Blame Game: Syria points to Washington, U.S. points to Moscow

The Syrian government blamed the US for an air strike that left three Syrian soldiers dead, but the United States believes Russia was behind the attack.

The Syrian government claims a U.S.-led coalition air strike killed at least three of their soldiers and wounded thirteen people on Sunday. Meanwhile, the United States has shifted the blame onto Russia, who refuses to claim responsibility.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - The Syrian government blamed warplanes from the U.S.-led coalition for bombing the Deir Ezzor province Syrian army camp, but an unnamed senior U.S. official said America is "certain" it was a Russian strike.

The official claimed, "We are not at war with the Assad regime and have no reason to target the Syrian Army."

Initially, Syria blamed the U.S. and called the attack an "act of aggression." Nine missiles were aimed at the camp, leaving three soldiers dead and thirteen wounded. There are also reports of three armored vehicles, four military vehicles, machine guns and an arms ammunition depot being destroyed.
Col. Steve Warren, from the joint coalition command center, told AFP News Agency, "We've seen those Syrian reports but we did not conduct any strikes in that part of Deir al-Zour yesterday. So we see no evidence." 

He added that the only strikes to occur on Sunday were over 390 miles from the Syrian army camp. The strikes took place in Deir al-Zour province, with oil wells as their targets.

The foreign ministry wrote a letter to the UN Security Council and secretary general, in which they said, "The Syrian Arab Republic strongly condemns this flagrant aggression by the U.S. led coalition forces, which blatantly violates the objectives of the UN charter."

The letter continued, saying, "The Syrian foreign ministry demands the UN Security Council act immediately in the face of this aggression and take appropriate measures to prevent its recurrence."

Interestingly, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he was unable to confirm the information the Syrian government provided. However, activist group Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently, believes the strike was at the hands of Russia's warplanes. 

The group took to Twitter, where it wrote, "It's very confusing and hard to know with all [these] warplanes and airstrikes above our heads."

Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff Davis said Russia did fly long-range bomber missions into Syria on Sunday, but admitted, "we have not been able to correlate one to the other."

Brett McGurk, American President Barack Obama's envoy to the coalition, posted a message on Twitter reading, "Reports of coalition involvement are false."

With Russia's recent questionable behavior, one must ask if the country is to be trusted. Several sources believe Russian President Vladimir Putin is attempting to start WWIII.

First Russia invades Turkish airspace and refuses to accept responsibility despite reports of being warned 10 times, now it generates greater tensions between the U.S. and Syria despite both country's efforts to side against ISIS. What will come from Moscow next?

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