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In a stunning interview to the Beirut-based al Mayadeen network, Hezbollah’s secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah has outlined how Maj Gen Qassem Soleimani – assassinated by an American drone strike at Baghdad airport a litle over a year ago – was instrumental in convincing Russia to help Syria militarily in its war against Salafi-jihadis.
Here is the interview on video, and here’s the video and transcript.
Nasrallah sets the stage for the crucial visit by Maj Gen Soleimani to Moscow in 2015, when he had a two-hour face-to-face meeting with President Putin:
(In this meeting) he (Soleimani) presented a (comprehensive) strategic report to (Putin) on the situation in Syria and the region, (and explained) the proposed idea and the expected results. Of course, (in the meeting) he used a scientific, objective, military and battlefield language, (and based his statements) on maps, land areas, numbers and statistics. At this meeting, President Putin said to Hajj (Qassem): “I am convinced”, and the decision (for a Russian military effort in Syria) was made. This is what I heard from Hajj Soleimani.
Nasrallah also makes an important precision: the whole process was already in motion, at Syria’s request:
Look, I am somewhat objective and rational. I do not like to create myths. It is not accurate to say that Hajj Qassem Soleimani (alone) is the one who convinced Putin to intervene (in Syria). I prefer to say that through his strategic reading (of events), argumentation, compelling logic, and charismatic personality, Hajj Qassem Soleimani was able to provide an outstanding addition to all the previous efforts that led Russia to take the decision to come to Syria. Great efforts were made (before) and many discussions were held, yet President Putin reportedly remained hesitant.
Nasrallah adds that Soleimani, “was skilled in (the art of) persuasion and had (impeccable) logic . He did not shame Russia into (joining the war), nor did he use (empty) rhetoric. Not at all. He used a scientific language, as he explained the (possible) military and battlefield outcomes, as well as the political outcomes for the (Russian) intervention (in Syria).”
It’s all about ground intel
Now let’s put this all in context. Putin is a master geopolitical chess player. Nasrallah observes there were “a number of relevant military, security and political officials” at the meeting. This implies Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and most of all top strategist Nikolai Patrushev.
All of them were vey much aware by 2015 that the ultimate target of having ISIS/Daesh fester in Syria – in tandem with the notorious “Assad must go” campaign – was to create the conditions for a fake Caliphate to reach power, spread to the Caucasus, and destabilize Russia. That was encapsulated in the Russian formula “it’s only 900 km from Aleppo to Grozny”.
Soleimani’s merit was to produce the definitive sales pitch. Based on his vast on the ground experience, he knew that a resistance front alone would not be enough to protect Damascus. The “secret” of this two-hour Moscow meeting is that Soleimani must have made crystal clear that the next stage for the fake Caliphate would be directed against Russia’s soft underbelly, and not Iran.
Moscow’s decision caught the Pentagon and NATO proverbially sleeping: Atlanticists were not expecting a tight Russian air force contingent and a squad of top military advisers to be deployed in a flash to Syria.
But arguably the political decision had already been made. Such a complex military operation needs exhaustive planning – and that took place before Soleimani’s visit. Moreover, Russian intel knew all the details about the state of war on the ground and the glaring overextension of the Syrian Arab Army (SAA).
What Soleimani brought to the table was absolutely priceless coordination: Hezbollah commanders, IRGC advisers, assorted Iranian-led militias, in conjunction with the Syrian Tigers, as the leading shock troops, seconded by Russian elite Special Forces, intervening either in the desert or in saturated urban areas – all able to pinpoint to surgical Russian air strikes against ISIS/Daesh and those reconverted al-Qaeda “moderate rebels”.
Soleimani knew that to win this war he needed air power – and he finally managed to pull it off, as he coordinated to perfection the on the ground/intel work of several armies and the top echelons of the Russian General Staff.
Starting on this fateful 2015 meeting, the alliance between Soleimani and the Russian military evolved to ironclad proportions. Later on, the Pentagon and NATO were very much aware how Soleimani, always the supreme battlefield commander, was closely working with both Baghdad and Damascus to definitively expel US boots from Iraq. That was the main not so secret reason for his assassination.
All of the above explains why US neocons and powerful Deep State factions will never “forgive” Iran and Russia for what happened in Syria – irrespective of further actions by the handlers of the new hologram administration in Washington.
Signs, so far, point to proverbial, non-stop demonization of Russia; Trump administration’s illegal sanctions against Iranian energy exports remaining in place; and no prospect of admitting that Russia, Iran and Hezbollah prevailed in Syria.
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Predecessors of Russia, Iran and others were responsible for the dissolution of the despised Khazarian Khaganate of antiquity. Modern ‘Israel'(?) is nothing more than a reboot of the corrupt Khaganate. American/World ‘Deep State’? Too obvious.
now that the neocons are firmly back in control of the two headed monoparty, troops and weapons are flowing back into syria to their headchopper proxies. i wonder if the russian and iranian response will be as subdued as the last time or will there be a price paid by u.s. troops illegally stationed in syria?
The rage against Russia for their role in thwarting the US sponsored jihadis continues unabated. Perhaps they’ll try again in some way, this time intervening more directly rather than through a proxy army. If so then things could get rather dangerous with the reckless idiot Biden team in place. Much of what happens will be just straightforward considerations of who has the power to do what they want, rhetorical niceties cast aside.
on another syrian thread, it was posted that new research had discovered vast reserves of oil such as to match that of SA in the disputed golan heights. there was no link provided, i’ve tried to research this without luck—if anyone can provide more on this i’d be most grateful. while we have many reasons why syria is foremost on the israeli/us radar, location, water & reluctance to embrace the universal embrace of the fed…oil reserves to match the waning SA would be further reason for renewed military action on the part of the ‘axis of kindness’. thank you, & thank you nasrallah, pepe & solemani.
JUSA wants to topple Iran and Russia because they had the audacity to nationalize their oil/natural gas by seizing them from the Jews. Jews do not take kindly to people who took their money. They think oil is God’s gift to them. The same with Venezuela, Iraq and Libya. Jews want all the oil that’s not in the hands of their puppet Arabs.
Look at the ten countries with the largest oil reserves:
1. Venezuela (largest known reserve)
2. Saudi Arabia
3. Canada
4. Iran
5. Iraq
6. Kuwait
7. UAE
8. Russia
9. Libya
10. USA
Hence all the meddling in Venezuela, Iran, Iraq, Russia and Libya — all their oil belong to the Jews, just like Wall Street belongs to the Jews — how dare those plebs try to mess with WS short sellers through GameStop and AMC, of course they need to be shut down, blocked from buying.
Thanks to technology, the Jews can now easily control everything — fake news, censor speech, change election results, doxx the dissenters, decide who can trade in the “free” market.
Our own Bolshevik Revolution is well underway. Jews now also have their own Red Army in the US, it’s called the FBI. They own everything and they intend to keep it. They are God’s chosen.
Simon Watkins on Oilprice dot com writes excellent recaps about oil business in the area.
I don’t know about the Golan heights, but there are surely huge deposits and interests in and near Syria.
Yes, and one aspect of that rage was the attempt to destroy Gen. Michael Flynn, who was the first high-ranking US official to blow the whistle on the proxy regime-change war the US was fighting by arming the jihadis.
Hah! Putin better just watch out ’cause Biden plays four dementia-nal chess an’ he has a Magic Pen to make happen whatever he wants an’ Play-Doh to make high speed trains and rockets and stuff and after his nappy-nap he gets to play Pony with Pelosi, so there!
Just a note of explanation: a large quantity of ZOG Canada`s reserves are in the “oil sands” (formerly tar sands). It is not oil, as most people understand oil. It is more like fluid bitumen. It is massively expensive to extract, and has an enormous impact on the air and water quality in the region. It needs high oil prices to be viable. Number 3 looks good on paper, but not so much in reality.
The main reason, in my opinion, for the hatred, manifest in the typically despicable murder of Soleimani while on a diplomatic mission requested by the USA (a perfidy over which the Zionazis crowed prettily)is that the Russians et al have thwarted the Oded Yinon Plan in Syria. That scheme, to destroy and break-up, along sectarian and ethnic lines, all Israel’s neighbours, is a truly Hitlerite crime. There’s a nasty irony. And it has killed millions, already.
But when Talmudist/Zionazi leaders in Israel declare, as the ‘Yesha Council of Rabbis and Torah Sages’ did during Israel’s barbaric bombing of Lebanon in 2006, that, under their interpretation of Judaic Law, killing civilians is not just permissible, but a mitvah, or sanctified good deed, the blood shed is sacramental. And when Smotrich, the Likud Deputy Speaker of the Knesset, can declare, on Israeli TV, that ‘Damascus belongs to the Jews’, the killing can only go on, until, one way or another, it is stopped. The Zionazis see their victims as insects, so the inevitable rise of resistances like Hezbollah, both enrages and surprises them, then frightens them. In that circumstance hideous miscalculation is pretty much inevitable.
Putin’s air force bombed the truck convoys which were hauling Syrian oil to Turkey.
Turkey, a NATO member, was Islamic State’s connection to the world. Anyone going in or out of the caliphate arrived or departed through Istanbul. Turkey had the international airports, seaports, banking, hospitals, and world-class services Islamic State needed. Islamic State couldn’t have raised money selling oil without the cooperation of Turkey.
Remember that used pickup truck from Texas which ended up as a gun platform for ISIS? Putin could tell you the obvious: ISIS was being supplied through third countries who wanted the caliphate to grow stronger, for reasons of their own.
Are there people who believe this?
I mean-serious?
Here’s what I am sure of, the return of of Mt. Navalny was the start of a regime change in Russia.
The poor Libyans are now suffering because she was one notch higher on the regime change list than Syria. Sadly for her there was no intervention. I recall reading a report that Putin was seething at Hillary Clinton for mocking Ghaddafi’s death… So that’s probably part of the impetus for Russia to intervene in Syria as well.
Escobar’s heart is in the right place, but this article is comically misinformed. Russia was planning its Syria intervention by 2013, and probably earlier than that. It passed a series of laws that year requiring government officials to liquidate their overseas assets, this was in anticipation of increased geopolitical tensions with the West.
This is completely wrong, of course. Everyone knew about Russia’s plans while they were being hatched, but they also knew, from a legal and military perspective, that there wasn’t much they could to to prevent it, either. This was why they began attacking Russia diplomatically at the time, and also the reason they so aggressively exploited the subsequent Ukraine crisis.
Putin’s seething at Clinton’s display of her psychopathic wickedness was simply a necessary reaction to contact with spiritual Evil. The ruling US elites are quite simply, and probably literally, diabolical.
Appealing to a true nationalist requires showing him how an action is in his nation’s interest and won’t lead it to ruin.
If only U.S. leaders required this kind of presentation before engaging in wars for Israel.
“It had been reported by the Financial Times in February 2013 that Israel’s Netanyahu-led government granted an American company the first license to explore for oil and gas on the Golan Heights.
A local subsidiary of the New York-listed Genie Energy company was given exclusive rights to a 153-square mile radius in the southern part of the Golan Heights. Genie Energy is advised by former Vice President Dick Cheney and its shareholders include Cheney, media mogul Rupert Murdoch and former CIA director James Woolsey.”
Link: https://visionmag.org/cheneys-genie-energy-trump-golan-recognition/
I had made the statement about Golan oil on the other thread you mention. The article I had in mind from some years ago stating the unprecedented depth of the seam was in oilprice.com. I have not been able to find the article again through search there. Here is something from the Hindustan Times that speaks of billions of barrels.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/did-oil-discovery-trigger-trump-s-historic-golan-move/story-D1ZuwO0lraF4dNzP0aytpK.html
And here is something from Tablet magazine:
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/billions-of-barrels-of-israeli-oil-tapped-the-golan-heights
@sarz, thank you. much appreciated. thank you also patti & nobody. nobody, genie is fascinating…i think its concern has shifted to off shore rights, lebanon & israel. & i vaguely (sorry my memory is fast becoming an embarrassment) that genie had undergone a name shift of some sort. if anyone can update that shell game i’d be most grateful. the mena is going to continue to be israel’s main focus; of course using american (5eyes) blood & treasure. as the west sinks israel sees itself finally rising to global dominance. for example, the iron dome, financed & supposedly created by both israel & america tech know how, israel now refuses to share. this is an indicator, along with a leading rabbi stating that israel will become the world’s rightful leader. this is possible, imho, only when the unmentionables own iran (for oil & treasure), syria (for water & resources), lebanon (for more of the same), egypt (mots), & iraq (mots). all given to israel gratis 5eyes blood. the red shield in london has played a long bloody game…never betting on china & russia being able to look out far & in deep & that both would again be brought to bear. we’ve been in a ‘cold’ war for @ least 2 decades. china ‘overlooked’ the bombing of its embassy, the opium wars, russia restrained her reaction to sochi, the bombing of her men’s choir, the bombing of a plane, the assassination of an ambassador, & like china & iran, the humiliation of rape @ the hands of the harvard/london elites. those whom believe china, russia or iran will succumb to defeat once again, really need to open their aperture. this ongoing war will not end with the axis of resistance’s submission but rather with the defeat of wrong headed greed & desire for global dominance. michael hudson’s latest post explores this battle ground magnificently.
Nice to see you posting again, MM. Missed your contributions over at the Vineyard of the Saker.
Here’s a very chilling analysis of what is in store in the ME now that the zionists are completely in the driver’s seat with Joe “I am a zionist!” Bidet installed as POTUS (although it was Trump who actually made the CENTCOM move Magnier discusses):
https://www.sott.net/article/447959-Dangerous-escalation-in-the-Middle-East-The-US-and-Israel-go-hand-in-glove-for-the-next-battle-against-Iran
A lot of folks here at Unz think Russia (and maybe China) will intervene if an attack on Iran is launched by the US/Israel. I am not so sanguine and do not share such sentiments, although I certainly hope that if so, the Russians (and again, perhaps China) would let the Israelis/USA know in advance that there will be hell to pay if they move forward with such plans, thereby potentially causing the USA/Israeli axis to recalculate. Again, I doubt it.
But the noises I keep hearing from Israel are much more focused and higher pitched in squealing that they will soon ‘do something’ about Iran’s ‘nuclear program’ (which they’ve squealed about before, but done little other than goad the US into killing Soleimani in yet another act of utter cowardice and, as you say, perfidy.) Note in the article Magnier’s assumption that Iran’s fatwa on never pursuing nukes may be pushed aside if they feel the survival of Iran is at stake (as North Korea has adequately demonstrated the utility of through its program having forestalled any attack on them effectively.) Perhaps Iran already has, and that is why Israel/USA are moving forward more aggressively in the direction of an attack. I strongly suspect not, or Israel would be literally freaking out, but nascent Iranian inertia in that direction may be the more likely catalyst for what we are now seeing displayed by what Magnier discusses in the article. I suspect Israel has excellent intelligence in Iran and may know the true score.
Certainly the changes that the USA has instituted via moving operations involving Israel into CENTCOM is particularly worrisome, as the implications that Magnier points out are sadly indicative of a shift towards an actual attack moving forward, rather than just more hot air from Tel-Aviv that Iran can ignore with relative impunity.
JR;
What are the authenticated sources you are using?
Thank you.
Mustapha, I was harassed too much at Saker, which I still read irreligiously, by the anthropogenic climate destabilisation denial cultists. As for attacking Iran-it’s a religious dooty for Bibi and the Talmudo-fascists. A New Purim, like his ‘New Pearl Harbor’ and lots of dead ‘followers of the Haman of Our Age’, all mitzvot given up to the Judaic God, and his self-appointed Representative on Earth, Bibi the Great, King of Israel. If they’re lucky they’ll get a New Masada, and their ‘Christian Zionist’ ‘friends’ that End Times apocalypse they are drooling for.
As they say wish in one hand and crap in the other and see which one fills up the quickest, your simply wishing that there will be some sort of color revolution in Russia which is about as far from happening as the distance to the moon.!!
The Syrian rebels had no air force. Nor did they have any real anti aircraft capabilities (the Syrian family dictatorship government forces were bombing the rebels from helicopters).
An Iranian successfully intervened against Syrians in Syria by calling in Russia to reigh high tech death from the skys. Having established a huge reputation he went to Iraq on regular flights right under the nose of the Americans. Talk about foolhardy!
Yes because Russia and its thermonuclear weapons ICBMs aimed at the Pentagon, Langley ECT ECT would be much easier to control when established and under the control of Taras Bulba style warlords than one teetotaler like Putin.
Does not sound like Russia and Iran’s victory has brought them any tangible benefits. Maj Gen Qassem Soleimani was his country’s Chuck Norris, but about Vietnam (where he lost a brother) Norris said “It was not a war in which our country was in danger”.
America’s plans for Iran involve slow economic throttling and the immiseration of it people. The Iranian leadership need the US as a bogeyman, but the truth is the US wants no part of an actual war with Iran, which is why America has never killed Iranians in Iran. Soleimani was an adventurer who went into the lion’s den. He was no coward, and as brave men fighting superpowers tend to do, he suffered death from above, which is what he brought to no-less-brave-Syrians. The doddering Iranian elite must be so sad at the demise of a relatively young and dynamic figure being talked of as a future leader of the country.
1 they were dropping barrle bombs they simply didnt have the quality and quantiy of weapons russians brought into play
2 destabilization does not mean takeover and it was more going for destabilization of kaukasus
3it has, brought benefit they have a friendly albeit broken down country on their border
Great article by Pepe. Very informative video.