{"id":197081,"date":"2019-10-29T08:26:50","date_gmt":"2019-10-29T08:26:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=197081"},"modified":"2019-11-01T07:42:45","modified_gmt":"2019-11-01T07:42:45","slug":"us-threatens-military-force-against-any-group-challenging-occupation-of-syria-oil-fields","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=197081","title":{"rendered":"US threatens \u2018military force\u2019 against \u2018any group\u2019 challenging occupation of Syria oil fields"},"content":{"rendered":"

Press TV \u2013 Oct 29, 2019<\/h1>\n
\"\"<\/a>

Russian satellitte photos of oil transit vehicles gathering in the U.S. seized Deir ez-Zor Province, Syria, 10 km east of Al Mayadin. Click to enlarge<\/p><\/div>\n

The Pentagon has threatened that American forces deployed around Syrian oil fields will use \u201cmilitary force\u201d against any party that may seek to challenge Washington\u2019s control of those sites, even if it is Syrian government forces or their Russian allies.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Speaking at a news briefing on Monday, US Defense Secretary Mark Esper referred to \u201cmultiple state and non-state\u201d forces vying for control of Syrian territory and resources.<\/span><\/p>\n

The US military announced last week that it was reinforcing its position in Syria with additional assets, including mechanized forces, on a mission claimed to be aimed at preventing Syrian oil fields from falling to remnants of the Takfiri Daesh terror group in Syria, reversing President Donald Trump\u2019s promise of a full military withdrawal from the Arab state.<\/span><\/p>\n

Speaking about the mission, Esper said Washington \u201cwill retain control of oil fields in northeast Syria,\u201d which provided the bulk of Daesh\u2019s\u00a0income at the height of its terror campaign. The Takfiri outfit has, however, collapsed after it lost all the territories it had captured in 2014 in Syria and Iraq.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cUS troops will remain positioned in this strategic area to deny ISIS (Daesh) access those vital resources. And we will respond with overwhelming military force against any group that threatens the safety of our forces there,\u201d\u00a0he added.<\/span><\/p>\n

Asked whether the US mission included keeping oil fields out of Syrian or Russian control, Esper replied, \u201cThe short answer is, yes, it presently does.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He added that the American deployment will allow the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) to use the oil revenues to fund its militants, who Washington calls allies in the so-called fight against Daesh.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to make sure that SDF does have access to resources in order to guard the prisons, in order to arm their own troops, in order to assist us with the defeat-ISIS mission,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Pentagon chief further confirmed that American forces in Syria would remain in \u201cclose contact\u201d with Kurdish-backed militants.<\/span><\/p>\n

The claims come just weeks after Washington shocked the entire world by abruptly abandoning their longtime Kurdish allies in northeastern Syrian and announcing a troop pullout in the face of a Turkish offensive against the Kurds.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Kurdish militants called Washington\u2019s move \u201cbackstabbing\u201d and quickly reached out to the Damascus government for support against the Turkish military.<\/span><\/p>\n

Esper further said, \u201cTurkey continues to bear responsibility for the consequences of their unwarranted incursion, which has brought further instability to the region,\u201d he pointed out.<\/span><\/p>\n

The defense secretary was speaking days after\u00a0Washington claimed that it had killed\u00a0Daesh leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi during a raid in Syria\u2019s northwestern Idlib Province.<\/span><\/p>\n

While detailing the military operation that Washington says led to Baghdadi\u2019s death, Trump said American troops would remain in Syria to \u201csecure\u201d oil reserves and even put up \u201ca hell of a fight\u201d against any force that tried to take them.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re keeping the oil,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve always said that \u2014 keep the oil. We want to keep the oil, $45 million a month. Keep the oil. We\u2019ve secured the oil.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe should be able to take some also, and what I intend to do, perhaps, is make a deal with an ExxonMobil or one of our great companies to go in there and do it properly,\u201d he added.<\/span><\/p>\n

Legal experts, however, say if US forces or firms take any oil without the consent\u00a0of Syria\u2019s legal government, that would amount to pillaging, a technical term meaning theft during wartime. Pillaging is illegal under both US and international law. It is explicitly prohibited by the Fourth Geneva Convention.<\/span><\/p>\n

Russian Defense Ministry spokesperson Major General Igor Konashenkov has blasted Washington\u2019s oilfield operation as \u201cstate-sponsored banditry,\u201d saying the US was stationing its troops in northeastern Syria to pave the way for smugglers to pillage Syrian resources.<\/span><\/p>\n

The ministry published aerial images on Saturday which it said show crude oil being smuggled out of Syria \u201cunder the strong protection of the US.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cWe\u2019re keeping the oil\u201d, says US Defense Secretary Mark Esper, and the US will use military force to defend Syrian oil fields it illegally seized<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[83],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-197081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-syria"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=197081"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":197083,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197081\/revisions\/197083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=197081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=197081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=197081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}