Hans Blix: U.S. has “poor excuse” for Syria incursion now

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63. Where are we moving these "Planes" to?????

Last edited Tue Aug 27, 2013, 11:58 PM - Edit history (1)

The movement of planes to Cyprus, seems to be an annual move to provide additional flight time for the pilots. i.e. it is something done every year.

Rain occurs mainly in winter, with summer being generally dry.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_of_Cyprus

Between June and October, you can go months without rain in Cyprus. Perfect flying conditions. This starts to end in October. Rainfall starts in October, peaks at about 9-10 days in January, and falls back to near zero in June.

As to elsewhere in the Eastern Mediterranean, I see no place the US or NATO can base planes. Carriers are an option, but right now the only Carrier the US has in the Mediterranean is the USS Harry S Truman. When the US attacked Iraq we had four carriers in the Persian Gulf, not just one. At least one other Carrier will have to be moved into the Mediterranean, and given the air power needed at least four to overwhelm Syrian air defenses.

US Carrier locations:
https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=217811069988644259786.000489a6f745d8c886913

Now, the recent move of British Planes to Cyprus is tied in with Britain's "Operation Cougar 13" which started in the middle of August. It is a maneuver through the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf. It is long planned, for such maneuvers MUST be announced publicly by international treaty months before they are held. The Royal Navy has done this twice before in 2011 and 2012 and due to the Royal Navy's long term plan seems to have become an annual event:

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/royal-navy-set-for-cougar-13

Presently the Royal Navy is off the Adriatic Coast in operation "Albanian Lion" which is being held with Albania: "Albanian Lion" is part of "Operation Cougar".

http://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/News-and-Events/Latest-News/2013/August/23/130823-Royal-Marines-Albanian-Lion

http://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/Operations/Current-Operations/Operational-Deployments/Ex-Cougar-13

This is the third time in the last three years that the British Navy has done this type of exercise, sailing from Britain to the Persian Gulf via the Mediterranean Sea and the Suez Canal.

This operation appears to be connected with French Units (France right now has a Aircraft Carrier, Britain does NOT except for two helicopter carriers, one of which is a 1980 era carrier converted to Helicopter use and scheduled to be mothballed or scraped next year).

Given the nature of these maneuvers and the fact only ONE US Carrier is in the Mediterranean sea at the present time, I see these as part of the same set of maneuvers NOT a plan to attack Syria. The Royal Navy did deploy its one Carrier, but it is carrying only Helicopters and thus without the ability to project power INLAND (it can project power on the high seas AND on the coast, but not inland, this is important for the fighting in Syria is well inland NOT along the coast).

Greece and Turkey (and thus Cyprus which has no refinery itself, import refined oil from Greece and Italy instead) gets their oil from Iran. Thus neither wants to cut off its oil supply. Turkey may want Assad out of power, but it is NOT going to risk its fuel supply to topple him. Iraq has already said NO to the use of its bases to attack Syria (the Shiite leadership of Iraq supports Iran not the US and that was the case even when the US occupied Iraq). Saudi Arabia Air bases are to far south. Jordan's air bases are close, but supplies come via Israel OR Iraq and Iraq will say NO and Jordan is NOT that trusted by Israel.

Israel has the Air Bases and support elements to support a US Attack on Syria. The problem with Israel, is Assad will point out the Israeli connection and thus force every middle eastern country to come to Assad's aid, even if the rulers of those middle eastern countries hate Assad's guts. Even the middle east rulers who are trying to topple Assad, if Israel is involved, will have to go through at least the motion of defending Assad from Israel. Thus Israel is out as where US forces can be based to attack Assad.

Egypt and Libya are to unstable. Thus Italy is the nearest Air Base except for the two British bases on Cyprus. Cyprus can veto the use of those two bases, simply by the fact it has enough artillery to put those bases out of operations when ever its wants to (through not for any long time period, but long enough to make the use of those bases marginal).

The nearest US Air base is in Sicily, which is over 2400 KM from Syria.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naval_Air_Station_Sigonella

F-15 Combat Radius is just under 2000 KM, Ferry range is 5500 KM. The difference is that Combat range is how far the plane can fly and return with a normal combat load. The Ferry range is how far it can go with fuel to get to where it is going. Thus from Sicily the F-15 will have to refuel at least once.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonnell_Douglas_F-15_Eagle

The F-16 has considerable shorter range, but with in flight refueling can get to Syria from Sicily.
Combat radius: 340 mi (295 nmi, 550 km) on a hi-lo-hi mission with four 1,000 lb (450 kg) bombs

Ferry range: 2,280 nmi (2,620 mi, 4,220 km) with drop tanks

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Dynamics_F-16_Fighting_Falcon

F-18 is about the same as the F-16:

Combat radius: 400 nmi (460 mi, 740 km) on air-air mission
Ferry range: 1,800 nmi (2,070 mi, 3,330 km)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonnell_Douglas_F/A-18_Hornet

Range of the A-10 is less then half the F-16 and F-18, but still can get to target with in flight refueling:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairchild_Republic_A-10_Thunderbolt_II

Now, the B-52, B-1 and B-2 bombers can clearly get to Syria, but they are all more area bomber then the pin point bombing needed. Thus they can join in any attack on Syria, but sooner or later you need the Fighter Bombers and attack planes and that is the big restriction.

Thus, unless Cyprus does NOT object to the use of those British Bases on Cyprus, the distance is borderline. Can be done, but at a high cost for you will have to send up a tanker for each plane on each mission. The more you are willing to re-fuel in flight, the more munitions can be carried. All of the above planes can all be loaded down with the maximum weapons load, but to take off fuel will have to be cut to get those planes in flight with maximum weapon load. Once in flight, they can be fully fueled (once in the air, less power is needed to maintain speed to the target, thus it is common practice to load planes to the max with weapons, but fuel them just enough to get air borne, then re-fuel them again in flight to the target).

I mention the above, for it shows how complex an attack on Syria would be. Libya was half the distance from Sicily, thus less refueling was needed, and quicker response was possible to request for air support from the ground. Once Qaddafi retreated to southern Libya, he was outside the range of the planes based in Sicily (Thus he was captured by a ground unit operating in the desert that attack his convoy and captured Qaddafi and shot Qaddafi).

The more I look into the situation in Syria, I see obstacles to any attack. Can NATO and the US attack? Yes, but these obstacles are enough to reduce such an attack to be a pale reflection of what NATO did in Libya (This can be seen when Qaddafi's forces retreated to Tripoli, as Qaddafi's forces retreated, those forces moved closer and closer to Sicily, making it easier for NATO planes to bomb what ever defensive positions Qaddafi's forces set up. Once Qaddafi moved south, the situation changed as he slowly moved out of range and response time from Sicily (Through by that time, his forces were so weak he was an easy target to take on by the forces that captured and killed him).

Syria is NOT Libya, it is a much more difficult target that will take more forces then presently available to attack Syria. Thus one of the reason for the UN investigation of these Chemical Attacks is to give time for NATO and the US to gets it forces in order to launch such at attack, but I see it taking at least another month to everyone on board, including the US Military, who has objection if and when the US has two or four carriers off the coast of Syria, one question for example what is the long term goal? Syria without Iraq is almost useless, but the US has lost Iraq to Iran for the first choice of the Shiites of Iraq is Iran. Does the US invade Iraq again, and this time make sure the Sunnis get control? i.e. put someone like Saddam back ion charge of Iraq, as long as he stays loyal to the US.

Thus I think Obama is under pressure from the Right Wing to attack Syria, for that is part of they plan to control world wide oil. The problem is that plan also requires Iraq to be loyal to the US (and it is not) and then to take over the oil and natural gas reserves of Iran (Which the US can not without support of Iraq and ACTIVE neutrality by Russia and China).

By what I mean "Active" Neutrality, is that neither country does anything that undermines US attack on Iran (i.e. Russia does not start on oil embargo, along with Iraq and Venezuela) or China sends ships through the various channels between the main islands of Japan.

Sorry, every time I look at Syria and does any type of basic research on Syria, it comes back NO ATTACK for the costs to even do a minor attack is just to high. Worse, it will open the US up to an Oil Embargo, that the US can NOT stop (one lead by Russia, Iran and Venezuela and supported by the Shiites of Iraq). Such an oil embargo will hurt all four countries, but will hurt the US worse for we are more dependent on oil, then those countries are on the US Dollar.

On the other hand Obama appears to be surrounded by people who still look at controlling oil as the key to world Domination. They want to control oil and Iraq, Iran and Venezuela are the weak links in any attempt to undermine US control. This is their dream, they dogma, that it should have died when the US withdrew from Iraq (and how the US withdrew from Iraq) does not even seem to have cross those people's minds. Thus Obama's talking points, to keep that dogma alive even through any attack on Syria is doomed to failure.