Syrian civil war

[Malcador]

 

Tiresome. Anyway, apparently people are shooting at the UN inspectors, heh.

 

This shouldn't be a surprise Malc, the Assad regime has been trying everything in its power to stop the UN inspectors getting the evidence that they used Chemical weapons.

 

And you know it'd be them and not the various 'rebels' how ?

[BruceVC]

 

 

Tiresome. Anyway, apparently people are shooting at the UN inspectors, heh.

 

This shouldn't be a surprise Malc, the Assad regime has been trying everything in its power to stop the UN inspectors getting the evidence that they used Chemical weapons.

 

And you know it'd be them and not the various 'rebels' how ?

 

Malc, ,Malc , Malc ....when are you just going to accept I am never wrong when it comes to political debates?

 

The reason that its almost 100 % likely that its the Assad regime behind the Chemical attacks is how they have been behaving since the attack last week Wednesday. Firstly they have been bombing the sites of the attacks for the last few days. Why would you do this unless you wanted to hide evidence. Secondly they have been restricting the UN inspectors from going to the sites. Today they finally had to allow access.

 

If you think of the consequences of either side using any kind of WMD surly if the Assad forces were innocent they would have escorted the UN inspectors there last week immediately after the attack to prove they had nothing to do with it. This would have gained them credibility in there campaign against the rebels who they claim are terrorists. There guilt is obvious by there delaying tactics

[Malcador]

Given their opposition's composition, I don't think the gas and then attempted murder of UN officials is out of the question (didn't they kidnap some UN peacekeepers a while back as well?). Their behaviour afterward does look fishy, denying the inspectors access for some time, the shelling could make sense as there is a war going on.

[HoonDing]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-23kmhc3P8U

[BruceVC]

Given their opposition's composition, I don't think the gas and then attempted murder of UN officials is out of the question (didn't they kidnap some UN peacekeepers a while back as well?). Their behaviour afterward does look fishy, denying the inspectors access for some time, the shelling could make sense as there is a war going on.

 

 But why would they need to bomb areas that had already been decimated by the Chemical attack? Its not like there are rebels there anymore fighting back. Trust me on this one the Assad regime is behind the usage of Chemical weapons . The question I want to know is " what is Canada planning to do or say about it" ?

[BruceVC]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-23kmhc3P8U

 

No

 

That's unfair, outdated and not relevant to how the USA implements foreign policy decisions or military intervention anymore

[HoonDing]

^You wish.

[Malcador]

That's unfair, outdated and not relevant to how the USA implements foreign policy decisions or military intervention anymore

It is, the BS is more refined than that.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-23kmhc3P8U

 

 

No

 

That's unfair, outdated and not relevant to how the USA implements foreign policy decisions or military intervention anymore

Actually it is pretty damn relevant and true. Working against the interests of nation means you are against them, and those states that are should not be treated well by the nation they are working against. Certain countries love slandering the US over almost anything, but can't wait to stick their hands out for money and cry if the US doesn't save their ass fast enough.

[Oerwinde]

 

 

Given their opposition's composition, I don't think the gas and then attempted murder of UN officials is out of the question (didn't they kidnap some UN peacekeepers a while back as well?). Their behaviour afterward does look fishy, denying the inspectors access for some time, the shelling could make sense as there is a war going on.

But why would they need to bomb areas that had already been decimated by the Chemical attack? Its not like there are rebels there anymore fighting back. Trust me on this one the Assad regime is behind the usage of Chemical weapons . The question I want to know is " what is Canada planning to do or say about it" ?

I hope Harper makes one good decision in his mandate and stays the hell out of it. The choice is between islamic extremists or secular dictatorship, I hope they kill each other off.

[Malcador]

But why would they need to bomb areas that had already been decimated by the Chemical attack? Its not like there are rebels there anymore fighting back. Trust me on this one the Assad regime is behind the usage of Chemical weapons . The question I want to know is " what is Canada planning to do or say about it" ?

Well gas can drift and disperse so rebels could move back in. But who knows really. Just really convenient timing, the UN observers arrive and ta-da gas attack. As for Canada, heh, ask what the US will be doing. Canadian troops can't go anywhere without the US (I mean that, Canada has no real strategic lift capability )

[rjshae]

Here we go again. The military power at the hands of the U.S. President seems just too tempting for any politician not to use.

 

I really hope we're ready for the cyber counter-attack (or first strike) by Iran and/or Syria, but I suspect we're not.

Edited August 26, 2013 by rjshae

[Gfted1]

I really hope we're ready for the cyber counter-attack (or first strike) by Iran and/or Syria, but I suspect we're not.

What? Do you think they are secretly sitting on the capability but are only waiting until we bomb Assad to spring into action and strike us down?

[rjshae]

 

I really hope we're ready for the cyber counter-attack (or first strike) by Iran and/or Syria, but I suspect we're not.

What? Do you think they are secretly sitting on the capability but are only waiting until we bomb Assad to spring into action and strike us down?

 

It's possible, if not likely, that Iran has already been probing for that possibility--after all, they do share capabilities with North Korea (which did recently perform a successful cyberattack against South Korea). An asymmetrical response seems the most likely form of counterattack, and a cyber attack requires only a modest investment. I'm just saying it's a possibility, so best to be on the guard.

Edited August 26, 2013 by rjshae

[BruceVC]

Here we go again. The military power at the hands of the U.S. President seems just too tempting for any politician not to use.

 

I really hope we're ready for the cyber counter-attack (or first strike) by Iran and/or Syria, but I suspect we're not.

 

No need to worry about any serious cyber-attacks on the USA. You have Prism and other programs to defend you

[Enoch]

The U.S. has shown that it doesn't especially care about a power vacuum in Syria.  If they did, they'd have acted long before now.  (See: Libya, and the quiet support for military leadership in Egypt.)  But there is a strong international norm against the use of nerve agents, and the POTUS has explicitly warned Assad & co. that their use would have Consequences.  

 

It's looking like a Kosovo-style air-based intervention is the likely next step.  Given the lack of a prominent Syrian faction that America/NATO/whoever can actually back, a purely aerial engagement targeting Assad's military command and control is probably the most practical and proportionate step to take.

 

The question is how far to take it.  I.e., what goal can be accomplished that would signal the end of the western military involvment?  A simple smackdown to deter future use of chemical weapons is unlikely to work, because finding all that stuff would be really hard and because the Assad regime is unlikely to be effectively deterred from anything, given the existential threat it faces.  You're not going to accomplish much of any worth unless you weaken it to the point of toppling.  And what then? 

 

There are no particularly good outcomes here, for the West or (especially) for the Syrians.  But an outcome wherein nobody backs up the broad taboo against the use of WoMD that has developed over the last 60 years is probably one of the worse ones.

[HoonDing]

Kerry's going to pull a Colin Powell.

[Zoraptor]

The reason that its almost 100 % likely that its the Assad regime behind the Chemical attacks is how they have been behaving since the attack last week Wednesday. Firstly they have been bombing the sites of the attacks for the last few days. Why would you do this unless you wanted to hide evidence. Secondly they have been restricting the UN inspectors from going to the sites. Today they finally had to allow access.

 

If you think of the consequences of either side using any kind of WMD surly if the Assad forces were innocent they would have escorted the UN inspectors there last week immediately after the attack to prove they had nothing to do with it. This would have gained them credibility in there campaign against the rebels who they claim are terrorists. There guilt is obvious by there delaying tactics

 

Bro, that's all been dealt with.

 

Assad has been shelling that area of Damascus on and off for the past year, and attacking pretty much consistently for the last month. There's nothing special about it being shelled, that's what happens to rebel held areas- why does the US bomb stuff? Must be to cover up [something], can't be because they think there enemies are there. He has no reason to use chemical weapons, when he's winning, when there are weapons inspectors in the country (who were only staying a matter of days, prior to this), when he doesn't want western intervention since that's the only way the rebels can win, when he supposedly used them a few miles away from the inspectors rather than Aleppo, Homs, Deraa or somewhere else hundred of miles away and when there are absolutely essential and crucial government held areas nearby for the gas to drift into on a wind change or get effected if you have a misfire or a rocket goes haywire. It makes no sense, if you were going to launch a gas attack, when you're already winning, you launch it when there aren't inspectors nearby or even in the country, in isolated areas where it is difficult to get information out of, there's no chance of an own goal, and which have as much plausible deniability as possible. If Assad were really so cretinously stupid as to use weapons now and in the way he allegedly did the argument would be irrelevant as he would have already lost due to moving his troops to the Med to defend against a possible attack from the Carthaginians under their despotic pairing of world renowned gourmand Hannibal and Dido, warbling her greatest hits as she comes. Every single thing about the attack is nothing short of moronic, if it were the government doing it.

 

Oh, and for 'conspiracy' theorists, someone bombed Syria's anti ship missile emplacements at the beginning of July. Exactly why Israel would do that was never explained since Hezbollah actually has decent ASMs already (and sunk an Israeli ship with one in 2006). Mighty convenient if you were planning on firing some tomahawks off ships though.

[Guard Dog]

I think experience should have shown us it is utter folly to try to stop (or help) one group of barbarians slaughtering another group of barbarians. No matter who wins the victorious group is going to kill civilians, women and children, by the thousands once it's over and then look for their next fight. They won't hold anyone who helped them with any high regard. After all if they are more than willing to slaughter other Muslims  whose faith is only slightly different from theirs where to the infidels hope to stand? I would not expend one cent of American treasure or one drop of American blood to stop them from doing what they seem to love to do. So they are using chemical weapons now. Where do you think they might have have come from?

 

In short, to hell with them. 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

I'm agreeing with GD here, we should just tell the Middle East to **** off and hope the extremists kill each other as quickly as possible.

[Walsingham]

I'm disappointed with you gentlemen on two levels:

 

1. I simply can't believe that many of you ( I won't say which) are really completely indifferent to the suffering of quite literally millions of innocent people who never chose this path of slaughter, and who are now powerless to stop it.

 

2. I can't believe you that many of you (I won't say which) are so pig ignorant you think that what happens in one Mideast country doesn't affect the others, and via ordinary trade, never mind petrochems, that your own countries are inextricably linked.

 

I am perfectly at ease with you wanting all the extremists, rapists, terrorists, and associated corrupt riffraff to disappear. But basing foreign policy on that presumption is worse than idiotic.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Well Wals, other than annexation(which I doubt would be well received) I don't really see a way to insure that Syria becomes civilized and/or is not a danger in some capacity to the West. Now if there was a way to ensure a Western democracy would be put in place I would be behind it, but as things stand now I don't see that as a likely outcome. The idea that thousands of people will die is horrifying, but so is enabling a possible threat who could cause thousands of deaths down the line.

Edited August 26, 2013 by KaineParker

[Walsingham]

Well Wals, other than annexation(which I doubt would be well received) I don't really see a way to insure that Syria becomes civilized and/or is not a danger in some capacity to the West. Now if there was a way to ensure a Western democracy would be put in place I would be behind it, but as things stand now I don't see that as a likely outcome. The idea that thousands of people will die is horrifying, but so is enabling a possible threat who could cause thousands of deaths down the line.

 

I don't think I argued in favour of intervention at this stage. But I also think it's dangerous and decadent to pretend that these are "barbarians" who ought to be ignored. Many of the people in these countries are more than capable of joining this discussion, if they weren't preoccupied with possibly dying. I don't deny that they have some odd and unhelpfuil cultural mores, but those don't make them less human.

 

FFS, I'm tempted to write off Great Britain every time they screen a new series of Big Brother. It doesn't mean that Britain is a helpless mewling mess of overly entitled windbags.

 

...I hope.

[kgambit]

Bro, that's all been dealt with.

 

If Assad were really so cretinously stupid as to use weapons now and in the way he allegedly did the argument would be irrelevant as he would have already lost ..........

 

Zo, you could be right but I don't think the argument that Assad would be a moron to try this is simply good enough ......

 

The first indications that Assad was prepping a chemical weapon attack might have been back in December 2012.  But I'm sure that was just him "repositioning" his stockpiles?

 

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/dec/08/syria-william-hague-chemical-weapons

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/12/syria-chemical-weapons-3/

 

And I suppose that all of the previous uses of chemical weapons in Syria either never occurred (despite some being verified) or were all false flag attacks that were originated by the opposition forces?  Despite the fact that it always seems to be the opposition or their populist support that seems to be hit.  (Damn - those opposition troops just can't the broad side of a barn)

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/08/21/a-partial-list-of-syrias-suspected-chemical-weapons-attacks-this-year/

 

I really suggest that you read this article (link is in the quote box).  I think it lays out one very plausible scenario about how this is a carefully orchestrated plan by Assad.  It does bring to mind the following line from the Hunt for Red October: The hard part about playing chicken is knowin' when to make the other guy flinch.

 

You've got to hand it to him. Bashar al-Assad may be a cruel and ruthless dictator, but he does know how to play his cards. His careful, incremental introduction of chemical weapons into the Syrian conflict has turned President Barack Obama's clear red line into an impressionist watercolor, undermining the credible threat of U.S. military intervention. Despite Obama's statement on Friday that "we've crossed a line," Assad knows that the United States does not want to be dragged into a Middle Eastern civil war and is attempting to call Obama's bluff.  

 

The Syrian regime's subtle approach deliberately offers the Obama administration the option to remain quiet about chemical attacks and thereby avoid the obligation to make good on its threats. But even more worrying, Assad's limited use of chemical weapons is intended to desensitize the United States and the international community in order to facilitate a more comprehensive deployment in the future -- without triggering intervention. 

 

The advent of chemical weapons use in Syria should not come as a surprise, and neither should the manner in which Assad has introduced them. The gory details about chemical weapons use are still forthcoming, but one of the first likely instances took place in late March at Khan al-Asal, a regime military facility under siege by rebels. Opposition reports and videos showed symptoms and effects consistent with a chlorine or phosphate-based chemical weapon, which the rebels claimed was delivered by a short-range rocket.

 

The Assad regime swiftly accused rebels of firing "rockets containing chemical materials" within hours of the attack, which helped outsiders suspect that a chemical-laden projectile had actually been used, and also had the effect of incriminating the usually slow-to-react regime. The chemical rocket attacked a specifically military rebel target at Khan al-Asal and the chemicals used were not highly lethal, although the recent reports from Israeli and U.S. intelligence officials have pointed to the use of more lethal sarin nerve gas.

 

This subtle introduction of chemical weapons fits the Assad regime's established model for military escalation. Over the course of the conflict, each regime escalation has started with military necessity and expanded to brutal punishment of the Syrian population. Assad has established a clear modus operandi for ramping up the battle without triggering international intervention: toe the line, confirm Western inaction, and then ratchet up the violence further. At each step Washington's hollow "we strongly condemn" rhetoric has validated the approach.

 

Assad's forces began using heavy weapons to shell Homs in February 2012 because they could not dislodge the rebels with ground forces alone. From the regime's perspective, military necessity demanded the relatively restrained use of artillery bombardment to soften rebel positions ahead of a ground offensive. Once Assad confirmed that artillery would not trigger an international response, the shelling expanded to target opposition civilian neighborhoods each day -- without any attempt to retake these areas with ground forces.

 

When the Syrian regime's ground troops became overstretched in June 2012, military necessity once again dictated escalation: Assad unleashed his air force. Assad did not have the troops necessary to respond to rebel advances in northern Aleppo and Latakia, and therefore employed limited helicopter strikes against rebel military targets. By August of last year, Assad had confirmed that his air offensive would not trigger a U.S.-imposed no-fly zone, which allowed him to deploy Syrian Air Force jets against rebel-held neighborhoods in Aleppo, punishing an innocent population for the rebels' gains.

 

The cynical pattern continued. The regime introduced ballistic missiles once the rebels became adept at shooting down aircraft and overrunning airbases. The strikes began in December 2012, with small numbers of Scud missiles fired at an explicitly military target, a base overrun by rebel forces. Once again, Assad waited to see what the reaction would be. And once again, it was Western silence. By restricting the initial targets to rebel forces and limiting the number of strikes, Assad desensitized the U.S. and international community to the introduction of a new, strategic weapon that could later be turned against the Syrian people. By January of this year, the missile strikes had expanded to include consistent attacks against densely populated urban areas in Aleppo and Damascus.

 

And chemical weapons are next. Much like the strategy employed with artillery, air power, and ballistic missiles, Assad's introduction of weapons of mass destruction intends to pave the way for more lethal and wide-ranging chemical attacks against the Syrian people in the future. Assad's chemical weapons are not just a strategic deterrent against foreign intervention, they represent a critical tool in the ongoing campaign against the Syrian opposition. Assad's approach to the conflict has been the inverse of what Western militaries call population-centric counterinsurgency: rather than clear insurgents out of population centers, Assad has sought to clear populations out of insurgent-held areas.

 

The strategy has successfully ensured that even when the rebels gain territory they lose the population, either literally, through physical displacement or death, or in the hearts and minds department, as civilians bear the brunt of the bloodshed and blame the rebels for their plight. It's a cynical but effective strategy. The regime's campaign of air strikes against bakeries, for example, isn't just sadism or poor aim; it's a deliberate attempt to ensure that the rebels can't provide basic services for the people in the areas they control. This approach to insurgency is not new; the Russians have historically adopted this model against insurgents in Afghanistan and Chechnya.

 

Population displacement is central to Assad's campaign: massacring Sunni villages, bulldozing Damascene neighborhoods, and launching ballistic missiles into downtown Aleppo all fit this overall approach. And chemical weapons fit this strategy. Even their limited use is terrifying, forcing populations to leave areas that the rebels have seized -- and sowing fear that more is to come. But in order to use this weapon in greater numbers, Assad needs to be sure that Washington isn't about to come knocking on his door with bunker busters. So far, there's no indication that it will.

 

read the rest of the article at the link provided.

 

BY JOSEPH HOLLIDAY | APRIL 26, 2013  http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/26/syria_chemical_weapons_strategy_obama?page=full

 

 

Two links that contain a huge synopsis of a lot the information about the attacks

 

http://shashankjoshi.wordpress.com/2013/04/26/what-to-read-on-syrian-chemical-weapons/

http://shashankjoshi.wordpress.com/2013/04/27/what-to-read-on-syria-and-chemical-weapons-part-ii/

 

Edit:  You might be right about this.  I don't think it's nearly as cut and dried as you think it is.  

Edited August 26, 2013 by kgambit

[Blodhemn]

Lolol at anyone buying the western narrative. We are just as crooked and responsible as the people in the thick of it, probably even more so since all we do is tear down the zones when there's any progress.