US forces to Jordan-Syria border

[Dr Mordrid]

Tripwire?

http://m.yahoo.com/w/legobpengine/news/panetta-us-sends-forces-jordan-131927741.html?orig_host_hdr=news.yahoo.com&.intl=US&.lang=en-US

BRUSSELS (AP) — The United States has sent military troops to the Jordan-Syria border to bolster that country's military capabilities in the event that violence escalates along its border with Syria, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Wednesday.

Speaking at a NATO conference of defense ministers in Brussels, Panetta said the U.S. has been working with Jordan to monitor chemical and biological weapons sites in Syria and also to help Jordan deal with refugees pouring over the border from Syria. The troops are also building a headquarters for themselves.

But the revelation of U.S. military personnel so close to the 19-month-old Syrian conflict suggests an escalation in the U.S. military involvement in the conflict, even as Washington pushes back on any suggestion of a direct intervention in Syria.

It also follows several days of shelling between Turkey and Syria, an indication that the civil war could spill across Syria's borders and become a regional conflict.
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[cjolley]

Or, letting al-Assad know that NATO, like love, is all around.

[Dr Mordrid]

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/d2749540-12ce-11e2-aa9c-00144feabdc0.html#axzz28xdFnhKx

Turkish jets force down Syrian airliner

Turkey forced down a Syrian Airlines passenger aircraft on suspicion of transporting weapons from Russia to the Assad regime and said it had seized illicit cargo, as the already tense confrontation between Ankara and Damascus became still more grave.

The news on Wednesday that scrambled Turkish F-16 fighter jets had made the aircraft break its journey from Moscow to Damascus and land at Ankara airport came as Turkey threatened to step up its retaliation to a barrage of cross border shelling by Syria.

Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkish foreign minister, told Turkish state television that the aircraft, which was carrying about 30 passengers, was forced to land because of information that it may have carried “certain equipment in breach of civil aviation rules”. He added that Turkey was determined to stop “weapons transfers to a regime that brutally massacres civilians”

A person knowledgeable about the search told the FT that equipment that could be considered arm parts had been discovered and seized. Reuters reported early Thursday that the aircraft had departed Ankara.

Some Turkish media reported that missile parts had been discovered on the aircraft and that several large crates had been removed
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