Mission Creep Drags Britain Into Quagmire of Global Conflict

The escalation to world war appears to be in motion, just waiting for the first diplomatic row to explode into something considerably worse than fighting various hydra-like bandits in Syria. Countries are being slowly dragged into the continuing violence with ever greater weapons and destructive capabilities and vociferous verbal dogfights ever more frequent.

With Russia, Iran and China on one side and the US, France, Australia and Britain plus the GCC countries, Turkey and Jordan on the other and Iraq and Syria in the middle, a lot is a stake in the world’s tinderbox.

US president Obama promised no less than 15 times to the world that American troops would not be deployed to Syria. With intensifying U.S. military operations in both Iraq and Syria, dozens of bipartisan US lawmakers issued an open letter on Friday calling for Congress to fulfill its responsibility by voting “as quickly as possible” on whether to authorize a war that is well over a year old. In the meantime, Obama has just authorised the deployment of special forces troops to Syria as it intensifies airstrikes which has coincided with Washington’s shift in approach to the conflict. As Russia intensifies its efforts, Washington is spurred to take more effective action.

There is serious political unrest at the parliamentary level in Britain. Parliament unequivocally voted for no military action in Syria in 2013 yet PM David Cameron simply lied by omission and sent fighter jets in defiance.

Just yesterday the head of the British armed forces said “Britain is “letting down” its allies by not taking part in attacking Isil’s key strongholds in Syria,” General Sir Nicholas Houghton, the Chief of the Defence Staff, said it “makes no sense” that RAF airstrikes in Iraq stop at the border, when Britain knows Isil has based its stronghold in Syria. He seems to have forgotten that Britain is a democracy and its people are not answerable to the army.

Last week Michael Fallon, the Defence Secretary, said it was “morally indefensible” that Britain was not attacking the extremist group and even went as far as to say that we should be fighting in Syria because of ISIL’s involvement in the downing of the Russian passenger plane in Egypt.

In Britain and America the political gloves are off – democratic process is suspended. The big guns are on the way.

As WSWS reports – The US will send a squadron of F-15C fighter jets to Turkey’s Incirlik air base, the US Defense Department (DOD) announced on Friday. The nature of the US war planes, which are specifically designed for dogfight combat operations with other highly advanced fighter jets, indicates that the deployment carries a significance far beyond what its small scale would suggest. The US is preparing for aerial combat with exactly who in Syria – Russia?

Turkey is not happy with the situation as it currently prevails. Senior government officials in Turkey have now escalated the situation by insisting they would “not hesitate” to use force against any nation’s military might. The defiant pledge has sparked fears that Turkey would not discriminate and could risk even waging war with the US.

Prime Minister Davutoglu said: “We downed a drone yesterday. If it was a plane we’d do the same. Our rules of engagement are known. Whoever violates our borders, we will give them the necessary answer.”

Meanwhile, the Chinese have confirmed aerial activity in the region. “The J-15 warplanes will take off from the Chinese Liaoning-CV-16 aircraft carrier, which reached Syrian shores on Sept. 26 (as debkafile exclusively reported at the time). This will be a landmark event for Beijing: its first military operation in the Middle East as well the carrier’s first taste of action in conditions of real combat.”

At the same time, the Syrian government halted all flights in and out of an airport in Latakia province and the airport is currently being used by Russia and Iran as an airbase. Thousands of Iranian troops have arrived, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed.

Despite Moscow’s denial of their own ‘boots on the ground’ they are present. “We have seen Russian servicemen way outside of their airbase in Latakia, contradicting reports that Russia is not engaged in the Syrian regime’s ground offensives,” reports the Moscow based Conflict Intelligence Team.

Britain sent its Special Forces (against a parliamentary vote) to mount hit and run raids against Islamic State deep inside eastern Syria dressed in black and waving ISIS flags as insurgent fighters. Part of a force known as the Coalition Joint Special Operations Task Force, the British troops are under American command. Dubbed “smash” the units, which travel in civilian pick-ups, launch their own unmanned aerial vehicles, to scan terrain ahead of them and attack.

What type of diplomatic emergency would it be if Russian troops or air forces engaged these black clad Britons, wiped them out and then found out who they were afterwards? Will the headlines read “Russia Attacks Britain”, what then?

Different types of wars are now taking place but the actors remain the same. The US is witnessing a rival financial world order and a direct threat to its blood soaked empire.  Global Research Reports – As the financial architecture of the world is being altered by China and Russia, the US dollar is gradually being neutralised as one of Washington’s weapon of choice. Even the monopoly of Washington’s Bretton Woods system formed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank is being directly challenged.

In response, on September 12th –  EU sanctions pushed by the US, targeted even more of Russia’s state finances, energy and arms sectors. These are sectors managed by the powerful elite around President Vladimir Putin. Russian state banks are now excluded from raising long-term loans in the EU, exports of dual-use equipment for military use in Russia are banned, future EU-Russia arms deals are banned and the EU will not export a wide range of oil industry technology. Three major state oil firms are targeted: Rosneft, Transneft and Gazprom Neft, the oil unit of gas giant Gazprom.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has openly accused the West of seeking to force a regime change in Russia through sanctions by saying “The West is showing unambiguously that they do not want to force (Russia) to change policy, they want to achieve a change of regime.” Putin, a master strategist will have all these factors in mind when it comes to Syria. And unlike Obama, Cameron, Hollande and Co, Putin is unanimously supported by the Russian people.

In Syria, unrest began in the early spring of 2011 within the context of Arab Spring protests, with nationwide protests against President Bashar al-Assad’s government, whose forces responded with violent crackdowns. The conflict gradually morphed from prominent protests to an armed rebellion after months of military sieges.

Slowly and surely, through ‘mission creep’ the major global super-powers, already engaged in currency, commodity and economic conflict are being dragged into the quagmire from cold war to hot war. If it is true that Russia is preparing a ground offensive with 150,000 troops, supported by Iranian and Syrian troops, how will the west respond and what will it take for the last rung of the escalation ladder to be reached for all out conflict?

Graham Vanbergen – TruePublica

 

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