Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine renewed worldwide consultants’ give attention to Moscow’s earlier navy intervention in Syria, launched in 2015, which frequently grew to become framed as a “testing floor” for the weapons and ways it now employs towards Ukrainian cities. Actually, direct navy motion of the kind seen on the Ukrainian battlefield — bombing campaigns, assaults on city areas, drone surveillance, and artillery assist — had additionally performed a key position in stunting and ultimately rolling again insurgent positive factors in Syria. However crucially, the Russian forces backing Bashar al-Assad’s embattled regime additionally understood the significance of state-building efforts: mainly, rebuilding the damaged Syrian safety forces into extra coherent, efficient preventing items.
Nonetheless, rebuilding the complete Syrian Arab Army (SAA), which stood at greater than 220,000 troopers earlier than the conflict, or demobilizing the lots of of pro-Damascus militias that had fashioned since 2011 can be an not possible process whereas rebels and ISIS nonetheless threatened a lot of the nation. As a substitute, Russia initially targeted on forming two new corps that it might instantly command and provide. Unifying the command chain between the air forces, floor forces, artillery, and provide traces can be a large force-multiplier for the Syrian regime, whose forces had been working extra like disparate armed factions merging out and in of operations rooms, somewhat than as a single coherent navy command. These new Russian-built items used excessive salaries and the provide of reconciliation to entice militias, draft dodgers, and deserters, who would serve alongside veterans and recent graduates from the navy academies.[1] The construction and meant use of those new forces was meant to reflect that of Russia’s first Syrian proxy, the Tiger Forces, a pro-regime unit initially established in 2013 and commanded by Damascus’ Air Pressure Intelligence (AFI) that drew on a mélange of AFI personnel, ex-special forces fighters, and native, principally minority, militias from the countryside round Homs and Hama. Certainly, it was the evolution of the Tiger Forces right into a extra standard navy drive, renamed the twenty fifth Anti-Terrorism Division, in 2019, that triggered the creation of Russia’s most up-to-date proxy — the sixteenth Storming Brigade.
The everyday pre-war construction of the Syrian Arab Army, as reported by ISW in 2013.[2]
Russia’s Early Makes an attempt at Rebuilding the Syrian Army
Instantly upon intervening in September 2015, Russian officers and floor forces hooked up themselves to the notorious Tiger Forces, which had constructed a reputation for itself as a key offensive unit for the regime after taking a lead position in breaking the siege of the Aleppo Central Jail in Might 2014. On paper, the Tigers had been a large 12,000-man unit, equal to an SAA division, although the overwhelming majority of those members had been reserve fighters who by no means noticed fight.[3] The core fight drive of the Tigers extra carefully resembled a single brigade, consisting of two,000 to 4,000 males organized into company- and battalion-sized cellular formations.[4] These items, largely fashioned round communal ties and commanded by native warlords, might be rapidly deployed to precedence fronts for both defensive or offensive missions. The geographic coronary heart of the Tiger Forces was in Homs and northwest Hama, enabling the drive to separate items concurrently between defensive operations alongside the Idlib entrance and offensive operations elsewhere within the nation.
Previous to the Russian intervention, the ability of the Tiger Forces got here from the backing of the AFI, extensively thought-about probably the most highly effective of the nation’s 4 intelligence branches, whose political energy ensured the group would continuously obtain air assist from the overstretched Syrian Air Pressure, and whose deep pockets ensured sufficient funds to repeatedly recruit new and veteran fighters. With the Russian intervention, the Tigers obtained extra assist from the Russian Air Pressure and artillery items in addition to command assist from Russian officers. Russian generals, officers, and particular forces troopers have been pictured within the subject alongside all ranges of Tiger Forces fighters, from its commander, Suhail al-Hassan, to low-ranking subject commanders, indicating an intimate integration of Russian belongings alongside their chosen accomplice drive.[5]
Russia’s first experiment in replicating this mannequin got here a month after the beginning of their intervention, once they introduced the formation of the 4th Storming Corps.[6] The title of the brand new unit implies it was meant for use extensively in offensive operations throughout the nation. However apart from collaborating within the 2016 assault in northern Latakia, the unit has remained on defensive responsibility in a restricted space in Latakia and northwest Hama.[7] Heavy reliance on volunteers, poor efficiency within the 2016 offensive, and recruitment woes made for a disappointing end result.
With the 4th Corps undertaking failing to satisfy Russia’s hopes, and with the essential battle for Aleppo metropolis drawing increasingly regime forces over the summer time of 2016, the Russian navy started constructing one other navy formation, meant to deal with lots of the issues encountered with the 4th Corps. The brand new fifth Assault Corps was formally introduced in November 2016.[8] It’s funded, skilled, and commanded by the Russians, as evidenced by the demise of Russian Lt. Gen. Valery Asapov on Sept. 23, 2017, who was publicly named because the commander of the corps on the time of his demise.[9]
The fifth Corps occupies a center floor of types between traditionally defensive Syrian items and offensive ones. The corps has had a questionable deployment document, with vital claims of mistreatment and an absence of assist from partnered Russian items, significantly throughout the summer time 2017 marketing campaign in central Syria.[10] In response to analyst Aymenn Tamimi, at its inception, the corps was meant to attract upon the as-yet-untapped manpower reservoir of state workers (who’re exempt from necessary service) and people who had already accomplished their navy service.[11] The hope was that by providing aggressive salaries on high of the soldier’s civilian wage, a brand new pool of recruits can be enticed to hitch the SAA; whereas on the similar time, these new items can be bolstered by extra skilled veterans.[12] Nonetheless, the corps has since turn into a outstanding vacation spot for reconciled insurgent factions, significantly from southern Syria.
Conflicting experiences concerning the fifth Corps’ effectiveness may be partially defined by the best way the unit is structured and supported. The fifth Corps is fashioned round eight brigades — theoretically consisting of round 2,500 to three,500 troopers every — and recruitment, coaching, assist, and deployment seem to largely happen on the brigade stage. As famous within the 2013 ISW report referenced above, a regular SAA corps is made up of three to 4 division, every consisting of 5 to 6 brigades. Whereas the 4th Corps is constructed round this basic construction, the Russians deliberately left divisions out of the fifth Corps. This new system allowed Russia to centralize the command chain of the fifth Corps so that every brigade commander experiences on to the top of the fifth Corps, somewhat than diluting energy with one other layer of commanders on the division stage. The result’s a a lot smaller-than-standard corps constructed round items that may be extra simply commanded, resembling one thing like a set of eight Tiger Forces.
The dimensions and construction of the fifth Corps allowed Russia to increase its attain throughout the nation, concurrently deploying brigades to just about each lively entrance. However it additionally proved not possible for Moscow, or Damascus, to assist all eight brigades without delay. Variance in fight expertise and effectiveness of the fifth Corps usually correlated to which particular brigade was concerned. For instance, the first Storming Brigade has an in depth relationship with the Russian navy, sharing the identical bases because the Russians in northwest Hama and receiving common artillery coaching from Russian officers.[13] The 2nd and third brigades are likewise primarily based in northern Hama and have fought extensively in offensives there and in southern Idlib. Conversely, the 4th and seventh brigades are considerably weaker than the remainder of the fifth Corps, drawing extra closely from reconciled Syrians and arrested petty criminals.[14] Each items are the one brigades not headquartered in western Syria — the place the majority of the Russian command is — with the 4th stationed in east Homs and the seventh Brigade positioned in Deir ez-Zor.
The second main transformation got here in August 2019, as a part of the SAA and Russia’s makes an attempt to maneuver the Tiger Forces out of the management of the AFI and combine them instantly beneath the SAA excessive command. Earlier efforts in early 2019 to separate off the Homs-based Tiger militias had failed, largely attributable to an absence of incentives. Nonetheless, in July of that yr, Maj. Gen. Jamil Hassan, the long-standing director the AFI who had overseen the creation of the Tiger Forces, retired. A month later, Assad turned on his cousin Rami Makhlouf, stripping him of most of his corporations and cash.[15] Makhlouf had been a key financer of the Tiger Forces, and his arrest left the militia uncovered and weakened. In what was almost certainly a coordinated effort, the SAA excessive command instantly pressured the Tigers out of the AFI’s sphere of affect and introduced them beneath the direct management of the brand new minister of protection, Ali Ayoub. On Aug. 28, Tiger Forces-affiliated social media erupted with posts stating variations of “By order and instruction of President Bashar al-Assad, commander-in-chief of the Army and Armed Forces, [we announce] the creation of the twenty fifth Particular Duties Division (Counter-Terrorism), led by Brigadier Common Suhail Hassan.”
With this transformation in patronage, the Russians and the SAA started restructuring the Tiger Forces, increasing the group from a extremely cellular brigade to a extra standard division. The twenty fifth Division consists of Regiments 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, and seven, every commanded by both an SAA officer or an AFI officer from the unique Tiger Forces. Both manner, regimental commanders come from extra conventional navy backgrounds and have precise ranks, a stark departure from the closely militia nature of the Tiger Forces’ earlier incarnation. The unique Tiger Forces teams have now been considerably organized into numerical corporations and battalions inside every of those regiments.[16]
Since turning into the twenty fifth Division, the brand new unit has elevated its cooperation with the fifth Corps, and Russian officers instantly oversee coaching on the new twenty fifth Division base northeast of Hama metropolis. The evolution of the Tiger Forces right into a extra standard division has additional expanded Russia’s management over key SAA items — significantly offensive items and people stationed in northwestern Syria. Just like the fifth Corps earlier than it, the twenty fifth Division now serves as an import instrument for integrating militias from Homs, Hama, Idlib, and japanese Aleppo, in addition to a path of recruitment inside the Sunni areas of the aforementioned governorates recaptured by pro-regime forces within the latter half of the conflict.
However this shift into the extra standard twenty fifth Division left the Russians and not using a dependable, smaller fast response drive whereas additionally not filling the hole within the Russian proxy presence in northern Aleppo. The Turkish intervention in February 2020 and the next Idlib ceasefire imposed on Russia and the Syrian regime a month later ended severe, war-time navy operations for Damascus and Moscow. Each militaries have used the 2 quiet years since to proceed their work rebuilding, retooling, and restructuring the array of pro-regime armed forces. It’s on this context that Russia fashioned the sixteenth Storming Brigade in late June 2020.
Russia Finds a New Hammer
The first point out of the sixteenth Brigade on social media occurred on June 25, 2020. In October of that yr, a member of the unit claimed the brigade fielded 1,000 troopers. Many of those troops had been pulled from the twenty fifth Division and fifth Corps, although others got here from varied items throughout the SAA, together with the Republican Guard. For instance, one member of the group posted an image in early July using a tank on a flatbed truck with the caption that he had transferred from the 18th Division to the sixteenth Brigade.[17] The brigade operates some heavy armor, as evidenced by a number of movies over the previous two years exhibiting small convoys on the transfer. One such video, posted on March 1, 2021, confirmed 5 tanks, three BMPs (Soviet/Russian-built tracked infantry preventing automobiles), and three self-propelled weapons. An image posted by the identical soldier in July 2020 confirmed 13 equally organized armored automobiles at a base. Nonetheless, just like the Tiger Forces, the sixteenth Brigade additionally closely employs flatbed-mounted artillery and so-called “technicals,” pickup vehicles mounted with heavy weapons corresponding to anti-air cannons.
Movies and footage posted by sixteenth Brigade troopers all through the autumn of 2020 confirmed a number of gatherings geolocated to the massive navy base south of Asilah, in northwest Homs. Nonetheless, in line with a Syrian officer with ties to the unit, the group’s most important base is close to Aleppo metropolis, the place its administrative and management facilities are housed, although items do continuously come to Hama for coaching. There are a number of attainable explanation why Russia and the SAA could have chosen to base the brigade in Aleppo. First, this will have been considered as a approach to bolster Russian and SAA affect in an space dominated by Iran (although claims of Russian-Iranian competitors are typically overblown). Extra vital is the strategic significance of Aleppo in any future hostilities. This can be one perception into how Russia plans to make the most of the brigade. From Aleppo, the sixteenth Brigade is properly positioned to react to any escalations alongside the Turkish fronts of Afrin, Euphrates Protect, and Manbij, in addition to to take a lead position in pushing southwest by means of the Aleppo-Idlib frontline ought to the ceasefire with the Islamist militant group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which operates in that space, ever collapse.
October 2020.
One other perception into Russia’s probably imaginative and prescient for the sixteenth Brigade comes from its alternative of management for the brand new unit. Brig. Gen. Salah Abdullah, an Alawite born in 1967 within the city of Tayba, within the Safita countryside, and the long-standing quantity three of the Tiger Forces, was chosen to steer the brand new brigade from day one. Not like Suhail Hassan and the Tiger Forces’ Operations Commander Yunis Muhammad, Abdullah doesn’t have an AFI background. Quite, he spent the early years of the conflict commanding Syrian Army items. In response to one biography of him printed on Fb by his supporters, Abdullah joined the seventh Division after graduating from the navy academy within the late Nineteen Eighties, the place he would ultimately take command of the division’s 1st Battalion, by 2011. It’s on this position that he “heroically” led the storming of the Omari Mosque in Dara’a, “cleansed” Hama metropolis, after which moved to its countryside to struggle in Kafr Nabouda, Lataminah, and Halfaya, earlier than lastly arriving in Latakia by late 2012. In 2013, he was chosen to function the navy official for the Tiger Forces in Aleppo, the place he commanded the Khanasir highway marketing campaign and the liberation of Aleppo Central Jail. He would spend the following a number of years main the Tiger Forces’ Aleppo campaigns all through the town, together with in Sheikh Najjar and Handarat, whereas additionally serving extra broadly because the Tigers’ “navy liaison” with the SAA.
His experiences in Khanasir and the Aleppo Central Jail display Abdullah’s in depth expertise main each his personal forces and joint operations rooms in essential, hard-fought offensive campaigns; whereas his work in 2011 and 2012 show the commander has no qualms about murdering civilians and utilizing collective punishment ways to realize the regime’s aims. His choice as the top of the sixteenth Brigade, subsequently, signifies that the Russians and the SAA view the brigade as filling the identical strategic position that the Tiger Forces did all the best way again in 2013, throughout the latter unit’s first main operations.
with Brig. Yusuf Abd al-Hamid
Mahmoud, the chief of employees of the
sixteenth Brigade.
Image posted on July 2, 2020,
by a member of the brigade,
congratulating Mahmoud
on the appointment.
Abdullah acquired his preliminary task a yr after the brigade was fashioned, returning to the place the place he initially made a reputation for himself as a ruthless commander. In August 2021, Damascus launched its first main navy operation in Dara’a because it had reclaimed the area from native insurgent fighters in 2018.[18] Within the three years since that offensive, Dara’a had been rocked by an more and more violent insurgency — a mélange of ex-Free Syrian Army (FSA) cells, native criminals, and Islamic State insurgents, all on high of standard retaliatory killings by regime forces towards former rebels. Earlier makes an attempt by the Assad regime to quell the insurgency didn’t have the assist of Russia, whose generals had negotiated the reconciliation offers that noticed the give up of Dara’a in change for the pseudo-autonomy of many cities that now served to bolster the insurgents. However by August 2021, the assaults had turn into too frequent, and with the Idlib entrance showing securely frozen, Russia greenlit an operation to retake a number of key cities.
Russia’s involvement was evident from day one. Video of an armored unit consisting of tanks, BMPs, and heavy artillery “touring to Dara’a” was shared by members of the sixteenth Brigade on their non-public accounts on Aug. 24, 2021. Two days later, video of the identical armored column, now explicitly labeled as belonging to the sixteenth Brigade, was disseminated extra broadly by pro-regime channels. On Aug. 30, members of the sixteenth Brigade introduced the primary fight demise from inside the unit, whereas others shared a video of themselves engaged in a heavy firefight “a number of days in the past” someplace in Dara’a. Different SAA items — all of which had been already stationed within the area — took half within the preventing; however it was the sixteenth Brigade that was the primary to enter every city as they surrendered one after the other. A video shared by Al Jazeera Syria confirmed Russian and sixteenth Brigade officers inside Dara’a metropolis on Sept. 8, whereas pro-regime information pages and sixteenth Brigade social media posts confirmed members of the unit and automobiles bearing the brigade’s title in Yadouda on Sept. 14, Muzayrib on Sept. 16, and Tafas on Sept. 20. At the very least part of these forces was led by Col. Jamal al-Din al-Ghajari, a battalion commander within the brigade.
With the give up of those three cities and a number of other neighborhoods of Dara’a metropolis, the sixteenth Brigade withdrew again to its bases and positions in northern Syria. On Oct. 25, a sixteenth Brigade tanker who had recurrently uploaded footage of the unit’s armored automobiles within the south posted, “The mission in Dara’a is over.” Over the course of the following week, he would share a number of images and movies of an armored column consisting of round 12 automobiles on its manner again to the Aleppo countryside. This was the primary — and to date, solely — operation for the brand new unit. In response to human rights organizations, the regime offensive left not less than 22 civilians lifeless, principally from indiscriminate shelling and heavy weapons hearth.[19] Since then, the brigade has remained on the frontlines of northern Aleppo province, throughout from the Turkish military and its allied opposition forces. Troopers and armored items of the sixteenth Brigade have been pictured round Idlib in 2020, and on the al-Bab and Manbij frontlines in 2021 and 2022.
The sixteenth Brigade’s emphasis on operations within the Aleppo countryside seems additional cemented by means of discussions this summer time about appointing Brig. Salah Abdullah because the deputy commander of the Republican Guard’s thirtieth Division. This division was fashioned in January 2017 to combine all pro-regime items in Aleppo beneath one command following Damascus’ recapture of the town the month prior, and it now serves as the primary navy drive within the metropolis and its countryside. In response to one officer interviewed by this creator in August, the choice to nominate Abdullah to the division has not been confirmed but; however whether it is, he’ll virtually actually retain his position as the top of the sixteenth Brigade. Thus, the command chain between the brigade and the broader SAA forces within the northern Aleppo space will likely be solidified — an essential step for bettering fight effectiveness within the occasion of a future offensive.
What the unit does within the occasion of a Turkish offensive towards Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) positions in Tel Rifaat or Manbij will likely be a key indicator for the Russian stance towards such an offensive. It’s unlikely that Russia will danger severely damaging its latest, and considerably small, proxy drive, although Russian and Syrian leaderships could view a Turkish offensive as a wonderful alternative to battle harden the brigade for future battles. However whereas the brigade could also be staffed with skilled officers and draw closely from veteran troopers, the unit can be decimated by Turkish air and artillery strikes, identical to the opposite SAA items that fought towards Turkey in Idlib in early 2020. It isn’t clear what incentive Russia or Damascus has for enduring such vital losses in a failed bid to cease a Turkish offensive that will finally be aimed solely at SDF-held territory.
Moreover, the long-term way forward for the brigade stays unsure. What function does a small quick-reaction drive serve in a frozen battle? The longer the SAA goes with out participating in any severe navy operations, the extra probably it’s that the sixteenth Brigade will merely be folded into the fifth Corps or twenty fifth Division — each items which are additionally supported and commanded by Russia. In any case, this has been the last word purpose if the Russian navy in Syria since forming the 4th Corps six years in the past. Ideally, the Syrian military wouldn’t want stand-alone fast response forces however would somewhat be capable of reconstitute its decimated particular forces, or not less than create specialised items inside broader formations (corresponding to the brand new Parachute Regiment of the twenty fifth Division) — buildings extra in step with a correct state armed drive. With the sudden storm of rumors and tales earlier this yr of Russia sending Syrians to Ukraine, one may suppose the sixteenth Brigade can be an ideal match for shoring up Russian traces in Kherson or Donbas. However as this creator argued in March, at current there’s neither proof of, nor motivation for, sending Syrians to struggle Russia’s conflict. No matter occurs to the sixteenth Brigade, its destiny stays tied to Syria.
This report was written partially utilizing information collected by the Syrian Archive, with assist from Safety Pressure Monitor, as half of a bigger undertaking that the Archive has been conducting for the previous a number of years, mapping out the historical past, construction, and deployments of pro-regime armed teams by way of public sources.
Gregory Waters is a Non-Resident Scholar on the Center East Institute and a analysis analyst on the Counter Extremism Challenge. His analysis focuses on the Syrian regime’s safety forces, primarily using open-source analysis to evaluate the capabilities and construction of the Syrian Arab Army and allied militias. You possibly can comply with him on Twitter @GregoryPWaters. The views expressed on this piece are his personal.
Photograph by DELIL SOULEIMAN/AFP by way of Getty Photographs
[2] Joseph Holliday, “Syrian Arab Army Doctrinal Order of Battle,” Institute for the Examine of Battle, February 2013. Word: A number of the transliterations on this graphic will not be correct. “Falaq” needs to be “Faylaq,” “Awal” needs to be “Fareeq Awal, and “Suriya” needs to be “Sariya.”
[3] Interview with a Tiger Forces reservist, 2021.
[4] For a historical past and construction of the Tiger Forces, see: Gregory Waters, The Tiger Forces: Professional-Assad fighters backed by Russia, Center East Institute, October 29, 2018. It needs to be famous that for the reason that publication of this text, the creator has recognized a number of extra Tiger Forces items or associates.
[8] Al-Tamimi, “The Fifth Legion.”
[9] “Russia says normal killed in Syria held senior publish in Assad’s military,” Reuters, September 27, 2017. The Russian navy presence inside the fifth Corps has continued to be documented since then. All through the primary quarter of 2019, Russian navy and suspected intelligence officers had been recurrently pictured in loyalist social media alongside fifth Corps brigade commanders on all fronts. Every brigade seems to constantly have the identical one or two Russian officers current, and it’s these officers who usually current medals to the brigade’s officers. Due to this fact, evidently the Syrian command construction of the fifth Corps rests beneath a Russian construction, from general command right down to brigade liaisons that assist coordinate the actions of items with these of the Russian navy.
[11] Al-Tamimi, “The Fifth Legion.”
[13] Interview with 1st Brigade artillery officer in Hama, 2021.
[14] Interview with Syrian soldier, 2020.
[16] For instance, a martyrdom announcement on a Tiger Forces-related Fb web page said that Hassan Abbas fought within the “Tiger Forces (twenty fifth Division), seventh Regiment, 4th Battalion, Bouasil Teams,” the Bouasil Teams being an unique Tiger Forces militia.
[17] Movies and footage posted by this soldier in prior years present him working the identical tank as a member of the 18th Division. This division has been decimated by the conflict and right this moment largely serves as an armored assist unit for different regime forces. It, subsequently, is sensible that the sixteenth Brigade’s new heavy armor was equipped from this division.
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