Need I say more? Really? The jihadi bastards were given enough time to consolidate their position in Idlib Province after the liberation of Aleppo City and you see the result. The White Helmet film and TV production crew are on the scene. Jihadi doctors with high production values on camera have been brought in to star in new shows (soon to be screened). The SOHR hermit is processing thematic material. The combined forces of AQ derivative "resistance" fighters were unleashed upon northern Hama. Well, that didn't go too well ... But the forces of salafist jihad always have the internet and gullible reporters across the world. Well, maybe not in Russia. Israeli media today seem solidly behind the idea that the beast Assad must have personally ordered this massacre, this abomination against the children of Syria. He MUST HAVE. It is in the nature of the beast.
Well, pilgrims, in 2013 we had Martin Dempsey who went to see Obama to tell him that the available intelligence did not support the idea that the SAA had attacked Ghouta with Sarin. Some of us know that US and UK government testing of the Sarin involved showed it not to be manufactured for military munitions. But, alas, we have no Martin Dempsey, visible on the scene as yet. The estimable Irishman has departed to a Carolina (?) university where he teaches a course on Yeats. A far, far better thing he does ... Ah, that's Dickens, isn't it?
Well, OK. IMO the R+6 should learn the lesson of this propaganda debacle and OVERRUN Idlib Province!! pl
Colonel,
A fake poison gas attack followed without further enquiry by a retaliatory strike is unequivocally neocon.
Does this mean that the Trump movement has lost its figurehead?
Posted by: English Outsider | 08 April 2017 at 06:20 AM
PA,
You left out Christian thought which is far more fundamental to Western thinking than Confucius.
Posted by: Fred | 08 April 2017 at 08:14 AM
Chris,
Putin needs to send a couple brigades of reinforcements. AQ stored their chemicals, which Susan Rice and company assured us they didn't have four years ago, on the outskirts to keep from losing them.
Posted by: Fred | 08 April 2017 at 08:32 AM
Bill,
Paul Ryan spent seven years screwing around on an ACA replacement bill so that the unicorns of the FSA could stage a false flag attack because everyone knew up front that we were going to invade Syria one day? That's quite a stretch.
Posted by: Fred | 08 April 2017 at 08:38 AM
According to Politico:
https://secure.politico.com/story/2017/04/trump-syria-strikes-debate-237025
Several people say Trump relied on Defense Secretary James Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who kept in touch with him several times a day and answered his questions in “straightforward, to-the-point ways,” said one administration official. All three advisers supported the strike and wanted the president on board.
Several top officials, including Tillerson, told Trump it was important to strike the exact airfield where officials believed the gas was made and from which the planes flew, according to two people, including a senior White House official. That would make the attack easier to justify and deem it “proportional,” a word they saw as key to ensuring the strike’s legality.
Posted by: The Beaver | 08 April 2017 at 08:53 AM
From a military stand point the article is certainly a valid view point. But I am more focused on whether the government controlled parts of Syria can survive long with out the money from the oil & gas reserves, the water from the Euphrates and the power plants in the East.
The US in Iraq carved off the bulk of the oil fields and gave then to the Kurds and the rest of Iraq is financially collapsing because of it. With the US having taken over two bases in Eastern Syria which are being turned into permanent bases the race is on to grab land there before the Kurds/US does. The plan is to create a failed state like in Iraq so the US doesn't have to put enough man power on the ground to take the whole state.
Israel is currently pushing for a buffer zone which if past is prologue will eventually be annexed by Israel. Turkey has said they still intend to seize Idlib. The plan is to turn the Syrians into the equivalent of the Palestinians. A people with out a country/citizenship and no voice in the world.
Posted by: BraveNewWorld | 08 April 2017 at 01:03 PM
Sure he is - if he thinks Trump and Putin will combine to force a settlement on him. Haley and Tillerson both sent out signals that Assad could stay, which put Trump and Putin on the same page.
This attack has buried that possibility.
Posted by: Horatio Parker | 08 April 2017 at 03:09 PM
A pic here of an expert gathering soil samples. Suitably attired in mask, gloves and flip flops.
https://images.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fimg.rt.com%2Ffiles%2F2017.04%2Foriginal%2F58e650c8c4618812078b4593.jpg&f=1
The site appears here in the guardian video
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/05/syria-chemical-attack-investigators-seek-samples-survivors-sarin-gas
Another pic floating around somewhere with two experts in masks gloves and flip flops gathering soil samples from this site.
Posted by: Peter AU | 08 April 2017 at 03:51 PM
"The officer ultimately responsible for the planning and execution of the attack was General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the joint chiefs. From the beginning of the crisis, the former intelligence official said, the joint chiefs had been sceptical of the administration’s argument that it had the facts to back up its belief in Assad’s guilt."
https://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n08/seymour-m-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line
If I remeber right the link to the MIT study is at the end of that one.
"Hersh Vindicated? Turkish Whistleblowers Corroborate Story on False Flag Sarin Attack in Syria"
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/10/23/hersh-vindicated-turkish-whistleblowers-corroborate-story-on-false-flag-sarin-attack-in-syria/
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/turkish-lawmakers-ankara-tied-to-use-of-sarin-in-syria/
www.todayszaman.com/national_chp-deputies-govt-rejects-probe-into-turkeys-role-in-syrian-chemical-attack_402180.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-chemicalweapons-idUSKBN0UI1Z920160104
Posted by: BraveNewWorld | 08 April 2017 at 06:53 PM
Anon,
The oil is sold on the world market at the market price. What happened to all the existing oil tankers that should be part of your analysis?
Posted by: Fred | 08 April 2017 at 10:57 PM
Fred- I am a "deplorable' and you are correct. Many Trump supporters are not in agreement with this recent military action...
Posted by: Pittsburgh Gal | 09 April 2017 at 12:27 AM
May I suggest that you offer your services to POTUS?? No joke here; I am serious.
Posted by: Pittsburgh Gal | 09 April 2017 at 12:29 AM
fyi How al Qaeda played Donald Trump and the American media http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/syria-chemical-attack-al-qaeda-played-donald-trump_us_58ea226fe4b058f0a02fca4d?ncid=engmodushpmg00000004 … via @HuffPostPol
Posted by: John_Frank | 09 April 2017 at 06:14 PM