Putin said that Russia reserves its right to help eradicate terrorists in Idlib, should they continue with provocations and block establishment of a demilitarized zone there. The President noted that he had informed his “colleagues” about the situation and that artillery strikes on some targets had already been carried out.
Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), Jaysh al-Izza and Horas al-Din are the core of the groups, who are constantly violating the demilitarization agreement by shelling government targets in Aleppo, Lattakia, Hama and Idlib. On October 27th, Zubair al-Turkmani, a military commander of HTS in the Aleppo countryside, confirmed that the militants had shelled Syrian Arab Army troops near the town of Khan Tuman." SF
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Whatever the outcome, a lot of present "facts" are going to change after the mid-term election. Trump will still be president and he will feel free to do things and accept things from which the pending election had restrained him.
There will be personnel changes at the top of many departments of the Executive Branch. There will be a second phase tax bill proposed. There will be an executive order ending birthright citizenship for the children of illegal immigrants. There will be quite a lot of changes.
Among those will be an acceptance by the USG of a Russian/Syrian (R+6) offensive to clear Idlib Province of jihadis. IMO there is a "side deal" between POTUS and the Russians on this.
The Turks continue to play their dark annexation game with regard to Northern Syria. The Russians can easily make the case that the demilitarized zone has failed and that the jihadis continue to attack by fire targets in SAG held territory including the western suburbs of Aleppo City.
Syria is not a large country. It will be easy to concentrate maneuver reserves along the lines of departure for the offensive. pl
