War

In a first of its kind event, Russian television today showed what it says is the first footage of Russian special forces fighting on the ground in Syria. 

Elite Russian units in Syria take part in search and rescue operations, assassinations of key rebel figures and coordination of air strikes, according to footage broadcast on state-owned channel Rossiya 24 on Sunday. Groups of heavily armed soldiers were shown coordinating sniper attacks, using robotic tanks and inspecting rebel corpses.

Just as the Assad regime (with Russian support) is about to retake Aleppo in a critical offensive, one which would shift the momentum of the nearly 6-year-long Syrian proxy war entirely to the benefit of the country's ruling regime, something unexpected happened: one day after the US announced it would send another 200 ground troops to Syria, and two days after  Obama unexpectedly lifted a ban restricting the delivery of military aid to “foreign forces, irregular forces, groups, or individuals,” Islamic State jihadists successfully recaptured the ancient desert city of Palmyra, after a much

President Putin has ordered full combat alert status for the S-400 Triumf air defense missile systems across the entire Russian border in response to a “Christmas threat” issued by President Obama.  Obama issued the ominous threat against Russian military and civilian relief forces in Syria, rejecting an agreement reached by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and US Secretary of State John Kerry to end the hostilities between the two nations in Syria.

The Obama administration admitted nearly 85,000 refugees into the United States in fiscal year 2016, the highest number since 1999.  Moreover, as we noted back in September, Obama's administration has laid the groundwork to increase that number even further in fiscal year 2017 to 110,000 (see "Hillbama Administration Plans To Admit At Least 110,000 Refugees In 2017"). 

Of course, not every state is doing their "fair share" to house the massive influx of immigrants with Pew Research Center recently pointing out that the top ten states are taking in 54% of refugees.

Syrian government forces temporarily halted their offensive against militants in Aleppo over the weekend to allow for evacuation of civilians from eastern parts of the city. Sputnik reports: Russia’s reconciliation center is evacuating civilians from eastern Aleppo in Syria through humanitarian corridors, the Russian Defense Ministry’s spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said Saturday.