REPORT: Online videos showcase Syrian rebels' foreign weaponry

     
From his home in the English town of Leicester, former business administrator Elliot Higgins trawls through sometimes hundreds of online videos a day from Syria's civil war.          

His research, begun after he took redundancy late last year, has made him a self-taught expert on the weaponry of a conflict largely inaccessible to outsiders, in which disparate rebel groups, some linked to al-Qaeda, form their own supply lines.           

"I was just interested, and no one else seemed to be doing it," the 34-year-old said in a telephone interview.         

In recent months, he has noticed that the rebels have been getting much more sophisticated Chinese, Croatian and other foreign equipment, notably the anti-tank and anti-aircraft weaponry they have long sought.           

More traditional experts, many of whom read Higgins' blog, have come to the same conclusion, although they say the supplies are not significant enough to change the dynamic of the rebel fight against President Bashar al-Assad's heavily armed forces.          

"What we are seeing now are weapons that could not have been taken from government stockpiles or bought within the region," said Higgins, who blogs under the pseudonym "Brown Moses".         

"They must be being flown in and shipped across the border from Jordan and Turkey."          

Saudi Arabia and Qatar, most believe, are the major buyers.         

The shakily filmed rebel videos posted on YouTube and elsewhere are almost invariably impossible to verify and contain few signs of hits on genuine targets, although fighting has devastated towns and cities, killed more than 100,000 people and forced millions to flee.         

Some appear deliberately intended to showcase new weaponry, particularly the latest types to arrive such as the shoulder mounted HJ-8 Chinese-made wire guided missile. Rebels crouch behind rubble, trees or buildings, quietly chanting religious slogans before firing.      

The most sophisticated anti-tank weapon obtained by the rebels so far, it is capable of punching through even modern "reactive armor" able to repel older and smaller missiles, although some rebels have complained they are not up to expectations.              


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REUTERS