Iran, Russia assistance crucial to Syria: Analyst

Press TV has interviewed Mark Sleboda, an international relations and security analyst in Moscow, about Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani saying a trilateral meeting between the defense ministers of Iran, Russia and Syria in Tehran indicates that Russia, Syria and Iran are determined to counter Takfiri terrorists. 

A rough transcription of the interview appears below.

Press TV: It seems Admiral Ali Shamkhani was very positive with regards to this trilateral meeting between the Iranian, Russian and Syrian defense chiefs. How do you see it?

Sleboda: Well they should be excited, they should be happy with the fact that the three main powers, they have sundry other allies, they have cooperation from Iraq, from Kurdish militias, and from Hezbollah on the ground but the coalition is strong and is recommitting itself to the fight.

However, we should sound a little bit of a negative note to this. The reason why this is necessary is because the overtures to bring this to a peaceful resolution, a ceasefire brokered with the United States has failed because it is quite obvious that the US and the other members of its coalition that are still trying to overthrow the Syrian government - …Qatar, Turkey, United Kingdom - are unwilling or unable to separate their proxies from al-Qaeda and numerous other terrorist groups on the ground and this has led to a harsh uptake in violence, in conflict particularly around the Aleppo area, and Russia has sounded increasing  alarm and frustration with the United States over recent weeks and I think that this meeting yesterday, carrying on in today, is about a re-assessment and recommitment.

In a way, you could say that Russia’s attempt to declare kind of a mission accomplished and a withdrawal of forces, however real that withdrawal really was, has failed. They have had a rude awakening, the US is unwilling and unable to cooperate to bring this to a peaceful resolution.

Press TV: Just going along this line of reasoning of it further, when it comes to such cooperation between Iran, Russia and Syria on the situation on the ground, when it comes to Daesh or other foreign-backed Takfiri militant groups, one has to question how much of a role can, for example, Iran and Russia play because let’s not forget when Russia entered the battlefield, so to speak, there was a lot of negative press from mainstream media, the Western governments were up in arms in criticizing Russia and blaming it literally for everything that went wrong on the ground, so one has to take that with a grain of salt, doesn’t one?

Sleboda: Well I think we have to take a look at what the Western press is looking about separate from realities on the ground and the reality on the ground is that the Syrian government was at a quagmire. They were unable, they were stagnating, they were unable to make gains on the ground up until the coalition assembled by Russia, including Iran, began to contribute in a large way and this is when we saw the Syrian government make great gains forward in Latakia, around Aleppo and in particular liberating Palmyra and that front goes on.

So I think the assistance of Russia and Iran are crucial to what happens in Syria and without it the Syrian government would be in a much more precarious position because of simply the amount of aid that the various moderate forces that are allied with al-Qaeda on the ground are getting from the West and the [Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council. So ignore what the Western mainstream media is saying and focus on the reality on the ground.

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