Patrick Poole, PJ Media: U.S. Analyst Admits: ‘Moderate’ Syrian Rebels Have Been Working With Al-Qaeda All Along
A Brookings-Doha Institute analyst finally spills the beans.
One of the most closely guarded secrets in Washington, D.C. about U.S. involvement in the Syrian war is that the “moderate” rebels whom the Obama administration (and many Republicans) backed were closely aligned with al-Qaeda’s official affiliate in Syria, Jabhat al-Nusra. They were also, at times, aligned with the Islamic State.
For regular PJ Media readers, this will come as no surprise. I’ve repeatedly documented the ties between the State Department’s “vetted moderate” rebel groups and designated terrorist groups based on snippets of reporting that challenged the administration’s official narrative.
WNU Editor: I guess this explains why the U.S. administration has been hesitant to supply these rebel groups with weapons. The above video is 7 months old, and it reveals how difficult it is to figure out who are the moderate Syrian rebels, and who are not. For what it is worth, the only rebels (in my opinion) who have been "moderate" are the Kurds.
6 comments:
Don't worry the State Dept. is on the case, re: recently uncovered video of Kerry demonstrating Administration investigative procedures:
https://youtu.be/SU2bJk9sPYY
I think (and I'm no expert--I just read all the time) that there were tons of moderates in the earlier days of the conflict. A lot of them got killed by the extremists. You remember when ISIS was just inside Syria and there was talk of arming the rebels against them... and then ISIS ended up killing more of them than Assad had and took their territory? A lot of the groups we were supplying ran out of ammo and money and so had no choice but to disband and/or join funded extremist groups.
So really, this might be mainly about the attrition from years of combat, not about the initial disposition. The moderates are largely dead now. And there just isn't any ammo, supplies, and money for wages for non-jihadists anymore. So if a moderate group wants to eat and fight (and thus stay alive), they have to do so under the umbrella of e.g. Al-Nusra.
And there used to be a bunch of insurgency inside ISIS territory against ISIS, along with all of the factions in the Iraq insurgency that would say they didn't like ISIS and would break with them later (like fallujah in the beginning). But ISIS killed so many of these guys and their leaders. They really consolidated their position. Al Nusra has done the same thing.
So I don't think it's fair to say there never were moderates. I think they mostly all died because we didn't really help them, or we did but they were too untrained to go up against ISIS's strength, or they're sidelined and just trying to hold on without any real support while the jihadists take territory, or they're now serving inside these organizations but mainly out of necessity or coercion.
By the time the administration got off it's ass and decided on the half measure of arming moderates, there were no credible moderates.
There never were.
Jay .... aside from the 18 to 25 years olds who may have wanted a "different society" at the beginning ..... any hope of a moderate opposition rising died when these kids started to be killed. Today .... this is a fight to the finish, and as bad as Assad is (and he is unbelievably horrid) .... ISIS, Al Qaeda. Nustra, etc. .... they are a different category.
WNU Editor,
Starting in 2006, the US started engaging and training the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, the same "guys" who ate hearts in the Islamic Uprising of the 80's, but were now, allegedly "moderates",
At the same time, kSA and the GCC were arming and training them.
28 days from Syrian Spring to heart eating selfies.
If Occupy followed the same model, 98% of a New York hotdog, would be Merryl Lynch Stockbroker, and 2% filler.
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