Despite President Donald Trump’s promises to withdraw American troops out of Syria, the US intends to maintain presence on the ground with a “small peacekeeping group” for an unspecified “period” of time, the White House said.

“A small peacekeeping group of about 200 will remain in Syria for a period of time,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said in a statement without elaborating.

Trump took the world by surprise back in December, when he announced the US withdrawal from Syria without specifying a timetable. The initiative was not well received in the Pentagon, even forcing Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to resign after clashing with Trump, as both the generals and politicians have been claiming that US presence in Syria is vital and that Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) terrorist group would inevitably reemerge if all of some 2,000 Americans leave.

The US withdrawal is being stalled by concerns about potential Turkish incursion into the territories currently controlled by the US-backed Syrian Kurds. On Thursday, Trump had another phone call with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the issue. Washington wants Turkey to agree to a buffer ‘safe zone’ in northeastern Syria and is also contemplating arming the Syrian Kurds, despite Ankara’s strong opposition.

While the US continues its diplomatic maneuvering, some noted the irony, wondering if the White House was using the term ‘peacekeeping’ correctly or was even aware of what it actually means. Others questioned the logic and the motive of maintaining such a contingent on the ground, noting that 200 troops could serve as a human shield, but is unlikely to really sway the outcome of the conflict.

Traditionally, the term peacekeeping has been used to describe the UN Blue Helmets whose missions are strictly mandated by the Security Council. American troops, however, hardly have any legal basis to remain in Syria, as they had never been invited by the official government in Damascus.

Like this story?

As Russia bolsters its efforts to secure and tap the Arctic, both the UK and the US have been vowing to meet its “challenge” – a premise that could lead to war, experts say, if their naval powers could muster the capabilities.

“It’s nobody’s lake,” said US Admiral James Foggo in a recent interview with US media – the latest in a string of American warnings against Russia’s northward push. His concern is primarily for “Arctic Council nations – of which we are a member,” and which are not interested in the Northern Sea Route being exploited by adversary powers like Russia and China.

UK Defense Secretary Gavin Williamson recently joined the chorus of warnings, saying Britain would “stay vigilant to new challenges” by “sharpening our skills in sub-zero conditions, learning from longstanding allies like Norway or monitoring submarine threats with our Poseidon aircraft.”

But Russia is better positioned both legally and physically to oversee the Arctic and, while still dangerous, the bellicose statements carry little weight for the reality on the ice, experts have told RT.

Bravado for domestic consumption

Williamson’s promise to defend NATO’s northern flank from Russia must be viewed “in the context of current UK domestic politics,” believes security analyst and former UK army officer Charles Shoebridge. With Brexit just around the corner, Williamson is drumming up the Russia and China threats so that other European nations aren’t “tempted to turn to the EU for its security, but must continue to rely on the US and UK through NATO.”

Ultimately, he could be aiming just for political gain.

Likewise in the US: James Foggo’s “nobody’s lake” comment was tellingly lacking in detail as to how exactly the US is going to keep Russia out of the Arctic, says retired colonel Mikhail Khodarenok.

“James Foggo’s statements at this point are of a purely political nature. It’s telling that he never clarified how exactly the US Navy is going to accomplish that task. Are they going to create naval groups in the Arctic Ocean, seize important coastal areas, channels, naval bases and ports? But that means war with a nuclear power, one which would see unrestricted use of weapons of mass destruction.”

Dangerous free-for-all

War can be averted, the experts believe, though the danger of escalation is very real. The situation, according to Khodarenok, is complicated by the vagueness of international law regarding the Arctic.

“James Foggo’s statement is a fresh indication that the Arctic is becoming an arena of global rivalry over transport lanes and natural resources,” Khodarenok said.

Shoebridge, on the other hand, believes that when faced with the danger of an armed incident spiraling into “uncontrolled escalation,” cooler heads will prevail.

“Despite the confrontational language they might use, most leaders of most states want to avoid this,” he said.

Questionable claims and capabilities

The US seeks to deny Russia and China the use of the Northern Sea Route – but the lane goes along the Russian coastline, which, under international law, gives Russia a degree of control over it, something Russia should lean on when defending its rights to use the waters, says Khodarenok.

Besides, while Foggo wants Russia and China out of the “nobody’s lake,” he admits American companies can’t use it either, since their vessels are too big for local conditions. Besides, Russia is the only world power with a significant icebreaker fleet, which makes it the only one capable of rendering aid to ships that have an emergency while sailing there.
On top of that, Russia has been reviving its military installations that guard the area, including radar arrays and permanent military bases. Abandoning those is not an option, since that would mean losing a vital strategic foothold.

At the end of the day the only ones undoubtedly standing to profit from the opening of the Arctic arena are military industrial contractors – with the US 2nd Fleet revived for the sole purpose of containing Russia’s Arctic ambition, Navy contracts are bound to follow.

Providing the military industrial complex with new contracts might in fact be one of the major reasons behind all this “public posturing,” William Mallinson, a former British diplomat and a professor at the Guglielmo Marconi University, believes.

“The American military industrial complex is very worried about a possibility of an independent EU Army,” he said, adding that Washington as well as its allies in London decided to once again drum up the anti-Russian hysteria and perpetuate the perceivable Russian threat.

“It is in the interests of the Americans and the British to continue the Cold War for as long as possible to keep the old business model of NATO,” even if it means reviving the Truman doctrine of containing Russia, which goes back to 1947, the professor explained.

“An EU army, independent from NATO, would be friendlier to Russia and the shareholders of the US and UK companies would lose billions of dollars in arms sales,” Mallinson said, adding that the US and the UK would continue to portray Russia as an adversary to keep NATO relevant, even though they could hardly challenge Russia in the Arctic as it has “more experienced” Armed Forces that are better adapted to the harsh polar conditions.

Subscribe to RT newsletter to get stories the mainstream media won’t tell you.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s surprise decision to strike an alliance with Israel’s far-right has unnerved many in Israel and abroad. The truth is more complicated but his goal stays the same: to stay in power by any means.

The looming early elections are seemingly making Israeli politicians more desperate in their quest to snatch precious extra votes. Netanyahu, however, appears to have gone ‘beyond the pale’ in his fight for political survival.

In late February, the prime minister provoked quite a stir by forming what was described as a partnership with two fringe far-right parties, in a move that rocked the Israeli communities both in the Jewish State and abroad, particularly in the US. The Israeli and American media swiftly reacted to this development, producing damning reports on the issue and publishing opinion pieces that accused the prime minister of “endorsing Jewish Fascism” and likened his move to “welcoming the Ku Klux Klan into an American administration.”

So why has the controversial long-time prime minister, who has already been mired in corruption scandals ahead of an early vote that he called for himself, taken such a drastic step?

Netanyahu might, in fact, just have nothing to lose, Amir Oren, a veteran Israeli journalist and political commenter, believes. “Netanyahu could not care less about his image right now. He is one step away from being indicted with corruption charges, including bribery,” he explained, adding that the prime minister is almost literally “fighting for survival, both politically and legally.”

In fact, Netanyahu’s Likud Party has not yet made an alliance with the far-right, at least not formally and not yet, the analysts believe. What he did was encourage the far-right parties to unite to clear the 3.25 percent election hurdle to get into the Israeli parliament – something they could not do on their own, for lack of support, Tatiana Karasova, the head of the Israel and Jewish Communities Department and an academic council member at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, explained.

An Israeli political analyst, Avigdor Eskin, told RT that “the Israeli election system makes it important for all major parties to compete for any extra votes,” adding that the fringe parties Netanyahu turned to still “represent between two and four percent of the electorate” and the prime minister now wants to prevent these votes from going to waste. “This is just a very pragmatic step,” he said.

That does not necessarily mean that Netanyahu has decided to move further to the right side of the political spectrum. Frankly speaking, the prime minister, who is known for his vehement opposition to Iran and his increasingly harsh policies against Palestinian protesters –which the UN recently described as potentially amounting to war crimes– does not have much room for moving further to the right.

Anyway, his move appears to be a coercive ploy rather than a conscious political choice. Netanyahu, who stayed in power for more than a decade already, fears that a newly-formed centrist Blue and White alliance – a loose coalition formed by various center-right and center-left forces, united almost solely by their opposition to the long-time prime minister and led by a charismatic former armed forces chief Benny Gantz, might actually remove his Likud Party from power.

“It is definitely possible that his rivals would be able to form a government and [Netanyahu] would not,” Amir Oren told RT.

Netanyahu abhors the very idea of forming a coalition with his strong centrist opponents, who would most likely challenge the policies of his government, Tatiana Karasova pointed out. Therefore, he needs to “erode” the composition of the new legislature with some fringe parties he could use as coalition partners, who would not dare to try and review his political course centered on the idea of Israel’s ‘security’.

Eventually, the Likud Party leader might even avoid aligning with the most radical of the far-right forces, like the Jewish Power Party, which is described as “racist” and bent on turning Israel into a “theocracy” while expelling all Palestinians, the analyst believes. What he really needs is to have 61 out of 120 parliamentary seats taken by his own party and potential “junior coalition partners,” which would allow him to form a government even if the centrist alliance formally beats his Likud Party at the forthcoming elections.

However, his tricky plan might eventually backfire. Recent polls project Likud winning just about 30 of Parliament’s 120 seats, AP reports. The public criticism of his decision to align with the far-right would likely increase in the coming weeks, according to Karasova. The ploy aimed at helping Netanyahu win the next elections might still hand him a defeat.

Like this story?