"The lessons of Aleppo's long, pointless siege" Topic

"In its 7,000 years of existence, Aleppo has been fought over by Babylonians, Greeks and Romans. The modern battle for the ancient Syrian city, however, may yet be as significant for the future of the Middle East as those fought by the kingdoms and empires of the past.

The four-year battle for Aleppo now seems to be reaching its final stages. More than any other place, the city – one of the oldest continually inhabited places in the world – has been the epicenter of the Syria conflict.

In time, Syria may be seen to define the early 21st century the way the Spanish Civil War did the 1930s – a perfect storm of all the worst trends in global politics and conflict. If it is, then Aleppo will be its Guernica, the Spanish town carpet bombed by Nazi aircraft in 1937 in a savage precursor to the horrors of the coming World War Two…"
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Amicalement
Armand

from the article:

Even now with Russian support, the Syrian government's attempts to seize it back have been largely unsuccessful.

Ummm, what? Is the author on drugs?

And in diverting its forces to the most recent Aleppo assault, Damascus left Palmyra too lightly defended and vulnerable to Islamic State, which recaptured the ancient city on Sunday.

Option A: Capture the country's largest population center, and the locus of resistance in the north.

Option B: Keep a foothold in a near-deserted town of archaeological ruins in the middle of nowhere, useful only as a jump-off point for liberating Deir-e-Zor and Raqqa.

Had Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton prevailed, those fighting to protect the last handful of rebel enclaves in the city might finally have seen Washington drawn into the fight, if only through enforcing a no-fly zone against Syrian and Russian aircraft.[emphasis mine]

Those poor "moderate" rebels. If only we had risked WW3 to save them. /sarc

The battle is not quite over. The failure of Assad's forces to take the sprawling city suggests they lack the combat power to do so.

Does this guy have his head buried in the sand? This was published yesterday, when already reports were coming in that terrorist defensive positions had largely collapsed and that Assad's forces held ~90% of the city. Pro-government Syrian journalists are posting Youtube footage from liberated neighborhoods and landmarks.

If Aleppo is to fall shortly, then much of the credit – if that is the right word – must go to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Russia has established a potential new role for itself, a source of military power for autocratic regimes the West might rather see gone.

Anyone who thinks this is a "new role" for our eastern antagonists has the memory of a goldfish.

His concluding paragraph is probably the only part that's worth a damn:

Syria – and Aleppo in particular – never had good options. As I've written before, it might just have been best never to have encouraged the opposition at all.

If the battle of Aleppo is seen as some kind of regional historic turning point, historians may well be arguing over it for generations. As it draws to a close, however, only one thing is truly apparent – that a city that started the century as a relatively cosmopolitan metropolis and destination for Western tourists has been reduced to rubble. And that all the fighting and international handwringing may ultimately have made little difference to who actually runs Syria.

Aerial bombardment seems to work.

Perhaps, not on its own, but definitely in concert with other forces.

Given the age of Aleppo, it isn't the first time it's been reduced to rubble and had its population butchered. It's recovered before and will recover again – and this time it won't be recovering in the hands of rabid Islamist fanatics like Ahrar al-Sham.

If you claim you want a war, do it yourself, don't complain those doing it instead are not using your rules. ( speaking of Rules, Yemen the media, please a bit?)

I suspect that life under Assad in 2011 was more bearable for the general populace than present conditions in Syria…….the West should leave well alone……after Iraq,Libya,Egypt and Syria we should take notice.

Regardless … Assad with Russia's help will reclaim Aleppo. With only it's ruins standing. And in turn killed many of the rebels. Besides any other reasons to retake Aleppo, there is/was a large concentration of Anti-Assad forces there. That make them a viable target …

And some good point Noble.
As it has been said, any position/objective can be taken if you are willing to pay the cost. And in this case, the largest cost will be paid by the denizens of Aleppo. And as we see Assad does not care about most of them at all.

Aerial bombardment seems to work.

Perhaps, not on its own, but definitely in concert with other forces.

Yes, as long as you really don't care about how much CD occurs. And of course even with the West using surgical strikes/Smart Munitions, etc. Airpower can't do it on their own. But with the combined arms concept, it works …

The lesson here is that if you want to poke your nose where it doesn't belong and cause trouble fomenting unrest in other countries for idealistic reasons such as toppling authoritarian dictatorships, you better be willing to pay the price or stay out of it.

Yes, as we saw how well that turned out in Iraq and Libya. Not to mention A'stan.

idealistic reasons

That has killed more than otherwise. We have to come from a pragmatic, realistic, Realpolitik, geopolitical outlook.

If Saddam or Gaddhaffi were still alive would things be any worse in either location ? There would probably a lot less deaths for one.

And A'stan, we should have only gone there to kill off UBL and AQ and any other jihads that we could. The A'stan government has been and is worse that useless, etc., … Once the US leaves, they have to be left to fight it out among themselves … That is what is happening and will continue for a very, very, long time …

The Western media has proven itself extremely hypocritical and as nothing more than worthless propaganda with relation to Aleppo.

One would think the siege finishing would be great news especially from a humanitarian perspective.

The West should be offering aid to those in Aleppo (this would help deters atrocities if Western aid workers are crawling over the place).

Instead the Western media is presenting the end of the siege as a humanitarian catastrophe. Here's that insane post truth that dominates Western thought.

We have to come from a pragmatic, realistic, Realpolitik, geopolitical outlook

Totally agree.

Unfortunately the West is increasingly driven by idiotic feelings and sentimentality, hypocrisy, confused values and what can only be described as stupidity in our elites (elites including the media as well as political leaders).

And whilst we run around in circles in the Middle East, we let the Chinese take over the South China Sea.

Real politick has been flushed down the toilet together with common sense and sense of purpose.

Amen …

Stupidity and ignorance plus that idiotic pretense at telling other ancient civilisations how to things.
We had ministers who thought India and Japan were in the south emisphere.