Yeah, that’s true.
Exactly what I was going to say.
It also assumes that he would actually understand the consequences of his actions. He’s not shown a good track record of that so far.
I’d think Putin saying, “I’m going to launch a cruise missile at Trump Tower” would focus his mind.
There’s a lot bigger assumption at work; that Trump is capable of forming and carrying out a policy that will create a stable peace.
What are the odds of that? People a lot more capable than Trump have been trying to do that for decades and haven’t succeeded.
Wish **LSLGuy **was still a poster, he wrote excellent posts on this. Yes USSR and China had clashed on their border. As do, Pakistan and India in Kashmir. And the USSR and USA sometimes fired on each others aircraft.
Point is at that time, there was either a formal or tacit framework in which all parties operated. Everyone knew (and followed) the rules of the game. On the border areas, they generally did not use weapons heavier than arty, use airforce for anything for recce and AD, on attempt to move in deep.
There is no such framework in Syria and no indication that a tolerable one can be found. Plus, unlike USSR0-China, Pakistan-India, USSR-USA air clashes, there are major, smaller third parties who are involved and who act more or less autonomously of their ostensible patrons.
Wishful thinking I am afraid, in presuming that it can be contained.
They have to fail, once.
SecDef Mattis told the House “I believe there was a chemical attack in Syria”
And then there was also this:
Don’t know. The Army said it was just practice for the Independence Day air show next week, and indeed, there were no crashes or explosions heard, and the only aircraft anyone saw ere Israeli F-15s. If it was in fact a Russian test… good. I hope we passed. And even if we didn’t, we could always use some training against a halfway-competent opponent.
The U.S., France, and the UK are bombing Syria. Explosions heard in Damascus, that sort of thing. No word yet on what the Russians are doing about it.
Guess Mattis couldn’t talk Trump out of it after all…
What AK said. A lot of the border clashes either occurred where one of the combatants did not have a meaningful strategic deterrent, or are formalized to the point of military ballet, in the present case of India and Pakistan.
A carrier battle group is coming to the Eastern Med. It is not out of the realm of possibility that the Russians, or someone wielding Russian surface to surface missiles, will be able to damage or sink it. And if that happens, among being probably the largest US hostile loss of life since 9/11, very bad things will happen.
The air strikes have begun. U.S., Britain and France.
The sun is up over there now. Sounds like the strikes have stopped, at least for tonight.
So, does it stop here? The Russians, other than possibly trying to shoot down the cruise missile strike, (and failing, because it’s really hard to do), don’t seem to have interfered much with this. No trying their own cruise strikes against a variety of NATO bases—including the US JSOC base in Deir-ez-Zor where about 300 or so Russian mercenaries got monkey-stomped a few months ago when they tried to overrun it. No trying to interdict any of the bombers or tankers that conducted these strikes.
Is it that the Russians will try to retaliate, if at all, obliquely? Oh, and Qatar evidently wanted to join the party with a few missile strikes on Syria of their own. Per Jack Posobiec, citing Al Mayadeen, although the tweet has been removed. Curious. If legit, guess the schism between them and KSA is temporarily on hold. Whatever happened with that blockade that KSA was placing on Qatar anyway?
If the Russians want to be proportional, they’ll strike our guys in Syria, not NATO bases. Of course, that’s difficult because we don’t have too many guys over there and they probably aren’t easy to identify. More likely Russia realizes that taking on the US, Britain, and France is probably not a great idea.
They tried that already. ‘Unofficially,’ cough. They got their shit pushed in. See, e.g, John Ringo, for a particularly gloating recap. ‘JDAM Arclight’ doesn’t sound like anything I’d want to be anywhere near…
Surface to surface missiles, OTOH, is something they are supposed to do really well, and is something that might really cause some problems with US ships or bases. Particularly if the shooters get accurate data (read, satellite) about where the ships are, and if the missiles come from a novel direction. Especially if the US units are occupied with something else at the time.
Then again, Hezbollah got hit too with some of these strikes, and maybe the Russians, if they feel like responding, will borrow them again.
Or maybe they’ll let bygones be bygones? So long as Qatari/KSA/Syrian/Iraqi natural gas isn’t undercutting their competitive advantage in Europe—and a pipeline for same to Europe hasn’t been built yet, and may never if Turkey doesn’t agree—why really should the Russians care? Well, other than slashing the market for some of their military hardware, which is about the only other thing the Russian Federation can meaningfully sell.
There would be nothing proportional about that. We took care to avoid hitting Russians. If they deliberately target us and try to kill Americans, that’s going to be a major escalation.
If they that again, and have Su-25 and 34 in support with Super Flankers providing cover?
The Drive had an excellent live reporting page..
TL: DR
- All attacks seem to have been standoff, to avoid SyA AD
- The US says they did not tell Russia. The French OTH, apparently did
- The Syrians say they shot down 13 missiles and a drone.
- Russian planes are now flying CAP over Damascus and Homs.
Last night the Secretary General of the UN said that the “Cold War was back”. Here is to hoping it remains “cold”.
So far.
We’re less than 1/3 of the way through Trump’s 4-year term.
I’m not worried about WWIII. And I think there’s essentially no chance of the US and Russia going nuclear over Syria.
Nuclear weapon use, if it happens, will happen due to a miscalculation with North Korea. A topic for a different thread.
Reports this morning that Russia & Syria are making claims that “most” of the 100+ missiles launched by the combined western forces have been knocked out of the sky before reaching their targets.
:dubious: :rolleyes: