Just what does this mean?
A Russian warship carrying "special cargo" will be dispatched toward Syria, a navy source said on Friday, as the Kremlin beefs up its presence in the region ahead of possible US strikes against the Damascus regime.
The large landing ship Nikolai Filchenkov will on Friday leave the Ukrainian port city of Sevastopol for the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiisk, from where it will head to Syria's coast, the Interfax news agency quoted a source from the Saint Petersburg-based central naval command as saying.
The article makes it sound like the ship will simply be in the eastern Mediterranean rather than entering port to deliver the special cargo.
The ship is a Russian amphibious warfare ship. It could carry up to 20 tanks or 40 other armored vehicles, so it has cargo space for something fairly big.
But Russia is already sending a specialized intelligence gathering ship, so the special cargo wouldn't be something for that mission, would it?
Russian warships are gathering in the waters off Syria. According to AFP, three ships from Russia’s Black Sea Fleet sailed through Turkey’s Bosphorus Strait on Thursday: the SSV-201 intelligence-gathering ship Priazovye, and the landing ships Minsk and Novocherkassk.
More might be on the way. A frigate and another landing ship are ready to head to the eastern Mediterranean from the Black Sea Fleet base in Sevastopol, according to CBS News.
Why is Moscow ordering so much sea power to the region?
Primarily to evacuate Russians in a crisis, the Russians say. Why they have only one ship capable of hauling people if that is the mission escapes me. And if the amphibious ship is to make room for Russian civilians, the ship would need to unload that special cargo, no?
But the article also notes what I've mentioned: the Russians can locate our ships and detect missile launches early--and give Assad some warning to duck and cover.
Could special cargo be some type of ground-based radar to set up in Syria? Some electronic counter-measure or GPS-jamming device?
I'm very curious to know just what our reset friends in Moscow are doing. Whatever it is, we're paying to much for the privilege of pretending Russia is our friend.
UPDATE: Could the "special cargo" simply be what the ship is designed to hold? Naval infantry and ground equipment? Given that I've long speculated that Assad might need Russian troops to survive in a rump Alawite state, might this be Russia's response to any attack by our air and naval forces? Get Russians into Syria to show overt support the way we demonstrated support for Georgia following Russia's war on Georgia in August 2008 and raised the risk of future Russian action?
Or, given that people are talking about the Kosovo precedent for our action (without Congressional or UN authorization), what if Russia is thinking about the Kosovo precedent, too?
Russian troops who entered Kosovo ahead of Nato peacekeepers on Saturday are camped near Pristina airport. ...
BBC Moscow Correspondent Andrew Harding says many analysts there believe Russia's generals decided to go it alone and score a quick propaganda victory against the West.
To recap, after the Serbs capitulated and agreed to let NATO troops enter Kosovo, the Russians marched in ahead of NATO to establish their own occupation zone.
In any war, the enemy gets a vote, as our military says. Things just don't follow our plan like a computer program. Russia, too, rigged though that vote may be, casts ballots.
UPDATE: Thanks to Mad Minerva for the link. And the more I think about it, the more I think that if I was Putin (happily, I'm not a paranoid with delusions of grandeur controlling a rickety nuclear-armed state) I'd deploy troops to Syria after we strike. And that isn't even a reason not to strike ineffectively because if I was Putin (again, the disclaimer) I think I'd move the troops in anyway once the crisis is over regardless of whether we strike. He could even appeal to his role in making sure sober analysis goes into the calculations of the sainted international community's debates.
As to Ms. Minerva's Bond title, I suspect the Obama administration thought Putin was The Spy Who Loved Me. But Putin is determined to retain A View to a Kill to let his little WMD-wielding minion keep his Licence to Kill Syrians in Live and Let Die.
Actually, you could have fun with a lot of Bond titles.
I'm not even going to Octopussy, however. Or Thunderball, for that matter.
