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Subscribe to RSSAlthough the U.S. does not want to assume a military role, it does want tougher sanctions. NBC's Andrea Mitchell.
The “significant” defection of a Syrian general could trigger more high-level defections from President Bashar Assad’s regime, Pentagon and diplomatic sources said Friday.
News of the defection spread as a 100-nation meeting in Paris concluded with calls for global sanctions against Syria to help end 16 months of brutal government repression and civil war that activists say have killed 14,000 people.
Pentagon spokesman Capt. John Kirby called the defection of Brig. Gen. Manaf Tlas a "crack in the inner circle" of Assad's administration.
Brendan Smialowski / AP
US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, center, listens with German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle, left, and French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius during the "Friends of Syria" meeting Friday in Paris.
Assad and Tlas were childhood friends, and Tlas was considered a confidant of the president.
While Tlas would be considered the highest-ranking member of the military closest to Assad to defect, the general had been placed under house arrest in March 2011 for his opposition to the government's crackdown on militants.
Tlas, a Sunni, had also attempted but failed to bring the Assad regime and Sunni elements of the opposition together.
Some members of the opposition have said they believe Tlas fled Syria only to try to save his family's fortune.
Game-changer? General, close friend of Assad, deserts Syria
U.S. officials could not confirm to NBC News reports that Tlas is on his way to Paris, where many of his family reside.
One U.S. official told NBC News that there was no direct contact between the State Department and Tlas.
Still, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, speaking after the international meeting in Paris on Friday, hailed Tlas’ defection.
Raed Qutena / AFP - Getty Images, file
An Aug. 22, 1999, photo shows then Colonel Bashar al-Assad, left, who is now the Syrian President, and Manaf Tlas, son of then Syrian Defense Minister Mustafa Tlas.
“Regime insiders and the military establishment are starting to vote with their feet" by abandoning the four-decade Assad dynasty, she told reporters.
Reporter behind the lines in Syria sees no end to war
"We think that is a very promising development. It also raises questions for those remaining in Damascus, who are still supporting this regime."
Clinton also called for Russia and China, which were not represented at the Paris meeting, to stop standing in the way of sanctions against Syria.
"I will tell you very frankly, I don't believe Russia and China believe they are paying any price at all,” Clinton said. “Nothing at all for standing up on behalf of the Assad regime. The only way that will change is that if every nation represented here directly and urgently makes it clear that Russia and China will pay a price because they are holding up progress, blockading it. That is no longer tolerable."
Syria-gate? WikiLeaks' latest drop of secret files
Analysts said the Paris meeting accomplished little despite stepped-up rhetoric.
“There is some solace Gen. Tlas has left Syria,” Aram Nerguizian, a Syria expert at Washington, D.C.-based think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies, told msnbc.com. But the Paris meeting left “no change in dynamics that is any way measurable ... I don’t think you have a big reshuffle of Russia position.”
Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told the Interfax news agency Friday that Clinton's statement went against the strategy for ending the bloodshed in Syria that was agreed to by world powers last Saturday in Geneva.
That agreement, brokered by international envoy Kofi Annan, said a transitional governing body "shall be formed on the basis of mutual consent." An earlier draft was watered down after Russia stonewalled, adamant that Assad should not be forced out.
Handout / Reuters
Smoke rises from Kerkenez, near Idlib, Syria, on Friday.
Syrian rebels dismissed the importance of the Paris meeting, saying sanctions weren't working.
They called for military intervention.
Are children fighting on Syria's rebel front lines?
NBC's Richard Engel, who just left Syria after spending a week getting a first-hand look inside the country, says "it was radically different" than the last time he visited now that opposition groups have created safe havens where they are openly in control. In those areas, Syrian troops – who are now concentrated in pockets within big cities -- could not be seen for hundreds of miles.
At the conference, Hassem Hashimi, a member of Syria's opposition National Council, called for a no-fly zone to prevent military forces from "flying over defected soldiers and civilians and bombarding them."
"We're sick of meetings and deadlines. We want action on the ground," said activist Osama Kayal, speaking via Skype from an area near Khan Sheikhoun.
This article includes reporting by NBC News' Jim Miklaszewski and Adrienne Mong, msnbc.com's Brinley Bruton, Reuters and The Associated Press.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton levels harsh criticism toward both China and Russia over their apparent support for a Syrian regime that may be losing control of the country. NBC's Richard Engel reports.
More world news from msnbc.com and NBC News:
- 'Wasn't just one or two children': Ex-Argentine dictators jailed for baby thefts
- First NATO trucks cross Pakistan border after 7-month closure
- Syria-gate? WikiLeaks' latest drop of secret files
- Kill whales to help fishermen? That's South Korea's plan
- US probes UN shipment of high-tech gear to Iran, NKorea
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Russia and China the condoners of human misery you as a government are despicable. Your day will come its called Karma, what comes around goes around. Letting people die in Syria with indifference is no different than what happens in your own country.
China and its human rights record speaks for itself, absolute freakin joke.
We are a nation of Democracy. Ideally we do not dictate what others do or don't. However, what Hillary Clinton did was commendable. I believe she has seen enough in Bosnia, Somalia, N. Korea and Rowanda to know what tragedy can happen. Trust her to do what is best.
This is a no win situation for the United States, Russia and China.
when Assad falls, Russia and China lose and ally in the middle east
And for the United States, it will be branded either not doing enough for branded the Devils helper for doing to much in Muslim affairs.
OMG, Hillary looks AWFUL!!!! That face is enough to crack any inner circle!
The opposition of Russia and China against foreign intervention in Syria saids a lot about just how insecure their illegitimate leaders are about the future of their own despotic rule over their respective peoples.
That being said, we must avoid any direct involvement in their civil war. Give them humanitarian aid, and perhaps some war materiel to defend themselves against attack from Assad's military, but we must stay out. Leave it to Turkey and the Arab League to lend a hand if they must.
If Egypt and Libya are any guide, neither side in the fight in Syria have any appreciation or warm feelings towards America and the West regardless of what we do or don't do.
Hmm, Shillery looks like she's on some heavy duty steroids. Wonder wazup. Knew a lady a few years ago who had to take them, and her face looked kind of like that, but about double. I can't remember if it was a breathing problem, or for pain control. But, they don't do good things, and they sure cut down on the life span.
Oh, and to trust this woman to do what's best?? Where have YOU been for the last twenty years?
Some never learn!
What did we get from Iraqi wars and Libya, Egypt Arab Springs?
Just watch Karma hitting back with vengeance for acting as puppets of autocratic, barbaric, despotic, highly corrupt bigoted Sunnis Saudis, oil companies and lobbyists!
What we have to do with Syria, Iran and other places?
What Russia and China are really trying to do is to forestall further imperialistic action by NATO in Syria, even as that rapacious, expansionist organization arms its Sunni terrorist proxies to destabilize Syria and commit murders that NATO and the UN will cynically blame on Assad.
That narrative doesn't jibe well with what you will read on MSNBC, or CNN, or the BBC, but it is the truthful one. Infer what you will about the listed "news" organizations.
I'll probably get blasted here, but I'm with Russia on this let them have their war, stay out of it. Eventually all dictators get over run. That place over there is like this you help one side and the other side condems you for life. Than your side wins and you are christin swine and we will wipe you off the face of the earth. It's a loose, loose situation with these people. Russia and China are the only ones that are showing me any common sense. Of course we have to go say and do something, we are expected to.
Jonathan;
I think we have to look and think deeper into the issue to fully comprehend what we have learned and gained from the past eighteen months.
china and human rights dont belong in the same sentence
roger white: Please start with Iraqi wars and examine closely what we got in return!
Hope the French are getting paid well to let this swine and his family reside there.
The Syrian's should track him down and shoot him for being a whoose.
Ahhh, we live on the same planet and share in the same, globally connected economy.
Beyond that many of these nations are central to the supply of oil, which you may have noticed, is of great strategic and economic value in this world.
Sadly, were it not for the large oil reserves of Libya, Iran, and most especially Iraq, we would probably not pay much more attention to events there than we do to unrest in Somalia.
But that would be a mistake. At the 9/11 attacks have demonstrated, what happens in obscure, seemingly insignificant parts of the world does have the potential to reach out and bite us.
I was no supporter of the second Iraq War, an unnecessary, reckless venture justified with lies and manufactured evidence. But our involvement in Afghanistan was a no brainer, and we have not had a central role in these other conflicts. In Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, deserted by his own army, was going down despite whatever we did or did not do, and we did nothing. In Libya, the primary support of this insurrection came from NATO and from Europe, not from the U.S., and the insurrection itself began without any outside instigation. Syria we had dealt with at arms length. What happens there will primarily depend on the actions of surrounding nations, such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
So, I fail to see any reason to support you isolationist view of the world, Jonathan. We are a part of it. We cannot escape it. What happens out there will affect us.
Ya, like THAT worked out really swell for us there as well, right dman????
*Rolls eyes*
Pffffffft.
HOTTICKET - While you're rolling your eyes, consider the alternative: that after the 9/11 attacks we elected to do nothing, leaving Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden to hatch new plots against us.
You look back at the current state of Afghanistan and see that it is far from perfect. You ignore the fact that, after our initial success, this nation was virtually ignored for the next 6 years, while George W. Bush was playing at nation-building in Iraq.
So, go ahead and roll your eyes. I could not be less impressed.
Syrian rebels dismissed the importance of the Paris meeting, saying sanctions weren't working.
When do sanctions ever work?
There is a need for a smooth transition of power. That transition is the ultimate signal of a society.
God Bless President Obama and Hillary Clinton for bringing down another Repressive Regime, and thank-God Mitt Romey wasn't in charge of foreign policy, or else he'd be still fighting the "Cold-War" all over again with the Russians. Seriously, Mitt's still stuck in a 1950 to 1960 "mind-set". I betcha he doesn't even know that the Soviet Union no longer exists. That's not just sad, that's sick.
That's why as a Republican, I'm telling all my Republican friends, Ron Paul supporters, and all you Freedom Loving Undecided voters, to Vote a straight Democratic ticket, come this November 2012.
Let's send Mitt Romney and his Republican Party of George Bush, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, Haliburton, and Blackwater, back to the "Dung Heap of History" where they all belong.
It's hard to believe there are childish people like you that actually open their mouths. Get off your dumb ass and live in Russia or China and see how repressed they aren't as a country—or take your fight to the source you seem to have the mentality for that.
Yes, if one opposes wars or interventions one can get abused!
During Iraqi wars, if one had opposed, people would have been beaten up!
Some have too much of one-track mind that they can't see all sides!
believe it or not sanctions do work in actual fighting situations like this. The problem is they work slowly but they are effective. When you put sanctions on a country that is not waring they seam to mostly don't work. People in this scene pull togather to get around it or just say we can do without. Pressure can pull people togather to overcome or make 1 person do a remarkable thing.
repub for obama seems as if these are your feelings that you are a dem not a repub. im not either so i really dont care just saying
Sanctions worked in Iraq...there were no weapons of mass destruction to be found. However, on principle and in this case, you are correct sanctions rarely work when a civil war is already in progress. An unholy mess, that I think unfortunately we can do little about.
Hard to imagine living through times like this. Makes all the whining here at home seem so insignificant. Thank God for everyone who has fought (and who fights today) for our freedom. I hope this works out for the common Syrian in the end - that government deserves to be annihlated for what they've done to their people.
If one can see fairly in all directions, why these should not start from Sunni Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE?
As most are aware, they are behind all the dramas with their al-Qaida, MB and other Sunni puppets supporting the Syrian rebels.
The same Sunni groups are inventing problems in Sudan, Somalia, Nigeria, Egypt (to start) and spreading like wild fire all over!
If atrocities and barbarism on girls, children and women are the criteria, then the most despotic, autocratic and bigoted Sunni Saudi ruler with his 5000 princes and princesses, Kuwaiti, UAE and other Arab League Sunni rulers and their rich sheiks are the biggest culprits in the history.
In killing of opponents again, these people have established world records.
If the US, Britain and others support such Sunni barbarians and beasts who treat girls and women as cheap sex slaves, then one can only conclude that Saudis, oil companies and their lobbyists determine what to see, how to lecture and where and when to act.
Sponsoring terrorist movements like the "Friends of Syria" constitutes "fighting for our freedom"?
Are you even aware that is an established fact that the families who were systematically murdered in Houla were Alawite families who murdered NOT by Assad but by the very terrorists who are being armed by Qatar, coddled by Turkey, paid by Saudi Arabia and praised as "rebels" by NATO countries?
roger white: Thanks!
syrians should "Saddam" Assad before he gets a "Gadhafi"
Americans should "Ceaușescu" Hilary Clinton.
Stesilaus: Tell us why, I can't wait to read your reasoning.
Jonathan: Love your posting - right on!
If bigoted Sunni Saudi puppets like al-Qaida or MB in Syria, it will be worse than Libya!
I suggest that several countries (with a conscience) should donate a couple drones each and use them to give Assad a taste of his own medicine. Assad and his father before him (who slaughtered an entire town and then bulldoned the town to cover up his slaughter. Assad is acting like his father before him, mass murdering dictator bent on high waters to slaughter thousands upon thousands, this is truely genocide and the world should not turn a blind eye to genocide by a evil mass murdering dictator that would slaughter majority of syrians if it serves his propose of staying in power.
IT IS FASCINATING.....
....To watch RT (Russian Television) spins this. Although Syria has done allot wrong, there IS proof that Alqeeda has stirred up a vast amount of violence... basically justifying the Government crackdown.
But..... don't worry, Obarma & Hillbilly Hillary have the answer....
BLAME GEORGE W BUSH ! ! ! (they've made a career out of blaming Bush for everything)
we should. he @!$%#ed everything up. they are working on un@!$%#ing his mess, here's your sign
Allergic...........Gallop poll 6-14-12....68% of all Americans blame Bush for the economy mess.
Obama /Biden 2012
H. Clinton....2016
'allergic: Judging by your posting, you must be allergic to youself! I imagine intellegent people are allergic to you!
How much the general got paid? This is usual practise by western countries to bribe officials,military leaders
by giving them money,foreign passports(US or French in this case?), maybe little house in San-Diego or whatever to make them leave their countries.
Yeah, I am curious myself what's the going rate for selling out your Syrian motherland and who is paying. Does Syrian general charge more than an Iraqi or a Lybian one? Just asking.
How dare he leave Syria. Coward.
I don't buy this epiphany, my take on this: He was made an offer he couldn't refuse by our busy, busy CIA, Criminals In Action. Only God knows what shenanigans are going on behind the curtain. But what is most appalling at all, hearing one of the most criminal regimes on Earth accusing Syria of crimes against humanity when it wasn't too long ago, a la Saddam, that we were partners in crime. Syria, during the dynasty of the retard pervert, was real busy torturing our "prisoners" and how come that is not a crime if we do it. Any government that feels threaten is going to fight til the end or relinquish power. If here in America, supposedly the land of freedom, liberty our gestapo wouldn't let OWS protest, why in other regions, nations they have to surrender power of free will or be invaded by our paid "volunteers." I don't understand, when America, the land of the free, wants to depose or dethrone any government they have to leave or be killed, like Salvador Allende when this "Christian and democratic" couldn't accept that a well known communist could win elections and then they gave free rein to Criminals In Action to depose a duly elected government and not content with killing Salvador Allende, we became partners in crime with one of the most ruthless dictators in America, Augusto Pinochet. After Abu Gharib, Guantanamo, Kandahar and other well known gulags, we can't claim the moral high ground, cause that morality doesn't amount to a hill of beans. One of these days we are going to, a la Nazi, bite more than we can chew and we will be brought down to reality. Of course, people are to stupid to realize it, but that slippery slope already started. Just imagine, who could have thought that the so called "most powerful nation in the world" now pays the other side money not to attack us. In other words, they have started to outsource wars and in a world of mercenaries, the one that pays the most wins. Let's hope we are going to have that kind of money to buy more insuirgents, terrorists to fight our wars for us.
Times change, Allies Change and you are living the reality of it right now.
hell no, you comments are sooo bogus in support of a evil mass murdering dictator that is currently committing genocide which includes torture of children (many of them had body parts cut off by Assad's thug running the torture chambers, and you support them? Might as well support hitler aims to kill jews, the difference is that Assad would kill majority of syrians to prevent them from gaining freedom and remove hiim from power.
Well, I guess even the crazy people need a place to share their thoughts... How about a diary? Then you can write this kind of incoherant babble and you won't have anybody judge it. Btw, we supported Saddam against the Iranians, liberal extremists who overthrew the Shah, who we also supported previously. And the CIA does a lot of under the table stuff, but I think its a little extreme to call them the "gestapo", when they basically just do things for the State department that are a little shady. ex: Bay of Pigs, killing Che Guevara, supporting rebel movements. Although these things are not exactly "legit" they are a neccesary evil. And also, in our "gulag" at Guantanamo, how many legal US citizens have been taken there? How many people have been taken off their couch and tortured? The fact that you're still here is a testament to the fact that our government isnt "out to get us". So please, lay off the conspiracy theory websites and pick up a book or something.
I think we should keep our noses out of it. it can come to no good end no matter who is in power. All we are doing is delaying the inevitable and causing more deaths Please tell me why it's in our interest to intervene? Assad is no worse than the muslim brotherhood (probably better). We have our own would be dictator to throw out in november..........
with new dictator! you'll still be whining
I dont expect Russia or China to do anything for Syria, both have let evil @!$%# happen within there own country so I doubt they are going to actually help someone else with there evil @!$%#. As we speak Russia is allowing North Korea to send over slave laborers in Siberia to mine and lumberjack.
And we don't have evil @!$%# in ours? It won't be long and you'll be hungry enough to admit it. Not all evil shoot guns.
Russia should do something or get out of Hilliary's way.
A 10% import tax/surcharge on all Russian and China export products to the US alone can out-weight the benefits that they get from supporting Assad!!!
Most American will be affected by this tax so the tax should be used to help them (lower income tax, sale tax...).
Now you figure that out. Democrats (mostly) have only been saying that for a four or five decades now. People here aren't smart enough hate a corporate executive who cut costs and made a fortune for himself by shipping jobs to foreign communist slave labor. They'd rather hate a lazy union worker that the republican propagandist parades in front of them while he makes billions selling out the US.
What you describe is known as a "tariff" (I'm being sarcastic. I assume you know this.). Corporations ("people" according to Scalia, Thomas, etc.) use their money ("free speech" according to Scalia, Thomas, etc.) to make sure this isn't done. It would violate freedom capitalism not to let corporations send our jobs to oppressed communists.
They said that Fourteen thousand people have been killed by Assad. How many will be killed when the hard line Taliban Muslims take over?? It seems all the Arab spring countries are turning into Sharia Law, hard line, women hating Muslims. Why should we even help these Sharia Law Muslims take over a once Stable country?
1. Be careful what you wish for.
2. I guess Russia doesn't want the above mentioned for a neighbor. Who would.........
3. Things can always get worse.
The first of the big ships to flee the sinking rats.
It's hard to fiqure out the world. I guess global economy have nothing to do with dis-agreements between countries. Here we sit with empty buildings where hundred of our American companies re-located to China and Russia. Dealing with business as usual each day. Dubia have companies from every country in the world doing business as if no war or dis-agreement are happening in the world. Maybe it's best I don't know any facts and just go through my day as I did yesterday.
Yeah let us stay the hell out of this fiasco and take the isolationsist route unless we want to support Al-Queda in overthrowing Syria, how did that work in Afghanistan, How many dead? How many missing limbs? This is a problem we need to stay out of, once Bashir is out our enemies will take over.
Asssad! Asssad! Asssad! don't you know soon are later and 'AS$' got to be wipe. Ponder on that and get out while you can. Mr Obama and Mr Biden 2012! let's us not change Captain in the middle of the sea.
LMAO. Tell that to the survivors of the Titanic.
You have to be kidding me. You know how many international laws, laws that we helped write that we seem to have no problem breaking, that we have broken in the past 12 years? Past 40? The CIA and these pro democracy NGOs are one and the same. They create an "opposition" through bribery, or just fan the flames of discontent to the boiling point. I am going to bottom line this. What is the bodycount lately? We have killed over a million and a half Arabs over the past 21 years due to bombing or sanctions. I don't think either Russia or China have done that recently. Also, if these Wahhabi crazies do topple Assad, all Christians and Alawites that haven't bugged out by then are DEAD!!!!!!!! Russia wants to keep their naval base, but we want Syria for our own bases to attack Iran from. Otto von Bismarck predicted that a wide European War would start because of the next to useless Balkans, now Barack and Hilary want to start WWIII over a damn small ME nation that nobody really cares about.
Syrian defection a 'crack in inner circle' I thought they did Opium in that part of the World, silly me.
All kidding aside, the only thing this indicates to me is that he is looking to escape prosecution for war crimes, is sick of living under the sanctions, doesn't want to be replaced by a Russian or he sees the end coming and doesn't want to be caught on the wrong side. What it doesn't mean under any circumstances is to be mistaken for someone who really cares about the people of Syria.
Asma...does your diamond necklace feel tight around your neck? Your days of destroying Syrians is almost over.
Crack in inner circle? No I think he was just trying to save his own ass. He knew world opinion of Asaad was deteriorating and got out while the gettin' was good. On second thought, maybe it would be classified as a crack.
the eyes look a little crazy.
"U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton levels harsh criticism"
You know that got their attention, things will be all better now...
There is an article (by a Russian writer) in the NY TIMES ''Why Russia Is Backing Syria" (see link below)
Russia sees Assad as the lesser of two evils (Islamic radicals). Which would you prefer? Russia has it's own problems with radicals in the Caucauses. And they have a fear of this problem spreading. The naval base is not a real big deal. And as for military sales, they've actually cancelled some to appease Israel. The civilian casualities are becoming a problem tho. It's looking more & more like a 'no win' situation. For Russia and for US. China is a more a mystery.
Read the article. You may get a grasp of Putin's stance. Here's a link to the NY TIMES article:
OK, I guess links don't work. Just google ' why russia is backing syria '
And once again - people are asking - is generalissimo obama lucky or good. You'd think that mccain would be the military expert. Telling obama to get into the syrian war with both feet. Army, navy, & air force. But the generalissimo refused. Without sending a single soldier. You had to admit the generalissimo's track record has been a perfect one up until that point.
But hey, look at what's happening now. Syrian military in 'pockets' with no control over large areas of the country. I tell you generalissimo obama deserves the nobel peace prize as much as any one who has received one. With sooooo many victories under his belt, you'd almost have to say the guy is good and not just lucky.
Believe everything you read? Idiot.