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Salim Idris, the sole address for U.S. support

 The American Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) published an Interview with Frederic Hof, former special adviser for transition in Syria at the U.S. Department of State. Titled '' The Hard Road to Syrian Peace".

During the interview how dissolved an important American interest to deal with , Major General Salim Idris, leader of the Supreme Military Council of Free Syrian Army and the commander of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who's operating out from Turkey.

Hof described Idris as a capable, competent, and honest officer who can use to try to bring order to this chaos and begin to marginalize some of these jihadist elements is his role as the sole address for U.S. support.

The American advisor explained more about the upcoming meeting between the Turkish Prime Minister Racep Erdoğan and the American President Barak Obama in Washington, where Obama is looking for a real Turkish commitment to work through the Supreme Military Council, which is led by a Syrian exiled defector, Major General Salim Idris, operating out of Turkey. This is the organization trying to impose some command and control over the disparate elements of the Free Syrian Army.

The idea and this is basically part of the Obama administration's revised strategy is to try to make General Idris the channel, the funnel, the authoritative address for the needs of the free Syrian army,whether it is weaponry, which the United States is still not in the business of providing, or nonlethal assistance, which is really important in terms of food, communications, body armor, medical, and the like.

 The one piece of real leverage that Idris who by all accounts is a very capable, competent, and honest officer can use to try to bring order to this chaos and begin to marginalize some of these jihadist elements is his role as the sole address for U.S. support. This is what the president is going to be looking for. Frankly, I don't know if Prime Minister Erdoğan has some specific tasks here, but the president is really going to reiterate what Secretary Kerry has said in his visits to Turkey: that we really need to centralize our assistance to the Syrian army.

 Does Idris have a real force?

No. He's got a staff, and he's got a headquarters. The way this conflict has evolved is very local in character. You have various armed organizations in different neighborhoods, different cities, different towns, operating under the label of "Free Syrian army" to distinguish themselves from the regime and from others, like the jihadists.

Zaman Alwasl
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