Blog on Syria 

Source: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34613514

10/27/15 Blog number 6 

Syria Poses challenges for Putin 

First and foremost, President Putin and other top Kremlin officials insisted that military victory in Syria was not Russia's real objective. If the Syria intervention provokes rather than prevents home-grown terrorism in Russia, Mr. Putin risks bearing part of the blame. President Putin told us that Russia's aim was to "liberate Syria from terrorists" and stop jihadists from the Islamic State group (IS) from taking over Damascus and then the entire country. Yet President Putin says that success cannot be partial - Syria partitioned and President Assad only in control of a rump state. But for the Russian government it is a useful backdrop for occasions like the annual Valdai meeting where President Vladimir Putin and other top Russian officials can showcase their views in exchanges with foreign scholars. This year the conversation was dominated by Syria and Russia's intentions there. Mr Putin gave another explanation: "One thing I learnt 50 years ago on the streets of Leningrad was that if a fight is inevitable, you need to land the first punch," he said pithily, offering a startlingly personal rationale for his Syria strategy. And that is where the first puzzle in Russia's Syria policy lies. "To liberate Syria we need to unite forces," he said, adding that Syria could become a new model of post Cold War collaboration. 

Whitney Hans Blog on Syria 
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/16/middleeast/turkey-drone-shot-down/index.html 
October 19, 2015 Blog number 5

Turkish air force reports it shot down unidentified drone

Turkey's air force shot down an unidentified aircraft - reportedly an unmanned drone - that entered Turkish airspace near the Syrian border, the Turkish armed forces said Friday in a statement. The drone was given three warnings by the Turkish military, but there was no response, Turkish officials said. All Russian aircraft returned from their combat missions in Syria, and Russian drones continue their aerial reconnaissance and "are functioning as planned," the Russian defense ministry said via Facebook. The origin of the drone is still unknown to officials but two U.S officials told CNN that the drone was from the Russians. Russia also recently entered the 4 1/2 year war that Syria is battling right now on the side of President Assad. Russia jets, in coordination with the Syrian regime, have conducted airstrikes against ISIS and other terrorist groups, broadly interpreted as opponents of the Assad regime. My reaction to it is I don't understand why all these countries are fighting and having all these wars when there doesn't need to be wars! 

Whitney Hans on Syria 

10/8/15 Week four source:

http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/08/middleeast/russia-syria-isis/index.html

Syrian official says 'wide-scale offensive' launched 

The article is talking about how a Syrian says there is a 'wide- scale offensive' launched. The reason for doing it was because the person wanted to eliminate terrorist groups to get back at them for the areas and towns that they have terrorised. Syrian army chief of staff Ayyoub is the person giving everyone the information of the attack but he wasn't clear on what area it was exactly suppose to hit at or the size and shape of the apparent launch. But something he did say that was important was that the role was being played by Russia, which appears they did that because they knew the Syrian was in badly need of help. Ayyoub said the following about the situation "following the Russian military airstrikes that diminished the fighting capacity of ISIS and other terrorist groups, the Syrian armed forces maintained their military initiative". I think it was very good that the government caught the man before the launch could have actually killed people so I'm happy to read that everything's okay and under control with the situation.

Whitney Hans on Syria 
Source:  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26116868

9/22/15 Week two articles 4-5

#4 Chemical Weapons

In August 2013 around Damascus rockets filled with sarin were launched which ended up killing hundreds of people. That's when President Assad agreed to completely remove any types of chemicals that could possible destroy Syria. It took up to one year to actually get rid of all the chemicals. Despite what the government did they still documented the use of toxic chemicals, such as chlorine and ammonia. The government did that to avoid attacks on rebel- held northern villages but it didn't help because between April and July 2014 that resulted in the deaths of at least 13 people. Some places were even accused of making homemade chemical weapons, possibly going against Kurdish forces and civilians of northern Syria. I think what the President did was actually a good call because if he didn't make that call he could have had a lot more people die!! 

#5 Humanitarian Crisis

Since the conflict more then 4 million people have fled Syria. Going further more is 7.6 million Syrians have disappeared from their homes. This number combined is more then 11 million of the Syria's population is gone! That is half of the population Syria had before this conflict happened. Unfortunately 12.2 million is in need that also includes 5.6 million of that 12.2 being just children alone. In December of 2014 they tried to get funding to help the the 18 million Syrians that are in need but they were only able to get half of the amount they were trying to reach to help all the Syrians in need. By 2015 studies show that about every 4 out of 5 Syrians were living in poverty - 30% of them in abject poverty. Not only was the living in need but Syria was loosing its educations. It is very sad news to read how Syria isn't as wealthy as the US is and so they are loosing lives each and every day and they can't do anything about it.  

Source: BBC News  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26116868
Whitney Hans on Syria  

9/14/15 Articles labeled from 1-8 week one doing articles 1-2

#1 Uprising turns violent

In March 2011 pro-democracy erupted in the southern city of Deraa after a group of teenagers vandalized a school to promote slogans, which made the security forces really upset. That’s the time when they open fired on the teens. Some of them even got killed, which made the whole city erupt in a battle with the government basically arguing saying the way they punished the kids was not okay. By July 2011 hundreds of thousands were taking to the streets across the country. Now I do agree that the teenagers should be punished for what they did but killing them was not the way to go about it. 

#2 Descent into civil war

The country just starts to get into so much violence it began a war where the fighting even reached the capital Damascus and the second city of Aleppo in 2012. By June of 2013 90,000 people had died from the war. Within the next year the number had more than doubled to 191,000 people but the number doesn't stop there! By August of 2015 the number is 250,000 people dead! Now the conflict has gotten heated within the government also, people are going towards President Assad. Which I don't blame them because he got them into the war. It's crazy to even think about the number of people losing there lives in this war. It makes me very sad to even think about it.