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Please guys, stay on topic.
This thread is about the situation in Iraq and Syria. |
On April 17 2018 16:08 Aquanim wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 16:01 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 15:31 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 15:17 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 14:51 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 13:44 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 09:09 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 05:27 raga4ka wrote:On April 16 2018 01:06 Mohdoo wrote:On April 15 2018 21:33 Jockmcplop wrote:
I don't know what's going on here but the official story coming from western governments doesn't seem to make sense at all to me.
1: There was no motive for a chemical attack. The only possible motive for anyone to launch an attack like this, given the current situation in Syria, was to get the US to attack Assad.
2: Why have Western governments decided they had to attack Assad right now, just before the OPCW starts their investigation into the chemical attacks?
3: Timing timing timing. There's been one constant in the last 6 months or so, and that is rising Western hostility to Russia leading to greater and greater tension. The Skripal poisoning, the US election investigations and now this.
I know its very vague but to me this has all felt completely wrong since the reaction to the Skripal poisoning, Western governments as a group are moving like an efficient machine, which is completely out of character, and apparently Russia keeps doing things that play right into their hands.
Things seem to be escalating far beyond where they should, given that none of the things we are accusing Russia and their friends of have any kind of forensic evidence to back them up. Just a pile of easily manipulated circumstantial evidence, and accusations against anyone who questions it.
Its almost as if our governments want this.
I keep seeing people talk about how they couldn't understand Assad's reasoning. Do you normally understand what Assad and other foreign dictators do? Why do you think you have such a firm understanding of the underlying motivations and what causes dictators to do what they do? Couldn't there be other things at play you're not aware of? Overall, the entire idea of "no motivations!" seems tragically arrogant. You don't have any reason to trust your ability to understand all the motivations. You'll never have the full story and you never have the full story for a variety of other things in the world. Why do you feel like you understand this so well? Assad is a dictator, but he isn't mad or stupid enough to do this. Can you justify this position, please? How do you know that? What do you know about Assad? You are presenting this as a given and it is not something we can just all agree on as fact. Your entire argument revolves around Assad being a reasonable, tactful person. It also assumes Assad knows he would be ejected or something for doing something like this. But France/US/UK are operating under the assumption that he did it and he's still mostly fine. The idea that he would never decide to do this is the premise of your entire argument. It is not a proven premise and everything else is built from nothing. This is a witch hunt! The accused shouldn't have to prove without a shadow of doubt that he didn't do something. Him not having any immediate and obvious motivations is good enough to give credibility to him not being guilty, since there is no evidence that contradicts it. You don't know that. You are using a very bad argument and pretending we will just eat it up. You don't know anything about his motivations and it is the crux of your argument. You are essentially saying nothing. No. That was a tangent of my argument. My argument was that you don't judge and punish someone without evidence. You still haven't addressed this. You only grasp for straws on my tangentical points, because it's obvious that my main point is right. Atleast if you believe in western law principles. There's at least one flaw in this line of reasoning: it is based on the assumption that all of the currently available evidence has been provided to the public. If (for example) exposing how they found out the Assad regime was responsible would expose information sources, or make it easier to conceal culpability in the future, US/UK/France/whatever might well choose not to do that. No. That's not a flaw in my reasoning. If it is as you claim, that's the accusors being unwilling to provide evidence. And if that evidence was the only thing that could prove it, then it's their fault. Try using that logic in court! "I swear I have the evidence, I just don't want to show it to you!" I can't believe that you guys are falling so hard for their propaganda. Your argument was: You have not (and at this time probably cannot, even supposing it is true) demonstrate that no such evidence exists. Therefore, this is a flaw in your reasoning. This is not a court of law, so the rest of your post is pretty much irrelevant.
What kind of mental gymnastics is this? If they can't provide evidence, not even to some UN secret counsil or the OPCW, then you surely can't judge someone. You can't just make your own courts. Ppl need to come together and look at the evidence together. That's what you do in a lawful society.
I can't believe how brainwashed you ppl are. How you're willing to throw maybe the most important european value out of the window, just because you despise the other side.
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On April 17 2018 19:09 L1ghtning wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 16:08 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 16:01 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 15:31 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 15:17 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 14:51 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 13:44 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 09:09 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 05:27 raga4ka wrote:On April 16 2018 01:06 Mohdoo wrote:
[quote]
I keep seeing people talk about how they couldn't understand Assad's reasoning. Do you normally understand what Assad and other foreign dictators do? Why do you think you have such a firm understanding of the underlying motivations and what causes dictators to do what they do? Couldn't there be other things at play you're not aware of?
Overall, the entire idea of "no motivations!" seems tragically arrogant. You don't have any reason to trust your ability to understand all the motivations. You'll never have the full story and you never have the full story for a variety of other things in the world. Why do you feel like you understand this so well? Assad is a dictator, but he isn't mad or stupid enough to do this. Can you justify this position, please? How do you know that? What do you know about Assad? You are presenting this as a given and it is not something we can just all agree on as fact. Your entire argument revolves around Assad being a reasonable, tactful person. It also assumes Assad knows he would be ejected or something for doing something like this. But France/US/UK are operating under the assumption that he did it and he's still mostly fine. The idea that he would never decide to do this is the premise of your entire argument. It is not a proven premise and everything else is built from nothing. This is a witch hunt! The accused shouldn't have to prove without a shadow of doubt that he didn't do something. Him not having any immediate and obvious motivations is good enough to give credibility to him not being guilty, since there is no evidence that contradicts it. You don't know that. You are using a very bad argument and pretending we will just eat it up. You don't know anything about his motivations and it is the crux of your argument. You are essentially saying nothing. No. That was a tangent of my argument. My argument was that you don't judge and punish someone without evidence. You still haven't addressed this. You only grasp for straws on my tangentical points, because it's obvious that my main point is right. Atleast if you believe in western law principles. There's at least one flaw in this line of reasoning: it is based on the assumption that all of the currently available evidence has been provided to the public. If (for example) exposing how they found out the Assad regime was responsible would expose information sources, or make it easier to conceal culpability in the future, US/UK/France/whatever might well choose not to do that. No. That's not a flaw in my reasoning. If it is as you claim, that's the accusors being unwilling to provide evidence. And if that evidence was the only thing that could prove it, then it's their fault. Try using that logic in court! "I swear I have the evidence, I just don't want to show it to you!" I can't believe that you guys are falling so hard for their propaganda. Your argument was: you don't judge and punish someone without evidence You have not (and at this time probably cannot, even supposing it is true) demonstrate that no such evidence exists. Therefore, this is a flaw in your reasoning. This is not a court of law, so the rest of your post is pretty much irrelevant. What kind of mental gymnastics is this? If they can't provide evidence, not even to some UN secret counsil or the OPCW, then you surely can't judge someone.
Providing information about espionage directed at the Assad regime to a "council" that includes Russia seems pretty dumb.
You can't just make your own courts. Ppl need to come together and look at the evidence together. That's what you do in a lawful society.
That would be why there was more than one country involved in the action taken, I expect.
I can't believe how brainwashed you ppl are. How you're willing to throw maybe the most important european value out of the window, just because you despise the other side.
You yourself are accusing the US/UK/France of perfidious action with no real evidence, so I'm finding this line of attack profoundly hypocritical.
+ Show Spoiler +To be clear about my position: I'm not claiming that I know with certainty that the Assad regime was behind the chemical attack - it just doesn't seem unlikely based on the known facts, and your assertions otherwise have seemed quite dubious. If it turns out that the regime wasn't behind it then I will be distinctly unimpressed with the "retaliatory" action, but I don't inherently object to the Western powers choosing not to lay all their cards on the table.
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On April 17 2018 16:25 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 15:06 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 14:12 Sermokala wrote:On April 17 2018 13:44 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 09:09 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 05:27 raga4ka wrote:On April 16 2018 01:06 Mohdoo wrote:On April 15 2018 21:33 Jockmcplop wrote:
I don't know what's going on here but the official story coming from western governments doesn't seem to make sense at all to me.
1: There was no motive for a chemical attack. The only possible motive for anyone to launch an attack like this, given the current situation in Syria, was to get the US to attack Assad.
2: Why have Western governments decided they had to attack Assad right now, just before the OPCW starts their investigation into the chemical attacks?
3: Timing timing timing. There's been one constant in the last 6 months or so, and that is rising Western hostility to Russia leading to greater and greater tension. The Skripal poisoning, the US election investigations and now this.
I know its very vague but to me this has all felt completely wrong since the reaction to the Skripal poisoning, Western governments as a group are moving like an efficient machine, which is completely out of character, and apparently Russia keeps doing things that play right into their hands.
Things seem to be escalating far beyond where they should, given that none of the things we are accusing Russia and their friends of have any kind of forensic evidence to back them up. Just a pile of easily manipulated circumstantial evidence, and accusations against anyone who questions it.
Its almost as if our governments want this.
I keep seeing people talk about how they couldn't understand Assad's reasoning. Do you normally understand what Assad and other foreign dictators do? Why do you think you have such a firm understanding of the underlying motivations and what causes dictators to do what they do? Couldn't there be other things at play you're not aware of? Overall, the entire idea of "no motivations!" seems tragically arrogant. You don't have any reason to trust your ability to understand all the motivations. You'll never have the full story and you never have the full story for a variety of other things in the world. Why do you feel like you understand this so well? Assad is a dictator, but he isn't mad or stupid enough to do this. Can you justify this position, please? How do you know that? What do you know about Assad? You are presenting this as a given and it is not something we can just all agree on as fact. Your entire argument revolves around Assad being a reasonable, tactful person. It also assumes Assad knows he would be ejected or something for doing something like this. But France/US/UK are operating under the assumption that he did it and he's still mostly fine. The idea that he would never decide to do this is the premise of your entire argument. It is not a proven premise and everything else is built from nothing. This is a witch hunt! The accused shouldn't have to prove without a shadow of doubt that he didn't do something. Him not having any immediate and obvious motivations is good enough to give credibility to him not being guilty, since there is no evidence that contradicts it. He has immediate and obvious motivations when he is at war within his own country and has been for years now. Even if he didn't have the fact that hes a dictator that has been okay with killing his own people in the past (the whole reason for the war in the first place) to keep power that doesn't give any credibility either way to him being guilty or not guilty. The opposition had much stronger motives for a false flag, than Assad had of doing an actual attack. But it doesn't matter, because the accused shouldn't have to prove without a shadow of doubt that he didn't (or didn't have any motivation to) do something. You're basically saying: But there's a chance that he could have done it. So we should blame him! What kind of logic is that? I believe in western principles of innocent until proven guilty. You need evidence, not weak potential motivations to execute punishment against an accused person. And even if he had strong motivations, it wouldn't change anything. You can't judge that someone is guilty without proving it. I don't think you understand how court works. Every trial is one side saying that there is a chance of it happening. The whole reason we have courts is because we don't really know for sure. Western values is very much judging based on a persons history,their motive and opportunity to do a crime. Assad has all of these in spades. The opposition can be said to.have motivation for a false flag but they dont have a history of this, are extremely fractured, and have far more to risk getting caught then to gain from the attack. The likelihood of it being a false flag compared to it being just assad killing his own people again isnt propaganda. Sideing with dictators and russia isn't being brave.
There's a difference between having a trial and one actor being judge, jury and executioner.
And Assad has not been proven of using chemical attacks. Have you even read the previous reports? You just listen and believe to the mainstream media propaganda.
There are however many examples of proven or obvious staged and rehearsed staged videos and photos.
But you can't just assign guilt based on history. We can discuss who most likely did it, and examine evidence for and against each scenario, but to assign guilt you need conclusive evidence.
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On April 17 2018 19:31 Aquanim wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 19:09 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 16:08 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 16:01 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 15:31 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 15:17 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 14:51 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 13:44 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 09:09 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 05:27 raga4ka wrote:
[quote]
Assad is a dictator, but he isn't mad or stupid enough to do this. Can you justify this position, please? How do you know that? What do you know about Assad? You are presenting this as a given and it is not something we can just all agree on as fact. Your entire argument revolves around Assad being a reasonable, tactful person. It also assumes Assad knows he would be ejected or something for doing something like this. But France/US/UK are operating under the assumption that he did it and he's still mostly fine. The idea that he would never decide to do this is the premise of your entire argument. It is not a proven premise and everything else is built from nothing. This is a witch hunt! The accused shouldn't have to prove without a shadow of doubt that he didn't do something. Him not having any immediate and obvious motivations is good enough to give credibility to him not being guilty, since there is no evidence that contradicts it. You don't know that. You are using a very bad argument and pretending we will just eat it up. You don't know anything about his motivations and it is the crux of your argument. You are essentially saying nothing. No. That was a tangent of my argument. My argument was that you don't judge and punish someone without evidence. You still haven't addressed this. You only grasp for straws on my tangentical points, because it's obvious that my main point is right. Atleast if you believe in western law principles. There's at least one flaw in this line of reasoning: it is based on the assumption that all of the currently available evidence has been provided to the public. If (for example) exposing how they found out the Assad regime was responsible would expose information sources, or make it easier to conceal culpability in the future, US/UK/France/whatever might well choose not to do that. No. That's not a flaw in my reasoning. If it is as you claim, that's the accusors being unwilling to provide evidence. And if that evidence was the only thing that could prove it, then it's their fault. Try using that logic in court! "I swear I have the evidence, I just don't want to show it to you!" I can't believe that you guys are falling so hard for their propaganda. Your argument was: you don't judge and punish someone without evidence You have not (and at this time probably cannot, even supposing it is true) demonstrate that no such evidence exists. Therefore, this is a flaw in your reasoning. This is not a court of law, so the rest of your post is pretty much irrelevant. What kind of mental gymnastics is this? If they can't provide evidence, not even to some UN secret counsil or the OPCW, then you surely can't judge someone. Providing information about espionage directed at the Assad regime to a "council" that includes Russia seems pretty dumb. Show nested quote +You can't just make your own courts. Ppl need to come together and look at the evidence together. That's what you do in a lawful society. That would be why there was more than one country involved in the action taken, I expect. Show nested quote +I can't believe how brainwashed you ppl are. How you're willing to throw maybe the most important european value out of the window, just because you despise the other side. You yourself are accusing the US/UK/France of perfidious action with no real evidence, so I'm finding this line of attack profoundly hypocritical. + Show Spoiler +To be clear about my position: I'm not claiming that I know with certainty that the Assad regime was behind the chemical attack - it just doesn't seem unlikely based on the known facts, and your assertions otherwise have seemed quite dubious. If it turns out that the regime wasn't behind it then I will be distinctly unimpressed with the "retaliatory" action, but I don't inherently object to the Western powers choosing not to lay all their cards on the table.
So if Lavrov says that it was a false flag involving a british agent, you would accept that story as the truth if he claims to have proof?
Oh wait, wrong team.
You bet that I'm accusing the US and their goons for acting without any real evidence. As long as they haven't provided any evidence, they have no evidence. And France has provided "evidence" btw. I don't know if that is all they have, but that paper was pretty pathetic as evidence.
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On April 17 2018 19:50 L1ghtning wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 16:25 Sermokala wrote:On April 17 2018 15:06 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 14:12 Sermokala wrote:On April 17 2018 13:44 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 09:09 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 05:27 raga4ka wrote:On April 16 2018 01:06 Mohdoo wrote:On April 15 2018 21:33 Jockmcplop wrote:
I don't know what's going on here but the official story coming from western governments doesn't seem to make sense at all to me.
1: There was no motive for a chemical attack. The only possible motive for anyone to launch an attack like this, given the current situation in Syria, was to get the US to attack Assad.
2: Why have Western governments decided they had to attack Assad right now, just before the OPCW starts their investigation into the chemical attacks?
3: Timing timing timing. There's been one constant in the last 6 months or so, and that is rising Western hostility to Russia leading to greater and greater tension. The Skripal poisoning, the US election investigations and now this.
I know its very vague but to me this has all felt completely wrong since the reaction to the Skripal poisoning, Western governments as a group are moving like an efficient machine, which is completely out of character, and apparently Russia keeps doing things that play right into their hands.
Things seem to be escalating far beyond where they should, given that none of the things we are accusing Russia and their friends of have any kind of forensic evidence to back them up. Just a pile of easily manipulated circumstantial evidence, and accusations against anyone who questions it.
Its almost as if our governments want this.
I keep seeing people talk about how they couldn't understand Assad's reasoning. Do you normally understand what Assad and other foreign dictators do? Why do you think you have such a firm understanding of the underlying motivations and what causes dictators to do what they do? Couldn't there be other things at play you're not aware of? Overall, the entire idea of "no motivations!" seems tragically arrogant. You don't have any reason to trust your ability to understand all the motivations. You'll never have the full story and you never have the full story for a variety of other things in the world. Why do you feel like you understand this so well? Assad is a dictator, but he isn't mad or stupid enough to do this. Can you justify this position, please? How do you know that? What do you know about Assad? You are presenting this as a given and it is not something we can just all agree on as fact. Your entire argument revolves around Assad being a reasonable, tactful person. It also assumes Assad knows he would be ejected or something for doing something like this. But France/US/UK are operating under the assumption that he did it and he's still mostly fine. The idea that he would never decide to do this is the premise of your entire argument. It is not a proven premise and everything else is built from nothing. This is a witch hunt! The accused shouldn't have to prove without a shadow of doubt that he didn't do something. Him not having any immediate and obvious motivations is good enough to give credibility to him not being guilty, since there is no evidence that contradicts it. He has immediate and obvious motivations when he is at war within his own country and has been for years now. Even if he didn't have the fact that hes a dictator that has been okay with killing his own people in the past (the whole reason for the war in the first place) to keep power that doesn't give any credibility either way to him being guilty or not guilty. The opposition had much stronger motives for a false flag, than Assad had of doing an actual attack. But it doesn't matter, because the accused shouldn't have to prove without a shadow of doubt that he didn't (or didn't have any motivation to) do something. You're basically saying: But there's a chance that he could have done it. So we should blame him! What kind of logic is that? I believe in western principles of innocent until proven guilty. You need evidence, not weak potential motivations to execute punishment against an accused person. And even if he had strong motivations, it wouldn't change anything. You can't judge that someone is guilty without proving it. I don't think you understand how court works. Every trial is one side saying that there is a chance of it happening. The whole reason we have courts is because we don't really know for sure. Western values is very much judging based on a persons history,their motive and opportunity to do a crime. Assad has all of these in spades. The opposition can be said to.have motivation for a false flag but they dont have a history of this, are extremely fractured, and have far more to risk getting caught then to gain from the attack. The likelihood of it being a false flag compared to it being just assad killing his own people again isnt propaganda. Sideing with dictators and russia isn't being brave. There's a difference between having a trial and one actor being judge, jury and executioner. And Assad has not been proven of using chemical attacks. Have you even read the previous reports? You just listen and believe to the mainstream media propaganda. There are however many examples of proven or obvious staged and rehearsed staged videos and photos. But you can't just assign guilt based on history. We can discuss who most likely did it, and examine evidence for and against each scenario, but to assign guilt you need conclusive evidence.
You seem to be looking at this as a "punishment" for Assad's crimes in some kind of inter-country justice system. That is completely the wrong way of looking at it. That's not what the airstrikes were about. If evidence is collected and it is found that Assad was indeed behind the chemical weapons attacks, AND somebody can manage to get their hands on him and bring him to The Hague, THEN he will be put on trial for war crimes (and crimes against humanity, and who knows what other charges), given a chance to defend himself with the best lawyers his money can buy, and probably end up rotting in jail for the rest of his life. However, that is NOT what this is.
The way you should see this is 3 countries believing Assad did something they consider to be definitely not okay, and devising a retaliatory action to show Assad that they thoroughly disapprove, warn him from persisting on this course of action, and threatening with further action if he does persist. Furthermore, the airstrikes were targeted to furthermore impair his ability to perform this action in the future. In other words, this isn't the criminal before the court part of the dance. This is the "HALT OR I'LL SHOOT" part of the dance. Now you can disagree that the US, UK and France have the right to play cop here. You can even protest that they are shooting at the victim, not the perpetrator of the crime, or at the very least, are just shooting wildly without knowing what the fuck is going on (although anybody trying to protest Assad's innocence has definitely not being paying attention). But however you see it, you shouldn't treat this as a court case, but a better analogy would be an active investigation with a dangerous suspect on the loose.
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On April 17 2018 20:04 L1ghtning wrote:
So if Lavrov says that it was a false flag involving a british agent, you would accept that story as the truth if he claims to have proof?
Oh wait, wrong team.
I wouldn't rule it out as impossible but it seems very unlikely for a number of reasons. The Assad regime using chemical weapons doesn't seem particularly unlikely.
You bet that I'm accusing the US and their goons for acting without any real evidence. As long as they haven't provided any evidence, they have no evidence. And France has provided "evidence" btw. I don't know if that is all they have, but that paper was pretty pathetic as evidence.
So you are insisting that the US and its allies must either give up information which might compromise their ability to prevent chemical weapon attacks in the future, or tolerate actual chemical weapon attacks in the present? That seems pretty absurd.
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On April 17 2018 19:09 L1ghtning wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 16:08 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 16:01 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 15:31 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 15:17 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 14:51 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 13:44 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 09:09 Mohdoo wrote:On April 17 2018 05:27 raga4ka wrote:On April 16 2018 01:06 Mohdoo wrote:
[quote]
I keep seeing people talk about how they couldn't understand Assad's reasoning. Do you normally understand what Assad and other foreign dictators do? Why do you think you have such a firm understanding of the underlying motivations and what causes dictators to do what they do? Couldn't there be other things at play you're not aware of?
Overall, the entire idea of "no motivations!" seems tragically arrogant. You don't have any reason to trust your ability to understand all the motivations. You'll never have the full story and you never have the full story for a variety of other things in the world. Why do you feel like you understand this so well? Assad is a dictator, but he isn't mad or stupid enough to do this. Can you justify this position, please? How do you know that? What do you know about Assad? You are presenting this as a given and it is not something we can just all agree on as fact. Your entire argument revolves around Assad being a reasonable, tactful person. It also assumes Assad knows he would be ejected or something for doing something like this. But France/US/UK are operating under the assumption that he did it and he's still mostly fine. The idea that he would never decide to do this is the premise of your entire argument. It is not a proven premise and everything else is built from nothing. This is a witch hunt! The accused shouldn't have to prove without a shadow of doubt that he didn't do something. Him not having any immediate and obvious motivations is good enough to give credibility to him not being guilty, since there is no evidence that contradicts it. You don't know that. You are using a very bad argument and pretending we will just eat it up. You don't know anything about his motivations and it is the crux of your argument. You are essentially saying nothing. No. That was a tangent of my argument. My argument was that you don't judge and punish someone without evidence. You still haven't addressed this. You only grasp for straws on my tangentical points, because it's obvious that my main point is right. Atleast if you believe in western law principles. There's at least one flaw in this line of reasoning: it is based on the assumption that all of the currently available evidence has been provided to the public. If (for example) exposing how they found out the Assad regime was responsible would expose information sources, or make it easier to conceal culpability in the future, US/UK/France/whatever might well choose not to do that. No. That's not a flaw in my reasoning. If it is as you claim, that's the accusors being unwilling to provide evidence. And if that evidence was the only thing that could prove it, then it's their fault. Try using that logic in court! "I swear I have the evidence, I just don't want to show it to you!" I can't believe that you guys are falling so hard for their propaganda. Your argument was: you don't judge and punish someone without evidence You have not (and at this time probably cannot, even supposing it is true) demonstrate that no such evidence exists. Therefore, this is a flaw in your reasoning. This is not a court of law, so the rest of your post is pretty much irrelevant. What kind of mental gymnastics is this? If they can't provide evidence, not even to some UN secret counsil or the OPCW, then you surely can't judge someone. You can't just make your own courts. Ppl need to come together and look at the evidence together. That's what you do in a lawful society. I can't believe how brainwashed you ppl are. How you're willing to throw maybe the most important european value out of the window, just because you despise the other side.
Governments don't need your specific consent to do stuff. If they want to be lawful, they have to wait for an UN resolution, which they did not. So you can call there reaction to the attack unlawful and you would be right. However, there is no independent court that decides which organisation attacked civilians with chlorine gas and therefore enables countries to act on that. The body responsible for control of chemical weapons can make an investigation based on which nations decide what to do. The last time they acted, Russia straight out denied their findings in the Skripal case valid and claimed the opposite had happened. Right now the OPCW wanted to investigate the area of the attack and was not allowed to enter it. By Syria. I wonder why. But i guess that was fake news as russia, the only source of unbiased news stories, called it fake news.
If three independent western governments call, based on surveillance, military intelligence and available footage, the possible attacker with a high amount of certainty, this is all the evidence you will ever get. What exactly do you think qualifies as evidence? A speech of Assad? "Muahahahahahaha, i did it!" The body that controls independent nations is not built to decide, only one side needs to veto and there is no decision. The UN is not a courtroom and western nations foreign decisions are only really limited by the consent of their public. I don't see a majority being as skeptical about the french statement, so i guess the maority approves of the deduction of guilt presented as evidence.
And you characteristics of Assad as a victim of terrorists that had to kill millions of his people because the west wanted to overthrow him is really frustrating. There is no question, that western support of the rebels has caused a prolonging of the fight and increased the deathtoll by a factor. This does not absolve the guy that started it. He is responsible for this. We handled it poorly, again, but it's tough to just sit there and do nothing. It's the typical dilemma of military interventions, do you stop a situation with the possibility of escalating consequences (Balkans, although not a great example) or do you accept that it happens and live with doing nothing (basically every conflict in Africa).
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On April 17 2018 20:08 Aquanim wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 20:04 L1ghtning wrote:
So if Lavrov says that it was a false flag involving a british agent, you would accept that story as the truth if he claims to have proof?
Oh wait, wrong team. I wouldn't rule it out as impossible but it seems very unlikely for a number of reasons. The Assad regime using chemical weapons doesn't seem particularly unlikely. Show nested quote +You bet that I'm accusing the US and their goons for acting without any real evidence. As long as they haven't provided any evidence, they have no evidence. And France has provided "evidence" btw. I don't know if that is all they have, but that paper was pretty pathetic as evidence. So you are insisting that the US and its allies must either give up information which might compromise their ability to prevent chemical weapon attacks in the future, or tolerate actual chemical weapon attacks in the present? That seems pretty absurd.
You're granting USA the privilege to attack, maybe even invade any country in the world, on any claim, and we in the rest of the world just has to listen and believe to them when they say that they have evidence of whatever wrongdoing, despite them refusing to share it. I'm speechless that there are ppl out there with views like this.
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On April 17 2018 20:08 Aquanim wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 20:04 L1ghtning wrote:
So if Lavrov says that it was a false flag involving a british agent, you would accept that story as the truth if he claims to have proof?
Oh wait, wrong team. I wouldn't rule it out as impossible but it seems very unlikely for a number of reasons. The Assad regime using chemical weapons doesn't seem particularly unlikely. Show nested quote +You bet that I'm accusing the US and their goons for acting without any real evidence. As long as they haven't provided any evidence, they have no evidence. And France has provided "evidence" btw. I don't know if that is all they have, but that paper was pretty pathetic as evidence. So you are insisting that the US and its allies must either give up information which might compromise their ability to prevent chemical weapon attacks in the future, or tolerate actual chemical weapon attacks in the present? That seems pretty absurd.
And he also hasn’t set for a standard of proof that he would accept. He is demanding “evidence” that he is free to disregard if he doesn’t like the results.
Not to say that anyone has conclusive evidence from the war zone. We don’t have that at this time. But the argument being presented is that Assad is not responsible for the chemical attack. The evidence being presented to support that is at minimum as suspect as the findings out of France.
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My grievance with the violation of international war varies greatly depending on the circumstances. So does yours, you just reserve your grievance for other nations, not sure why. When the Balkan was on fire, Nato acted, first half assed and then seriously. Compared to Syria or any serious conflict in Africa, the atrocities there were on a pretty small scale. We just cared more because it was closer to us and the people being hurt looked more western.
If the States decide they wanna throw a few missiles at buildings that belong to a masskilling dictator in the middle east, i don't really care. Call me when they start to violate a states right that does not deserve it and can actually retaliate of if they want to do more then a publicity stunt. Also, when they are not probably right about their allegations of the other party using chemical weapons against the public.
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On April 17 2018 21:29 L1ghtning wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 20:08 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 20:04 L1ghtning wrote:
So if Lavrov says that it was a false flag involving a british agent, you would accept that story as the truth if he claims to have proof?
Oh wait, wrong team. I wouldn't rule it out as impossible but it seems very unlikely for a number of reasons. The Assad regime using chemical weapons doesn't seem particularly unlikely. You bet that I'm accusing the US and their goons for acting without any real evidence. As long as they haven't provided any evidence, they have no evidence. And France has provided "evidence" btw. I don't know if that is all they have, but that paper was pretty pathetic as evidence. So you are insisting that the US and its allies must either give up information which might compromise their ability to prevent chemical weapon attacks in the future, or tolerate actual chemical weapon attacks in the present? That seems pretty absurd. You're granting USA the privilege to attack, maybe even invade any country in the world, on any claim, and we in the rest of the world just has to listen and believe to them when they say that they have evidence of whatever wrongdoing, despite them refusing to share it. I'm speechless that there are ppl out there with views like this.
Not at all. I have confidence that if the US, UK and France were wrong or deliberately misleading in this instance, it will come out and there will be consequences.
Until that time, I put more weight on their claims than those of Russia and Assad.
The US in particular may not have as good a track record in similar situations as I would like, but in terms of veracity they still beat the pants off some tin-pot dictator.
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On April 17 2018 22:29 Aquanim wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 21:29 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 20:08 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 20:04 L1ghtning wrote:
So if Lavrov says that it was a false flag involving a british agent, you would accept that story as the truth if he claims to have proof?
Oh wait, wrong team. I wouldn't rule it out as impossible but it seems very unlikely for a number of reasons. The Assad regime using chemical weapons doesn't seem particularly unlikely. You bet that I'm accusing the US and their goons for acting without any real evidence. As long as they haven't provided any evidence, they have no evidence. And France has provided "evidence" btw. I don't know if that is all they have, but that paper was pretty pathetic as evidence. So you are insisting that the US and its allies must either give up information which might compromise their ability to prevent chemical weapon attacks in the future, or tolerate actual chemical weapon attacks in the present? That seems pretty absurd. You're granting USA the privilege to attack, maybe even invade any country in the world, on any claim, and we in the rest of the world just has to listen and believe to them when they say that they have evidence of whatever wrongdoing, despite them refusing to share it. I'm speechless that there are ppl out there with views like this. Not at all. I have confidence that if the US, UK and France were wrong or deliberately misleading in this instance, it will come out and there will be consequences. Until that time, I put more weight on their claims than those of Russia and Assad. The US in particular may not have as good a track record in similar situations as I would like, but in terms of veracity they still beat the pants off some tin-pot dictator.
Honestly it shouldnt be that difficult - and certainly not as uncommon as it is - for people to just admit that we know fuck all about Syria.
We are clearly being lied to on an industrial scale by every single government involved in Syria. The Western media tends to just parrot whatever the government tells them, the Russians are far, far worse.
I would never believe Russia but that doesn't mean I trust my own media or government at all when it comes to issues in the middle east.
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On April 18 2018 01:07 Jockmcplop wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2018 22:29 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 21:29 L1ghtning wrote:On April 17 2018 20:08 Aquanim wrote:On April 17 2018 20:04 L1ghtning wrote:
So if Lavrov says that it was a false flag involving a british agent, you would accept that story as the truth if he claims to have proof?
Oh wait, wrong team. I wouldn't rule it out as impossible but it seems very unlikely for a number of reasons. The Assad regime using chemical weapons doesn't seem particularly unlikely. You bet that I'm accusing the US and their goons for acting without any real evidence. As long as they haven't provided any evidence, they have no evidence. And France has provided "evidence" btw. I don't know if that is all they have, but that paper was pretty pathetic as evidence. So you are insisting that the US and its allies must either give up information which might compromise their ability to prevent chemical weapon attacks in the future, or tolerate actual chemical weapon attacks in the present? That seems pretty absurd. You're granting USA the privilege to attack, maybe even invade any country in the world, on any claim, and we in the rest of the world just has to listen and believe to them when they say that they have evidence of whatever wrongdoing, despite them refusing to share it. I'm speechless that there are ppl out there with views like this. Not at all. I have confidence that if the US, UK and France were wrong or deliberately misleading in this instance, it will come out and there will be consequences. Until that time, I put more weight on their claims than those of Russia and Assad. The US in particular may not have as good a track record in similar situations as I would like, but in terms of veracity they still beat the pants off some tin-pot dictator. Honestly it shouldnt be that difficult - and certainly not as uncommon as it is - for people to just admit that we know fuck all about Syria. We are clearly being lied to on an industrial scale by every single government involved in Syria. The Western media tends to just parrot whatever the government tells them, the Russians are far, far worse. I would never believe Russia but that doesn't mean I trust my own media or government at all when it comes to issues in the middle east.
I’ve had this feeling that the internet has given us all this false sense of “worldly” knowledge and expertise about different regions, which is only exacerbated by the low quality reporting of current broadcast news. I don’t really know what is going on the side of my own state, but for some reason I feel justified in expressing an “informed opinion” on Syria. Even though it is a god damn warzone and the people in that country likely have a hard time knowing exactly what is going on. We have a hard time admitting we don’t know what is going on and we might never really know with certainty.
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On April 17 2018 22:00 Broetchenholer wrote:
If the States decide they wanna throw a few missiles at buildings that belong to a masskilling dictator in the middle east, i don't really care. Call me when they start to violate a states right that does not deserve it and can actually retaliate of if they want to do more then a publicity stunt. Also, when they are not probably right about their allegations of the other party using chemical weapons against the public.
But isn't that kind of disturbing that certain countries can just launch missile strikes into other countries as a punitive action, not even being at war? It's only a concern when the country being bombed has the capability to retaliate? I just can't imagine any scenario where any middle eastern country could launch missiles into Europe or North America without it being a full declaration of war.
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Do you want to be the one to start that war?
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On April 18 2018 03:04 LegalLord wrote:
Do you want to be the one to start that war?
Why is it not called war to launch two major missile attacks into a country within a year? I'm not trying to argue for more war, but I think it's dishonest how we (the US in particular) frame our numerous "interventions" all around the world. I'm sick that we are selling weapons to everyone, attempting regime changes all over the place, and yet pose as the moral police. Maybe i'm just ranting off topic..
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The concept of declaring war and suing for peace are not concepts that are embraced worldwide or applied in all conflicts. I am not sure how widely accepted it is in Middle Eastern governments. A declaration of war happens after some sort of provocative action that requires the injured nation to fully mobilize its military. If Syria wants war with the US, it could just declare war. If the US wanted war with Syria, we likely wouldn’t give them several days notice of an incoming airstrike.
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Isn't launching missiles into your country a "provocative action"? Of course they can't retaliate against our $500 billion a year military; it just seems like we are operating under the rule of "might makes right", which is our very grievance we have against dictators like Assad. We demand instant responsibility and punishment for his killing of dozens of civilians, yet take no responsibility for the incalculable amounts of death and suffering we've caused around the world with arms sales and meddling in other countries governments. If we cared so much about the suffering of Syrian civilians, we ought to accept refugees and try to end the civil war, not prolong it. I think Lightning has a valid point that if we're going to judge the likelihood of Assad using chemical weapons based upon his past actions, then we should also be critical of the claims of the opposing side.
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I don’t think my statement about declaring war implied that we shouldn’t be critical of the US’s action, past or present. Only that if Syria wanted to declare war on the US, they could do it.
Now if you want to say that there isn’t a reasonable argument that the US president was authorized to take this action under US law, that is a better argument.
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Indeed. The reason the US can bomb countries without starting a war with them is that those countries do not want a war with the US. A full war starts once at least one of the two countries wants it.
The US is so militarily dominant that a lot of countries accept being bombed by the US without trying to retaliate because they have the reasonable assumption that fighting back will lead to disaster for them. And so it is helpful for both them and the US to call the act of the US bombing countries "not a war". There are only a few countries against whom the US can not do this stuff. No one thinks that this is not a shitty situation to be in, and the US reputation of acting reasonably and to the good of humankind is quickly deteriorating due to this.
The question of whether or not it is ethically acceptable to bomb other countries is completely different from that one.
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EPT
