US forces bombard very strategic Syrian Army position in south Syria – Why is it important? What we now know

Late on Sunday night, Syrian Army units operating in southern Syria came under heavy bombardment from an artillery barrage launched by US forces. The attack targeted a very specific and important Syrian military position in the region.

As mentioned even in Syrian state media reports, the Syrian military units which came under attack were based atop the mountain of Jabal Al-Ghorab. This high mountain has such serious strategic value that it leaves nearby US forces positioned in the Al-Tanf area anxious with the reality that it is the Syrian Army, and not them, who possess it.

So effectively does Jabal Al-Ghorab tower over the Martian-like desert terrain of south Syria, that it allows Syrian Army sentry units stationed on top of it to oversee the entire Al-Tanf area, including the base where the US forces and Pentagon-backed rebel groups operate from.

Syrian Army outposts on top of Jabal Al-Ghorab have been attacked by US forces without provocation before; earlier this year, the US conducted a drone strike on a position atop the mountain which reportedly killed at least two Syrian troops.

Whilst the US may have the world’s most powerful air force, all generals know that, for ground forces, nothing beats holding the high-ground in a given area of operations.

The Syrian Army’s stationing on Jabal Al-Ghorab serves an operational thorn in the side of US and US-backed forces, for whilst they might have denied the skies over Al-Tanf, all their movements and positions can still be spied upon from the highest peak in area.

Map shows the Syrian Army areas “in the circles ” that were attacked .