...
Bloodless Victory Against a Passive Opponent
Even considering all this, Obama waited the better part of a week after the Syria talks formally ended, and some two-and-a-half months after his administration had reached a consensus that Russia was behind ... ... outcome, Putin had already won: he took to heart von Clausewitz’s maxim that “War is the continuation of policy [or politics] by other means,” something that Obama seems to have missed. Putin had essentially “weaponized” WikiLeaks ...
... commercial dispute court in Stockholm, Sweden.
If it seemed the players of Team Putin gave up too easily on having RUE taken out of the game, they had other plans in motion to counter Tymoshenko’s effort to limit Russian influence in Ukrainian politics.
Criminal Scheme #2: Manafort Key Agent in Laundering Dirty Gas Money to U.S. During Crackdown
Even before Putin agreed to let Tymoshenko kill RUE, his agents—including Firtash, Mogilevich, and Yanukovych (the latter with Manafort ...
... further made clear by this new New York Times story showing at least $12.7 million in authorized payments. His role in Ukrainian politics over the last few years is even cloudier. UPDATE 8/15: Some of Manafort's subordinates were still operating in ... ... feels he shares with Putin, and Gen. Flynn is on record advocating closer U.S. ties with Russia, in particular on the issues of Syria and terrorism. August 8th update: interestingly, the Green Party's candidate for president for 2016, Dr. Jill Stein,...
... has failed to effectively deal with conflict in Libya, Ukraine, and Syria, all within or near its periphery. The situation in Syria has led to refugee and migrant crises unseen in the world or Europe since WWII; Europe’s response has been grossly ... ... refugees.
Leaders like Angela Merkel of Germany, trying to show kindness and compassion to refugees, may be ousted sooner by politics rather than later for her troubles, and other governments balk at attempts to coordinate regional refugee and economic ...
... the timeline, geography, facts, context, and history concerning the withdrawal and the rise of ISIS makes this abundantly clear and provable beyond any reasonable doubt. Ultimately, Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki's policies and the dynamics of Syria's raging civil war are the clear catalysts and drivers behind current crises with ISIS both in Syria and Iraq.
By Brian E. Frydenborg (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter @bfry1981) December 16th, 2015
Originally published on LinkedIn Pulse ...
... Russian fighter-bomber jet that Turkey alleges violated its airspace. The Russian jet had been bombing Turkmen positions/villages—part of a series of Russian bombings in recent days that have targeted Turkmen—on the border area of Turkey and Syria. Turkey is supporting these Turkmen rebels against Assad that Russia is bombing, and had previously asked Russia not to bomb them. Turkey also claims it warned the plane ten times before it fired, but Russia denies this. The alleged violation of ...
... which occurred in Paris, and the issue of surveillance is far more complicated than the documentary Citizenfour would have you believe.
To those who think the only solution to this is simply more use of force and would blame Obama for not invading Syria and Iraq today like Bush invaded Iraq in 2003, please, just go away and stop talking. There are many complex factors in play. France in particular has serious problems with how it treats its Muslims and immigrants, problems that were not unrelated ...
... are able to strike anywhere, including Russia itself.
By Brian E. Frydenborg (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter @bfry1981) October 2nd, 2015
@ValkryV
Originally published on LinkedIn Pulse
AMMAN — Anyone who’s been paying attention to the Syrian vortex of death, and Russia’s role in this vortex, knows that Putin’s motivations are not terribly difficult to understand and are, in fact, obvious. They generally run on three levels:
1.) Preserve the regime of Bashar al-Assad, ...
... maybe even some of the authority from the Executive Branch to the Legislative Branch. Even the rebels and the government in Syria both strangely united in questioning this move of Obama’s. Again, such an action is one that works better in the abstract ... ... facilitate just that. This was, to use my own label, after Russia’s long stint as the obstructionist Tea Party of international politics and also after Putin’s farcical, blithely hypocritical New York Times op-ed calling for a diplomatic, non-violent ...
...
Obama withdrew from Iraq and was ahead of the curve compared to many in realizing American troops could not bring about the politics necessary to stabilize Iraq, but he did so in a responsible, gradual way that no sane person could say caused a drastic ... ... allies that he would see our troops out in 2011. We will come to ISIS (and Obama’s mild military reengagement in Iraq) and Syria as separate issues.
Israeli/Palestinian Peace
Here, one may be tempted to make more of the efforts of the Obama Administration ...
