Posted on 05/09/2015 12:12:29 AM PDT by MinorityRepublican
Lebanon’s Hezbollah is on the verge of launching an offensive against Syrian rebel groups in the mountainous Qalamoun region straddling the Syria-Lebanon border, north of Damascus.
But what was once seen as a relatively minor engagement in the broader Syrian conflict has taken on new significance. After military setbacks in the north and south of the country in the past six weeks, the regime of President Bashar al-Assad is desperate for a victory and is depending on his Shia Hezbollah allies to deliver it.
Assad and his Iranian and Hezbollah allies badly need to defeat — and to be seen defeating — the various rebel factions dug into the rugged Qalamoun mountains to stave off the perception that the tide may have finally turned against them.
“Today we are fighting a war, not a battle,” Assad said Wednesday in a rare public appearance. “War is not one battle but a series of many battles … We are not talking about tens or hundreds but thousands of battles and … it is the nature of battles for there to be advances and retreats, victories and losses.”
Assad needs a win to show his supporters that he still has the upper hand. And the pressure is on Hezbollah to secure that victory by crushing rebel groups, mainly Jabhat al-Nusra (the Nusra Front) and the ISIL in Qalamoun.
“When the operation begins, it will speak for itself and impose itself on the media,” Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah’s leader, said in a televised speech Tuesday. “We will not announce its location or timing.”
The long-awaited offensive was set to begin on April 28 but was called off at the last minute, according to Rifaat Nasrallah, the head of a Hezbollah-allied defense force for the Christian village of Ras Baalbek in Lebanon’s northern Bekaa Valley.
(Excerpt) Read more at america.aljazeera.com ...
Syria and Iran don’t maintain air superiority within Syria?
During its wars against Israel Syria couldn’t maintain air superiority over its own territory even with technically superior aircraft.
Iran’s airforce:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_of_the_Iranian_Air_Force
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