The strategy has echoes of the secret war the CIA ran with the Saudis against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s when they trained and armed the “Mujahideen”, which included the likes of Osama bin Laden.

The Soviet War in Afghanistan, 1979

They supplied the Mujahideen with 1,000 Stinger missiles, the most lethal hand-held ground-to-air missiles of the period. Those missiles devastated the Soviet air force and turned the tide of the war.

Terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq, which are now backed by the CIA and the Saudis, are demanding supplies of Stingers or similar man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS or MPADS).

Improvised MANPADS batteries employed in Syria

The moment President Vladimir Putin declared Russia’s intention to launch attacks against radical groups in Syria, the CIA and the Saudis increased their flow of missiles to the Syrian battlefield.

By all accounts, they recently transferred an additional 500 missiles and other weapons. The justification for the CIA move was the one that has been used since the start of the conflict, namely that the weapons were intended for “moderate” Islamic groups opposed to the Syrian government.

This all comes at a time when opinion polls in the West show a majority favor Russia’s Syria intervention.

The most significant aspect of the latest supply of additional missiles was how it crystallized the ongoing plans of the CIA and the Saudis to draw Russia deeper into the Syrian conflict by adding even more firepower to the battlefield, hoping terrorists will ensure Russia gets bogged down.

There are still many within the Saudi royal family and in the halls of power in Washington who believe Russia is the enemy and that the defeat of the Russian forces in Afghanistan in the 1980s led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.

However, it is clear from the 1980s Afghan war that United States and Saudi support for the Mujahideen created the Taliban and the even more dangerous radical groups. The outcome was tied to the September 11 attacks, atrocities across the globe, two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that created radicalized people worldwide, and the subsequent emergence of ISIS and its affiliates.

There has been no real scrutiny of the latest CIA-Saudi axis, but evidence shows it has been in place for years. In 2013, the Saudis ordered 15,000 anti-tank missiles from the U.S. Their plan was to arm and train extreme militias they supported in Iraq and Syria, believing those groups would weaken Iraq, destroy the Syrian government and in the process degrade Iranian influence across the region.

Contrary to claims that it has backed the current Iraqi government, Washington has nevertheless allowed the CIA and the Saudis to arm Iraq’s enemies.

The Saudi role in buying weapons and then having the CIA disperse them mirrors the way US.

Intelligence and the Saudis operated in tandem in the 1980s. In 1984, the Saudis purchased 400 Stingers on the pretext they were for national defense but then gave many of them to the Mujahideen in Afghanistan.