US troops overwhelmingly disapprove of Syria strikes - poll

US servicemembers oppose military strikes in Syria by a three-to-one margin, according to a poll by Military Times. An online survey of more than 750 active-duty troops found 75 percent of respondents were not in favor of airstrikes against the Assad regime. A slight percentage more said it is not in the US national interest to get involved in the country’s civil war. Military Times said money and a war-weary isolationist streak were top reasons for the soldiers’ disapproval.

Philippine troops advance into rebel-held villages

Fifty-six people have died in a six-day standoff between government troops and rebels in the Philippines, AP reported local officials as saying. Government troops have started to make their way into coastal villages in the south of the country, where Muslim rebels from the Moro National Liberation Front have held dozens of residents as hostages. The standoff has led to 60,000 residents fleeing their homes.

Iraq

A suicide bomber has killed 26 people Saturday who were attending a funeral of a member of Iraq’s Shabak minority in the northern province of Nineveh, Reuter’s reports. The attack took place in Bartella, 25 km east of Mosul, the provincial capital. No one has claimed responsibility for the attack but in the past Sunni militants have targeted the Shabak minority as they are predominately Shi’ite and have warned them to leave the area. The 30,000 strong Shabak community have their own distinct language and live near the Turkish border. Two other attacks in the Nineveh province left a policeman dead and three others wounded, while an explosion in Dujail, near Baghdad killed two more people.

Syrian opposition elects moderate Islamist as provisional PM

The Syrian opposition to embattled President Assad, an umbrella group led by the Syrian National Coalition, has elected the moderate Islamist Ahmad Tumeh as their provisional prime minister.Tumeh, a 48-year old former political prisoner from the east of Syria, received 75 votes out of the 97 cast in a ballot in Istanbul.The move is seen by analysts as an attempt to raise its credibility as high stakes diplomacy plays out between the US and Russia to try and resolve Syria’s two year civil war. Tumeh is an independent Islamist and has been appointed to run rebel-held areas where a slide into chaos has threatened to undermine the opposition to President Assad.

​Turkish citizen detained in Egypt on charges of espionage, conspiracy

A 46-year-old Turkish citizen has been arrested in Egypt on suspicion of spying and conspiring with the Muslim Brotherhood, security sources announced on Saturday. Rasit Oguz was arrested in the city of Ismailia northeast of Cairo back in August while taking photographs of military facilities, state news agency MENA reported. Relations between Ankara and Cairo have been tense ever since the Egyptian military ousted President Mohamed Morsi in July. After a crackdown on Morsi supporters in August, Turkey recalled its ambassador from Egypt.

McCain baffles Russian communists promising to respond to Putin's op-ed in Pravda

The announcement was made on Friday by Brian Rogers, a spokesman for the senior Republican senator known to be one of the fiercest Kremlin critics, this comes shortly after the US daily published Putin’s op-ed, in which he criticized Washington for the tendency to rely “solely on brute force” in their foreign policy.

The publication triggered a tough response from the White House as well as from top US lawmakers.  Senator McCain described Putin’s piece as “an insult to the intelligence of every American.”

“Mr. McCain has been an active anti-Russian politician for many years already,” said Dmitry Sudakov, the English editor of Pravda.ru, as cited by the Foreign Policy’s blog, The Cable. “We have been critical of his stance on Russia and international politics

source rt.com

'To bomb or not to bomb?' Obama's Shakespearean decision

The speech to the American people looked a class act, lacking only Hamlet’s skull and a Shakespearean costume. The reality? He’s lost the argument for strikes on Syria, and he knows it.

Obama’s ‘sea of troubles’

First, the moral argument: far from being able to claim, as Obama did, that the US “has worked with allies to provide humanitarian support, to help the moderate opposition, and to shape a political settlement,” his administration has in fact “stood idly by” for two years while 100,000 people have been killed, more than 4 million people have been made homeless refugees and the country has been sucked into a sectarian bloodbath. 

From Agent Orange to white phosphorous

Obama’s rendering of the US’s own chemical weapons history is also highly selective, not to say downright suspect. Has he somehow forgotten the US military’s use of millions of gallons of Agent Orange in the Vietnam War?

source rt.com