Thread: Syria

Originally Posted by Hanna

Never seen such an extreme propaganda war as in the case of Syria!
The killings of the rebels are reported as killings of the government....
The creepy thing is that LOTS of people obviously support the current government, or the other side would have won over a year ago. Whole cities and ethnic groups, no doubt about it.

The same was against Iraq in 1990-91 and in 2002-2003, against Serbs during the whole decade from 1991 to 1999 and in many other cases. Unfortunately, it's a norm, not an exception. The goal of media is not to inform the people, but to change their mind in a necessary way.

Kudos to Russia for staying impartial and not jumping on the propaganda bandwagon.

Russia is not completely impartial. It sells weapon to the Syrian government and it blocks all the resolutions against Syria in the UN. The media cover of the events is rather pregovernmental too.

Originally Posted by Marcus

The same was against Iraq in 1990-91 and in 2002-2003, against Serbs during the whole decade from 1991 to 1999 and in many other cases. Unfortunately, it's a norm, not an exception. The goal of media is not to inform the people, but to change their mind in a necessary way.

Russia is not completely impartial. It sells weapon to the Syrian government and it blocks all the resolutions against Syria in the UN. The media cover of the events is rather pregovernmental too.

Yes, you are probably right, but in the case of the Serbs, I simply did not see it. It was just at the time when new human rights abuses by socialist governments were "discovered" practically every week. I was totally fed up and disillusioned with all of it and just ignored any news to do with Eastern Europe... The other problem was that I had not been aware that Yugoslavia consisted of so many different countries. It was pretty confusing unless you had the time and interest to get up to speed on the background, which I did not at the time. But previously nobody every talked about separate nations there, just of Yugoslavians, the Adriatic coast etc. When media started to talk about "ethnic cleansing" and concentration camps, they did not leave much room for sympathising with the Serbs even though they they were Christians, Slavs etc, etc.
Back in the 1990s there was no access to alternative news sources like we can find online today.

Iraq - Yes, I remember that I did not believe that Iraqi soldiers had yanked Kuwait babies out of incubators out of sheer spite, or that surrendering Iraqis in the second Gulf War had asked the Americans for a Big Mac when surrendering... The propaganda onslaught was pretty all encompassing and there was no access to anything else.

I agree that RT is NOT a neutral source of news. I like it anyway, but it is obvious that they have a few agendas going on, like a small paypack on the UK for all the diplomatic troubles recently..... Gleeful reporting on the problems with the Euro and immigration in Western Europe.... An obsession with "Neo Nazis" in the Baltic... But there is a lot of substance behind the majority of their claims on these matters, even though it irritates me!

So you really think that Russia is secretly supporting the current regime despite their claims to the contrary? If I hear that some Russian special commandos are there and stirring up trouble I'll be just as annoyed as I feel with the UK/US about their involvement. If Russia is meddling they should stay out of it! Holding up existing contracts and obligation is not meddling though. They could not have anticipated this when they agreed to service helicopters or set up the Russian naval port there. But it seems to me that Russia is making an effort to try to stay out of it even though it had friendly relations with Syria in the past.

Originally Posted by Basil77

Iran, obviously. They are trynig to perform this thrick with Russia constantly, but it doesn't work for for now. I wonder for how long?

Yes, I guess Russia is a bit vulnerable to that..... First the Soviet states fell away for better or worse, and then there was troubles in the "outskirts" of Russia proper and the Chechen war....
Even the UK is not immune, with the Scots and sometimes Northern Ireland sometimes talking seriously of going their own way.

Since Russia has basically never shown the slightest bit of aggression towards my country, and since I largely like the people and the culture, I really want to see Russia as a confident country with internal stability.... I guess to some extent Russia can "buy" the loyalty of the outer regions with oil money...
And why not try some nationalistic campaigns....
It seems like lunacy for parts of Russia to break away... Isn't most of the country supported out of Moscow and the central regions anyway? Thy couldn't even extract their oil and transport their gas with out central help, could they? Do people see this as a risk, I mean the Russian Federation breaking up in a similar way to the USSR?


And in case anyone was in any doubt about what I have been saying...

Britain’s former Special Air Service (SAS) commandos are reportedly training armed opposition groups fighting against the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, reports say.

The Daily Mail and Sunday Express have revealed that the mercenaries have set up training camps in Iraq and on the Syrian border for the armed rebels.

British army sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, have said the militants are receiving instructions in military tactics, weapons handling and communications systems.

Groups of 50 militants at a time are being trained by two Mideast-based private security firms which employ former SAS personnel.

More than 300 rebel forces have completed the commando training program, and are said to account for a number of the opposition’s combatant units fighting Syrian security forces in Damascus.

Britain has also placed more than 600 troops on standby over the unrest in Syria.

UK Foreign Secretary William Hague says London should be acting outside the UN Security Council and step up its support for militant groups in Syria.