War with a delay

The United States inflicted a powerful missile blow to Syria: on the night of April 7, the American destroyers released 59 cruise missiles at the Syrian Air Force base in the province of Homs. In response, Russia suspended military cooperation with the United States in Syria. As a result, the risk of unforeseen incidents between the military of the two countries - Russia and the United States - first after the end of the Cold War faced the threat of a direct military clash for the first time. And this is not just a new cold war - it is a delayed hot

Tomagavka was released from the destroyers Porter and Ross, who were in the Eastern Mediterranean. The point of the blow was at the Ash Shayrat air base in the Homs Province: according to Washington, it was from this airfield that the aircraft of government forces took off, which brought chemical bombs on the city of Khan-Sheikhun in the Idlib province on April 4. As a result of the use of Zarin, more than 70 (according to other sources, more than 100) civilians died, and more than 500 were injured.

Donald Trump: “Russia is faced with a choice: either take responsibility
for doing
Assad, or admit that she does not control Assad "

Why did Assad need to use chemical charges? It was in the Khan-Sheikhun area that the opposition managed to reject government troops. Damascus had to quickly return the status quo. And the use of poisonous substances was pushed by the fact that the current US administration seemed to demonstrate a willingness to treat Damascus softer than predecessors: after all, a week ago, the US Permanent Representative to the UN Nickei Haley said that the Assada departure from the presidential post is not a goal of US policy. However, Damascus miscalculated.

Night blow

According to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, as a result of a night blow on April 7 to the target, 23 “Thomagavka” out of 59 reached the goal, the place of the fall of the remaining 36 missiles is unknown. At the same time, at the air base itself, according to the Russian State Media, six aircraft were destroyed, and the runway was not damaged. At the same time, the Syrian journalist Thabet Salem in an interview with the BBC World said that 14 aircraft were destroyed as a result of an American blow, as well as runways and warehouses at the airport. However, according to the head of the British Ministry of Defense, Michael Fellon, during the “thorough preparation” of the night blow, everything was calculated so that the Russian military deployed in Syria would not suffer.

The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation also claim that immediately after the massive American missile strike, the armed groups of the Islamic State* and the Jebhat al-Nusra group* went on the offensive to the position of government forces. At the same time, the official representative of the Ministry of Defense, Major General Igor Konashenkov, at a briefing on April 7, did not explain whether there was some kind of relationship between these events. But in any case, another thing is obvious: so far in Syria, the coalition, led by the United States, attacked only IS's goals* and did not touch the troops of Bashar al -Assad. A blow to the Syrian air base does not just mark the beginning of a new stage in the Syrian military campaign-the United States hit the main Russian military-political ally in the region, and therefore, on Russian interests in the Middle East, finally, the personal prestige of Vladimir Putin, the president and the commander-in-chief, by the order of which the Russian armed forces began the military campaign in the military campan Syria in support of Bashar al -Assad and his regime. The Syrian opposition reports that at night and on the morning of April 7, Israeli combat aircraft inflicted a series of strikes at the positions of the Hyzbollah of the Hyzbollah, whose formations are fighting in Syria on the side of Assad.

Vladimir Putin: “US strikes on Syria are aggression against a sovereign state in violation of international law under a far -fetched pretext”

Exchange of rhetoric

The order to inflict a missile strike on the ASh-Shayrat database was personally given by US President Donald Trump. “Russia faces a choice: either take responsibility for what Assad does, or admit that it does not control Assad,” he said. According to Trump, a blow to the Syrian airbase corresponded to the "vital interests of the US national security." The European allies of the United States supported this decision: it demonstrated “the necessary determination to give an answer to barbaric chemical attacks,” Donald Tusk, chairman of the European Council, said on April 7. “The EU will work with the United States to put an end to cruelty in Syria,” he added.

The Kremlin responded with a statement by the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov: the Russian President considers the US missile strike “aggression against a sovereign state in violation of international law and under a far-fetched pretext.” As a response on April 7, Moscow announced the decision to suspend the effect of the prisoner with the United States in October 2015 a memorandum of preventing incidents and ensuring the safety of aviation flights in Syria. “The meaning of the Memorandum was lost tonight with strikes,” Peskov said. The risk of incidents in Syria after a missile strike, according to the press secretary, "increased significantly."

The twelfth hour

The Russian Foreign Ministry also issued an application that states that the American missile blow was preparing “in advance”, and the events of April 4 in Idlib “were simply used as a preposition for demonstration of force”. At the same time, the informed NT source in the Russian diplomatic department believes that there are no signs that the events in Syria will lead to the cancellation of the visit of the US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, scheduled for April 11-12. “So far there are no signals, but, given the level of negative rhetoric on both sides, everything can be,” said a source in a conversation with the magazine on the morning of April 7.

However, Tillerson will arrive or will not come, and Russian diplomacy will seem to be approaching its twelfth hour. Not to the star, but to the twelfth. This is when the carriage turns into a pumpkin, and the coachman into the rat (nothing personal, Sergey Viktorovich, nothing personal).

For four years, it was believed that in 2013 the domestic Foreign Ministry held a brilliant combination. Sergei Lavrov convinced US Secretary of State John Kerry that Assad’s regime could voluntarily abandon his chemical weapons. The White House, which then did not seek to bring his own threats about military interference in Syria at all, was satisfied with the promises of the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry. Him weapons production capacities were dismantled. The poisoning substances from the arsenals of Damascus seemed to be exported and destroyed under the control of international officials. The US attack on Syria managed to prevent, rejoiced in Moscow. It turned out not to prevent, but only to postpone ...

It is not interesting to be interesting how the Russian military department explained the use of Assad Himom weapons by aviation. It turns out that the Syrian "drying" bombed the warehouse where the evil-aware opposition stuffed ammunition with Zarin. At the same time, the Russian authorities did not even understand that this, to put it mildly, the intricate version did not at all remove responsibility from Damascus and the Moscow supporting it. If they did not know that they were bombing, then this discredits previous statements that all air strikes are applied on the basis of exhaustive intelligence. If they knew that in the warehouse chemical weapons, then, intentionally wanted to poison hundreds of people.

By the way, the journalists of the French Libération have already talked with the inhabitants of Khan Sheikhun-no one there saw no exploding “warehouse of terrorists”. Moreover, French doctors were in the city, they felt the effect of gas after an air attack. And they, too, did not see any fire in the warehouse. They explained: sarin is sprayed at a temperature of 147 ° C, and so that because of a fire in a warehouse with Zarin, people die from suffocation, such a fire had to rage for several hours-it was impossible not to notice him.

Washington has already issued its verdict by ignoring the Russian version. According to Trump, "there can be no debate that Syria used forbidden chemical weapons." Most states agreed with such a verdict. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that Russia has not fulfilled its obligations on the 2013 deal. And now "the Russians must carefully consider whether they are going to continue to maintain Assad's regime."

Diplomatic defeat

No matter what the case ends, what is happening for the Kremlin is already a diplomatic defeat. Starting a military operation in Syria in 2015, Moscow successfully blackmailed Washington with the possibility of incidents in the airspace of this country. However, now the White House decided to take a chance. The American military, however, used emergency communication channels in order to inform Russian colleagues two hours before the attack. And those, thank God, did not try to counteract American blows. Meanwhile, just for the sake of such counteraction and Russia placed its own air defense systems in Syria, meaningfully hinting: S-300 complexes are able to intercept winged missiles. But they did not intercept. Either they did not consider it necessary, or could not. As a result, the Russian military presence in Syria literally before our eyes loses its significance as an argument in global policy.

The communication channels established in accordance with the memorandum took advantage of the Americans to warn about the attack. The closure of such a channel at the time of the acute international crisis, of course, increases the risks many times if Washington plans new airstrikes

As a response, Russia, as already mentioned, refused to implement the provisions of the Memorandum on the prevention of possible incidents in the Syrian airspace. By the way, the Americans took advantage of the communication channels established in accordance with the memorandum to warn about the attack. The closure of such a channel at the time of the acute international crisis, of course, repeatedly increases the risks if Washington plans new airstrikes. Russia, it turns out, now does not want the Americans to warn her about the preparation of such blows. And thus, as far as one can judge, reserves the right to some “response actions”.

For the first time after the Caribbean crisis before Moscow and Washington, the prospect of a direct clash loomed (albeit theoretically). Yes, the participation of the Soviet military in the Korean and Vietnamese wars was the secret of the police. However, the United States then preferred not to pedal this topic. In Washington, it was clearly understood: it is worth recognizing the fact of the direct combat clash of the USSR and the United States, and the conflict will be very difficult to limit the space of a certain “overseas” territory and not slide down to war in other theaters. I would like to believe that now they understand this in both the American and Russian capitals ...

* “Islamic state” (IG, ISIS, Daish), “Jebhat al-Nusra”-organizations prohibited in Russia as terrorist.

Photo: ABACA Press/TASS, Edlib/Zuma/Tass