{"id":30412,"date":"2018-02-03T11:00:51","date_gmt":"2018-02-03T19:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=30412"},"modified":"2018-02-03T11:00:51","modified_gmt":"2018-02-03T19:00:51","slug":"us-backed-free-syrian-army-group-shoots-down-russian-jet-kills-pilot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2018\/02\/03\/us-backed-free-syrian-army-group-shoots-down-russian-jet-kills-pilot\/","title":{"rendered":"US-Backed Free Syrian Army Group Shoots Down Russian Jet, Kills Pilot"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Jaysh al-Nasr rebel group in Syria, part of the US-backed Free Syrian Army, has posted <a href=\"http:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/syrian-rebels-reportedly-shoot-down-russian-su-25-pilot-unkown-2018-2\">footage<\/a> of its fighters celebrating the shoot-down of a Russian Suhkoi-25 jet fighter in the Idlib province of Syria. It is the first time a Russian fighter has been shot down by Syrian rebels attempting to overthrow the government of Bashar al-Assad in Syria.<\/p>\n<p>The plane was apparently brought down by a man-portable air defense system (ManPADS) surface-to-air missile. According to press reports, the pilot ejected from the plane safely but was killed by the Syrian rebels on the ground.<\/p>\n<p>The 2017 US military spending bill provided <span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtontimes.com\/news\/2016\/dec\/27\/russia-enraged-us-arming-syrian-rebels-manpads\/\">authorization<\/a> for the Department of Defense to arm the rebels with shoulder-fired antiaircraft missiles or ManPADS. At the time, the Russians vigorously objected to the dramatic US move to provide sophisticated weaponry to the rebels, claiming (rightfully it turns out) that &#8220;[t]<span>he relevant decision also poses a direct threat to aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces&#8230;&#8221;<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><span>The scenario where a US-backed, US-supplied jihadist group in Syria uses US weapons to shoot down a Russian plane and then murders the pilot on the ground should be seen as a near-nightmare escalation, drawing the US and Russia terrifyingly closer to direct conflict.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><i>Daniel McAdams is director of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ronpaulinstitute.org\/\">The Ron Paul Institute for Peace &amp; Prosperity<\/a>. Reprinted from The Ron Paul Institute for Peace &amp; Prosperity.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Jaysh al-Nasr rebel group in Syria, part of the US-backed Free Syrian Army, has posted footage of its fighters celebrating the shoot-down of a Russian Suhkoi-25 jet fighter in the Idlib province of Syria. It is the first time a Russian fighter has been shot down by Syrian rebels attempting to overthrow the government [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":241,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-30412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/241"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30412"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30412\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30414,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30412\/revisions\/30414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30412"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=30412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}