@PaulJ: Yeah it looks like the convoy trucks were just burned out,no blast damage at all. The whole situation stinks

“We have closely studied [drone videos] from where the incident took place and we did not find any signs of any ammunition having hit the convoy,” Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in a statement Tuesday.
“There are no craters, while the vehicles have their chassis intact and they have not been severely damaged, which would have been the case from an airstrike. [All videos] demonstrate that the convoy caught fire, which happened almost at exactly the same time as militants started a large scale offensive on Aleppo,” the statement said.

“Only representatives of the ‘White Helmets’ organization close to Al-Nusra Front who, as always, found themselves at the right time in the right place by chance with their video cameras can answer who did this and why,” it continued.

The White Helmets is a volunteer civil defense organization that operates throughout opposition-controlled Syria and is often linked to militants from the group formerly known as Al-Nusra Front.

https://www.rt.com/news/360092-syria-ceasfire-us-russia-un-issg/?utm_source=browser&utm_medium=aplication_chrome&utm_campaign=chrome

One of the videos released by the Defense Ministry from the site appears to show militants driving a pickup with a mortar taking cover behind the aid convoy.

Russia also denies that Syrian warplanes could have hit the convoy, as they don’t carry out flights at night.

“Our [Russian] defense forces already made statements that their aircraft was not involved [in the incident]. The Syrian aviation also could not work there, as the attack was carried out at night, the Syrian Air Force does not operate at night, it doesn’t have the capabilities for it,” Lavrov told Russia’s Channel 1.

On Tuesday, the UN retreated from previous claims that the convoy was hit by military planes.

“We are not in a position to determine whether these were in fact airstrikes. We are in a position to say that the convoy was attacked,” UN humanitarian spokesman Jens Laerke said.

You just got to love those Russian drones with video cameras :-)

@Motherofdivinejebus: I’d say the SOHR (some lad in his attic in Coventry),is feeling pretty stupid today.

@Motherofdivine. If the Russians have all this drone video footage because they. ‘Monitored’ the convoy then why don’t they show the footage of the attack on the convoy?

@Jan, why are you so quick to rip on SOHR. on any given day you can see articles on Kremlin state RT that cites information from Russian ‘bloggers’. Today there’s an article about Mh17. Just because it’s on RT doesn’t mean it’s true.

@Diaspora’d: Do keep up there old bean.They followed the convoy to it`s destination, and to where it was handed over to the militants – the drone then returned to base while the militants moved the convoy to a location that the Russians weren`t privy to, and couldn`t be privy to.
The convoy wasn`t hit until a few hours after the trucks had been handed over and moved.
Do a bit of reading, piece it altogether yourself – now you are just being lazy.
Plus the attack happened in pitch black conditions, something the Syrian airforce can`t do, as they are not equipped for.

Now the yans are trying to say it was 2 Russian SU`s that hit the convoy – even though the chassis are all intact on the trucks with no blast damage or craters, but look like they burned from the ground up.
And i mean, The white helmets are first on the scene?

@Diaspora’d: https://www.rt.com/news/360059-drone-aleppo-militants-video/

@Diaspora’d: Because SOHR is one lunatic in a 2 bedroom flat in Coventry, that communicates by telephone with “contacts” he has never met, he hasn`t set foot in his own country in over 15 years FFS!

Here is one for you !! As i have said, do some reading

The New York Times also for the first time reveals that Abdul Rahman’s operation is indeed funded by the European Union and a “European country” he refuses to identify:
Money from two dress shops covers his minimal needs for reporting on the conflict, along with small subsidies from the European Union and one European country that he declines to identify.

And while Abdul Rahman refuses to identify that “European country,” it is beyond doubt that it is the United Kingdom itself – as Abdul Rahman has direct access to the Foreign Secretary William Hague, who he has been documented meeting in person on multiple occasions at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London. The NYT in fact reveals that it was the British government that first relocated Abdul Rahman to Coventry, England after he fled Syria over a decade ago because of his anti-government activities:

http://landdestroyer.blogspot.ie/2013/04/exposed-syrian-human-rights-front-is-eu.html

Convenient for the perpetrator of the attack that the footage unfortunately wasn’t recorded by the Russians..

@Jan & Co. Inflicting us again with ‘copy’ from Kremlin state media….

It’s called “Propaganda” and in case you haven’t noticed both sides engage in it, but apparently you’re problem may be that you’re naive enough to believe only one side puts it out taking as ‘gospel’ what the other side has spoon fed you.

Mother this is more for you, as you are not a numpty like Dias, and clan, let me know if you cannot access the entire article as I do have it.

US Special Forces sabotage White House policy gone disastrously wrong with covert ops in Syria

Ousting the Alawite government of Bashar al-Assad had been a long-term strategic goal of the United States. The summary of a 2006 diplomatic cable authored by William Roebuck, the chargé d’affaires at the U.S. embassy in Damascus, reads:

We believe Bashar’s [Assad] weaknesses are in how he chooses to react to looming issues, both perceived and real, such as the conflict between economic reform steps (however limited) and entrenched, corrupt forces, the Kurdish question, and the potential threat to the regime from the increasing presence of transiting Islamist extremists. This cable summarizes our assessment of these vulnerabilities and suggests that there may be actions, statements, and signals that the USG can send that will improve the likelihood of such opportunities arising.

The cable goes on, outlining how the United States government should exploit fissures between Syria and Iran. The Iranians have long used Syria as a logistics and command hub for Hezbollah operations. Exploiting fears of Shia meddling in Sunni affairs was one way that America could create a fracture in the alliance.

In June of 2007, the Bush White House debated military action against a suspected Syrian nuclear reactor. Vice President Dick Cheney pushed hard for military intervention. “I again made the case for U.S. military action against the reactor,” Cheney wrote. “But I was a lone voice. After I finished, the president asked, ‘Does anyone here agree with the vice president?’ Not a single hand went up around the room.” Stung badly by faulty intelligence suggesting that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, President Bush opted for a diplomatic option.

During this timeframe, American special operations soldiers assigned to Task Force Orange were deployed to Syria under commercial cover. However, they targeted foreign fighters flowing into Iraq to fight coalition soldiers rather than fixate on the Assad regime. “The missions enabled JSOC to build a detailed picture of the network of jihadis from Aleppo and Damascus airports through the Syrian section of the Euphrates River Valley until they crossed into Iraq near Al Qaim,” Sean Naylor wrote.

Meanwhile, State Department cables reveal that the U.S. government was actively searching for ways to undermine the Syrian government, and potentially remove Assad from power. Another 2006 cable reads, “Finding ways to publicly call into question Bashar’s reform efforts-pointing, for example to the use of reform to disguise cronyism-would embarrass Bashar and undercut these efforts to shore up his legitimacy.”

Roebuck points out another interesting vulnerability to the regime, one that would come into play in full effect a decade later. He wrote that the Kurds are “the most organized and daring political opposition and civil society groups are among the ethnic minority Kurds, concentrated in Syria’s northeast, as well as in communities in Damascus and Aleppo. This group has been willing to protest violently in its home territory when others would dare not.” Also revealed in the cables was that the United States was covertly financing Assad’s political opponents.

The U.S. ambassador to Syria from 2010 to 2014 was Robert Ford, who traveled around Syria meeting with opposition leaders prior to the outbreak of civil war. This was back when Syria was simply next on the list of Arab Spring countries and protesters in Syria were demanding liberalization from the Assad regime. Ford was an outspoken critic of the regime, and criticized the Obama administration in 2014, saying that the United States had not put enough pressure on Assad. Advocating the arming of so-called moderate rebels, Ford went on to say, “We have to think about a way to escalate pressure.”

https://sofrep.com/63764/us-special-forces-sabotage-white-house-policy-gone-disastrously-wrong-with-covert-ops-in-syria/

@Diaspora’d: And you living in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA are completely unbiased about the whole thing??

Nail on the head

@Motherof divine. NYes sir, it’s not very difficult to realize that both sides engage in propounds. You and your buddies on this forum don’t seem to get it. Verbatim cut & paste from RT and Russian bloggers , not very convincing.

*propoganda. Sorry for the typo, I don’t cut and paste as much as goys do

@Diaspora’d: Check out the NYT yourself, and read what they have written about SOHR, I do a lot of research and reading from different websites from around the world – prove me wrong on what i have said about SOHR, prove me wrong on what i said about the Syrian Airforce capabilities to operate at night, prove me wrong about there being no craters or blast damage to the chassis of those trucks.
I am not a pimply teenager on his first run in the world. Call me Cynical if you want, but i have seen enough Bullshit in my fifty years on this planet, to be able to recognise BS when i see it.

@motherofdivine. You don’t get it. It’s a media war, no one can prove anything. You’re not convincing anyone with the one-sided propoganda you cut and paste. CNN put out a story that the Syrian army killed in the Airstrike on Sunday were not in military uniform. Wikileaks are being doctored by Russian hackers. RT quotes Russian bedroom bloggers to dispute MH17 evidence, You’re a fool if you take one side’s propaganda ” hook line and sinker”.

A fool judges exclusive source over context. ‘Russian Bloggers’ have highlighted legitimate irregularities, that cannot simply be dismissed. Show me your evidence for WikiLeaks being doctored, more unsubstantiated empty rhetoric.

I am not playing the cut and paste game PR, just google it, the story was that the leak inadvertently had 2 copies of the same document one was the real document the other was the doctored one.

Ya, everyone knows the Kremlin isn’t in the business of propaganda…
*facepalm*

Judging by this forum, Theres definitely a quorum for setting up an RT fan club in Ireland.
We get RT America over here, I check in regularly but it’s as extreme as Fox News

@Pádraig Ó Raghaill:

“Ousting the Alawite government of Bashar al-Assad had been a long-term strategic goal of the United States.”

It’s not at the expense of the fight against ISIS. The US air strike was aimed at ISIS but Syrian soldiers were hit by mistake.

@Ciarán Masterson: Maybe read the entire 8000 word article

Mother…what you said.

Here is another section of it for you

The CIA underestimates the threat

After the 2009 withdrawal of the U.S. military from Iraq, the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Center’s presence also became a pale shadow of what it had once been during the heyday of Operation Iraqi Freedom. During the height of the war, the CIA could deploy targeting officers to Iraq and assign them regionally, so a targeting officer would work Mosul and focus on the leadership elements of al-Qaeda in Iraq and the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI, which later became ISIS), but several years after the withdrawal, the CIA was unable to tap into U.S. special operations units as a force multiplier.

In 2011 and 2012, Delta Force would deploy a single operator to Iraq as a counterterrorism liaison, but the CIA’s chief of station (CoS) in Baghdad made it clear that Delta was not welcome in Iraq. However, U.S. Army Special Forces were able to deploy by working for the State Department and training Iraqi Special Operations Forces (ISOF). In the years leading up to the rise of ISIS, the commander’s in-extremis force, a specialized counterterrorist element in each Special Forces group, would deploy in small numbers in an advisory capacity. Meanwhile, the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Center Iraq (CTC/I) was mostly focused on combating Shia militias.

CTC/I become CTC/SI, recognizing the transnational threat of ISIS, which now sprawled across two countries. Although some believed that CTC/SI had to switch its focus to targeting mid-level Baath party leaders within ISIS who guided the group on strategy, tactics, and propaganda, the leadership of CTC/SI and the newly formed Syrian Task Force consisted of only 10 targeting officers who were constantly forced to shift gears as the agency’s senior leadership would have them focus on ISIS, al-Nusra, the Khorosan Group, Shia militias, and Ahrar al-Sham.

Targeting the Khorosan Group was one of the CIA’s early successes in the Syrian Civil War. Tracking signals intelligence (SIGINT), the CIA was able to positively ID senior al-Qaeda leaders from those who formed the nucleus of Khorosan. Intercepting their cell phone conversations, the CIA targeted the group, eventually wiping them off the face of the earth with airstrikes. However, CTC “didn’t even track ISIS worth a damn,” a CIA officer said.

Amazingly, ISIS remained in the background, regarded by CIA leadership as little more than another insurgent group. The director of CTC, who had once been chief of station in Baghdad, did not care about Iraq one way or the other according to multiple sources in CTC who spoke to SOFREP confidentially. Since this was the party line held by the CTC director, it filtered down through the lower ranks in the CIA. The Syria Task Force was focused on Khorosan and Nusra, while Baghdad Station continued to focus on Shia militias and local car bombings. In Erbil, the CIA’s chief of base told a member of the Syria Task Force, “I don’t know why they keep sending you guys [targeting officers]. Nobody gives a shit about counterterrorism in Iraq.”

Lingering in the background was ISIS, a force of 500 to 1,000 fighters that no one took seriously. All of that changed in 2014, when ISIS spilled across the border from Syria, massacred the Yazidi ethnic minority in Sinjar-turning hundreds of girls and women into sex slaves-before moving on and capturing the major city of Mosul in northern Iraq. For a moment, it looked like ISIS was going to overrun Erbil before taking on Baghdad. Then, Jihadi John started executing hostages.

British citizen Mohammed Emwazi, nicknamed Jihadi John, appeared in a series of publicly released execution videos. Delta Force launched an attempted hostage rescue mission with Jordanian counterparts to rescue two journalists being held by ISIS, John Sotloff and James Foley. Despite the sizable firefight they engaged in while on target in Syria, the two American journalists had been moved elsewhere.

That August, Jihadi John, wearing his black balaclava, forced Foley to read an anti-American statement, then beheaded him with a knife and threatened to do the same to Sotloff if the United States did not cease its intervention in Iraq. In September, another video emerged in which Jihadi John beheaded Sotloff. The brutal murders of two captured American journalists shocked the world, particularly the horrified American public. ISIS was now on the front pages of major newspapers, drawing the attention of policymakers and a public demanding that something be done.

ISIS was now on the CIA’s radar. CTC targeted the organization, but not often enough to have any tangible effect on the battlespace. Toward the end of 2014, the CIA had less than 20 targeting officers and analysts dedicated to fighting ISIS. As of early 2016, the situation had improved little. According to several sources, the CIA simply does not care about ISIS. Using an excuse that ISIS is an army rather than a terrorist organization, they have punted the job to Army special operations-the men of Special Forces and Delta Force.

In Syria, the overwhelming priority for the CIA is what some CTC officers call Director John Brennan’s baby: the removal of the Assad regime.

Forgot the link, same one as above

https://sofrep.com/63764/us-special-forces-sabotage-white-house-policy-gone-disastrously-wrong-with-covert-ops-in-syria/

Thanks for that, I bet Putin would never allow former Russian Special Forces post stuff like that on the Internet….at least not from Russia anyway.

@Diaspora’d: An article commentator

“The Russians have been saying this pretty much all along but of course being Russian they have zero credibility with those raised on an MSM forced diet. I wonder if you’ll be able to get said MSM to publish this article?”

Sure, but in Putin’s Russia you have to get a license from the Kremlin to become a blogger.
You have the benefit of quoting a US blogger and commentators, the benefit of anmore open society.

@Diaspora’d: That is utter rubbish Dias, I know several Russian bloggers, even met a couple and that is just bollox, my man.

If you want information good and bad here is a good place to start http://www.compromat.ru/ – The restriction of voice in Russia pertains to the 3000 audience law when you have to abide by the rules of Journalism – interpret that as you like, it has positives and negatives.

Seriously. Would you just google, “Russian blogger law”. There are even Russsian sites that confirm the restrictive regulations for blogging n Russia. Now compare that with the freedom of the US bloggers you cut and paste in your comments to push your narrative. Blogging in Russia is Restricted by the Kremlin. Do some research.

any blogger with more than 3,000 readers is required to register with Russia’s media oversight agency.