@ Yul, for me there is nothing sweeter than the sound of western “leaders” whining because they can’t have their way. Which is what we are seeing here. Hammond is complaining that Russia is not helpful in the process of turning Syria into either a failed state or Turkey/Saudi dominated wahhabi state. Poor baby. Would you like a binkie to suckered on?

Posted by: Lysander | Feb 2 2016 16:33 utc | 3

If you look up ISIS territorial losses on Google, you’ll find they were touting a 25 percent rollback as long ago as April 2015. Obviously, it didn’t quite jive with the many news reports touting ISIS’ impressive gains up until Russia entered the war. They have to provide justification for more troop commitments, while at the same time, they have to show that they’re actually doing something, even if it’s a lie.

Posted by: Les | Feb 2 2016 17:23 utc | 5

I’m guessing that the Yankees would rather talk about % losses of ISIS territory than % losses of ISIS ter’rists (the lesser evil).

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Feb 2 2016 18:05 utc | 7

Since Syria hasn’t “invited” us, we have had to walk the tightrope of playing up the threat in Iraq (where there are regular reports that ISIS is losing some hearts and minds), so as to justify escalation of force (and personnel) while downplaying the rapidly diminishing popularity n of our most recent designated ex-pat Haider al-Abadi.
Iraq Government / Haider al-Abadi is requesting (more) US aid in training the local police force (which I believe we have been doing since 2003+, obviously with “mixed results” … and demanding (since 12/11/2015) that Turkey/Erdogan remove its troops … most recently suggesting Turkey provide training and equipment for Iraqi troops instead.

Iraq’s prime minister appealed Friday to Turkey to pull its troops out of Iraqi territory and instead provide training and equipment to fight the Islamic State group, which he and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry insisted is losing ground.

01/22/206 from Davos.
such laffs.

Posted by: Susan Sunflower | Feb 2 2016 18:27 utc | 9

The old Sanctions Boomerang –
Turkey is facing a shortfall of nearly 4.5 million Russian tourists this year, causing Turkey’s tourism industry to miss out on some $4.5 billion in lost revenues, according to Aegean Touristic Enterprises and Lodging Association (ETHICS) Chairman Mehmet Isler, as quoted by the newspaper.
European tourists, mainly from Germany, have changed their preferences to Greek resorts, he added, citing the “propaganda” of the recent terrorist attacks in Turkey as covered by the European media as the reason for this trend.
source – http://sputniknews.com/business/20160201/1034052900/turkey-tourist-industry.html

Posted by: Alberto | Feb 2 2016 18:35 utc | 11

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – A long-anticipated battle to recapture the Iraqi city of Mosul from the Islamic State (ISIS) will be difficult, bloody and long, the spokesman of the US-led coalition warned Tuesday.
US Army Col.Steve Warren dismissed claims that the coalition had signed any secret agreements to reclaim Mosul from ISIS.
Speaking to reporters at the US embassy in Baghdad, Warren said that an estimated 5,000 to 8,000 militants from the ISIS group are expected to be inside Mosul and other parts of the province.
He warned that ISIS fighters will fiercely fight off any offensive to defend what is Iraq’s second-largest city and the group’s stronghold in the country.
“There will be difficult battle, bloody battle and will be long one,” he predicted.
Warren urged Iraqis in ISIS-held areas to remain patient, pledging that Iraqi forces would liberate their areas.

rudaw.net – 2 hours ago.
Interesting the need to “dismiss claims” … I have read that in the past ISIS has vastly reduced the number of their soldiers in any given city in advance of similar attacks/attempts to regain control.
Will ISIS make “coalition forces” look the fool… and possibly the liar?

Posted by: Susan Sunflower | Feb 2 2016 20:24 utc | 13

@12 pen

–The Plan has always been to bring China into the NWO. Club of Rome took the decision some years back to homogenize living standards, that countries might more easily be integrated. …
–As a consequence of making most countries of the world dependent on exports, even to be permitted to create currency and credit, labor all over the world is set into competition. …
–I implore you to measure everything against what the people of the world need. …
There is not so much wrong that we cannot set it right, if we keep our wits about us.

Is that all you, Pen? Great stuff! So what ought we to do?

Posted by: jfl | Feb 2 2016 21:48 utc | 15

Covert Invasion of Libya Under-Way?
Tony Cartalucci – http://landdestroyer.blogspot.ca/2016/02/us-nato-invade-libya-to-fight.html
We’ve ruined the country, all the rich folks have fled to the EU, so it’s now time to rape it completely…

Posted by: fredjc | Feb 2 2016 22:44 utc | 17

The territory is not well defined.

Posted by: Edward | Feb 2 2016 22:47 utc | 19

“$582.7bn budget will address ‘new strategic era’ of state-based aggression US to press advantage in hi-tech weapons and check Chinese ambitions”
Exactly – This should be on the lips of everyone blabbing about Iowa.
Jeez, the “new strategic era”… wasn’t it just 15 years ago Donald Rumsfeld was telling us how we were in a “new environment” and had to prepare the military to fight asymmetric wars against small nations?
Seems like there’s a “new strategic era” every time there’s a check to be signed…
The biggest shell game every played – which $600 Billion Dollars is the “new strategic era” under?

Posted by: guest77 | Feb 3 2016 0:45 utc | 21

Hillary was just on Charlie Rose…..puke.

Posted by: shadyl | Feb 3 2016 1:30 utc | 23

Shady Lady @ 23, Yes, she is disgusting. It’s been my personal observation of her character these past two years that she is probably on drugs– the sometimes slovenly grooming and that aspect of incontinent emotion. Like when she laughs– ughh.
As if there weren’t enough the matter w her.

Posted by: Penelope | Feb 3 2016 2:26 utc | 25

On the matter of what portion of Syria that is controlled by ISIS, there is a useful map in elterritoriodellince. Lince distinguishes between the area ISIS controls and the area (mostly desert) where they have influence. It turns out that the area they control is actually rather small – smaller than that controlled by the Kurds. The area on which they have merely influence is huge, but perhaps not that important. With this in mind, the various estimates about what proportion of their territory ISIS has lost take on a different significance.

Posted by: Roger Milbrandt | Feb 3 2016 3:01 utc | 27

jfl @ 15,
If Russia & China would act together in creating a new financial system where nations manage their own currency/credit and their own bilateral trade policy– If they would do that, almost all of Latin America would join them in a heart-beat, and SCO. So would Malaysia; she tried once before to leave the IMF w a group of other countries. (I can’t quite remember what the details were.) They could even do it simultaneously.
But alas, China has recently committed quite extraordinary economic acts to better her integration into the IMF– privatizations and monetary policy changes to “harmonize” w the rest of the world oligarchy. I don’t see any evidence that China’s now neo-liberal oligarchs want to overturn global oligarchical institutions. US is sponsoring China as leader of the G20 this year.
Russia alone w SCO, Iran, S America– I don’t know if she could pull it off. I don’t even know if truly sovereign nations or democratic states are wanted by the Russian leadership. There was at least a limited agreement between US & Russia for Russia to go into Syria. Must have been– no sanctions & pretended surprise after it happened in slow motion. Not so terrible– it was in Russia’s interest & govts make secret agreements. But it bothers me greatly that Russia didn’t close the Syrian border, at least w Turkey. What can it mean?
So what should we do? Form a political platform, a specific set of political principles that we want to form the basis of our govt. That clearly shows how to structure an alternative political and economic path. Only after Americans are united behind a set of ideas will candidates appear. The political will to insist comes out of having the certainty of specific intent. It’s grand to say we want the constitution back, but it didn’t envision the monetary and international structures that usurp sovereignty. And it’s not enough just to be AGAINST today’s oligarchs or their actions and institutions. Americans, like people all over the world, are idealistic. We fight for ideals, for a vision of a just society presented in more detail than just slogans.
Unfortunately, there is a powerful wedge issue which will inhibit activists and others from coming together– the global warming hoax. It is a powerful impediment with wide consequences.

Posted by: Penelope | Feb 3 2016 3:30 utc | 29

Penelope:
Valentine Katsonov of Moscow State University has written extensively on the IMF, China and Russia. Basically, there is now a struggle for control of the IMF. The BRICS block wants veto rights, and if the United States doesn’t grant this, Russia and China may leave the IMF. Obviously, China’s exit would effectively end the IMF; the US couldn’t finance the IMF in the absence of China. The impetus for this was the IMF’s recent decision that Ukraine could still receive loans after defaulting on a sovereign loan from Russia. The Chinese and Russian governments believe that the US may encourage nations to default on loans from China and Russia. They now want to have a veto to insure their rights as creditors. Imagine the impact: Will nations continue to pay their debts to the US issued through the IMF, if the IMF can no longer function as the lender of last resort, or will they default and look to the Chinese-led banks for future financing ? Here is Katsonov’s latest on this topic; he’s done a series of articles on this that are well worth a read.Michael Hudson also wrote an excellent piece on this that was published on Counterpunch and his website (michael-hudson.com).
http://m.strategic-culture.org/news/2016/02/02/imf-reform-effective-there-quite-fight-ahead.html

Posted by: LZA | Feb 3 2016 4:07 utc | 31

Susan Sunflower@32 – “…Anyone know how willing Iraqi “Arab”s are to risk their lives liberate a Mosul as a Kurdish (Sunni) town? or if Mosul has become sufficiently Arab, as opposed to Kurdish, to be considered “worth” serious sacrifice to liberate it from ISIS?…”
Your statement suggests a substantial number of Iraqi Arabs were forced out of Mosul and now want to return and liberate it. While that must be true to some extent, the majority of the Iraqi Arabs in Mosul were Sunni and stayed (at least initially) when ISIS showed up.
Arab Sunnis made up somewhere around 60% of Mosul city’s population of 2.5 million at the start of 2014. Many were sympathetic with Saddam’s Baathists and preferred (at the time) ISIS control rather than Baghdad’s Shia-dominated control. I’m sure many have since changed their minds and want to leave, but can’t. ISIS disarmed them, so there are no sleeper cells of anti-ISIS fighters that are going to help much.
Arab Sunnis considering whether to liberate Mosul have to be thinking about this dilemma: do they want to die to return to a city that was pretty much handed over to head-choppers by the old Baathist loyalists of the Iraqi military who still live there? Are the moderate Sunnis that fled merely liberating it for the ISIS-and-Baathist-sympathizing Sunni Arabs that remained? Are the liberating it only to see ISIS-supporting Sunni residents remain as if nothing had happened and their support is consequence-free? Are they liberating it for the Shia-dominated Iraqi government that was pretty much responsible for letting it fall into ISIS hands through ineptness to begin with? Are they liberating it so the Barzani Kurds can carve out a piece of their own on the east side as part of their ever-expanding Israeli Kurdistan?
I would bet that a lot of them do want to return home, but they won’t die for the privilege merely to enable another group of exploiters and mobsters to run the place. That’s after the Iraqi Shia militias and Kurds loot the place for whatever wasn’t destroyed in the battle. And neither the Iraqi Army, nor the Kurds are going to kick doors down house-by-house. They will expect someone’s artillery or air power to neutralize (level) hostile areas before they move in. Mosul will be a wasteland of smoking ruins by time they have the last few head-choppers chased out. Then the endless car bombings begin.
Honestly, would you be willing to die to return to the hole where your home was in an city with no functional infrastructure, police, hospitals or jobs?
The Sunni Arabs have been given ‘some’ small arms and ammo, but hardly anything to mount a serious defense of the city after they retake it. Does that mean they will – once again – have to rely on an inept Baghdad and Shia militia for security? Or will they have to rely on mobster and billionaire Barzani for security? How will they protect themselves from whomever is protecting them? And who screens the returning Sunnis to weed out any closet jihadists of various stripes?
The choice might be easier for a displaced Arab Sunni if they’ve been living under a blue plastic tarp on the side of a mountain starving to death for the last year. How could things get any worse?
The following Gulf2000 Project Ethnic Composition Map of Mosul (2013) is an excellent reference. From the Kurdish perspective, they are willing to go in and reclaim Kurdish neighborhoods, but hardly see it as their job to sacrifice thousands of Kurds for what is now and ethnically-cleansed, all Sunni Arab city. Nor do they want to be stuck guarding Arab urban areas when the car bombs start going off. The Kurds are to the north and northwest of Mosul roughly at the periphery of the circle on the map.

Posted by: PavewayIV | Feb 3 2016 6:43 utc | 33

LZA @ 31,
Thanks for the link to Valentine Katsonov’s article; he’s a good man. Michael Hudson is one of the originators of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) and I’ve read his books. However, he is sometimes remonstrated even by his host on the Real News for optimistic projections of the behavior of China & Russia– that is, rosy conclusions which host and other guests are just bound to object to because they counter known behavior.
I am not without hope, but present behavior certainly tends in another direction. It is not control of the IMF which must be amended, but its central role must be done away with. It’s an instrument of control and surveillance which is not compatible with national sovereignty.
Everyone said when the IMF was forced to break its rules by lending to Ukraine while in default that it was the death of the IMF and/or the Silk Road. (Building the Silk Road requires guarantees for the credits to be advanced.) China in her threat to leave wants that violation of the rules rescinded, and perhaps further changes to the allocation of voting rights. Neither will change the nature of the neoliberal system of which the IMF is one of 3 embodying institutions.
Thanks again for the link. I’ll try to write something coherent on what the IMF central role is in the next week or so.

Posted by: Penelope | Feb 3 2016 9:45 utc | 35

30
HRH HRC is an inveterate liar, check-kiter and baaksheesh wallower who ran her last presidential campaign $35 MILLION dollars in the red, in 2008, then in 2009, as now SecState, grifted Hamid Karzai $5 BILLION skimmed from US humanitarian aid to Afghans. US State wrote the speech that Karzai gave at the London conference. Shortly after, hearing no nays, HRH made five undocumented trips to Kabul with her big ambassador pouches. Shortly after, Clinton’s announced her -$35 MILLION campaign debt had been, “paid by an unnamed benefactor”, and ‘dead broke’ former First-Lady was suddenly worth $15MILLION.
It’s all in the record. $15M+$35M=$50M, standard 1% Finder’s Fee in international trade for $5000M grift to Karzai, while HRH was a Fed official in plain view,…and nobody said dick, although many were privately appalled like our Ambassador to Afghanistan, who stated that 85% of that humanitarian aid to Afghans was, “round-tripped to WADC-NOVA.” They killed him.
She’s slovenly because she’s handled. Her *handlers* are the Deep Goverment follow-the-money you’re seeking. Clinton is just the pentagram, drawn in the dirt with chicken’s blood, to call up Shaytan on the next new blood moon of Shibboleth.
“We came … we saw … he died! Haww,haww,haww.”

Posted by: Chipnik | Feb 3 2016 10:34 utc | 37

@ Edward no 19: “The territory is not well defined”.
Exactly. Are we talking about territory where ISIS roadblocks control access, areas where they operate freely without interference or areas they have covered by artillery and rocket fire?

Posted by: ralphieboy | Feb 3 2016 10:48 utc | 39

re 32

As I recal Mosul was one of the Kurdish cities that Saddam ordered colonized/populated by Arabs

Quite wrong. It’s a Sunni Arab town, always has been. With some Kurdish eastern outskirts. Note that Paveway, ever the Kurdish propagandist, doesn’t want to admit this, although it’s been true ever since the city’s foundation in the 7th or 8th century (it’s an Early Islamic garrison town, built opposite ancient Nineveh, with some dubious pre-Islamic history).

Posted by: Laguerre | Feb 3 2016 12:19 utc | 41

Laguerre@41 – You seem like an educated person, yet you are unable to articulate exactly what part of my posts are lies intended to deceive someone about the Kurds. You surely know more about the situation there than I do. Do you understand how posting works? Nobody can read your mind and figure out what you don’t like about my replies, least of all me.
Are you a Barzani fan-boy and object to my characterization of him as a mobster and thief? Do you hate Kurds and wish they would all just leave Iraq and go somewhere else? I honestly don’t know because you’ve never once bothered to explain yourself in your snarky replies accusing me of bias. You seem to suggest some kind of secret, pro-Kurdish agenda on my part at times, but those are usually to replies where I am less than charitable to the Kurdish leadership or their actions. See why I’m confused?
re Mosul being an Arab city: “…Note that Paveway, ever the Kurdish propagandist, doesn’t want to admit this…
OK, what part of ‘land-grabbing’ and ‘Israeli Kurdistan’ don’t you understand? The implication was that Mosul WASN’T a Kurdish city for them to retake. The comment about 60% Arab applied to the situation in 2013 after a massive influx of refugees from other parts of Iraq. Mosul was about 20% Kurdish, if that, with all the refugees. And while Mosul had an Arab majority population and Arabic was most commonly spoken, it was a fairly diverse multi-ethnic/religious city, i.e., it was not exclusionary in the eyes of the majority Sunni Arab population that I’ve ever heard of. That excludes issues like ‘forced Arabization’ which really didn’t apply to Mosul to the degree it applies in other Iraqi cities.
The only part ‘I won’t admit to’ is that Sunni Arab refugees from Mosul are single-mindedly eager to fight and die to take their city back ‘because it’s an Arab city’. That ignores the complexity of the situation in several dimensions, dumbing it down to a black-and-white choice kind of like CNN or the NYT would do for the knuckle-draggers. I’m not accusing YOU of over-simplifying the situation, but you have contributed nothing to Susan’s question other than your usual warning about my Secret Agenda©.

Posted by: PavewayIV | Feb 3 2016 14:07 utc | 43

@44 So the area in question ‘has long been neglected, despite its oil and farming, by the Syrian regime’. Good thing too I guess otherwise they’d be accused of brutal repression.

Posted by: dh | Feb 3 2016 16:28 utc | 45

30;As I despise the hell bitch,my take that clothes do not make the person,and substance is much more preferable in a candidate than their sartorial choices,is put to the test by her vacuous and terrible policies of sh*t.
Elon Musk tells critic;No Tesla for you!Ah its good to be a billionaire Ziomonster,sucking on the American taxpayers dole.

Posted by: dahoit | Feb 3 2016 17:06 utc | 47

Macon,
Granted. Whether it has more recently added the impulsiveness of drugs to its pre-existing evil is probably not a fit speculation for rational minds. Let us bend the little gray cells to more important topics. Regards.

Posted by: Penelope | Feb 3 2016 18:26 utc | 49

jfl,
“uniting in a first things first way around the need to seize power, and let what we do once we have power sort itself out afterward, democratically.”
To seize power first & assume you can guide it into a sound polity later was tried by:
— Occupy Wallstreet: “We musn’t make specific demands cuz might be co-opted.”
— Maidan: The innocents first demonstrating & even others paid to demonstrate wanted to get rid of the corrupt Yanukovich & the other oligarchs. They thought a more just regime would automatically follow.
— Egypt: The first revolution was simply against Mubarik. There were candidates who had thought about what came next– real democrats. It is said (unverified) that the US managed to pressure them into hurried elections Many Egyptians were baffled to find Morsi & his Muslim Brotherhood to have “won” the election. Maybe. Egyptians might have benefitted by rigorous debate of political ideas all the way down to what a concrete enactment would mean.
Democratic revolutions are no different than color revolutions in at least one regard: Whoever is best organized wins. Do you think people who haven’t even arrived at consensus as to what they want are sufficiently organized to find & maintain leaders and all the rest of what’s required after the fact?
As you say, jfl, it’s a question of trying or not trying. I think it’s best to engage the little gray cells BEFORE acting & that without a commonly-understood goal action cannot lead to it.

Posted by: Penelope | Feb 3 2016 19:31 utc | 51

You don’t think Global Warming is divisive? Good lord, man, it’s become identity politics.
You say that I and the oligarchs are on the same side in denouncing the Anthropogenic GW.
So you think the oligarchs are against the AGW hypothesis? In that case, how very brave our govt is to defy them by passing laws to diminish the use of oil & gas. And our brave legislators are spending billions to subsidize alternative energy. Yessir, their actions are in defiance of Big Oil and their Bankers.
And how have you become convinced of the correctness of AGW? Did you have to find out about it thru the internet cuz TPTB wouldn’t cover it in the MSM? Why no, the MSM has bravely defied the power structure from the very beginning. Why they even carry exaggerated stories pushing AGW.
stories out of all proportion to even AGW science. That’s because they are concerned and so are willing to defy their very corporate owners.
Yessir, the govt & MSM are allied against Big Oil, their Bankers & the whole power structure.
Ah, I see, you believe the AGW story because it was told by that consummate outsider, former vice
president of the US Al Gore. Why he got the Nobel Prize for it (just one week after a London Court found serious errors of fact in his video).
I’m sorry for the sarcasm, jfl. You see so clearly that govt and MSM are aligned in Big Oil & Bankers’ interests in foreign wars– that they are in fact one power structure with the big transnational corps.
By what process do you forget that when you look at the AGW issue? Do you really think that govt & MSM are defying Big Oil/Bankers in forwarding the AGW story?

Posted by: Penelope | Feb 3 2016 20:19 utc | 53