Tuesday, February 13, 2018

Syria: Reports that the US air-strike on Saturday killed hundreds of Russian mercenaries

(Deir Ezzor) It was reported over the weekend that the US carried out airstrikes on Syrian militia who had had decided to cross into SDF (Kurdish) territory in which grab an oil field which just happened to be there.  The story goes that the Syrian Milita had asked the Kurds if they could have it, and the Kurds said no, as it would mean allowing troops loyal to the regime to cross the de facto border between the Kurds and the Syrian Government.  Well backed up by 500 armed men a lot of tanks , artillery and 4x4s sporting heavy machine guns they advanced into contact in which to make light work of the defending Kurds. Problem was the Kurds called in Air-Support and the Syrian Militia had their own Battle of Big horn.  At the time it was reported that only 100 men had been killed (As well as over 20 tanks)


However ‘The Conflict Intelligence Team, a group of well-respected Russian online researchers,’ noted an increase on that day on social media of the deaths of hundreds of Russian Mercenaries working for the secretive Russian private military group Wagner. Now Russian sources are saying as many as 200 Russian nationals could have been killed in a clash last Wednesday. Which is strange as Moscow reported at the time that no Russians had been killed. Grigory Yavlinsky, an opposition politician, said that if Russiancitizens had been killed in large numbers, Vladimir Putin and other officials owed the country an explanation.
“I demand an explanation as to why Russian nationals take part in ground military operations in Syria, despite the statements by the president and defense minister that Russian military formations will be withdrawn from this country,”

It has also been reported today that a US drone took out a Syrian T72 tank, but then they are armed with Hellfire Missiles and it was designed to take out Russian tanks.
If the high estimates of Russian casualties are confirmed, it would be the most lethal clash between US and Russian citizens since the end of the cold war