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US and Israel Test Missile As Syria War Tensions Rise
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Joshua Mitnick reports that Israel and the U.S. carried out a missile test over the Mediterranean Sea on Tuesday morning that was detected by Russian surveillance systems. Israel's defense ministry eventually said a Sparrow rocket had been fired to simulate a ballistic missile attack on the Jewish state to test the Arrow interceptor system. The Arrow – which wasn't fired Tuesday – has been developed to defend against long range rockets primarily from Iran, a main patron of the Syrian regime. Arieh Herzog, a former Israeli missile defense director, says that the Sparrow missile is developed to simulate 'the worst threats' in the region so Israel can hone the capabilities of the Arrow III missile interceptor. Herzog speculated that the launch Tuesday was done at a considerably long range. Another Israeli expert said the incident could be seen as muscle flexing by the U.S. and Israel. 'You could say perhaps its show of strength to Syria and its Iranian ally — that Israel has a range of options at its disposal. And to place pressure on Assad and Iran that Israel takes [retaliation threats] seriously,' says Meir Javedanfar, a lecturer on Iranian politics at the Herzliya Interdisciplinary Center. Pentagon press secretary George Little said the U.S. 'provided technical assistance and support to the Israeli Missile Defense Organization flight test of a Sparrow target missile over the Mediterranean Sea.' 'The United States and Israel cooperate on a number of long-term ballistic missile defense development projects to address common challenges in the region,' added Little. 'This test had nothing to do with United States consideration of military action to respond to Syria's chemical weapons attack.'"
Related news today: Pentagon may be involved in chemical attack in Syria, US intelligence colonel hacked mail reflect
In a time of rising tensions in the Middle East, what could make more sense than an unannounced missile test which could be easily misinterpreted?
The hacker uploaded a load of email correspondence for several security contractors to pastebin, their wives and a colonel or two. it is being taken offline as fast as it is being distributed... it certainly does look damning evidence. Is anybody surprised given that we know Syria has been on the chopping block ever since "The New American Century" was published...
I'm just swinging my fist 1mm from your face, I'm not touching you, you can't stop me, there's no law against swinging your arms, stop touching my hands with your face, ha ha ha!
Except that in this case instead of getting kicked by an irate sibling some stuff might be blown up.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
We need to end this madness, this is not Sparta!
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/no-war-syria/QcTV4m0F
By Missile we mean Democracy Spreading Device.
Why don't we stay the fuck out of syria. Neither side likes us. We can't 'win' anything.
We're going to piss away a bunch more lives and money we don't have, for what?
'This test had nothing to do with United States consideration of military action to respond to Syria's chemical weapons attack.'
HAHAHHAHHAHA
The three laws of thermodynamics:(1) You can't win. (2) You can't break even. (3) You can't even quit.
Now that Dear Leader Obama is the president and has decided that we all need to give war a chance, NPR has taken to calling anyone who doesn't want his war to be an "isolationist."
You'll note that this term was never used against people who disagreed with wars in Afghanistan or Iraq... instead those people were "anti-war" or "pro-peace". We basically need another Republican as president so that the press can go back to attacking the president instead of being his trained lapdog.
AntiFA: An abbreviation for Anti First Amendment.
Yup, they're so real they didn't have to include the headers.
Looks very fake. Someone mentioned that the signature files don't match up
You can download all the correspondence from pastebin (well, a few hours ago you could).. All headers are there...
I wouldn't put it past the people who run the U.S. to lie their way into war like they have done before. But those emails look fake to me. No American writes like that.
Sorry, but did you download/read the emails? Look totally legit and there are thousands of lines for you to read... defiantly legit.
Why does the U.S. care about this conflict? Seems to me there's more important issues to be resolving at present.
Firing a missile over the Mediterranean Sea, unannounced, with all of the threats of a US strike on Syria. What could possibly go wrong?
Or perhaps the idea was to see if someone would fire back. It sure would be a lot more convenient to fire off a bunch of Tomahawks "in self defense" right now.
Wouldn't an American general and his friends speak English? This looks like fake to me. The language seems unnatural for a native speaker. Some examples:
"Hope to see you soon again."
"Thanks God, they are alive. I hope they got a kind of present or some cash."
"I saw it either and got afraid very much."
"I see their faces when in sleep. What did Tony say you about this?"
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
I dunno, i'd have to remain skeptical of those. A lot of the emails with lines of dialogue pertaining to the gas attack in them sound like the writer suddenly forgot how to speak english. Not at all the same flow as the rest of the emails.
Smells more like "Extremely weak fakery" than anything, but then sometimes i'm absolutely amazed at how people are completely unable to communicate in english these days so who knows.
First: shortly after Russia reported that they detected a missile launch, Pentagon denied having anything to do with that. Now it is reported that both USA and Israel conducted the test together. Is USA just stepping in for Israel? Don't they not even pretend to be impartial?
Second: who in their right mind approves to test a ballistic missile in Syria's backyard in this situation? Do they also give matches to kids with "go, play somewhere in some stacked hay"?
Could be however the full email correspondence dump has a lot of stuff to go through...
"Submitted by: Said Al-Khalaki (Freelance journalist)"
Yeah Terrorists everywhere blaming Freedom Fighters for everything. We will free the living shit out of all the coutries. FOR MURICA!
Oh the irony. If the US is behind this attack, shouldn't the rest of the world gather and attack them? Didn't Obama argue that international law must be enforced?
http://youtu.be/o2TmDtj9oPg?t=3m10s
ayottesoftware.com
Wouldn't your average /. commenter (and his friends, if any) speak English?
Yea this is a load of crap. People need to think more. You get to be in political power by always coming out on the winning side of the risk to benefit equation. The risk to president Obama that would come from giving the rebels chemical weapons is through the roof. The benefit is at best tiny. Just not in the cards folks.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
any time they get to one of the points that mentions gas attack its like the writer just had a stroke and can no longer form sentences.
My hunch is this is was a bit like when I worked at Eglin AFB in the late 1960s. Every so often, the USAF would pull an aging ground-to-air missile out of its warehouses and use it for some purpose before it had to be scrapped. The rockets were fired up into the ionosphere creating a pretty glow for scientific purposes. The even older air-breathing ones were converted into drones and fighters would use them for target practice. It was one of the latter that, when its self-destructive system failed after being badly shot up, may have overflow Cuba, creating similarly silly furor.
Sparrows have been in our military inventory since the 1950s, going through many revisions. I suspect this was an old one that our military tweaked to act like a fast-moving, warhead-bearing missile. Using it to test Israel's anti-missile capabilities was a good move and was ho-hum ordinary to anyone who knows how the military works. They practice and test constantly.
Of course, this has also provoked hysteria in the ever-clueless press. I know the Atlantic Wire had a particularly silly story. It also got the conspiracy buffs all in a dither. They forget that no publicity accompanied this test, so it had nothing to do with intimidating Syria. And it involved a single air-to-air missile weighing perhaps 500 pounds--hardly the stuff of global power politics.
I call BS because said colonel uses "yahoo" mail instead of .mil. Right.
The US fired the missile unannounced . . . to see if the Russian surveillance systems could spot it . . . and if the Russians could warn their Syrian pals about it.
They're just probing the target's defenses at this point. Nothing new here. The US military folks just want to see how good the Russian made stuff is, before they do anything for real.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
I feel like I woke up on Bizarro World. Mr. Winter Soldier is promoting “limited action” ( isn’t that how Vietnam started?) attacking another country that is not a direct threat to the US (wasn’t that the left’s argument against deposing Saddam?). Listening to Lurch promoting military action and hearing nothing but crickets from Code Pink, et al is astonishing to me. It really is all about tribe with the left, isn’t it? Unilateral military action with no UN sanction is all just peaches and cream when a Dem is president.
I don't understand the claim. Is the claim that the videos are fabricated? But
data about hundreds of dead, including kids, comes from many independent sources, some of which are highly
reliable - such as doctors without borders. Are all these sources in on it, and not many people actually died?
The opening geostrategic positioning is being finalized.
Feints, propaganda, disinformation, prepositioning are occurring. Some hope to lure us into the bear trap. initially it's about Russian and Iranian natural gas monopolies being used to create near eastern and European hegemonic states but China and then India and Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt, Iraq, and the Stans all have their roles to play. Will it unfold slowly or quickly, accelerating surely. 911 was the opening gambit, will control over 03 on the moon be the final goal? Control over energy going into the next century is the ultimate prize and creates the super power axis of the next 100 years
The risk to president Obama that would come from giving the rebels chemical weapons is through the roof. The benefit is at best tiny. Just not in the cards folks.
Same logic could apply to Syria's leadership. What strategic military importance was there to using chemical weapons on a remote village full of civilians Vs the enormous risk of UN invasion by using them. I suspect the most likely suspects behind the attack are third parties that stand to gain by an invasion (i.e. not US, not current Syrian regime either).
Its a Missile DEFENSE System. Not plainly a missile designed for destruction
The cynicism amongst some people is so strong that they'll blindly believe any shred of evidence regardless of how fake it looks. It's a good and healthy thing to question, but to buy into every stupid conspiracy theory that comes along is idiotic. They're only capable of being cynical in one direction which means the right interests will be able to easily exploit their naivete.
I bet the guys who posted those supposed emails read the summary and in their gleeful rush to share this crap neglected to dig any deeper. But I guarantee you that a year from now people will continue repeating this story and all blog links will lead right back to this particular site. When it comes to this sort of thing blogs tend to be a circle jerk where everyone uses everyone else's blog as proof for their claims.
troll. fake.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
Thank USA for taking care of Earth overcrowding. Our military complex will take care of that and bombers will drop bombs after bombs on these savages.
Your welcome.
Looks perfectly legit. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to wire $1,000 to my barrister in London so he can free up the one million GBP waiting for me.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
I don't understand the claim. Is the claim that the videos are fabricated? But data about hundreds of dead, including kids, comes from many independent sources, some of which are highly reliable - such as doctors without borders. Are all these sources in on it, and not many people actually died?
I don't see how you get your first question, no comments here even imply that the videos were faked. The question that is pertinent is "who used the chemical?". Are you perhaps confused by the term "False Flag"? The term does not imply that an event did not happen, but rather implies that the event was staged. This is the Hegelian dialectic (problem => reaction => solution).
John Kerry last week stated that it did not matter who used chemical weapons. That statement is absolutely wrong, and I really hope you are intelligent enough to know that Kerry was wrong.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
If you were against the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, you were a terrorist or pro-terrorists by Bush's statements. Did you forget the whole "you are either for us or against us" speech used and intended to stifle questioning policy? MSM labelled many people unpatriotic as well as pro-terrorist.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
The world reacts to the crisis in Syria.
Solving Unix problems since 1989...
I'm not a War Hawk or anything of the sort but I do believe all of us know something has to be done. We cannot allow the Syrian government to think it is the least bit acceptable to use chemical weapons. Some of you know the quote "You know what this is? It's Munich" we can't give Syrian government or the Iranian government want they want because they threaten to retaliate and we don't feel like dealing with it. There is no real right answer but the wrong answer is to do nothing.
I'm sure it was, um, just a coincidence. Yeah, that's it, a coincidence. A previously scheduled anti-missile test that just happened to not actually test the "anti" part of the anti-missile system.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
"Seems unnatural"?
Pretty noncommittal way to say that this is obviously 100% bullshit. No native speakers of either American or British English speak or write sentences like that. Even Yoda would laugh at the ridiculous structure.
If you follow the parent link, you'll see that the claim is that the videos are fake. E.g.
"From the Anthony’s wife dialog with her friend it’s clear the video with the children killed in the chemical attack near Damascus was staged by U.S. Intelligence."
Of course it's not coincidence. The test may have been planned for months but Israel would have pushed up the deadline on any such testing. They would be rightfully concerned about what may happen in the next few weeks, since they are on the front lines. If they can do anything to prepare for retaliatory attacks launched from Syria (or Iran), they will be doing it. I suspect Turkey is doing the same, as is everyone else in the region who happens to be affiliated, in any way, with U.S. interests.
Except the Syrian army didn't use chemical weapons.
Don't let the "Hacked emails" distraction confuse you. The UN inspection teams didn't find any evidence that the Syrian army perpetrated the attacks.
The infamous photo used to show all the dead bodies wasn't even from Syria. It was from Iraq.
Also, Kerry's "We Know" speech was based on 100% bullshit.
http://www.sott.net/article/265807-A-Response-to-John-Kerrys-Syria-Evidence-Speech
It takes some time to learn about the real situation on the ground and think this through calmly, but that's what needs to be done in order to avert further tragedy. People like simple answers and the war mongers want to get people to seek them so that they can supply the easy lies which will lead to war.
We need to learn to think things through before reacting. Reacting along the paths chosen for us always leads to horrors. The government is using the same WMD tactics all over again to start another war.
Don't be fooled.
"Same logic could apply to Syria's leadership. What strategic military importance was there to using chemical weapons on a remote village full of civilians Vs the enormous risk of UN invasion by using them. I suspect the most likely suspects behind the attack are third parties that stand to gain by an invasion (i.e. not US, not current Syrian regime either)."
1 Actually it doesn't here. The UN will not invade because China and Russia will not agree to it. They will veto any massive UN action.
2 The US will not invade because the US is war weary and the President doesn't have the support.
3 The US did nothing when Iraq used them.
So the worse is that the US will fire some cruise missiles to make a show of it. The Syria under their brave leaders took the "worst" that the Imperialist US dogs and their lackeys could dish out and stood firm. In other words we slap the on the wrist and they stick out their tongue at the world. In other words President Obama mucked this up because frankly he just is not a good president. I am not saying that he is evil or anything like that. He seems like a good guy but he should have done a few terms in Congress to get educated about the world outside of being an "activist organizer".
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Besides, the US would never be a part of shady dealings or false-flag operations. It's never happened before and will never happen in the future. The US just doesn't do bad things, period.
Same logic could apply to Syria's leadership. What strategic military importance was there to using chemical weapons on a remote village full of civilians Vs the enormous risk of UN invasion by using them? I suspect the most likely suspects behind the attack are third parties that stand to gain by an invasion (i.e. not US, not current Syrian regime either).
This is the one question I keep asking myself too. What possible benefits might be coming to Syria if they actually used the chemical weapons? If their back was against the wall and Assad was saying "eff this, let's throw everything we have at these infidel rebels!".... yeah, I could see that as a reason. Unfortunately Syria has a whole lot to lose and not much to gain by doing this kind of stupid gas attack. For crying out loud, Syria has access to jet fighter-bombers, artillery cannons, and a whole range of explosives of a modern military at their disposal. If the goal was simply to kill a bunch of people, there were literally dozens of ways to get that accomplished without resorting to the "weapons of mass destruction".
The rebel groups, on the other hand, have their backs to the wall and are desperate... where Assad clearly has the upper hand as long as those rebels aren't getting outside assistance from other governments. They have very little to lose and a whole lot to gain if these chemical weapons are used and publicized... especially if that use is blamed upon the Assad government. Having the U.S. Army directly back up your own little band of rebels definitely is a huge boost to both morale and actual firepower.
Something definitely stinks here and this doesn't make the official Obama administration story sound all that accurate. I don't know about details here as the PR spin doctors have really mucked this thing up thus finding "the truth" is nearly impossible right now.
You aren't thinking enough like a conspiracy theorist. These are either a carefully crafted code to their Illuminati brothers or the colonels have been removed from the earth and alien doppelgangers have been put in their place.
See, it's all very obvious when you think it through.
Not unlike pithy and anal comments sometimes made on Slashdot?
It doesn't sound like you've been around here much.
This looks like fake to me.
Maybe this whole thing is a false flag false flag!! Did you ever think about that??
Oh no, of course not. You sheeple don't know how to spot a conspiracy even when it's hovering menacingly right over you.
"What do you despise? By this are you truly known." --Princess Irulan, Manual of Muad'Dib
/)
THIS
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
If the goal was to gather and eliminate the current leadership in Washington DC, I think you might find a few supporters even in America itself. I would prefer to do that at a ballot box, but if the armies from around the world are coming anyway there could definitely be some internal domestic support too.
Heck, there are currently some deep divisions within the U.S. military itself. There is a distinct possibility that if military units are ordered to action, they may not follow orders. Then again the Obama administration has been conducting a purge of military leaders over the past couple of years, so there is likely to be some very loyal people at the top.
I still don't see it, but that's okay. Try searching for "Egypt Crisis Actor" in Youtube. Then "Syria Crisis Actor" in Youtube. Or hell, have some fun and just search for "crisis actor".
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
it's hovering menacingly right over you.
That's the FSM.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Syria has access to jet fighter-bombers, artillery cannons, and a whole range of explosives of a modern military at their disposal. If the goal was simply to kill a bunch of people, there were literally dozens of ways to get that accomplished without resorting to the "weapons of mass destruction".
The problem is that the explosives route doesn't command territory, and it doesn't have a high enough body count.
It's like the "you have 6 bullets, I have 20 people" equation. You will kill the 6 ( maybe ), but the remaining 14 will get you.
Of course, you have to have a mad enough "20".
Weapons like gas add to the body count and add to the terror in the minds of the opponents, and might be able to take out the "20".
emt 377 emt 4
What Assad was doing was scaring the opposition shitless with the chem. weapons. According to intelligence from several different countries, he's done this over 10 times. It was just that he happened to do it in close where there were (a) people with cameras, and (b) medical facilities to record the casualties. He was simply upping the ante because the West didn't do anything after his previous gas attacks and he knows Russia and China don't have the ethics or morals to stop him. Iran certainly won't mind a few more dead Sunnis, and neither would Hezbollah.
So, what was in it for Assad? In a word, Fear.
But the mercenaries and imported religious fanatics (a.k.a. "rebels" in the media) don't have the "20 people". Most of the civilian population wasn't terribly happy with Assad, but almost NONE of them like these new idiots and everyone blames them for the violence (rightfully so). If the gov't gasses a neighborhood and kills the 20 civilians, they've just killed a bunch of people who support them, the majority who don't like either side, and almost no one who opposes them. They're already frightened of anyone carrying a weapon at this point, they won't have gained anything except pissing off surviving relatives who otherwise wouldn't have done anything.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
I have yet to read anything about mercenaries and imported religious fanatics.
Can you substantiate this?
emt 377 emt 4
The US didn't make a fuss over Iraq using them against Iran because of the little disagreement the US had with Iran in 1979.
Either what you said will happen or in 20 years we get declassified CIA files that show this was true. Then people like you still say "Yea, old new, we knew this was happening then, what else is new?". Truth is most of us are trying to figure out what is going on. We do not know for sure. Only the true Puppet Masters know. But it is almost always about money and power.
Somebody with some real balls has to step up and say "No more goddamned bombs."
But mainly as a crucial catalyst to bring back Jesus Christ for the closing speech of the Apocalypse.
In all frightening seriousness, this is a fundamental tenet in not-so-far-Right-Wing foreign policy.
And they made little fuss when Iran used them back. That is what the Syrian government was hoping for and even if we don't they know we will not take them out so the risk seems worth it.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Is 'limited strike' against Syria something like how Osama launched a 'limited strike' against the USA by striking the WTC?
wars are HUGELY profitable for politician's portfolios, to say nothing of the large corporations that have our politicians in their pockets.
The problem is that the explosives route doesn't command territory, and it doesn't have a high enough body count.
It's like the "you have 6 bullets, I have 20 people" equation. You will kill the 6 ( maybe ), but the remaining 14 will get you.
Of course, you have to have a mad enough "20".
Weapons like gas add to the body count and add to the terror in the minds of the opponents, and might be able to take out the "20".
Bullshit. If you want to build a bigger bomb, you just go ahead and build it. The question isn't 6 bullets and 20 people, but rather 6k bullets and 20 people, wondering if after the first couple hundred bullets into each person should the commander be reprimanded for simply wasting ammunition. Assad has a large enough army and is well supplied enough to hunt down and wipe out each of these rebel groups with vastly superior and overwhelming military force.
That really isn't a problem.
The real problem is that these groups are being supported and supplied with weapons and technical support from other countries, namely the USA, UK, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and other groups (including the infamous Al-Qaeda who is actively recruiting people to help with the Syrian rebels). Since so much in the way of weapons, food, and equipment is being sent to these rebels by other major countries, why not a few canisters of chemical weapons too? It would be stupid to say that these other countries don't have access to chemical weapons and the knowledge in terms of how to build and deploy them.
The only reason why you use chemical weapons in a situation like this is either because you are mentally unbalanced (in which case.... why did the Obama administration and other governments help him out for so many decades?) or if you want to engage mass casualties where killing some of your own supporters and even loyal soldiers will be killed to deliver that final death blow.
You nor anybody else suggesting Assad has done this has given a rational explanation for why his soldiers or officers actually conducted this attack. Certainly it wasn't to increase body counts, as the victims of the Dresden fire bombing campaign can amply account for. Assad is certainly capable of conducting such a bombing campaign against a civilian population he they cared, thus chemical weapons simply aren't needed.
While I don't believe this is true, I do recognize that if it were true, systems are in place to keep it secret, and I would be none the wiser. But what the hell can I do but make educated guesses?
The US should just needs to add gas masks and chemical protective clothing to the next non-lethal assistance goody bag and let things play out. If the more civilized countries of the world can stomach indiscriminant killings than I guess the US shouldn't rock the boat. I am afraid it is going to take another WW2 era holocaust to once again remind the world just how petty and inconsequential their political stances and politicized morality really are.
{{Citation needed}}
Seriously. If he had done this dozens (at least the ten time you suggest here), there wouldn't be nearly so much fuss over this most recent usage of those weapons. It would have already been an accepted diplomatic fact among everybody involved and then the question would be if chemical weapons usage rises to any sort of a serious issue that is as bad as somebody using a thermonuclear weapon instead.
That is what is being claimed here.
I also don't buy the fear argument, so far as any military commander (even those commanders in World War I which actually deployed such weapons) knew that it would be an escalation of hostilities and not viewed favorably by the international community as a whole. When Germany used chemical weapons in the Netherlands, their back was up against the wall and their generals were desperate to try any possible action to try and break the log jam that was trench warfare during that war. Having a million corpses of your fellow soldiers tends to make you desperate for some major change.
Assad was in no similar kind of danger and had a great many other options available to get the job done, especially knowing that America and the UK were openly supporting the rebels and would use any possible excuse to ramp up that support even further.... as did happen too. Even total jerks like Stalin avoided things like chemical weapons simply because he wouldn't take the diplomatic loss from their use.
Try reading any news source that isn't American based.
Just today Putin was calling your Foreign Sec a liar because he claimed Al Qaeda are definitely not in Syria - http://rt.com/news/putin-syria-interview-ap-387/
The French have apparently contributed to the "rebel cause" in a rather unplanned way
And the recent (5 days ago) claims that the sarin gas attack was a rebel mistake and the weapons were provided by the Saudis, also mentioned numerous Saudi fighters in the region. No link here, as there isn't a single source that I would actually subject my browser (or eyes) to - but a quick google has a seemingly endless list of conspiracy sites touting the story.
The most incredible thing is how few whistle-blowers there have been in US history.
And they made little fuss when Iran used them back. That is what the Syrian government was hoping for and even if we don't they know we will not take them out so the risk seems worth it.
Why would you say that Assad's government in Syria "knows we will not take them out"? After seeing the armies of Iraq evaporate as the morning dew in the Gulf War (Syria was actually an allay of America in that war and got a front row seat to the full capabilities of the U.S. military), I'm sure they realize that America is more than capable of a full conquest and even annexation of Syria if it was in the interests of the U.S. Congress. It wouldn't even cause a military draft to happen in America or even much in the way of increased taxes.
From the perspective of the U.S. military, Syria is just vermin that needs to be dealt with. Syria damn well knows that too. They also have a neighboring country (Iraq) that serves as a strong example of what can happen to them if they decide to dick around with America.
Perhaps they feel that their relationship with Russia and China can be used as a counter to American military force. The Security Council veto is irrelevant other than that particular justification for going to war isn't an option this time around.... but having Russian ships and marines standing by waiting for a move by the USA is a potential counter.
World War I started for weaker reasons than this, and similar kinds of balancing of powers against each other was attempted.... and all fell apart too. Serbia hasn't been the same since those days when the Archduke Ferdinand was assassinated either. It was squished like a bug then forgotten as a backwater issue to the greater war that ended up happening. Syria is in the same danger and I would think Assad is just as knowledgeable about history as I am in that regard.
Simple the President has no stomach for boots on the ground. He is also is planning a punishment attack and nothing more. No it is a good gamble and he has Russia and China to keep the UN out of it. Without the UK to back him up President Obama is now just flopping around trying to offload as much blame and responsibility has he can. AKA it isn't his red line it is the world's.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
"Bullshit. If you want to build a bigger bomb, you just go ahead and build it."
Sure, or buy it. Problem is, excepting nuclear bombs, even a sustained barrage just doesn't kill as many people as you might think it does.
"The question isn't 6 bullets and 20 people, but rather 6k bullets and 20 people, wondering if after the first couple hundred bullets into each person should the commander be reprimanded for simply wasting ammunition."
Except it is 6 and 20 writ large. You dont have enough bullets/ bombs to eradicate them all.
"Assad has a large enough army and is well supplied enough to hunt down and wipe out each of these rebel groups with vastly superior and overwhelming military force."
They why hasn't he? From where I sit, it looks like he wants to get rid of "the rebels".
"The real problem is that these groups are being supported and supplied with weapons and technical support from other countries"
OK.
"why not a few canisters of chemical weapons too? It would be stupid to say that these other countries don't have access to chemical weapons and the knowledge in terms of how to build and deploy them"
You may be right on shipping them. They likely do have them.
"The only reason why you use chemical weapons in a situation like this is either because you are mentally unbalanced"
Or desperate
" (in which case.... why did the Obama administration"
Only the Obama administration? I hardly think so. The issues in the middle east go back past Eisenhower.
"and other governments help him out for so many decades?) or if you want to engage mass casualties where killing some of your own supporters and even loyal soldiers will be killed to deliver that final death blow."
I would expect they would keep the loyal soldiers out of the area. And try to gas areas where they believe there are many rebels and few supporters.
"You nor anybody else suggesting Assad has done this has given a rational explanation for why his soldiers or officers actually conducted this attack."
He wants them dead, disarmed, deactivated or otherwise out of the way. The conflict there has been open since march of 2011, and there have been internal issues ( not everyone is happy with Assad, nor his father ) going back to the coup d'etat that installed his father. He ( and his opposition ) sees what has happened in neighboring Arab states, with their leaders being removed/deposed/etc and he wants to avoid that. His opposition believes there is no better time to engage in uprisings.
"Certainly it wasn't to increase body counts, as the victims of the Dresden fire bombing campaign [wikipedia.org] can amply account for."
Certainly it was. And Dresden is an example of what I speak of. In spite of a bombing campaign that Assad *could not* accomplish many lived.
It looks like about 25k people were killed from a population of about 350k+.
I would expect the survivors were rather unhappy with the English/Allies after that.
"Assad is certainly capable of conducting such a bombing campaign against a civilian population he they cared, thus chemical weapons simply aren't needed."
He could conduct a bombing campaign. He could not accomplish something like Dresden. Not even close.
Assuming he could, the international outcry would be just as great, and his ability to deny that it happened and that he was responsible would be next to impossible. Gas kills people, but it doesn't leave as much photographic evidence ( bodies would be there, of course, but the craters wouldn't ).
emt 377 emt 4
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standartenf%C3%BChrer_(Oberst)_Herzog
http://www.imdb.com/media/rm2919598336/tt1278340?ref_=tt_pv_md_4
Simple the President has no stomach for boots on the ground. He is also is planning a punishment attack and nothing more. No it is a good gamble and he has Russia and China to keep the UN out of it. Without the UK to back him up President Obama is now just flopping around trying to offload as much blame and responsibility has he can. AKA it isn't his red line it is the world's.
So we should kill a few hundred or thousand Syrian children in a "punishment attack" in retribution for an attack that killed a few hundred Syrian children. Yeah, that makes a whole lot of sense to me.
Why doesn't the US offer approximately the same amount of space over in, say Utah, along the Great salt Lake. Let them exodus out of that hellish spot next to all the fighting where everyone seems to want to kill them. Then everyone over there can just fight amongst themselves like they have for thousands of years like idiots and we just sit back and watch. Stop the bombs.
Could that little disagreement have anything to do with another little disagreement the Iranians had with the US in 1953?
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Keep in mind that the gas attack happened in a suburb of Damascus.
Damascus is the capital of Syria. Assad's palace is like, what, 10 miles from where the gas attack happened?
Do you REALLY think that he would launch a gas attack when a change in the wind could bring that gas directly to him? That reminds me of the people who think Iran would blow up Israel, not realizing that the land Israel sits on is holy land for Iran, too; the epitome of cutting off your nose to spite your face.
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Damascus is not a remote village full of civilians. It is the capital of Syria.
This would be not unlike Obama gassing a suburb of DC because he's in a disagreement with Republicans.
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The President: "I have directed Secretary of State Kerry to send a strongly worded memo to Mr. Assad. Strongly. Worded."
Maybe it is you who are forgetting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_the_Iraq_War
Feb 15th specifically is regarded by record books as the largest protest ever, in the entire history of the human race. I'm not sure how you can classify the largest protest in the history of the world as "barely anyone".
Never said it did. I am just saying what Obama wants to do and why it will not work.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Reminds me of Python's Life of Brian....
"This calls for immediate....discussion!!!"
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
No. At the time nobody really made a fuss over the Shah taking over the government. It was remarkably free of the organized mayhem seen today when power is transferred from one person or group to another. The US did supply money and promises of profitable future economic relations. The British went a little further by sending a couple of warships in to block Iranian oil exports all in a bid to stop the nationalization of their oil company assets. In general what the Shah did was not technically illegal because Iran's governmental precepts and rules gave the ruling Monarch the power to replace the Prime Minister under certain conditions. In 1979 the Iranian people replaced an anti-Islamic autocrat with a hardcore religious dictator. The liberals and student progressives of the time who initially started the wave of protests to remove the Shah were more interested in holding US embassy staff members as hostages then actually organizing and running their country. While they were playing around with the hostages the Islamic party took control of everything and then proceeded to kill or imprison anyone who offered up a different opinion on how to organize and run a country. Sort of like the protesters in Egypt rallied against Mubarak while the MB stood in the background claiming how they supported the protest but were not going to put up any candidates for Mubarak's replacement and we have all seen how that worked out. To bad the Iranians of 1979 couldn't of engineered a do over revolution after just one year.
http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4127345&cid=44676733
No?
So it's not true that the 1979 revolution in Iran was in part fueled by anti-American animosity for our role in installing and supporting the Shah as ruler of Iran?
I mean, sure, in 1953, they might not have been opposed to what was happening (if they even knew what was happening at the time). But then again, in 2003, the US and most of the world thought Iraq had WMD and planned on using it. Funny how time has a habit of changing how an action is perceived. Just because someone isn't against it at the time it happened doesn't mean that it isn't viewed as a "disagreement" after-the-fact.
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Anti-American animosity is the primary cause for every evil in the world today. It is the easiest position to take in any geo-political argument. Its doesn't require any actual facts and is easy to understand by any idiot who can not understand any thing more complicated.