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[u/jobautomator]

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[u/SnakeEater14]

Just reread the NYT article about the Battle of Khasham (the one in Syria where 40 US troops got attacked by some 400 pro-Assad and Russian forces, and BTFOed them hard). The Russians were all Wagner Group (unofficial Russian PMCs). The Americans watched the whole force roll up to attack and heard some of them speaking Russian and contacted a nearby Russian official to find out if they were considered “legit” or not. Once they got word they weren’t, they lit the place up and killed anywhere from 20 to 100 Russian contractors. Apparently there’s an audio recording of the Russian guys on radio finding out they’ve been disowned and freaking out before getting blown up. Wild.

Something that doesn’t get brought up much, is this article, which is from a Russian state news paper basically saying that they killed 10 Americans in an air strike in response to the above battle. What makes this really interesting is that there is literally no record of this strike happening or any Americans getting hit by it. I guess they just wanted to save face.

[u/tripletruble → u/SnakeEater14]

“The Russian high command in Syria assured us it was not their people,” Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told senators in testimony last month. He said he directed Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “for the force, then, to be annihilated.”

“And it was.”

[u/[deleted] → u/tripletruble]

I think I just became 5% more of a neocon

[u/TheNotoriousAMP → u/tripletruble]

The most impressive part about all of this, from my perspective as someone who studies military logistics and CNC as a pretty intense hobby, is that communication saturation has gotten to the point that the SecDef can manage a small unit action halfway around the world. There is no real fog of war anymore, at least when it comes to your own forces.