Article

2013-08-21 Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Hundreds of Syrians killed in alleged chemical attack by Assad's forces

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Posted by g(r)omgoru 2013-08-21 03:05|| || Front Page|| [7 views ] Top

#1 You think I am stupid for posting the obvious. You find my posting the obvious offensive to your tasteful PC standards.

NOBODY is ever going to do SQUAT about Syria. NOBODY has the balls for ANY reason to help the Syrians . NOBODY really cares. Essentially the Syrians are a bunch of nobodys in Booga booga.

The EU will wave its arms and weep. All the EUroweenis are prancers. But they won't DO anything. The United States is run by a Wussy with a mouth and a suit. They sure won't do anything. The whole world goes quack quack quack. And I don't see any money in helping Syria so go say your payers in Las Vegas. Russia is only in it to get some coin for supplying the big nosed Moslem clowns with ammo.

Everybody is going to stand around and watch and pick their noses. The Syrians are not WORTH squat to anybody. Why even act like we care? Admit it, you wouldn't die for Syria would you? All it is is "news".

I am just telling you the truth. There isn't anything nuanced about it. The Syrians and Syria are just another Middle Eastern craphole. You find that untrue? It IS true.
LET them die. They aren't really worth any effort. And besides Obama wouldn't fight for his own mother let alone Syria and neither would YOU.

Posted by Threater Flusoper9823 2013-08-21 07:10|| 2013-08-21 07:10|| Front Page Top

#2 Can't disagree much with Threater this time. I can be even more cynical and callous, and suggest that since both Pencilneck and the opposition suck, and to roughly the same extent, we should quietly help out whichever side is losing at any given time, and pass the popcorn bowl. The bad side to that plan is that most of those being harmed are bystanders not interested in the fight.

Posted by Glenmore 2013-08-21 07:41|| 2013-08-21 07:41|| Front Page Top

#3 Probably as bogus as all the other attacks.

Just a sign that AlQ forces are losing and faking atrocities.

Posted by Bright Pebbles 2013-08-21 08:25|| 2013-08-21 08:25|| Front Page Top

#4 Heard some speculation after Gulf I about the Gulf War Syndrome.
Thinking was it resulted from a marginal exposure to nerve agents.
Problem is, our policy was that use of nerve agents justified everything in response up to nukes.
We didn't nuke anybody, which means our threat is baseless, which can't be acknowledged. So the point was to insist the GWS was the result of something else.
Not a doctor, so the huge variation in the symptoms of GWS doesn't look as if it came from the same cause.
Nevertheless, a threat not acted upon becomes useless and the other side knows it.
Because the other side knows it.

Posted by Richard Aubrey 2013-08-21 08:35|| 2013-08-21 08:35|| Front Page Top

#5 It remains a case of Evil versus Evil: Fascism versus Salafism. You simply can't root for either side.

From a point of view of national interest the best you can do is make sure neither side wins or loses. But it's sure hard on the inhabitants, most of whom are mostly harmless. And it's hard on the original rebels, probably the majority of whom just wanted to dump Pencilneck.

Posted by Fred 2013-08-21 09:53|| 2013-08-21 09:53|| Front Page Top

#6 You find my posting the obvious offensive to your tasteful PC standards

No, I find your posting offensive due to your lousy prose.

I've seen better writing on the instructions that came with my 'made in China' iron.

Posted by Pappy 2013-08-21 10:02|| 2013-08-21 10:02|| Front Page Top

#7 That said, Syria is a no-win. The window of opportunity was 17 to 20 months ago, when the rebel factions could be identified.

What resulted instead was dithering by a White House team that found itself surprised by Libya's after-effects, paralyzed by consequentialism, and wary of political blowback from getting involved, however peripherally, in another Middle East conflict.

There's there's the Klingon mission list that was overloaded with things not-to-do, a DoD wondering how to both do what it's told and pay for it all, and a State Department trying hard to look busy doing the the 'peace talk shuffle' for the Paleos and the Israelis.

Add in the Arab propensity for screwing up, and you have what you have.

Posted by Pappy 2013-08-21 10:16|| 2013-08-21 10:16|| Front Page Top

#8 My vote is to continue doing what we are doing. i.e. stay the hell out of the conflict. As CJCS Dempsey says here the rebels won't support American interests.

Posted by Penguin 2013-08-21 10:52|| 2013-08-21 10:52|| Front Page Top

#9 consequentialism,ve
Ahhh, the hubris of the elites canonized. The consequentialists rule the DoS and has caused many of the current crop of problems.

The consequentialist is much like a global-warmenist. They both think that they can understand all the nuances of a chaotic system with uncountable (and unknowable) variables and create a model that will predict down to the tenth of a degree what the consequences of a given decision will be.

Yet after decades of failed prognostication they continue to believe, again like warmentists, that their predictions were perfect but something unexpected arose.

The hubris is still intact. They never learn. The unexpected is the way of the world!! It's those damn unknown-unknowns again!! Therefore you can only judge virtue on the specific act AND how robust that act is when the unknowns become known.

Anyone who disagrees with these elitests and doesn't bow to their self-defined perfection are attacked as denialists, rascits, RWNJ, ignorant and worse.

We need to understand our own needs and desires in any situation and make our decisions based on what will be both ethical and effective in the short term. The long term is unknowable.

Posted by AlanC 2013-08-21 12:30|| 2013-08-21 12:30|| Front Page Top

#10 Debka on this with an invasion spin of US trained rebels from Jordan
Syrian opposition activists report between 200 and 650 dead and hundreds more wounded in a poison gas strike by Bashar Assads forces on rebel-held areas of eastern Damascus. They claim nerve gas canisters were dropped by Syrian Air Force fighter planes which were seen flying over the area after the attack, the most extensive reported till now. Their claim has not been verified. The regime denied the accusation, saying there was no truth whatsoever in reports that chemical gas was used near Damascus, and maintaining over state television that the Syrian army was conducting a conventional attack on rebel positions south and east of Damascus.
DEBKAfile reports exclusively that Assad is acting to counter the first organized incursion of US-trained Syrian rebels from Jordan into southern Syria. The first group of 250 rebels, trained in special operations tactics by US and Jordanian instructors, entered Syria Saturday, Aug. 17, armed with weapons of Russian provenance supplied by the US and Saudi Arabia.
They are fighting under US and Jordanian commanders based in the Hashemite Kingdom.
A second group of 300 fighters crossed into Syria from Jordan Monday.
They are linking up with local rebel groups chosen from amongst those with no ties with the jihadist Jabhat al-Nusra (Al Qaeda in Syria).
According to our military sources, the rebel units are advancing at speed along the Syrian-Israeli border. They have forced the Syrian brigades posted there into retreating from positions inside a strip of 1-25 kilometers from the border, and captured the villages of Raihaniya, Breiqa and Beer Ajam.
This tactic has moved the Syrian army back from the area opposite the Israeli Golan, and started marking out a buffer zone between Israeli and Syrian forces in the Horan province.
DEBKAs military sources report that additional Syrian rebel forces are standing ready in Jordan to cross into Syria. The incoming forces will then start extending the nascent buffer zone northward towards Deraa (fountainhead of the Syrian uprising in 2011) and east toward Jabal Druze.
This Jordan-based rebel offensive was launched shortly after Gen. Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint US Chiefs of Staff, visited US forces in Jordan and inaugurated the underground US war room near Amman for commanding the operation in Syria.
Syrian ruler Bashar Assad has more than once declared that if the Syrian capital Damascus came under threat, he would resort to chemical warfare and the entire Middle East including Israel would go up in flames. For now, his army is fighting to keep the rebels from taking control of southern Syria.

Posted by 3dc 2013-08-21 15:58|| 2013-08-21 15:58|| Front Page Top

#11 If true, that means clearing an area to be later enforced with a NFZ.

Wonder if the Hesbies will then do deflect/reprisal ops into northern Jordan?

Posted by Pappy 2013-08-21 17:03|| 2013-08-21 17:03|| Front Page Top

#12 As related to Gen. Dempsey's remarks, see also CHINESE DEFENSE > US MISSLE ATTACK ON SYRIA RULED OUT FOR FEAR OF REBEL BACKLASH, i.e. agz US Milstrikes on a Muslim country, symbol of malleged new US interventionism, + collateral casualties among civilians.

* ASSOCIATED PRESS > TOP US GENERAL SAYS [Obama Admin believes] SYRIAN REBELS WON'T BACK US INTERESTS, REJECTS [Full or Limited] MILITARY INTERVENTION.

versus

* TOPIX > [Various] REPORTED SYRIA CHEMICAL ATTACK TESTS US HOPES TO AVOID WAR.

* SAME > [USA Today] SYRIA ATTACK PROMPTS CALL FOR US ACTION.

IMO this is another major "red line" for POTUS Bammer affecting US credibility in the Muslim World + beyond.

THE "LAST ONE"???

Iff Baby Assad did indeed conduct this chemical attack, to which BTW Assad's Govt. is formally or officially denying as we speak, then BABY ASSAD HAS SYMBOLICALLY SLAPPED THE BAMMER + "OBAMA DOCTRINE" HARD ACROSS THE FACE WID HIS ALAWITE GAUNTLET - iff it was the Rebs or Foreign MilTerrs, IT IS CLEAR THE BAMMER = USA HAS NO POWER OR INFLUENCE AMONGST THE ANTI-ASSAD OPPOSITION.

The question now is iff the Bammer will take action this time, or once again ignore + set aside; + iff he does take action to what degree AS THE BAMMER = USA HAVE A HELLUVA LOT OF DIPLOMATIC OR CREDIBILITY DAMAGE TO REPAIR, MOST OF IT DUE TO THE BAMMER'S OWN DOING OR MORE ACCURATELY THE LACK OF SAME.

Posted by JosephMendiola 2013-08-21 23:40|| 2013-08-21 23:40|| Front Page Top

23:50 JosephMendiola
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