According to geopolitical analyst Steven MacMillan, editor of The Analyst Report, in a recent article for digital journal New Eastern Outlook published on October 12, “Washington is rapidly losing the microscopic amount of respect it had around the world, as US propaganda is becoming more childish by the week. Any rational person who is even remotely informed just sits back in amazement at the volume of deceptive, deceitful, and outright ludicrous statements constantly spewing from the mouths of top US officials.”
One of the latest comical episodes was when the US President, Barack Obama, actually tried to argue that Russian airstrikes against the so-called Islamic State (ISIS/IS/ISIL) are only strengthening the terrorist organization.
The U.S. President said that “The moderate opposition in Syria is one that, if we’re ever going to have a political transition, we need. And Russian policy is driving those folks underground or creating a situation in which they are [debilitated], and it’s only strengthening ISIL.”
In the real world however, Russia has been severely weakening ISIS and fellow extremist forces in Syria through bombing terrorist command centers, weapons warehouses, training camps and other enemy positions.
Above all, Russian airstrikes have illuminated the complete sham of the US-led coalition against ISIS, as Russian airstrikes have been far more effective already, compared to Washington´s campaign, and have created doubt as to the real intentions of the Western coalition.
Russia has once again outmaneuvered the West in relation to Syria, after a stroke of diplomatic genius from Moscow in 2013, which led to the Syrian government giving up their chemical weapons arsenal and averting a full-scale invasion by Western forces.
Obviously, the Western narrative that there are “moderate” terrorists fighting in Syria which we can trust and we should arm, is (and always has been), a total fallacy.
In reality, from the beginning, there were never any moderates in the Syrian conflict. The US complains as Russia bombs its protégées the Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood and AQI (al-Qaeda in Iraq), which are the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria, as evaluated by the Defense Intelligence Agency in their recently-declassified intelligence report from 2012.
Only one day after numerous countries –including the US– accused Russia of targeting civilians in Syria; Washington had to admit its forces had committed a war crime by bombing a hospital in Afghanistan, which was run by the NGO Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)) and which resulted in the killing of 19 civilians (including at least three children), and wounded 37.
Hence, in the United States voices of great political weight in the superpower have begun to appear advising a different perspective on the new situation.
Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, in an article published by the Wall Street Journal argues that the Russian anti-terrorist operation against the Islamic State in Syria has put an end to the political order in the Middle East which had been dominated by Washington for over 40 years. The White House should act more constructively and acknowledge that “the destruction of ISIS is more important than the overthrow of Bashar Assad.”
“The U.S. has already acquiesced in a Russian military role. Painful as this is to the architects of the 1973 system, attention in the Middle East must remain focused on essentials, and the U.S. government must acknowledge the need to dialogue with other great powers,” said the former U.S. State Secretary.
According to Kissinger, the U.S. must understand that “Russia’s principal concern is that the Assad regime’s collapse could reproduce the chaos of Libya, bring ISIS into power in Damascus, and turn all of Syria into a haven for terrorist operations, reaching into Muslim regions inside Russia’s southern border in the Caucasus and elsewhere.”
“But whatever their motivation, Russian forces are already in the region and their participation in combat operations is a challenge to US policy in the Middle East on a scale never seen at least over four decades,” he said.
www.englishmanuelyepe.wordpress.com
* Manuel E. Yepe is a lawyer, economist and social scientist. He is an Associate Professor at the Raul Roa Higher Institute of International Relations in Havana. He served as Ambassador, Director General of the Prensa Latina News Agency, Vice President of the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television, founding National Director of UNDP’s Technological Information Pilot System (TIPS) in Cuba and Secretary of the Cuban Peace Movement
A CubaNews Translation
Edited by Walter Lippmann
www.walterlippmann.com
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