I came here for insight on Syria... and nothing..

[baldgriff]

So its like the Street Fight with all of the News Rooms in AnchorMan.... Watch out for Timothy Robbins or Ben Stiller joining the fight....

[bryanbutler]

heard two stories on NPR this morning that presented the "other side" of the story - that the rebels might be doing this themselves. kind of refreshing, actually. though a cynic would argue that if so many people are against this, they're just running those stories because it's what folks want to hear.

i still want to see the evidence the government is talking about. though once bitten twice shy applies here, since we were hoodwinked so badly on iraq.

[johnnya24]

9%? Perhaps Americans are just tired of intervening right now. We're still in Iraq. We're still in Afghanistan. We intervened in Libya, though briefly. There's talk of Iran, the constant muscle behind Israel, Pakistan now and again, and good lord North Korea always seems to want to start shit with us.

9%? I'm not surprised. It's bad enough jumping from one to the next, but to be in multiple places, militarily...well we might as well just go back to the WW2 military force size...we'll need it if this keeps up.

If you have a gigantic military infrastructure, you have to use it or you cannot justify keeping it.

I've read a lot of "strategic" type articles these last few days. Most are just speculating in the hope they catch lightning in a bottle. Many a successful political blog has been made that way. But there are some interesting theories, as long as you take them with a pinch of salt.

One theory I read a couple of times was that this "mini-intervention" (the assumption being it will be a 2-day symbolic intervention) is designed purely to take out Syria's air defense capabilities so that Israel have an unimpeded flight path to hit Iran's nuclear facilities if need be (Syria --> Northern Iraq --> Iran). I'm not sure why that would be necessary, if there was UN approval for action, the US have the 5th Fleet and a carrier strike group in the area.

[johnnya24]

heard two stories on NPR this morning that presented the "other side" of the story - that the rebels might be doing this themselves. kind of refreshing, actually. though a cynic would argue that if so many people are against this, they're just running those stories because it's what folks want to hear.

i still want to see the evidence the government is talking about. though once bitten twice shy applies here, since we were hoodwinked so badly on iraq.

The Guardian, who have been behind the NSA / GCHQ revelations, have been unquestioningly trumpeting the Government line much to the chagrin of their readers. Back to their usual routine. But today, after 7 days, they published their first balanced piece from one of their better journalists Seumas Milne.

An attack on Syria will only spread the war and killing

This might not fill you full of confidence, from the US based Foreign Policy Magazine:

Exclusive: Intercepted Calls Prove Syrian Army Used Nerve Gas, U.S. Spies Say

Some of the quoted remarks from "intelligence sources" are pretty disturbing considering that this evidence is designed to support the claims for war / intervention.

The US intelligence explanation for the motives behind Assad's alleged attack are "stupidity":

"It's horrible, it's stupid," the intelligence official said about the East Ghouta attack by the Syrian military. "Whatever happens in the next few days -- they get what they deserve."

They don't have any explanation why Assad supposedly did this. There is no logic and they know it. They know they will not be able to come up with a narrative that fits together. So we'll just call it "stupid" and bomb the shit out of them anyway.

US intelligence seem to be going with the Lone General Theory ... its a variation of the Lone Gunman Theory. Apparently a lunatic Syrian General / Officer, for reasons only known to himself, decided to attack a highly populated and visible civilian area close to the UN inspectors ... a few days after the UN inspectors arrived. No motive, no explanation, no conclusive proof of who did it.

Nor are U.S. analysts sure of the Syrian military's rationale for launching the strike -- if it had a rationale at all. Perhaps it was a lone general putting a long-standing battle plan in motion; perhaps it was a miscalculation by the Assad government. Whatever the reason, the attack has triggered worldwide outrage, and put the Obama administration on the brink of launching a strike of its own in Syria. " We don't know exactly why it happened," the intelligence official added. "We just know it was pretty fucking stupid."

"We don't know what happened" ... let's go to war anyway.

The intercept intel is I believe from the Israelis, or at least that is what I heard earlier. This article says US Intelligence, but I think it was the Israelis ... hardly renowned for their trustworthiness, especially given the timing of the release, 7 days after the event.

[Bob Kohm]

This is seriously messed up, folks. First, there is almost no way that the attack in Syria was a nerve agent. Lookj at the casualties, or, rather, lack of casulaties. Nerve agent attacks don't leave mothers and fathers to cry over the dead babies as we saw in that video-- they wipe out everyone exposed ot them. That's simple common sense. If there was a gas attack at all it was likely something like CS or other non-lethal crowd control agents followed by conventional attacks-- higher local concentrations could conceivably overwhelm those with underlying health conditions or children while the rest of the area experiences only tear-gas like issues.

Second, why do we even care? The Assad regime is a bunnch of bastards who hate the US. The rebels are a bunch of bastards who hate the US. The smart play is to let them beat the living hell out of each other for as long as possible, kill as many people as possible and then for the US to deal with whatever is left after the fighting peters out. There are some here who think that hating the consequences of realpolitik make realpolitik somehow less "real"; tough luck, guys, this is how it works. The only possible justification for a strike of any sort I see here would be to teach the third world that using NBCs is a very bad idea. The only way to do that would be to either massively strike Syria to make an example of them(too expensie to bother with) or to kill the generals & regime leaders (very, very difficult to do). The whole NBC line int he sand thing is a bit silly-- Rwanda happened with machetes and axes, not persistent nerve agents or some exotic chimerical bug out of VECTOR's old bag of tricks. Unless someone thinks that a Cold War mentality towards the third world is a good idea-- you use an NBC, we wipe you off the face of the planet-- we should drop all of this bluster and bullshit about use of chemical weapons.

Last, what exactly is a "limited strike" supposed to accomplish-- especially one that has been kicked around in the international media for a week? HuffPo already is running reports of the Syrians evacuating Army HQ, etc. Every weapons depot is now empty and their stocks of bio & chem weapons are on the move and vulnerable to being captured by the rebels or even the friends of the regime-- Hizbullah, Hamas, al Qaeda, etc. We've forced high value wepaons out of thir secure laagers and onto the roads where they are vulnerable not to US strike but to capture by US enemies. Shoot me now.

For all the bluster of those who like to use idiotic phrases like "another illegal war" with nothing more to back them up than their own horrendously flawed thinking and echo chamber buddies, it has to be said that this policy coming out of DC is misguided to the nth degree. Military folks I know hate the idea on more levels than you have fingers to count them on. State permanent staff (those who do the real work rather than the political appointees) are supposedly in an uproar over Kerry's pronouncements this week.

This is no way to run a railroad, folks. It's every bit as dumb as the last Admin's rush to war in Iraq. The only reason its results won't be as bad is because the scale of the action will be much smaller despite the fact that the thinking shows the same absence of consideration of the situation.

[Fresno Bob]

If we do anything to Syria without total co-operation with Turkey, we are idiots. We need to be working hand in hand with them in the region

[johnnya24]

If we do anything to Syria without total co-operation with Turkey, we are idiots. We need to be working hand in hand with them in the region

Pretty sure Turkey are on board with the whole "Get Assad" thing.

[Fresno Bob]

Pretty sure Turkey are on board with the whole "Get Assad" thing.

Then let's do a Libya and have Turkey do the heavy lifting while we do logistics and air superiority

[Bob Kohm]

Turkey doesn't have the resources to take on Syria and could conceivably give the Syrians the impetus to come together to fight a Turk invasion. Even putting aside those problems (and the possibility that the Syrians could outright militarily defeat Turkey), I seriously doubt that Erdogan has the internal political clout to take Turkey to war anyway.

[johnnya24]

If you weren't worried before, check this out ... Marie Harf, the State Department Deputy Spokesperson, just claimed that

The UN isn't the only international body that we're consulting here.

Did she just try and compare getting legitimacy from the [Assad hating] Arab League with UN approval?

Here's another gem!

... the Syrian conflict started [by Assad] is what's responsible for the increased al-Qaeda activity ... we place the blame squarely on the Assad regime.

This is so bad it's almost funny. What the fuck is going on here ... seems like Bush levels of ignorance [or condescension] all over again. They can't think people are that stupid?

[DMT]

Bhob taking the same foreign policy stance as the leftist wing of RJ, about time

[Bob Kohm]

Did she just try and compare getting legitimacy from the [Assad hating] Arab League with UN approval?

The UN has legitimacy? Doubtful, Johnny. Of course we would be talking to the Arab League, NATO, the EU, etc. in addition to the UN, for what it's worth.

[Bob Kohm]

Bhob taking the same foreign policy stance as the leftist wing of RJ, about time

With the slight difference of arriving at the same point through considered policy rather than the "Hey, how can we state the most anti-American thing we can find" path that you, elD and your thought leader Johnny generally take

[johnnya24]

Another Guardian pro-war propaganda piece ...

Syrian army may use kamikaze pilots against west, [anonymous] Assad officer claims

Unnamed Syrian army officer claims they have "8,000 suicide martyrs" (you know, just like the "evil doing" turists). The Guardian have been one of the most pro-war publications in the UK this week. Which is an amazing turnaround given the last 2 months, but not wholly unexpected. The Daily Mail and Telegraph, both right-wing papers, have both expressed strong reservations, at least in part. The right-wing UKIP have came out completely against intervention.

Things are really screwed up. This just feels so so wrong.

[Roto Rooter]

Let them kill each other. We hate both sides, so who gives a F? We have no business getting into a conflict in Syria. Obama should be impeached if he takes us into this mess.