Iraq & Syrian Civil Wars - Page 87

On August 29 2013 19:15 MoltkeWarding wrote:


The funny thing is how while much contrarian information appears in the mainstream, they are tucked into such corners of small print and understatement that it might as well be a kind of self-indulgent censorship. In any case, as for the admitted date of the UN request, and other things, here are some things which you can read and draw your own conclusions.

Doubts as to the Obama Administration's justification for citing Syria prevarication as a legitimate casus belli can so reasoned:

Here is a transcript of John Kerry's speech regarding the rationale behind taking military action: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/08/26/read-the-full-transcript-kerrys-speech-on-syria-chemical-weapons-and-the-need-to-respond/



Apart from Kerry's failure to mention the likely possibility that the sniper fire which peppered the investigation team was not the responsibility of the Syrian government (he already knows!), there are several things his statement failed to explain:

There are no plausible means by which the Syrian government could cover up the basic facts of a nerve agent attack, by shelling or other unspecified means: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/08/28/science/not-easy-to-hide-a-chemical-attack-experts-say.html?from=global.home

Furthermore, the alleged four-day "delays" which implicated the Syrian government were equally misleading: http://www.accuracy.org/release/un-admits-it-didnt-ask-for-access-in-syria-until-saturday/, making Kerry's claim both disingenuous and irrelevant.

The final piece of common sense which needs to be put together is to contrast the sense of urgency manifested by the US government about weapons inspections prior to the 24th, and its attitude today, as it attempts to pressure the UN to break off the investigations:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/syria-wants-un-weapons-inspectors-to-stay-longer-move-could-forestall-us-military-strike/2013/08/28/69855348-1008-11e3-85b6-d27422650fd5_story.html

From this it is reasonable to infer that the weapons inspections in Syria, recalling similar circumstances in 2003, had been regarded in Washington as a tool to be exploited for the generation of a casus belli, and nothing more.


Furthermore, while most agree that some kind of chemical attack took place, I am as of yet unaware of any declarations by the American or Allied governments as to the specific types of weapons used. Therefore while an investigation would not establish the fact of chemical warfare, it could plausibly uncover evidence as to whether the type of attack unleashed was plausibly compatible with government use of military grade weaponry. The doubts expressed in the aforementioned article that Sarin or Tabun was the chemical in question has been echoed by several other sources, including Paula Vanninen of the Finnish Institute for the Verification of Chemical Weapons: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2013/08/2013821215836835335.html

The conclusions is that while some alleged victims show partial symptoms of exposure to nerve agent warfare (see: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/22/world/middleeast/syria.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&), others are displaying symptoms of exposure to pulmonary agents. The former head of the the Chem Bio Warfare Project at Stockholm has cast further doubts that some kind of nerve attack was actually used: http://www.the-trench.org/apparently-major-chemical-weapons-attack-near-damascus-reported/, noting the lack of secondary exposure and other necessary symptoms.

On August 29 2013 19:15 MoltkeWarding wrote:
Furthermore, the alleged four-day "delays" which implicated the Syrian government were equally misleading: http://www.accuracy.org/release/un-admits-it-didnt-ask-for-access-in-syria-until-saturday/, making Kerry's claim both disingenuous and irrelevant.

But when Inner City Press asked Ban to respond to widely circulated press releases about a request being made to him, the UN says the actual request has not been received yet.”
He said today: “It’s like everyone is telling Syria to let the police in, but the police didn’t knock on the door. The Syrian government can’t fulfill a request before it’s made. We don’t know what Syria would have said if the request was done on Thursday, but Kerry’s claim that they Syrians delayed is without merit. This episode does not make one question the Syrian ‘regime’s credibility’ as Kerry claims, but rather that of the U.S. and UN.”

On August 29 2013 21:44 MoltkeWarding wrote:


If the Israeli "information" is to be taken at face value, that the missiles were fired from "mountain ranges" west of Damascus, presumably the anti-Lebanon mountains, how could short-ranged rocket artillery like the alleged Falaq-2 strike as far as Ghouta on the eastern reaches of the city? A look at the map says the claim does not make sense.

Falaq-2

...This launches a single 333 mm unguided surface-to-surface rocket to a maximum range of 10,800 m.

On August 29 2013 19:15 MoltkeWarding wrote:
Apart from Kerry's failure to mention the likely possibility that the sniper fire which peppered the investigation team was not the responsibility of the Syrian government (he already knows!), there are several things his statement failed to explain:

There are no plausible means by which the Syrian government could cover up the basic facts of a nerve agent attack, by shelling or other unspecified means: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/08/28/science/not-easy-to-hide-a-chemical-attack-experts-say.html?from=global.home

With Syria, he added, the best evidence for chemical forensics would be blood and tissue samples from victims and survivors that display acute symptoms. Careful analysis of such samples, he said, can reveal “telltale markers.”

Dr. Moore said his own judgment of the Syrian situation, based on viewing pictures of the victims, was that the crippling and killing “clearly looks like the work of a nerve agent.”

But he also said the United Nations inspectors could be confounded if, a week after the attack, the “worried well” presented vague symptoms but no solid evidence of chemical exposure.

“The further you are from an incident,” Dr. Moore noted, “the more difficult the investigation will become.”

Another hurdle, experts note, is that Syria has been shelling the area of the massacre in what Secretary of State John Kerry on Monday described as an attempt at “systematically destroying evidence.”

Furthermore, the alleged four-day "delays" which implicated the Syrian government were equally misleading.

The final piece of common sense which needs to be put together is to contrast the sense of urgency manifested
by the US government about weapons inspections prior to the 24th, and its attitude today, as it attempts to
pressure the UN to break off the investigations:

From this it is reasonable to infer that the weapons inspections in Syria, recalling similar circumstances in
2003, had been regarded in Washington as a tool to be exploited for the generation of a casus belli, and nothing
more.

Furthermore, while most agree that some kind of chemical attack took place, I am as of yet unaware of any
declarations by the American or Allied governments as to the specific types of weapons used. Therefore while an
investigation would not establish the fact of chemical warfare, it could plausibly uncover evidence as to whether
the type of attack unleashed was plausibly compatible with government use of military grade weaponry. The doubts
expressed in the aforementioned article that Sarin or Tabun was the chemical in question has been echoed by
several other sources, including Paula Vanninen of the Finnish Institute for the Verification of Chemical
Weapons: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2013/08/2013821215836835335.html

The conclusions is that while some alleged victims show partial symptoms of exposure to nerve agent warfare
(see: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/22/world/middleeast/syria.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&), others are displaying
symptoms of exposure to pulmonary agents. The former head of the the Chem Bio Warfare Project at Stockholm has
cast further doubts that some kind of nerve attack was actually used: http://www.the-trench.org/apparently-major-
chemical-weapons-attack-near-damascus-reported/, noting the lack of secondary exposure and other necessary
symptoms.

On August 29 2013 22:32 Pandemona wrote:
Might need to change title of this thread soon. The way its going we could have a mini world war on our hands. Russians sending over a warship to the Med waters. UK and US both saying they will act on "Humanitarian grounds" on launching missile strikes and not going through UN channels. And both sides are stating concrete evidence that the Syrian leader did indeed order the chemical attacks on his own people.

UK Parliment are having an emergency meeting in the next 15minutes and a vote on the outcome should be available to the public around 10pm UK time. Not sure what the US stance is right now i no Obama has laid low today but David Cameron is pretty adamant he wants to intervene atleast.

After all this was said yesterday today the Syrian leaders have issues a document to the UK Government official which condoned any attack on them without a proper investigation. Also invited them to Syria to do their own investigation and blamed everything that has happened to their people on Al Qeada and worded it as "our common enemy".

Humanatarian rule

Russian warship heads to the Med sea

There are no plausible means by which the Syrian government could cover up the basic facts of a nerve agent attack, by shelling or other unspecified means: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/08/28/science/not-easy-to-hide-a-chemical-attack-experts-say.html?from=global.home

"They’re very good,” said David H. Moore, a toxicologist at Battelle Memorial Institute, a nonprofit research group in Columbus, Ohio, and a former official at the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense, at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland. “If adequate samples are collected, there’s a high probability that they will find conclusive evidence of exposure to chemical warfare agents".

...Another hurdle, experts note, is that Syria has been shelling the area of the massacre in what Secretary of State John Kerry on Monday described as an attempt at “systematically destroying evidence.”

The clock may be ticking not only on environmental clues in Syria, but biological ones as well.

in addition an un investigator accused the rebels of using chemical weapons last time around (source), kerry however claims that rebel forces do not have access to chemical weapons (source). this seems contradictory.

"According to the testimonies we have gathered, the rebels have used chemical weapons, making use of sarin gas," del Ponte, a former war crimes prosecutor, said in an interview with Swiss radio late on Sunday.
"We still have to deepen our investigation, verify and confirm (the findings) through new witness testimony, but according to what we have established so far, it is at the moment opponents of the regime who are using sarin gas," she added.

The final piece of common sense which needs to be put together is to contrast the sense of urgency manifested by the US government about weapons inspections prior to the 24th, and its attitude today, as it attempts to pressure the UN to break off the investigations...From this it is reasonable to infer that the weapons inspections in Syria, recalling similar circumstances in 2003, had been regarded in Washington as a tool to be exploited for the generation of a casus belli, and nothing more.

On August 29 2013 23:27 nunez wrote:
there's a level of indirection there yes, according to the testimonies. and i'd love to find the complete report of that investigation, but i have yet to find a trace of it.

with one hand you underline the need to be skeptical of the statements of the un investigator who is reporting on these testimonies (implying that the un investigators are not able to be skeptical towards these testimonies themselves), and with the other you blindly accept the evidence that the us claims it has.

so you want to encourage people to be skeptical of the relatively un-biased (pun intended) investigator who is openly discussing what is going on, and you want people to swallow the 'facts' that have been established by us intelligence services behind closed doors on the ten year anniversary of the iraq invasion.

i find that angle of approach difficult to make sense of and i really wonder why you are unable to realize this yourself.

if you think striking the chemical stockpiles and thus preventing them from doing more harm sounds realistic and sensible i am afraid you have another thing coming. i already linked an article about the difficulties of disarming chemical weapons and i suggest you take some notes.

edit: i agree that the testimonies should be put under scrutiny, but i could do without the hypocrisy (i'm sure i'm guilty of it too, feel free to point it out so i can correct myself).

Mozoku wrote: Of course, all of this is contingent on the evidence the US is yet to present. But you attempting to incriminate them before they present reeks of the very bias you're accusing us of. Furthermore, the Arab League has independently found evidence which aligns with the US allegations. Early signs are looking like US probably has a point (though we'll have to wait and see obviously).

With the United States barreling toward a strike on Syria, U.S. officials say they are completely certain that Bashar al-Assad's government is responsible for last week's chemical weapons attack. They just don't know who in the Syrian government is to blame.

On Wednesday, State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf admitted as much. "The commander-in-chief of any military is ultimately responsible for decisions made under their leadership, even if ... he's not the one that pushes the button or said, 'Go,' on this," Harf said. "I don't know what the facts are here. I'm just, broadly speaking, saying that he is responsible for the actions of his regime. I'm not intimately familiar with the command and control structure of the Syrian military. I'm just not. But again, he is responsible ultimately for the decisions that are made."

On Tuesday, The Cable reported that U.S. officials are basing their assessment that the Assad regime bears responsibility for the strike largely on an intercepted phone call between a panicked Ministry of Defense official and a commander of a Syrian chemical weapons unit. But that intelligence does not resolve the question of who in the government ordered the strike or what kind of command and control structures are in place for the use of such weapons. "It's unclear where control lies," one U.S. intelligence official told The Cable Tuesday. "Is there just some sort of general blessing to use these things? Or are there explicit orders for each attack?"

On August 30 2013 02:03 Derez wrote:
The arab league would agree with bombing assad even before the chemical weapons attacks. They're the ones supporting the rebels in the first place. While they're not wild about another western intervention they're willing to tolerate it to get what they want; an iranian ally out of power.

I think Assad should have been bombed a long time ago on humanitarian grounds. Over 100k killed by a dictator that won't give up on ruling a country where half the population doesn't accept it. Whatever the alternative is, it has to be better than this for the long term development of Syria. Bomb him, force peace talks and enforce a peaceful settlement, either heavy federalization or split it up entirely.