Category Archives: Uncategorized

NATO is having a summit. Among other things, the situation in Syria will be addressed. Specifically, NATO wishes to address this fact: Turkey is holding up a defense agreement for the protection of the Baltics from Russian aggression unless NATO pledges to label the YPG of the Syrian Democratic Forces a terrorist group and assistContinue reading “Dec 02: NATO, Turkey & US: A Viewer’s Guide”

So one of the unforeseen but in retrospect obvious—and pleasant—side effects of a project like this is learning about some of the “local” culture. In this case, while many different cultural elements come up given the diversity within Syria, Kurdish culture comes up a lot for obvious reasons, most notably because Old Man Erdogan isContinue reading “Dec 01 (2/2): Kurds, Culture & (^_^)/ Korea”

Oh my fucking God they are building a fucking wall. I mean, more is going on, but I didn’t want to bury the lede on this one. After invading and occupying the territory of NE #Syria between Tal Abyad – Serê Kaniyê – M4 road, #Turkey now begins the physical separation of the territory usingContinue reading “Dec 01 (1/2): The M4 Highway: Build that Wall!”

So let’s check in with Turkey—a bit of a news round-up, if you will. As per the larger picture, it seems Turkey is moving further into Russia’s orbit. That just makes sense; Russia has a lot of gravity. "It is clear, though, that with Turkey’s economic and strategic dependence on Russia deepening, any future disagreementContinue reading “Nov 30 (2/2): Talking Turkey. And Politics”

candylandriots The last thing I want to do is over-summarizeb ut having now read all of the above myself, a couple of the links (extracted from Twitter) and one thing Rev wrote struck me as particularly important. Drone footage of Damascus and Aleppo NY Times Review of Books on who are Turkey’s proxies in SyriaContinue reading “Nov 30 (1/2): Today in the Fight against ISIS”

So I wanted to look at how the war works in ways beyond the obvious fighting. I mentioned how the terrorist bombings were a feature of the apparent lull in military operations to further the belief in the populace that life there is indeed now unbearable. To really understand the lull in the fighting, though,Continue reading “Nov 29: Total War on Rojava: Deep Operation”

Rojava is weird. I was going to not post today. As in, very specifically leave today blank. I wanted to do it as a juxtaposition with the notion of giving thanks, which entails both thanking those around us, but also recognizing those we cannot thank but make the world better. And I know for anContinue reading “Nov 28: Happy American Thanksgiving”

OK, so there’s this weird fucked up Assad apologist movement going on that, just from the nature of it, the usual suspects involved, etc., is clearly coordinated, as I will go over below. It’s been bugging me because I haven’t been able to figure out what it’s all about. But I think I have itContinue reading “Nov 27 (3/3): Tulsi Gabbard & the Assad Apologists”

Safe zone not safe for civilians. We knew this, but let’s take a look. HRW: Turkish-backed groups involved in looting, summary executions in northern Syria @vvanwilgenburg https://t.co/KMrHbpeooa — Mutlu Civiroglu (@mutludc) November 27, 2019 Not only local outfits such as Kurdistan24 are covering the story, but also larger organizations like The Guardian. The Guardian: Turkey’sContinue reading “Nov 27 (2/3): HRW: Safe Zone Not Safe.”

So, since there’s that lull in the “big picture” war stuff as the geopolitical situation shakes out a bit, you know what that means: Terrorist bombings! the sound of a big explosion rocked the city of Qamishlo — Y.N.M.S (@ynms79797979) November 26, 2019 When a car bomb went off in Qamishi the other day, thereContinue reading “Nov 27 (1/3): Nobody Believes Turkey Isn’t Bombing Cities in Rojava.”