The BBC, CBS and other are reporting this morning that Syrian Republican Guard Brigadier General Manaf Tlass has “defected” to France via Turkey. According to CBS:
Brig Gen Manaf Tlass The al-Arabiya television network quoted French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius as saying the defected general was already on his way to Paris, where he is known to have many personal connections, and where the international “Friends of Syria” conference was taking place.
Say again?! An acting Brigadier General of the Syrian Republican guard was “known to have many personal friends” in Paris and amongst the participants of a conference which is clearly organized and run by the US CIA?! Any the (in)famous Syrian Mukhabarat did not find that a sufficient cause to at the very least have him removed from his position and investigated?
Looking at this grinning play-boy with the obligatory cigar in his mouth I am reminded of my good Syrian friends who more than 10 years ago were telling me how incompetent and corrupt the Syrian regime was and how its security services were feared, but only by regular people, not the regime’s elites.
By the way, Tlass is not Alawite, but Sunni. Just saying…
On a related topic, I just watched a report by Russian TV crews from the Syrian city of Duma, near Damascus. The city was recently retaken by government forces following many days of battle against al-Qaeda units and the footage made by the Russian TV crews of the ruins of Duma reminds me of similarly looking images of Grozny after the eviction of the Chechen insurgency. Clearly, these were heavy battles against much more than just a few “snipers” or “terrorists”. The Syrian government soldiers interviewed by Russian reporters said that their opponents were very well trained (in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Iraq) and that they were also very well armed.
I hope that I am mistaken in my hunch, but it sure looks to me like the regime is in very bad shape and could begin crumbling apart.
The Saker
Saker, It may be that he is only visiting his dying father, who has been in Paris seeking medical treatment for some time. For more details, Penny over at Penny for your thoughts blog has a lot of good info:
http://pennyforyourthoughts2.blogspot.com/
I think you’ll like that blog.
@Lysander:It may be that he is only visiting his dying father
Unlikely, alas. If he was under house arrest, it would be logical to expect him to run. If he was not under house arrest, then he is a Brigadier General of the Guard, in which case he cannot leave his country in the midst of a large-scale insurgency, much less so for a country which is “hyper-Zionist” and at the forefront of the fight against Syria.
I will be delighted if I am proven wrong, but so far I don’t buy it.
@Lysander: I think you’ll like that blog.
I do, it looks very good indeed. Thanks for the pointer!
Dear Saker,
This sort of defection is meaningless in the big scheme of things.
The Tlass family has traditionally been very close to the American CIA, and the Assad clan knew it all along…
CIA has been re-doubling its efforts in pushing for defections like that one, in order to compensate for the utter failure so far, in pushing the regime over the edge.
Best,
Joe
@Joe: This sort of defection is meaningless in the big scheme of things.
No doubt about that
The Tlass family has traditionally been very close to the American CIA, and the Assad clan knew it all along…
But is that not the strongest possible indictment of both the Tlass family and the Assad clan? If the Tlass family are traitors and the Assad family knows this, then are they not ALL traitors?
Clearly this regime who, let me remind those who like to “forget” about this, was more than willing to sub-contract and torture “rendered” *SUSPECTS* for the US CIA was full to the brim of pro-US and CIA-linked individuals, and not anti-Israeli Syrian patriots. And then, I want to restate something else here:
I personally cannot imagine that the Israelis would have murdered Imad Mughniyeh without the active support of top-level individuals in the Syrian regime.
So my conclusion is this: the Assad regime was ROTTEN ROTTEN ROTTEN to the core.
Frankly, if it wasn’t my belief that the so-called Syrian opposition was even worse, I would personally cheer the overthrow of Assad and his clique of corrupt and immoral minions a la Tlass.
Unlike those who now like to lionize Assad as some kind of heroic resistant to the Empire, I see him as another Saddam, another Mubarak or as another Noriega: a puppet of the Empire who fell out of favor or who out-lived his useful “shelf life” and who can now be replaced by some other CIA puppet.
This is all very disgusting and very depressing as the victims of all these ugly operations are, as always, the Syrian people…
Honestly Saker, I have to say you’re being too harsh regarding Syria’s role in resistance. It’s far from a perfect record, but it certainly can’t be compared to Mubarak or the Jordanian and Saudi kings. Not even close.
Yes, they joined Gulf War one and yes they helped the CIA in the early two thousands (though they legitimately thought that radical Salfists are their enemies as well and who could blame them.)
On the key elements Syria never budged despite enormous pressure. There was huge pressure during the Bush years to get them to close Hamas offices in Damascus. No dice for the empire. Huge pressure to break away from Iran and Hezbollah. But in fact they drew closer to them.
I recall Rumsfeld in the month after the Iraq invasion accusing Syria of hiding Iraq’s nonexistent WMD. That was a serious hint and threat. Syria stood firm.
Sorry but as a Sunni Muslim I have to ask myself when was the last time a Sunni lead state exhibited the resistance shown by Syria/Iran/HA today? Maybe Egypt under Nasser came close and that ended in disaster with Egypt now firmly in the collaborationist camp.
At this point, the only choice is to support the rebels, whose ultimate goal is to break up the Syrian state (the actual fighters may not want that, but their western paymasters sure do) or the government…for all its faults…that will keep the country together.
A very easy choice for me.
Off Topic, but I wanted to commend Xerxes, one of your occasional commenters. While I ate up Erdogan’s BS like it was ice cream a couple of years back, Xerxes had him pegged from the first moment. I should have listened to him.
Dear Saker;
In your response to me@07 July, 2012 11:16…I fully and unequivocally concur with your statement about the Syrian Mafia.
I have a lot of respect for Lysander, but i do not agree with him here, not one bit…
The Assad Mafia has been hiding behind the accomplishments of Hezbollah and Iran for decades, and all they have provided is a P.O.Box for the Resistance material transfers from Iran and a Strategic depth. Period. It is a lot, but that’s it!
Best,
Joe
@Lysander:It may be that he is only visiting his dying father
I seriously doubt that as he would know that he would be detained by French secret service agents as soon as he touched down on French soil.
@Joe: This sort of defection is meaningless in the big scheme of things.
No doubt about that
Is it? It undermined the Gadaffi regime and if a close friend of Assad defects seeing he is on the losing side who was put into a position of power due to his family friendship to Assad presumably other members of the security apparatus where inaugurated in the same manner and are thinking the same thing.
This is all very disgusting and very depressing as the victims of all these ugly operations are, as always, the Syrian people.
From what I am seeing on the internet virtually every Syrian in the diaspora supports the revolution/insurgency in the Mid East, Europe and North America and only a matter of time before the Assad regime falls.
The best course for Russia to take is make a secret deal with Israel as they both have vested interest in Syria and against Islamist factions coming to power.
@ Lysander
Egyptian Cleric Yaaqub: MB Presidential Candidate Mursi Told Me Shiites Are More Dangerous Than Jews
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3OVHQ65V1g
Who says that Russia and Israel are not on the same page in Syria…?
I didn’t!!!
Best,
Joe
@Lysander & Joe: On the key elements Syria never budged despite enormous pressure. There was huge pressure during the Bush years to get them to close Hamas offices in Damascus. No dice for the empire. Huge pressure to break away from Iran and Hezbollah. But in fact they drew closer to them.
A couple of short points here: closing the offices of Hamas in Damascus was only a PR issues for all sides involved. If Assad would have done so, Hamas could have easily re-located to Iran and given the Iranians a fantastic PR boost. It would also have made Assad look terrible in the eyes of the Arab public opinion. The real effect would have been zero, as Hamas does, like Hezbollah, have informal, semi-clandestine, “offices” in every Arab and even European capital anyway. Dumping Hezbollah would have been an even bigger PR disaster for the Assad regime. So they “courageously” hosted Imad Mugniyeh in Damascus, and then helped the Israelis murder him….
Sorry but as a Sunni Muslim I have to ask myself when was the last time a Sunni lead state exhibited the resistance shown by Syria/Iran/HA today?
Well, then the issue is simple: if you consider yourself a Sunni Muslim on theological grounds, then you can simply not endorse/condone/defend the actions of Sunni politicians, and if you consider yourself Sunni Muslim on family grounds, you can distance yourself from this branch of Islam on political grounds. I am neither Shia nor Sunni, but I notice the very same thing you do: the Shia are at the forefront of the resistance to the Empire, whereas the Sunni are either ineffective in their resistance (Hamas, Muslim Brotherhood, FIS), or outright collaborators (KSA, Qatar, al-Qaeda). *WHY* most Sunni Muslims have fallen away so far from the teachings of, say, a brilliant figure like Sayyid Qutb is not something I can explain simply because I did not study the history of the Muslim Brotherhood, but I suspect that the truly Satanic trio of “USA+KSA+Israel” has played a key role in turning Sunni resistors into subservient collaborators. Whatever may be the case, you also have the option of being a Sunni in the tradition of Sayyid Qutb and his true followers. Does that make sense?
Who says that Russia and Israel are not on the same page in Syria…?
Here, dear Joe, you are touching upon a very very VERY complex topic which is wholly misunderstood by 99.999999999% of people and which is not a black/white issue, but something with infinite shades of grey. I might have to sit down and write a full analysis of this very complex topic, but I just don’t have the time right now. I will just say this: under the Putin/Medvedev the Russians have effectively tossed out Eltsin’s Zionists our of power, but the Kremlin also realizes that it simply cannot go the Iranian way and take on Israel and the Jewish lobbies worldwide head-on. Add to this that Russia and Israel have a RADICALLY different relationship than the USA/EU and Israel. The USA/EU are Israeli colonies, for all practical purposes, whereas Russia is not any more, yet the Zionist lobby in Russia is powerful, and there also is something of a “Russian lobby” in Israel. So I would describe this relationship as a “pact of non-aggression”. Both sides play it *REALLY* nice towards each other in the public eye, and behind the scenes both sides clearly view each other as opponents, though not necessarily as enemies, and they will negotiate and compromise on a case by case basis. This is really a very complex issue, and a relationship which is constantly in flux, and in the case of Syria I think that there is a darn good reason why Israel and Russia both go out of their way not to appear to be confronting each other. Frankly, I think that Putin and Netanyahu are far more willing to compromise on a future outcome than what is usually assumed. Does that kind of oblique pseudo-explanation make sense to you?
Dear Saker,
I fully and unequivocally agree with you, and i understand this special relationship in the same way as you do…fully!
I will add to your analysis the following headline to your very good explanation: The Russian-Israeli Nebula or Mafia…The Belgian Government has coined the Term: NEBULA about this special cozy relationship….I did not invent it…LOL
Best,
Joe