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| Terror Networks |
| Syrian Rebels: Obama admin ignored early plan to stop IS |
| 2015-01-04 |
| Two months before Mosul and other cities in northern Iraq fell to the Islamic State last June, representatives of a Syrian rebel group called on the new U.S. special envoy for Syria with an outline of a plan to stop the extremists. The group urged the U.S. to shift its focus to eastern Syria, where the Islamic State had emerged from Raqqa and other towns under its control and begun military operations to capture Deir el Zour province. If Islamic State fighters seized the region’s oil and gas resources, they’d gain enough power to destroy the U.S.-backed rebel forces across northern Syria and link the swath of territory they held in Syria to that under their control in Iraq’s restive Anbar province. The Islamic State didn’t follow quite the path that Syrian rebel officials had predicted, conquering Mosul before Deir el Zour. But the rebels were right that the extremists’ takeover of eastern Syria would speed the demise of the moderates by radicalizing the battlefield, opening the border with Iraq to free movement of arms and manpower, and providing the Islamic State with income from the sale of oil and gas. But the presentation April 17 to special State Department envoy Daniel Rubinstein was stillborn. The plea for immediate financial support for moderate forces in the east, backing for a rebel offensive in Aleppo that would divert Islamic State forces, and relief and medical supplies in the east went unanswered. |
| Posted by:Pappy |
| #3 By most accounts, whether pre-June 2014 or post-June 2014, pre-Congressional Inaugural 2015 or post same, the Bammer's FP is still putting the US + mainstream America at serious risk. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2015-01-04 21:42 |
| #2 The administration also has tried to choke off complaints from rebel officials and commanders, threatening a total aid cutoff if they’re quoted in the news media, rebel officials said. For this reason McClatchy isn’t naming its rebel sources. That and keeping a lid on sources makes it more difficult for AG Holder to haul McClatchy before a judge threatening to prosecute under the Espionage Act. |
| Posted by: DepotGuy 2015-01-04 11:07 |
| #1 White House spokesman Alistair Baskey said Nagata and his team were “free to meet with members of the moderate Syrian opposition as they deem fit in order to advance their train and equip program.” Which shifts the blame to General Nagata, who dutifully says nothing. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2015-01-04 00:39 |