From: "George Sherwood" 

On Fri, 18 Aug 2006 10:53:42 +0100, Adam wrote:

> George Sherwood wrote:
>> On Thu, 17 Aug 2006 15:05:10 +0100, Adam wrote:
>>
>>> http://www.mosnews.com/news/2006/06/02/syrianbase.shtml
>>>
>>> Y'know wot I woz saying wrt sailing AD warships in for a port visit when
>>> the Israelis were bombing Lebanon....welll..... seems like the Russians
>>> have twigged the idea...
>>>
>>> http://www.mosnews.com/news/2006/06/02/syrianbase.shtml
>>>
>>> "Russia has begun works in the Syrian port of Tartus
seeking to built a
>>> full-scale naval base for the ships of the Black Sea Fleet, currently
>>> based in Ukraineƒ’s Sevastopol, the Kommersant newspaper reported on
>>> Friday, quoting unnamed sources in the Defense Ministry and the General
>>> Staff of the Russian Navy.
>>
>> Actually pretty old news.  Nothing to do with the present conflict in the
>> Middle East.
>>
>> George
>
>
> So you say. Amazing timing though. & once in place this will change the
> dynamics seriously. Given this is "old news" then one
wonders if it was
> this which forced the US & Israel to look for any sort of pretext for
> acts of violence prior to the establishment of the base(s) & the
> concomitant AADS.

I don't understand the "So you say".  The article you posted is
from early June and I had heard the rumor before. This is clearly not a
result of the conflict in July/August in Lebanon as you seem to imply. 
Also if you notice this is denied by the Russians that they will home port
ships in Syria.  Seems to me more like port improvements so they have the
option of port calls there.  Also have you studied lately the number of
underway days for the Russian fleet lately?

George

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