Russia seems poised to defend its ally as
Russian warships are being dispatched to
the Syrian coast as Moscow boosts its
presence in the region ahead of
expectations the US will not wait for
world support and go it alone with air strikes on the Assad regime. The St Petersburg central naval
command has announced the large
landing warship Nikolai Filchenkov will
set sail for the Syrian coast to join two
Russian destroyers which had already
left. They will join a Russian anti-submarine
ship, a frigate and three other landing
ships in the eastern Mediterranean
coast. In the game of brinkmanship, the
Russians announced the latest warship
deployed would be collecting “special
cargo” but would not elaborate. “The ship will make call in Novorossiisk,
where it will take on board special cargo
and set off for the designated area of its
combat duty in the eastern
Mediterranean,” the Russian official said. The US also has warships in the area and
as US president Barack Obama has
previously revealed, any military
engagement would likely come from air
strikes – most likely fired from warships
– on suspected chemical weapons plants and the mechanisms of delivery
including the Syrian airforce. The US is unlikely to wait for any support
from world leaders or the United Nations
but use the expected approval of its
Congress to launch a two-month
“limited” campaign as early as the end of
the month. The deployment comes amid high
tensions at the G20 summit of world
leaders in the Russian city St Petersburg
which was to debate the economy and
poverty in developing nations but
instead the agenda has been hijacked by the Syrian crisis. There is a clear split in opinion at the
conference as to the evidence that the
Bashar al-Assad regime used chemical
weapons on its citizens which killed more
than 1400 people including 400 children
last month. US navy warships have been ordered to
move closer to Syria and prepare for a
‘possible’ missile attack. There now appears to be little debate
chemicals were used but a split on who
actually used them. Both Russia and China, which held
private talks at the summit, do not
believe the evidence is in while the US,
UK, France and Australia believes it has
and retaliation is required. UN chief Ban ki-moon has been
attending the summit urging support for
a peace conference. Overnight summit host Russian
President Vladimir Putin held a dinner for
the leaders during which they made their
case for entry into the Syria crisis. President Obama said he had “very high
confidence” in the evidence chemical
weapons were used and urged strong
condemnation. He was supported by Prime Minister
David Cameron, and Foreign Minister
Bob Carr, representing Australia, who
also said they respectively had evidence
of an atrocity by the regime. France’s Francois Hollande also said he
was prepared to enter the conflict. The G20 world leaders have just one
more day of the summit to bridge bitter
divisions on action although that is
unlikely to happen with officials already
saying the animosity between nations,
notably Russian and the US and UK, and tension generally in the forum made that
an impossibility. Such has been the tone there is wide
reporting Mr Putin’s official spokesman
Dmitry Peskov yesterday dismissed
Britain as “just a small island no-one
pays any attention to” and boasted how
rich Russians were buying up most of Chelsea, an upmarket suburb in London. The stunning diplomatic sledge was later
being ever being made. Similarly the US
administration has made no secret of its
fury and anger with Mr Putin. Talks are continuing.
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