‘Our support made it possible’

Russia touts essential role in Syria’s advance against IS

UQAYRIBAT (Syria): As the Islamic State group seems to crumble across Syria, a top Russian commander points to a pulverised tank once used by the militants as proof of his country’s essential role in their demise.

In recent months, Syrian troops have rolled IS back in the country’s northern province of Aleppo, Hama and Homs in the centre, and most recently, Deir Ezzor in the east.

But Moscow is keen to remind the world that its support for Syria’s beleaguered forces made these advances possible.

In Uqayribat, a town recently recaptured from IS, the chief of staff of Russia’s contingent in Syria leads a tour of a ruined factory where IS once produced one of its most terrifying weapons: “tankbombs”.

Militants would pack antitank mines and TNT into the vehicles, retrofit them with protective armour, then detonate them at Syrian army positions.

“The effect of such kamikaze tanks is considerable,” says LtGen Alexander Lapin during a tightlycontrolled tour by Russia’s military.

He points proudly to the gutted shell of an old Soviet tank, likely captured from government forces when IS swept through central Syria.

Ironically, it was a Russian strike that reduced the wouldbe bomb – with a “kill zone” of 300m – to a harmless, charred carcass.

“Such design lets the tank lead both offensive and defensive actions. IS was the first organisation in history to use such a weapon,” he says.

“Only Russian aviation can destroy them with their bombs.”

Uqayribat sits in the vast desert territory of Syria’s central Hama province and has changed hands several times between militants and government troops in Syria’s sixyear war.

In the first press tour to the town, Lapin says Syria’s army and a volunteer brigade ousted IS from Uqayribat, but Russia also played a key role.

“New methods of warfare were used here, and Russian aviation inflicted extensive fire damage here,” he adds.

Weapons, including Russia’s OFAB500 fragmentation bombs, have shattered 48 tanks in Uqayribat, 30% of which were being fashioned into “kamikaze tanks”.

Moscow has found three tank factories like the one in Uqayribat, and suspects one is still operating in AlMayadeen, an IS bastion near the border with Iraq.

“We will find it, and we will destroy it,” Lapin says.

Russian reconnaissance drones were the first to scout the Uqayribat factory, and they also uncovered a network of IS tunnels crisscrossing the town. — AFP