Syrian government forces, led by the Republican Guard, are advancing against Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda) and Faylaq al-Rahman in the areas of Ayn Tarma and Jobar in the Eastern Ghouta region near Damascus.
While clashes are reported at multiple points across the frontline, an especially intense fighting has taken place in the Manasher roundabout area.
According to pro-militant sources, the clashes are ongoing amid multiple airstrikes by the Syrian Air Force in the area.
The general idea of the government advance in the area is to put pressure on militants in Jobar and then to Isliate the district from Ayn Tarma. The control over the area of Zamalka and the nearby roads plays a key role in the strategy of the Syrian military.
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Progress in East Ghouta seems to always go at a snail’s pace. I think there even the most atrocious WWI trench warfare battles saw more rapid progress then this battle. And this supposedly has the advantages that A: the East Ghouta is supposed to be surrounded and isolated. And yet US made TOW missiles keep on popping up. And B: supposedly some of the elite SAA units, the Republican Guard and the 4th Armored Division, are involved.
Jobar has been nothing but a pile of rubble for years now… Fighting from either side is extremely difficult. However, now that the “line” is moving again, is a good sign.
How many islamist are there in the pocket? Obvious they depends of farming for food, I´m so evil what the gliphosate (crop killer agent) is so tempting :D . The islamist are tiny warlords and they has a zone of domination and concentration. If you attack a point they gather fighters in enough numbers for repell an attack, but what happens if you attack them in 30 places?
Urban warfare, the nightmare of any army, modern, top army, all fear that kind of war. The SAA must get methods for to find the tunnels and complete the isolation (includes use the tunnel for infiltration) A question, the civilians fleed the city or they are hostages-human shields?
somehow americans took baghdad quickly. basra also faster then saa jobar :-O
The US left all those sleeper cells in Baghdad such a good job they did , stop believing they had success all those unexplored tunnels byISIS is how they are infiltrating the city.
ISIS came after hes talking about the Iraqi army.
ISIS was started by the US in 2007 to disrupt Syria and Iraq they were formed as sectarian group of former Baathists in Iraq not the same party in Syria. The US in that conflict had the same uncontrollable Shia Militias fighting the Iraqi army which did the all the work while the US looted the antiquities and gold just a fact of the criminal behavior of the US and they are not exempt as was claimed by the US ambassador, they broke international laws.
Only thing done wrong was the false accusation of WMDs that was used to invade Iraq
There was more than that done wrong , the US could have chased Saddam’s army but they head toward the antiquities and Gold which shows they were there for an old fashioned heist.
We didn’t just chase them we kind of annihilated them. Saddam shouldn’t have gone around gassing Kurds, fighting wars with Iran and invading Kuwait.
The US stayed in Baghdad to loot the city , the PMU chased Saddam , Saddam never gassed any Kurds fact it was a CIA whoops they tried to send a missile to attack Iran , Kuwait attacked Iraq after being prodded into it by the US all the fake news in regards to that was told by the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador to the US and she even admitted she lied about that, she was paid by the US to say those things at the UN.
A CIA whoops? lol all US did that US did this nothing by the hand of the regimes. Get your head out of that conspiracy website for once!
That wasn’t a conspiracy CIA copped to it after the numbers matched a missile they had it was meant for Iran. You hhappen to not like hearing them owning up to something but those days are gone.
Get over it , saddam was a fool he was killing Kurds making wars with Iran and invading places he shouldn’t have. He had to go.
Saddam did this all at the behest of the US all that happened was he was no longer useful, the US killed Mossadegh in 1959 was the most Democratic leader in the Middle East.The US installed their Dictator in his place then he was replaced by a British one and the US in 1979 installed Saddam. This to me looks like only the US needs to go now since they are leftover of a bygone era.
No saddam could have avoided all of this but he was a dictator bent on conquest, he had the 6th largest army in the world he was making wars with Iran, we even gave him the ultimatum to leave Kuwait. But did he take it ?
That was a fake war created by the US which had Kuwait attack Iraq at US insistence all the people involved told lies as they did admit to the whole thing being a fraud. They were all hired by Ruder Global , which was responsible for creating the Kuwaiti fake incubator scenario , the fake massacres in former Yugoslavia and the reason to invade Iraq ,Libya,Afghanistan.
Your country creates the situations through false narratives and you think the world isn’t getting wise to what is going on. Keep living in the goldfish bowl, fish.
Please spare me your ignorance and willful stupidity in regards to matters you don’t bother researching nor even have the willingness to understand.
Lol Kuwait didn’t want to get invaded and pulverised by Iraq, saddam did it because he was a warmonger bent on conquest. We gave them the ultimatum but he didn’t take it.
Stop being an idiot with your facts and they did , the only warmonger is the US Congress they just hide behind lies to facilitate their greed. The people of US reap no financial benefit just that 1% does, something you need to learn. You and your selective facts bore me, here is one for you the actual collective US debt is 481 trillion dollars as of 2016.(CIA Factbook)
Expect full liberation by 3018.
Its a built up urban area with lots of civilians the Syrian government does not want to kill if they can avoid it. that is why it is slow. If it were the USA ordered by its master racist supremacist Israel the entire area would be carpet bombed like Mosul and Raqqa, to kill as many Goyims as possible.
There are not civilians in Jobar https://www.google.it/maps/@33.5168492,36.3340197,1047m/data=!3m1!1e3 Only rubbles, snipers, tows, landmines, mg and tunnels.
That is why going is slow with ieds everywhere it’s very difficult to send troops into a region mined and filled with ratholes. Many of you think the Tigers would be good are very wrong about this since Urban warfare like this is very tricky since they could retreat and pop up from another rathole elsewhere from behind. These groups had a long time to develop a network of tunnels which should have been never allowed to have happened.
The ugly nasty fighting in this more like the trench fighting of old at times it will come down to hand to hand fighting. The tunnels can be easily booby trapped making one approach with caution to going into the tunnels. The Germans built fortified bunkers with long narrow hallways that could be easily defended and I would imagine no different here.
The US would just bomb or level the city and forget about trying to save as many buildings as possible.Then again they never rebuild anything they destroy since they feel they weren’t responsible.
for these cases russians have special bombs
so much young good soldiers already sacrificed for a couple buildings and streets, finish the job finally in a big ground offensive and split jobar from the rest. if the SAA loses more men, i dont think that they can call this offensive a win. i understand the battlefield is a hard one, much tunnels etc, but come on how many elite units they need to finish the job? maybe send the tigers, they would do the job in 2 days.
“The tunnels are the answer” ( Cyrus the great, King of persians). Babylon was a sacred city and they had a artificial river in the middle with a tunnel, the persians avoid the high walls of the black city using the tunnel-river. Find the tunnels and use or destroy with methane explossion (grisu gas), How to find a tunnel, in geology for find oil, there a prospection tools what founds any hole under earth.
My word man. I am absolutely with you Alan. It has been a long bloody battle involving a lot of casualties there. As far as the battlefield is concerned, there are no freaking “elite units” there…….. All in all an irresponsible military campaign with young Syrian boys (so-called “elite”-soldiers) thrown into the battlefield and fighting under unbearable conditions. Something has to be done to speed up the operation, but at the moment it is just straight bullshit warfare and if I would be a soldier there- not even getting paid decently- I would be quite fed up with my commanders and the government (especially since I also heard that recruitment strategies in Damascus are unfair and corrupt- rich kids buying themselves liberation from military service and partying instead). Such unfair tactics and corruption are actually a major reason why many Syrians fight for the terrorists/opposition and why the goveernment lacks legitimacy within significant segments of the population. But I am sure an open and sencere discussion about these hot-topics is off topic for most pro-government actors. It´s always easier to blame Israel and the USA for EVERYTHING
They have sent the 42nd brigade off the 4th Mechanized which has been there from the beginning and most effective fighting force, then the 103rd of the SRG which also has been effective in fighting.
East Ghouta is larger than Raqqa in territory, to capture this whole area will be long, bloody and costly campaign. SAA as usual is wasting time and energy, instead of priorityse. Utterly stupid as usual. You know the Roman Empire reach such a dominance not because it fought all it adversaries at once. They picked the time the place and the opponent, one by one campaign by campaign, until there was no one left. There was these Roman saying brave ones fight at any time any place, and the winners chose the place and the time where the brave dies.. Russia gave Syrian Government excellent opportunity to pick and chose opponents, and fight them one at a time. ISIS should be dismantled and all resources including 4th division from the National Guard should be concentrated there. Once its gone and as much of the territory retaken and liberated, then concentrate on Idlib. Then you can have a look and possibly sit and see if agreement of some sort can be achieved with the curds and then eliminate Homs and East Ghouta pockets.
It may be time to go Roman. If so, give notice and schedule MOAB’s sequentially from one side to another!
They are trying to open the Highway for humanitarian aid to come through since this was part of the de-escalation agreement politics are also being played out by the US sponsored groups in the region.