Four centers of operation have been established in the city with the troops on the ground paving the way for an undercover Turkish military incursion into Syria.
The debkafile site said the presence of British and Qatari troops in Homs topped the agenda of Tuesday’s talks between Assad’s officials and head of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service Mikhail Fradkov.
Qatar makes little secret of supporting the Syrian opposition with cash, arms and political support. Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani said in mid-January he is ready to send troops to Syria to stop the violence there. Britain insists it is not planning any military action against the Assad regime.
The scenario painted by the report closely resembles Libya’s collapse into anarchy. UN Security Council resolution 1973 forbade any ground troops from intervening in Libya while creating a pretext for NATO to launch a bombing campaign against Muammar Gaddafi’s troops.
However Qatar, Britain and France later confirmed they had sent units to assist the Libyan rebels. Secret French weapons drops were discovered after they fell into the wrong hands. There were also unconfirmed reports that Western special forces directed air strikes from forward frontline positions and directed combat tactics.
The Pentagon and its allies have proposed the creation of a humanitarian corridor in Syria with a view to delivering supplies and humanitarian aid to Syrian civilians. However, critics have cast doubts on the plans, likening them to the no-fly zone in Libya which preceded military intervention in the country.
Commenting on the US’s proposal for the creation of a “humanitarian corridor,” journalist Carla Stea told RT its “opening could easily become distorted and used for other purposes.”
The Libya example was cited by Russia and China when they vetoed a draft UN Security Council resolution on Syria last Saturday. Britain, France & the US, who backed the resolution lashed out at Moscow and Beijing, accusing them of siding with a regime that had ‘blood on its hands’.
Ali Rizk, a Middle East expert talking live to RT from Beirut, described the UK and Qatari intervention as a sign of “how desperate the anti-Assad forces have become.”
“After the Russian veto dealt a severe blow to their agenda, now they are in a state of desperation where they’ll probably stop at nothing to try and regain the momentum again,” said Rizk.
He then linked the refusal of pockets of the opposition forces to negotiate unless Assad falls as part of a Western agenda to remove a political obstacle to their interests in the region.
“For the West it’s not about negotiations; it’s about overthrowing a regime which is part of a border block which Western powers want to get rid of.”
“The political stance is that if we overwhelm Assad we’ve dealt a severe blow to Iran’s presence and Hezbollah, two of Israel’s staunch enemies.” Source