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The Syrian Army repelled two attacks by militant groups in southeast Idlib, the Russian military reported.
According to the Russian side, militants stormed Syrian Army positions north of Khan Shaykhun and northwest of Abu Dafn. The first group of militants consisted of 60 Hayat Tahrir al-Sham members and 8 vehicles armed with guns. The second group consisted of 80 militants, a BMP armoured vehicle and up to 5 vehicles armed with guns. Both attacks were repelled.
Seems one BTR 60 was destroyed pic.twitter.com/eKJUDS8UJa
— ZOKA (@200_zoka) January 21, 2020
Repelling 2 “large” attacks of 60 and 80 fighters isn’t what I wanted to hear, I wanted to hear about a massive ground assault by the SAA consisting of thousands of soldiers, even tens of thousands of soldiers, why are we sitting on our butts while the terrorists are pushing the front lines the way they are. And to be honest I really don’t know why an attack of just 60 to 80 fighters is considered a large attack, they’re attacking fortified front lines afterall, that’s not what I’d consider a large attack against a battlefront, that would take many hundreds of fighters if not thousands, 60 and 80 isn’t what I’d consider a large attack against a front line, maybe a little village or outpost, but not a battlefront. I keep hearing bad weathers the excuse for a halt in SAA operations ‘again’, but it’s not according to the weather maps of Idlib I’m looking at, so sadly I’m starting to smell another ceasefire blowing in the wind, which is the last thing we need.
Since the fall of Dara…SAA only have retaken some village in Hama, some Hills in Latakia and one city in the south of Idlib!…the problem is not Russia…the problem is SAA which lack of well trained and motivate troops, bullet proof jackets, helmets and armored tanks and vehicles to launch a massive operation to retake all Hama-Aleppo highway which enable the fall of Idlib capital….
If the Terrorists were better trained and better equipped than the SAA I could agree with you, but the truth is they’re far less well trained and equipped than the bulk of the SAA forces are. And even lets say for arguments sake that the terrorists were actually better trained and equipped than the SAA are, it still doesn’t mitigate the fact that the SAA has AT LEAST 3 [maybe 5] TIMES THEIR NUMBERS on the ground. Here’s a simple fact of war, I’ll give you 100 of the best equipped and trained soldiers and I’ll take 300 of the worst trained and ill equipped soldiers, then lets have a fight and see who wins, if you use better strategy and tactics it would probably be you, but if I used the better battlefield strategy and tactics I’ll bet my ill equipped and badly trained fighters would kill every single one of yours, NUMBERS MATTER, add onto that air support and no matter how good your tactics and how bad mine are, you would still lose. I’m afraid your argument has no weight whatsoever, if the Vietnamese and Koreans had thought like you do they would’ve lost their wars against the US aggressors [Korea only half won], so don’t write off the SAA just yet, a good military commander never blames his own troops, he blames himself for not making all the right considerations and employing the best tactics. For example ask any military person you know what they would do in this situation, I’ll bet you every single one of them from a captain up would say this, ‘we should open another battlefront in the southwest of Idlib to relieve the pressure on southeast of Idlib, possibly even open up several more fronts’, and they’d also say ‘and we should never pause during successful advances, we should just keep driving the enemy north and ignore all ceasefires, I’m sure that’s what every single one of them would say.
SAA tried to open new fronts…Latakia and now west Aleppo…but without achieve targets….SAA still use T-55 tanks, pick up trucks and BMP…all of them vulnerable to ATGM attacks!…therefore they have to change tactics and use massive special forces ( snipers team and ATGM operators, Drones, night vision..etc..) to hunt ATGM spots under hands of terrorist teams!…in Donbass it is very difficult to launch ATGM attacks vs enemy bases because sniper teams( cal 50, lapua.etc..with a range of 2km) are active and deployed around…
Latakia, west Aleppo and northern Idlib are where all the best trained and equipped fighters are, and they’re also amongst the most fanatical too, the Uighurs and Chechens for example are in Latakia , north Hama and northwestern Idlib, so they should be the last places the SAA attacks. A good military commander only attacks the strongest link in the chain when he knows he has overwhelming force on his side, if he can destroy the strongest link in the chain the ones in front of it will break too, but that’s never going to happen here in Syria, the civilian population won’t let it happen. Familiarize yourself with what happened when the SAA tried to retake Ghouta, the civilians there were nearly as big a problem as the fighters were, and it’ll be the same thing that happens all along the Turkish border, they are the strongest links in the chain. But west Idlib, central Idlib, and western Idlib are all weak links in the Turkish chain, that’s where the SAA should be concentrating their attacks, these areas have open terrain with less densely populated areas, less civilian support for the terrorists, longer logistic routes to Turkey [where the terrorists equipment and supplies comes from], and normally fewer and less fanatical fighters, unless they get massive reinforcements as they have during the Aleppo air assault, when the SAAF and Russia took their eyes off the prize which allowed the terrorists to mobilize and take full advantage of the fact. You must have missed out on seeing what the SAA, SAAF and Russia achieved during the Daraa/Quneitra campaign, in just 3 short weeks they beat 15,000 HTS fighters, 30,000 FSA fighters and more than 2,000 Isis fighters, and they did it with only 55,000 SAA soldiers, and with absolutely minimal casualties on their side, southern Idlib should be no harder, in fact it should be easier, the odds are more in favour here, Assad converted 25,000 of those FSA fighters he beat in Daraa into SAA soldiers, LOL.
The problem is, from what you know about thousands SAA soldier, only tiger, 4th division, and 3 more I forgot soldier that had ability to do the thrust attack deep into idlib, the other just bulk forces that mostly useable just for guarding or something not important enough, that make every attack very slow because they need to deploy this very few precious forces wisely make every SAA took an ages to attack something especially it had heavy fortified by enemy and it got halted again by politic, so unless there are crazy setback just wait patiently and turks already send more jihadist to libya, make some unbalance to hts forces that saa can take advantage
Whats true for the SAA is doubly true for the terrorists, most of them are useless too, but the terrorists have to guard a massive battlefront which means spreading their soldiers very thinly all along the front lines, which coincidentally makes it easier for the SAA to launch offensives against them. 55,000 SAA beat 30,000 FSA, 15,000 HTS, and 2,000 Isis fighters in less than 3 weeks in Daraa and Quneitra with minimal losses, that’s what they can do when they want to.
I realize South Front are trying their best to provide good information. But, the active maps of Syria contributes better daily information. Syrian Armed Forces, Russia & the other Syria allies are pounding those terrorist gangster factions in Idlib region 24/7. They are doing a great job, and must continue heavy bombardment 24/7. Eventually these terrorist gangsters will be too weak to fight.
I send more prayers that courage and bravery will liberate more Syria real estate.
Meanwhile, crazy Turks are building 750 emergency dwelling type houses in northern Idlib; …which will be bombed and turned into rubble in the future, because, these ugly dwellings will be housing terrorist gangsters factions. Assad must be laughing at Turkey’s building plans on Syria’s real estate.
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad will rebuild this area with some extraordinary construction projects. Residential – commercial development rebuilding Syria will cost over $400 billion; (a new construction 20 story building with unique architecture costs about $300,000,000). Many countries want to help Syria rebuild a futuristic Syria with modern technology (including green energy/renewable energy building); would be an opportunity for many countries to become involved.
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