| "Weapons transfer to target group achieved, sir." "Well done, Jones. Well done, indeed," is precisely how I hope the conversation didn't go. But the other possibility isn't much better: "I don't understand it, sir. Every time we arm and train a group of the good rebels, the bad rebels overrun them and take the weapons." |
At least 29 fighters from the Western-armed Hazm movement were killed along with six Al-Nusra
...the current nom de guerre of al-Qaeda in the Levant, which isn't to be confused with al-Qaeda in Iraq and the Levant...
Front jihadists, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
It said fierce fighting had broken out on Friday night for Base 46, west of the city of Aleppo.
"Al-Nusra captured Base 46," said Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Britannia-based Observatory.
Base 46 is a sprawling military compound that rebel fighters seized in November 2012 from troops loyal to Syrian
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneckal-Assad
Scourge of Qusayr...
.
In a statement, residents in the nearby rebel-held village of Atareb criticized the attack on the base and appealed to Al-Nusra to instead fight the "infidel regime and its allies".
The offensive came a month after Al-Nusra -- al-Qaeda's official affiliate in Syria -- expelled Hazm from Regiment 111, another base they had taken from Assad's forces.
Hazm is mainly present in northern Syria. Last year, it was the first to receive U.S.-made anti-tank missiles from its Western backers.
It is one of a number rebel groups that the United States classes as "moderate". They are loosely branded as the Free Syrian Army
... the more palatable version of the Syrian insurgency, heavily influenced by the Moslem Brüderbund...
.