Turkey has maintained a buffer zone five miles inside Syria since June 2012, when a Syrian air defense missile shot down a Turkish fighter plane that had strayed into Syrian airspace. Under revised rules of engagement put in effect then, the Turkish air force would evaluate any target coming within five miles of the Turkish border as an enemy and act accordingly.
The downing of the Russian Su-24 fighter fits perfectly with the way in which the Turkish government has been ratcheting up tensions on the border, using its jihadi allies to seize Syrian territory, and trying to incite a violent reaction that will force greater NATO or US involvement. I seriously doubt that Putin is gullible enough to take the bait and overreact to this obvious and pathetic provocation in Ankara. He will exact his pound of flesh at some other time, a time of his own choosing.
The Turks have shot down a Russian jet that may (or may not) have been skirting into Turkish territory at the time. This marks the first time since the start of the Cold War that nuclear-armed NATO has committed an act of war against another nuclear-armed state. It’s a well-known and well-rehearsed scenario for a possible global conflagration.
Turkey’s provocative action puts Russia one step away from full-scale war with NATO
There still remains the illegality of what the French and the Americans are doing in Syria with their air forces. As Moscow has repeatedly pointed out, the US-led operations are in violation of international law, as they have not been approved by the Syrian government. Russia’s operations were authorised by the Syrian authorities and are therefore legally deployed.
Once again in the history of American intervention we have the spectacle of the creators being threatened by their own creation. It’s not that long ago that the mujahideen, who benefited from American financial and military support during the Soviet war in Afghanistan, later turned on the West in the form of Al-Qa‘ida. Yesterday’s “freedom fighters” have become today’s “terrorists.”
Excluding legitimate analyses of profoundly important events like those in Paris when they are most needed is not responsible, careful journalism. It is dangerous cowardice. It is most definitely not a politically neutral position.
Paul Mason, economics editor of “Channel Four News” in the UK, has emerged as one of the foremost apologists for military intervention in Syria. More significant still, he is a vocal advocate of US-led military action against Russia and China.
For the last 12 hours we’ve been constantly refreshing Google News for just one — one — western article about Putin’s bombshell comments at the G20 summit in Antalya. You would think that the Russian President stating publicly that ISIS is receiving money from 40 different countries, including G20 members, would be “newsworthy”. Right?
The panic and fear witnessed on the streets of the city shown on the mainstream news channels in the aftermath of the attacks will, I suspect, be an illustration of what is to come in the future.
In truth, France had been implicated on the side of Al-Qaïda at least since the beginning of 2011. At that time, the United Kingdom and France had signed up for the US project called « the Arab Spring ». The goal of this operation was to overthrow all the secular Arab régimes and replace them with dictatorships run by the Muslim Brotherhood.
By comparison, the Times (11/14/15) had six first-day stories on the Paris attacks, three of them on the front page. There were some 20 follow-up stories the next day (11/15/15), four of them on the front page. The day after that (11/16/15), there were 15 more follow-up stories, another four on Page 1. One of the November 16 follow-ups—on page 6—looked at reactions in Beirut to the Paris bombing.
