US: Syria Fired Scuds at Rebels

December 12, 2012 from CNN

The Syrian regime has fired at least four Scud missiles at rebel forces in a dangerous escalation of the conflict, US officials say. The regime has at least 400 of the short to medium-range missile and also appears to be deploying incendiary "barrel bombs," the US says.

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Syria

Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south and Israel to the southwest. A country of fertile plains, high mountains and deserts, i... Explore this topic

Syrian Civil War

The Syrian civil war is an ongoing armed conflict in Syria between forces loyal to the Syrian Ba'ath Party government and those seeking to oust it. The conflict began on 15 March 2011, with popular demonstrations that grew nationwide by April 2011. These demonstrations were pa... Explore this topic

Missile

In a modern military, a missile is a self-propelled guided weapon system, as opposed to a unguided self-propelled munition, referred to as just a rocket . Missiles have four system components: targeting and/or guidance, flight system, engine, and warhead. Missiles come in type... Explore this topic

Ballistic missile

A ballistic missile is a missile that follows a ballistic flightpath with the objective of delivering one or more warheads to a predetermined target. Shorter range ballistic missiles stay within the Earth's atmosphere, while longer range ones are designed to spend some of thei... Explore this topic

Scud

Scud is a series of tactical ballistic missiles developed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. It was exported widely to other countries, in particular third world countries. The term comes from the NATO reporting name SS-1 Scud which was attached to the missile by Western... Explore this topic

Syrian army

The Syrian Army, officially the Syrian Arab Army, is the land force branch of the Syrian Armed Forces. It is the dominant military service of the four uniformed services, controlling the senior most posts in the armed forces, and has the greatest manpower, approximately 80 per... Explore this topic

Bashar al-Assad

Bashar Hafez al-Assad is the President of Syria and Regional Secretary of the Syrian-led branch of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party. He has served as President since 2000, when he succeeded his father, Hafez al-Assad, who had ruled Syria for 30 years prior to his death. Al-Assa... Explore this topic

CNN

Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by American media mogul Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States. While the news channel ha... Explore this topic

Middle East

The Middle East or Mideast is a region that encompasses Western Asia and all of or part of Northern Africa, depending on the context. The term is considered to be Eurocentric and used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East. The corresponding adjective is Middle-... Explore this topic

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