Baladi News – (The military analyst at Baladi News Network)
The past ten days were teemed with many military developments, especially in northern Syria. In Aleppo, the regime forces reached and cut-off Castello Road, imposing a complete blockade on the city, which was a shock for both the rebels and the civilians inside and outside Aleppo.
Now, about 300 thousand civilians have become trapped inside the liberated part of the city as the regime encircled the city from outside Aleppo as well as the remaining parts of the city under its control.
Blockading Aleppo has always been an important goal for the regime. This was emphasized in the beginning of 2014, when the regime tended to work on besieging Aleppo and break the siege on the allied villages of Nubul and Zahra, which is an important step for achieving the ultimate goal of surrounding Aleppo. Eventually, the regime’s persistence paid off because of the rebel’s lack of unification, the nonexistence of an organized strategy, and the reliance on reaction rather than taking the initiative.
Meanwhile the rebels were stacking the corpses of Shiite militants sough from Aleppo after the battles of Khan Touman and al-Iss, the regime was advancing quietly in the south. The battles of southern Aleppo seemed as a process of diverting the rebels from the real aim, or rather a process of distracting the rebels by fighting on more than a front.
The regime succeeded in gradually making Castello the only path for both the rebels and civilians for obtaining both supplies and foodstuffs. It was clear that Castello road was going to be the next aim for the regime. However, the rebels did not pay attention to that point, so they did not take any action to prevent capturing it by the regime. Defensive strategy was never enough to protect this road, especially that the Russian air cover would not allow the establishment of an active defensive line in the area, but would allow the regime and sectarian militias to advance and destroy any forces that would establish any sites over there. The successful strategy should have been offensive, which would have prevented the blockade and thwarted the regime’s strategy that succeeded significantly.
Dismemberment
There are concerns that the regime would try to dismember the besieged part of Aleppo by focusing its attacks on the area located between al-Sakhour Turnaround and al-Baraa Bin Malek Mosque, which would split that area in half if a large attack was waged.
The regime is currently concentrating on the northern part of that area, which includes al-Haidariya, al-Halak, Bustan al-Basha, al-Sheikh Khedr, and other areas that would be isolated from the other rebels’ controlled areas, repeating the scenario of Grozny in Chechnya that enabled Russia to control it.
Breaking the Siege
There are a number of possibilities to break the siege and opening gaps that can be utilized in the regime lines. This can be done through attacks inside and outside the city, which could confuse the regime and make it unable to orient its military efforts towards repelling any attacks.
It can be said that the rebels’ task inside the city should be preventing the regime from advancing within the liberated parts and isolate large areas to deal with them alone. From the outside, the rebels should work on breaking the siege by opening gaps within the regime forces controlling the outskirts of the city.
The most important area that must be focused on in the current stage is Khanaser road, which is still the vulnerable side for the regime. Attacking this point would weaken the regime attacks’ momentum by cutting off this road of supply, which would force it to push a part of its forces, including its war forces, to reopen it, especially near al-Sheikh Hilal area and its surroundings. This could help in recapturing Castello Road, especially if it was accompanied by intensive attacks from other areas by not allowing the regime focus its defense in one area.