by U.S. air and artillery assets after an alleged 20-30 tank rounds impacted within 500 meters of the SDF headquarters in Khusham. The U.S. employed field artillery, drones, combat helicopters, and AC-130 gunships to devastating effect.
Speigel Online reported that U.S. forces also simultaneously engaged a force of approximately 400 pro-Assad Syrian tribal militia and Shi’a fighters advancing north from the village of Tabiya, south of Khusham. A small contingent of Russian mercenaries, stationed in Tabiya but not supporting the Syrian/Shi’a fighters, was hit by U.S. fire. This second Syrian force, which the U.S. had allowed to remain on the east side of the Euphrates as long as it remained peaceful and small, was allegedly attacked again on 9 February.
According to Spigel Online’s sources, “more than 200 of the attackers died, including around 80 Syrian soldiers with the 4th Division, around 100 Iraqis and Afghans and around 70 tribal fighters, mostly with the al-Baqir militia.” Around 10-20 Russian mercenaries were killed as well, although Russian state media has confirmed only nine deaths.
This account of the fighting and casualty distribution is in stark contrast to the story being reported by Western media, which has alleged tens or hundreds of Russians killed:
[A] completely different version of events has gained traction — disseminated at first by Russian nationalists like Igor “Strelkov” Girkin, and then by others associated with the Wagner unit. According to those accounts, many more Russians had been killed in the battle — 100, 200, 300 or as many as 600. An entire unit, it was said, had been wiped out and the Kremlin wanted to cover it up. Recordings of alleged fighters even popped up apparently confirming these horrendous losses.
It was a version that sounded so plausible that even Western news agencies like Reuters and Bloomberg picked it up. The fact that the government in Moscow at first didn’t want to confirm any deaths and then spoke of five “Russian citizens” killed and later, nebulously, of “dozens of injured,” some of whom had died, only seemed to make the version of events seem more credible.
Spiegel Online implies that the motive behind the account being propagated by sources connected to the mercenaries stems from the “claim they are being used as cannon fodder, are being kept quiet and are poorly paid. For them to now accuse the Kremlin of trying to cover up the fact that Russians were killed — by the Americans, of all people — hits President Vladimir Putin’s government in a weak spot: its credibility.”
The Spiegel Online account and casualty tally — 250 Syrian/Shi’a killed out of approximately 900 engaged, with 10-20 Russian mercenaries killed by collateral fire — seems a good deal more plausible than the figures mentioned in the initial Western media reports.
Don’t have any resolution on the casualty counts for the fighting on 7 February, but do have a few additional newspaper reports of interest:
Conclusions: A significant fight happened on 7 February, at least 9 Russians were killed and clearly several dozen wounded. It might have been over 100 killed in the fight, but we cannot find any clear confirmation of that. I am always suspicious of casualty claims, as anyone who has read my book on Kursk may note (and I think I provide plenty of examples in that book of claims that can be proven to be significantly in error).
Interesting article form the Telegraph: Putin’s shock troops-how Russia’s secret mercenary army came up against the U.S. in Syria
That copy may be behind a paywall…so try this: https://firenewsfeed.com/news/1167339
A few highlights:
This was a direct confrontation between U.S. forces and Russian-paid contractors. During the Vietnam War, some Russians were killed in our bombing of North Vietnam and other operations (16 or more Russians killed). During the Korean War, Russians pilots, posing as North Koreans, engaged in aerial combat with the U.S. aircraft, along with providing AA (around 300 Russians killed total). But I suspect you have to go back to Russian Civil War (1917-1921) to find a major ground action between U.S. and Russian forces. Not sure any of them were of this size.
Related articles: These 5 Proxy Battles Are Making Syria’s Civil War Increasingly Complicated
I found this article from Reuters to be particularly interesting: Russian toll in Syria battle was 300 killed and wounded
….
Related article: Russia: 5 citizens probably killed by U.S. strike
I gather we finally have a defense budget in place and it runs through September 2019 (there is no requirement to pass a budget for only one year). It is an $80 billion boost above spending caps for this year and $85 billion above spending caps for FY2019. This is a total of $165 billion above spending caps. The U.S. defense budget was already at least $35 billion over the spending cap. The budget request for FY2107 was initially $583 billion. I gather the budget for FY2018 is the BCA Budget Cap figure of $549 + $80 = $629 billion. Don’t quote me on this.
See:
I did note that Senator Rand Paul in his brief filibuster speech last night said that we were involved in seven wars. Of the top of my head, I only count six:
Makes me wonder which war I am missing (perhaps he is counting Yemen).
Also of note was that we ended up halting a battalion-sized attack in Syria by the Syrian government. See: http://www.businessinsider.com/us-syria-killed-100-russian-syrian-backed-fighters-2018-2
A few highlights:
General of the Army Valery Gerasimov, Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia, provided detailed information on Russian military operations in Syria in an interview published in Komsomolskaya Pravda on the day after Christmas.
Maxim A. Suchkov, the Russian coverage editor for Al-Monitor, provided an English-language summary on Twitter.
THREAD: 1. (Almost) Everything you wanted to know about #Russia‘s military operation in #Syria. Rus Chief of General Staff Army Gen. Valery Gerasimov reveals sensational details @kpru. I summarized major points in ENG: pic.twitter.com/QQblAwOJlX
— Maxim A. Suchkov (@MSuchkov_ALM) December 27, 2017
While Gerasimov’s comments should be read critically, they do provide a fascinating insight into the Russian perspective on the intervention in Syria, which has proved remarkably successful with an economical investment in resources and money.
Gerasimov stated that planning for Russian military operations used Operation Anadyr, the secret deployment of troops and weapons to Cuba in 1962, as a template. A large-scale deployment of ground forces was ruled out at the start. The Syrian government army and militias were deemed combat-capable despite heavy combat losses, so the primary supporting tasks were identified as targeting and supporting fires to disrupt enemy “control systems.”
The clandestine transfer of up to 50 Russian combat aircraft to Hmeimim Air Base in Latakia, Syria, began a month before the beginning of operations in late-September 2015. Logistical and infrastructure preparations took much longer. The most difficult initial challenge, according to Gerasimov, was coordinating Russian air support with Syrian government ground forces, but it was resolved over time.
The Russians viewed Daesh (ISIS) forces battling the Syrian government as a regular army employing combat tactics, fielding about 1,500 tanks and 1,200 artillery pieces seized from Syria and Iraq.
While the U.S.-led coalition conducted 8-10 air strikes per day against Daesh in Syria, the Russians averaged 60-70, with a peak of 120-140. Gerasimov attributed the disparity to the fact that the coalition was seeking to topple Bashar al-Assad’s regime, not the defeat of Daesh. He said that while the Russians obtained cooperation with the U.S. over aerial deconfliction and “de-escalation” in southern Syria, offers for joint planning, surveillance, and strikes were turned down. Gerasimov asserted that Daesh would have been defeated faster had there been more collaboration.
More controversially, Gerasimov claimed that U.S.-supported New Syrian Army rebel forces at Al Tanf and Al-Shaddidi were “virtually” Daesh militants, seeking to destabilize Syria, and complained that the U.S. refused Russian access to the camp at Rukban.
According to Russian estimates, there were a total of 59,000 Daesh fighters in September 2015 and that 10,000 more were recruited. Now there are only 2,800 and most militants are returning to their home countries. Most are believed heading to Libya, some to Afghanistan, and others to Southwest Asia.
Gerasimov stated that Russia will continue to deploy sufficient forces in Syria to provide offensive support if needed and the Mediterranean naval presence will be maintained. The military situation remains unstable and the primary objective is the elimination of remaining al Nusra/Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (al Qaida in Syria) fighters.
48,000 Russian troops were rotated through Syria, most for three months, from nearly 90% of Russian Army divisions and half of the regiments and brigades. 200 new weapons were tested and “great leaps” were made in developing and using drone technology, which Gerasimov deemed now “integral” to the Russian military.
Gerasimov said that he briefed Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on Syria twice daily, and Shoigu updated Russian President Vladimir Putin “once or twice a week.” All three would “sometimes” meet to plan together and Gerasimov averred that “Putin sets [the] goals, tasks, [and] knows all the details on every level.
Article on ISIL: Fight against ISIL not over yet
Highlights: