Russia says Assad will not back down first but shouldn't he?

First, Russia knows damn well that Bashar Al-Assad is wantonly slaughtering as many people as they can. They have resorted to daily attacks on cities and citizens including Alawite's Assad's own sect using tanks and fighter jets. They have purposely resorted to strafing bread lines, killing doctors and bombing hospitals. It is ludicrous for Russia to say it is wrong to expect Assad to stop this first and withdraw its troops from the cities..

Assad will not back down first: Russia said Saturday it would be "naive" for outside powers to expect Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to withdraw his troops first from cities and then wait for the opposition to follow suit. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said such a demand on the regime amounted to a call for "capitulation" that Western and Arab nations had no right to make.

"When our partners say that the government must stop first and withdraw all its soldiers and weapons from cities - and only then call on the opposition to do the same - well, this is a completely unworkable scheme," said Lavrov. "Either people are naive or it is some sort of provocation," he noted in answering questions from students at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations.

On top of that, we knew from day one that if there was to be success for the rebels against Assad who is killing hundreds of his own people every day that almost the entire military would have to defect and take on Assad. As of August 27 the FSA said more than 60,000 of all ranks and all disciplines from the highest ranking General on down have defected with many more waiting for their chance to defect.

Long Wait to Defect From Assads Forces: “We don’t go on patrol any more. We spend the days without leaving the barracks, following the news on TV. We have not fired a single bullet since the beginning of the revolution.” Some have suggested that the Democratic Unionist Party (PYD), the dominant political party among the Kurds of Syria, may have negotiated truce with Bashar Al Assad’s government. Party chairman Salah Muslim has denied to IPS that there has been any agreement.Many within Syria also suggest that Damascus has abandoned this region in an attempt to distance Kurds from the Free Syrian Army forces.

Furat says he has “no problem whatsoever with the PYD.” But he can hardly hide his anxiety. “I tried to flee to Turkey but the Syrian army captured me and I was detained for ten days. Today it would be impossible to get back home due the myriad of checkpoints manned by both rebels and the government. “Many comrades say they will wait at their positions and put down their weapons when the FSA arrives, but nobody knows what will happen when the rebels reach this area. I doubt I’ll get my salary this month, so I’ll try to cross to Turkey or Iraq at the first opportunity.” Another policeman, Dilhar, recalls his recent defection.

Add this to the 23,000 Assad's murderers have already killed along with some 500,000 that have already fled the country and rightly so unless they had the will to stay and fight Assad, plus the knowledge that some 2 1/2 million people need aid aid, food, medicine, and shelter. Don't you think Assad should back off first?

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said government forces had killed 27 people, while 12 soldiers died in the fighting. More than 23,000 people have died since the uprising against Assad began in March 2011, according to the U.K. based observatory. Two explosive devices also rocked an area near a government military unit in Damascus, the Syrian Arab News Agency reported on its website, without saying where it got the information. Al Arabiya television, citing a rebel group, said the bombing targeted the Syrian army’s command.

More than 2.5 million people need aid, protection inside Syria as China says safe zone will not work: "More than two and a half million people, including the refugees from Palestine and Iraq, are now in great need of the assistance and protection inside Syria," Eliasson said. "This is more than double the number (UN) Under-Secretary-General Valerie Amos reported to you in March." "The most pressing needs include water and sanitation, food and shelter, blankets and health care," he said. "Less than half of primary health care facilities and hospitals are now fully functional in Syria."

"The destruction of pharmaceutical plants and storage facilities is making drugs and equipment scarce," he said. "At the same time, the number of people in need of medical care increases." "Access to health facilities has become difficult or impossible in some areas due to violence, check points and fuel shortages," he said. "Food prices have tripled in some areas."


Syrian troops take town on refugee flight route: Syrian troops recaptured from rebels Thursday a border town used by refugees to cross to Jordan, activists said, an apparent bid by the regime to stem the flood of Syrians fleeing their country's civil war. Damascus meanwhile accused Cairo of stirring up violence in the country, as Syria lengthens the list of other Arab countries that it blames for its unrest. Egypt's President Mohammed Morsi called this week for Syria's president to step down in an indication of the increasing isolation of Damascus in the Arab world.

In the latest clashes, hundreds of Syrian soldiers backed by 20 tanks assaulted Tel Chehab, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and local activist Mohammed Abu Houran said. Rebels fought back but were pushed out. A Jordanian army officer living just across the border said by telephone that he had heard heavy shelling starting early in the morning, but that it had subsided by midday. "It sounded like the shelling came from tanks and armored vehicles," said the officer, who cannot be identified under standing army regulations. "God help the Syrian people."

This is no way to get the people on your side. Forcing them to stay in the cities without the basic necessities of life so you can eradicate them is not the way to success. Unless Russia comes out in the open to help Assad stay in power, despite Iran's, Russia's, and Hezbollah's help the rebels will persevere. It is what comes after that that is grossly disconcerting not only in rebuilding Syria but in preventing the devolution of the middle east into all out sectarian war and then WW3.



James Joiner
Gardner, Ma
http://anaverageamericanpatriot.blogspot.com