The US-led coalition killed more than 100 Assad regime fighters in eastern Syria on Wednesday, officials said, in the largest deliberate strike carried out by Western forces against pro-Syrian government troops.
The coalition said it struck regime fighters with airstrikes and artillery after they launched an "unprovoked attack" against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Western-backed rebels fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) in Syria.
"We estimate more than 100 Syrian pro-regime forces were killed while engaging SDF and coalition forces," a US military official said.
The strikes took place in the Euphrates River valley in the province of Deir Ezzor, where Isil still holds scraps of territory but is under intense pressure from both Syrian regime forces and the SDF.
The US has struck pro-regime forces in eastern Syria several times but Wednesday's attack caused more casualties than any previous deliberate strike.
Around 100 Syrian army troops were killed in an accidental strike in Deir Ezzor in September 2016 when US forces mistook them for Isil fighters.
The US and the Assad regime have for the most part maintained an uneasy truce in Syria, exchanging hostile words but rarely shooting at each other
Wednesday's strike against pro-regime forces illustrates the complex new reality in Syria, where the shared enemy of Isil has largely been defeated and tensions are growing between competing military forces in the country.
The US said that around 500 pro-regime troops, backed by tanks and artillery, had launched what appeared to be coordinated attack on an SDF headquarters.
“The coalition conducted strikes against attacking forces to repel the act of aggression,” a coalition spokesman said.
The US did not specifically say if the fighters were from the Syrian army or an allied militia or a foreign fighters group like the Lebanese militants Hizbollah.
The Syrian regime said the fighters were from a local militia fighting against Isil and accused the US of "a war crime and a crime against humanity".
Damascus regularly protests against the US-led intervention in Syria, calling it a violation of Syria's sovereignty, but has been largely powerless to stop it.
The US maintains a "deconfliction channel" with Russia, which is allied with the Syrian regime, and the two militaries use the channel to coordinate their movements to avoid to any accidental conflicts.
The US and Russia took military action in the last 48 hours to show the bit-players in the Syrian war that they are not calling the shots for the next moves. The objects of this lesson were the Assad regime, Turkey, Iran and Hizballah.
On Wednesday night and Thursday morning, Jan. 7-8, members of the US 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit fired M777 Howitzer guns, backed by air strikes, against Hizballah and pro-Iranian Shiite militia forces operating in the Deir ez-Zour region east of the Euphrates River.
Russian forces may also have been involved in the clash, say sources in Washington.
According to the official US-led coalition communique, pro-Assad forces attacked a headquarters of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) east of the Euphrates, which is the deconfliction line separating the US area of operations from that of Russia and the Assad regime, and suffered 100 dead in the US counter-attack.
Deir ez-Zour: Here, the US is engaged in a concentrated effort to arm and supply logistics to the SDF and the Kurdish YPG for two missions: the fight against Islamic State and a solid front to contain the Syrian, Iranian and Hizballah forces operating in the region. DEBKA Weekly’s military sources reveal that, in this sector, the US contingent is not content with delivering training and supplies; it also provides artillery and air support, labeled “preventive fire,” to help the local forces keep Assad’s army and its allies pinned down in their positions. This holds them back from continuing their easterly advance to the Iraqi border. The slightest movement outside those lines draws sustained American fire.
Al-Tanf Front, SE Syria: This is the most active front. Hardly a day goes by without pressure from Russian special forces, Syrian troops, Hizballah, or local groups. A combined Russian-Syrian-Hizballah push has long sought to drive the Americans out of Al-Tanf, because it is the key to free and safe passage from southeastern Syria into western Iraq and northern Jordan. However, the US garrison isn’t budging – even when it comes under live artillery fire and air strikes.
On Thursday, Jan. 8, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan put in a call to Vladimir Putin in Moscow in search of an understanding with the Russian president on coordination between their air and air defense forces in Syria. DEBKAfile’s military sources report that the call had become urgent, since it looked as though Russia was preparing its air force and air defense systems to hit the Turkish warplanes that were providing air support for the Turkish anti-Kurdish operation in Afrin.
On Tuesday, Russian forces took over the Syrian Abu Dhuhour Airport east of Idlib and moved in Russian planes and helicopters. Elsewhere in Syria, they deployed their air defense weapons systems to new positions in the Aleppo and Idlib regions.
A Syrian military spokesman announced that all parts of northern Syria were now covered by a comprehensive anti-missile shield. Afrin air space had suddenly become an effective no-fly zone for Turkish air force operations. This was Moscow’s punishment for the downing on Feb. 3, of a Russian Sukhoi 25 Frogfoot ground attack aircraft over the town of Maasran in northern Idlib by Hayat Tahrir Al Sham rebels, firing a ground-to-air man-portable missile. The Russians believe that Turkey gave the rebel group those missiles.
The Kremlin issued a communique after the Putin-Erdogan conversation stating that they had agreed to establish a Tension Reduction Zone in Idlib. But our sources report that the main part of the conversation was far from accord. Putin’s demanded that Erdogan call off the Turkish campaign in Afrin, repeating the demand issued Wednesday by Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani. Therefore, if Erdogan decides nevertheless to carry on with his anti-Kurd campaign in northern Syria, he will find himself not only up against the Trump administration, but also his allies, Russia and Iran.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Wednesday accused the US of planning to partition Syria.
“Plans of de facto partition of Syria exist. We know about it and will ask our American colleagues how they do imagine all this,” Lavrov said during a speech at “Leaders of Russia” contest.
He also said Americans were changing their stance about the reason for their presence in Syria.
“Americans seem to have abandoned assurances given to us that the only purpose of their presence in Syria is to defeat terrorists.”
“Now they say this presence will remain until they are convinced that Syria has begun a sustainable process of political settlement, the result of which will be regime change,” he said.
Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011 when the Bashar al-Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests — which erupted as part of the “Arab Spring” uprisings — with unexpected ferocity.
Since then, more than a quarter of a million people have been killed and more than 10 million displaced across the war-battered country, according to the UN.
The Syrian Center for Policy Research, however, put the death toll from the conflict at more than 470,000 people.
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