Obama’s ‘regime change’ in Syria: effort to destabilize China, Russia?

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The greater Middle East is on fire with one failing state after another overrun by Salafi jihadists—Libya, Iraq, Syria, Yemen—and rapidly reigniting Afghanistan, inflaming Central Asia, Russia’s Chechnya, China’s Xinjiang, southeast Asia and even South Korea.

This week, South Korea received bomb threats from an Islamic State (IS)-linked group to blow up a shop near COEX, a large shopping complex in the wealthy district of Gangnam in Seoul.[1] In April, IS attacked the South Korean embassy in Libya and killed at least two people.[2]

It appears the negative contagion of US –sponsored regime changes in the Mideast, that empowered the rise of Salafi jihadism, is pivoting east and destabilizing Asia. After one year of US-led anti-IS campaign, the Islamic caliphate is getting stronger and on the march, destroying the old world order and establishing a new one with the implicit backing of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and especially Turkey’s Erdogan.

As Turkey held election on November 1, a pro-AKP columnist even claimed that under a new presidential system, Erdogan would be “caliph” of the Sunni Muslims in the world, with the 1,005-room new presidential palace hosting “representatives from nations under the caliphate.”[3]

http://atimes.com/2015/11/obamas-regime-change-in-syria-effort-to-destabilize-china-russia/

[geek tragedy]

1. I think it's more plausible that the Great Pyramids are grain silos. nt

[bemildred]

2. Doesn't seem to be working too well, if that's the objective.

But I see that sort of thinking a lot. Paranoia is popular all over, but don't get me started, I'm in a good mood today.

[geek tragedy]

3. Destabilizing China would be a global catastrophe, even people who really

dislike the US recognize that it's probably good that Texas isn't an independent state with nuclear weapons

[bemildred]

4. Could result in a lot of refugees ...

I think there has been enough destabilizing for the moment, we need to work on something else.

[KoKo]

5. Interesting read...a different view of Syria situation

on what is going on with Syria.

Article seems to support Kissinger's view on dealing with Syria over Kerry/Obama's strategy. But, I have such a bad view of Kissinger that it's hard not to feel (with my bias) that some of this article might be push back against Kerry/Lavrov's efforts. The is a seeming acceptance by our Think Tanks of the Kerry/Lavrov efforts and even Russia's intervention now being reported in MSM.

When Richard Haas (CFR) and a few others suddenly seem very cheered by the current coordinated efforts in Syria...I get worried. That's quite a turn around for him (and a couple of others) who, not so long ago, were whipping up anti-Putin/Russia Cold war rhetoric. To turn around that fast makes me wonder what's up unless its desperation for a way out.

Anyway...bringing China and India into the Syrian discussions sounds like a good idea....whether it would complicate things more, though, is a problem. The article's mention of an article from 2014 about the possibilities of mining China's coast did bring to mind our current intimidating military efforts in the China sea.

What did you think of the article?

From the article:

China Mention....

Unless IS and its Wahhabi allies are stopped decisively, Russia fears a repeat of 1980s when radical Wahhabi jihadists in Afghanistan, inflamed by CIA and Saudis, were used in the Chechen insurgency to weaken Russia.

This threat is similarly shared by China with its Xinjiang insurgency, and further reinforced by a February 2014 article in the US Naval Institute’s Proceeding magazine.

In the article entitled ‘Deterring the Dragon’, the author, a retired naval commander, proposed sending special operation forces to arm China’s restive minorities in Xinjiang and Tibet at a time when Beijing is suffering from its worst terrorist attacks by Uyghur militants in the past two years.[14]

The author also proposed laying offensive underwater mines along China’s coast to close China’s main ports and destroy its sea lines of communications, which further creates distrust in the current Sino-US military standoff in the South China Sea, with Chinese naval commander Admiral Wu Shengli warning US counterparts that a minor incident could spark war if US did not stop its “provocative acts” of deploying warships to disputed waterways in the region.[15]

Rightly or wrongly, Beijing perceives this as part and parcel of US strategy to encircle and contain China’s rise, hemming its eastern flank via defense alliances in the Western Pacific and destabilizing its western flank in Central Eurasia via color revolutions and separatist movements.

And when Beijing sees Washington backing Turkey/Qatar/Saudi stance of arming and funding thousands of anti-Chinese Uyghur militants in Syrian “rebel groups”, coupled with US gunboat diplomacy in the South China Sea, this “deterring the dragon” combination risks escalation into a military conflict between Beijing and Washington.[16]

AND THIS...re Kissinger Strategy

In the face of IS and radical Islam’s invasion of Eurasia that is destabilizing Russia, China and India, all three stakeholders should be included in future talks on Syria.

Given combating IS is the unifier of great powers while Syrian regime change is the divider that allows IS to get stronger, US should recalibrate its Sunni Wahhabi-driven strategy and start working with other legitimate Mideast stakeholders to counter Islamic extremism. Absent this, it may behoove the Eurasian powers outside of US-led coalition to take Kissinger’s advice, and begin forging their own coalition via SCO and CSTO to counter terrorism in Syria.

[bemildred]

6. Well it depends on whom it is one is most afraid of.

If one is most afraid of Russia, than the jihadis are unimportant peasants. If one is most afraid of militant Islam, than it is Russia whom one must suck up to in order to defeat the jihadis. I think fear is a lousy basis for deciding what to do, though occasionally useful for motivatiion.

I assume that anyone who tries to manipulate me emotionally wth fear or anger is not my friend, and I deal with them accordingly. One of my objections to dick-waving is that it is precisely an attempt to make someone mad so they will do something stupid. And I expect people we deal with overseas to view it the same. They won't be afraid. they will think we are dumb shits.

Which is what I think of Ash Carter at this point.

[KoKo]

7. The Russian plane downing

seems to have unleashed a new round of posturing. Hard to know what the next strategy will be by the major parties involved.

There is so much conflicting news coming from the ME its hard to keep up with and to even try to figure out the alliances at this point. There's information and disinformation all in bits and pieces depending on the source.

Then there's that second Yemen Cyclone with more devastation....but, little else known at this point.

It's all pretty depressing, really.

[bemildred]

10. Well, they all lie with abandon.

Some are better at it than others, but they all do it without a thought.

[bemildred]

12. About the "new round of posturing" ...

That confused me too, in fact it still does, because it doesn't make sense. However, I think now it's the desire to provoke that lies at the base of it, they are hoping that Putin will do something stupid in reaction, as with the various provocations we keep trying, and so they see it through that lens, and that is what they talk about, "will he do something stupid this time?"

But I think he will ignore it, he is good at ignoring things like that, and he's got away with it this far.

Edit: stories like this:

http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Russia-set-to-retaliate-against-IS-after-plane-bombing-complicating-Syria-intervention-432660

And here you see Putin's reaction, he removes the problem:

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2015/11/11/commentary/world-commentary/russias-travel-ban-egypt-taking-heavy-toll/#.VkMnxXqIbY4

[KoKo]

13. ...!

Thanks...Both articles are interesting reads..

The Jerusalem Post speculation and the Bershidsky Bloomberg Business View..

[bemildred]

14. Russian news reports say Moscow has banned Egyptian national carrier from flying to Russia

MOSCOW — Russian news reports say Moscow has banned Egyptian national carrier from flying to Russia.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/russian-news-reports-say-moscow-has-banned-egyptian-national-carrier-from-flying-to-russia/2015/11/13/c7d78520-8a12-11e5-bd91-d385b244482f_story.html

[KoKo]

8. Found this about Ash Carter today...

I know it's from ICH....but, I thought it was a good read...

---------------------

US Defense Secretary Threatens Russia and China

By Patrick Martin

November 10, 2015 "Information Clearing House" - "WSWS" - US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter delivered a pointed warning of future wars Saturday in an address to a forum at the Reagan Library in southern California. The reckless and provocative character of the Pentagon chief’s speech is underscored by the targets of his saber-rattling: Russia, with the world’s second largest stockpile of nuclear weapons, and China with the third.

The subject of the forum was the restructuring of the military-intelligence apparatus to deal with the threats that strategists for US imperialism anticipate in the coming years. As Carter noted, “After 14 years of counterinsurgency and counter-terrorism–two skills we want to retain–we are in the middle of a strategic transition to respond to the security challenges that will define our future.”

Giving only brief mention of the ongoing US wars in Afghanistan and against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Carter said he wanted “to focus my remarks this afternoon on another kind of innovation for the future, which is how we’re responding to Russia, one source of today’s turbulence, and China’s rise, which is driving a transition in the Asia-Pacific.”

Carter paid tribute to the warmongering of the Reagan administration (1981-1989) in which he served, holding his first Pentagon job as an aide to Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger. He credited Reagan with a military buildup that contributed to the demise of the Soviet Union, particularly “America’s support for the mujahedeen in Afghanistan,” although Carter was diplomatically silent about this support giving rise to Al Qaeda.

The defense secretary claimed that both Russia and China, in different ways, were challenging the foundations of international order laid down by successive US administrations throughout the period since the end of World War II. “The principles that serve as that order’s foundation,” he said, “including peaceful resolution of disputes, freedom from coercion, respect for state sovereignty, freedom of navigation and overflight–are not abstractions, nor are they subject to the whims of any one country.”

Actually, those principles have been systematically violated by the US in war after war over the quarter century since the collapse of the Soviet Union. It was the existence of the USSR, not any respect for “principles,” that set limits to the depredations of US imperialism.


From 1991 on, Washington has felt itself empowered—its strategists wrote openly of a “unipolar moment” in world history—to use military force in an increasingly unrestrained and reckless fashion. Wars and other military interventions have followed in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Haiti, Yemen and now Syria, along with the ongoing buildup of US forces along the western border of Russia and the coastal waters of China.

More at......

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article43378.htm

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11. Not getting in the middle of that argument. nt