How the U.S. positioned its warships to trick Russia ahead of Syrian strikes

Just goes to show that a good military deception plan pays off in ways that are seldom explained, but often significant.
The Russians and Syrians look one way, we hit them from a different direction.
Surprise!
Having said that, I don't think that the vaunted air defenses that they boast of are all that they're cracked up to be. The Israelis hit Syrian and Iranian positions regularly, and hardly ever lose an aircraft. When they actually did lose an F-15 a couple weeks ago, the Israelis destroyed nearly half of the Syrian Army's anti-aircraft batteries in a matter of days.