British Prime Minister David Cameron took his case against the Assad regime to the House of Commons and was met with a rather rude reception.
The UK Parliament will later vote on whether to back the principle of military intervention, but the leader of the opposition Labour Party, Ed Miliband, has said MPs should not have to decide on what he called an “artificial timetable”.
Speaking in the Commons, he insisted any UK action should be based on the principle that “evidence should precede decision; not decision precede evidence”.
“I do not rule out supporting the prime minister,” Mr Miliband added. “But I believe he has to make a better case than he did today on this question.”
The debate in parliament was spirited and skeptical. But the main problem was the lack of evidence, with Cameron conceding, “Let’s not pretend there is one smoking piece of intelligence that can solve the whole problem.” Rather than a smoking gun, Cameron laid out a circumstantial case based on the Joint Intelligence Committee’s assessment (pdf). And, to put it bluntly, the assessment was poorly supported and relied on what we call in philosophy a logical fallacy called “begging the question.”
Here, the question is “who perpetrated the chemical attack on August 21st?” Cameron spent considerable time trying to prove that any attack had occurred at all, pointing to the plethora of YouTube evidence and the testimony of Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) that thousands of people were treated who exhibited symptoms consistent with a chemical attack.
He argued the scale of the attack was large, that the regime had carried out 14 previous small-scale chemical attacks (who knew?), that we know that the regime has chemical weapons, and that we have no evidence that the rebels do. He argued that the fact the regime was attacking the area with conventional weapons at the time is evidence that they must be responsible for the non-conventional weapons. Finally, he relied on the following excerpt from the assessment:
It is being claimed, including by the regime, that the attacks were either faked or undertaken by the Syrian Armed Opposition. We have tested this assertion using a wide range of intelligence and open sources, and invited HMG and outside experts to help us establish whether such a thing is possible. There is no credible intelligence or other evidence to substantiate the claims or the possession of CW by the opposition. The JIC has therefore concluded that there are no plausible alternative scenarios to regime responsibility.
We also have a limited but growing body of intelligence which supports the judgement that the regime was responsible for the attacks and that they were conducted to help clear the Opposition from strategic parts of Damascus. Some of this intelligence is highly sensitive but you have had access to it all.
This is not enough. It begs the question.
It argues that the rebels did not carry out the attack because they could not have carried out the attack. But their argument is limited to the fact that they have no evidence that the rebels had access to a chemical agent that hasn’t even been positively identified, yet.
The problem is that the rebels quite possibly did have access to chemical weapons (including, potentially, sarin), as the Russians have alleged for months, an allegation made even more likely by revelations reported by the BBC in June that al-Qaeda in Iraq was making chemical weapons. In any case, the world is asking a question, and the response is that there is no question.
Furthermore, the question of motive is not addressed. The rebels had the motive, but the regime did not. If this were a murder case, we’d be prosecutors who have no murder weapon and no motive, who are relying simply on opportunity (the suspect could have done it) and a process of elimination that hasn’t eliminated another prime suspect who did have a motive.
Granted, they wave classified information in front of us as buttressing their case, but they won’t let the public see it.
This is not even close to good enough.
“The rebels” in the vicinity of the attack were not the Nusra Front, the al Qaeda affiliate that might have access to chemical weapons.
Rather, they were an indigenous Syrian rebel group, consisting of what Juan Cole describes as “local boys.” If we put together all of the wholly-evidence-free assumptions necessary to get to a theory of a rebel false-flag operation, we’re still stipulating that a force not affiliated with al Qaeda carried out a chemical weapons massacre against their neighbors and cousins.
Professor Cole concludes today that the evidence available puts that never-terribly-plausible theory to rest entirely.
The rebels had the motive, but the regime did not.
False. The rebels had been taking territory in the vicinity recently. Professor Cole theorizes that the Homs offensive, the regime gains that are often pointed to as evidence that Assad was winning, drained the forces in the vicinity of the attack of manpower, which would explain both the recent rebel gains there and the motive for a local commander to bring in the big guns.
The regime has vastly more motive and opportunity than the rebels to launch that chemical attack.
Good commenting manners require a hyperlink.
You’re right, my bad.
http://www.juancole.com/2013/08/western-strike-stall.html
http://www.juancole.com/2013/08/signals-intervention-syria.html#comment-217273
http://www.juancole.com/2013/08/signals-intervention-syria.html#comment-217262
Is this the solid evidence you were speculating about, or do we have to wait just a little longer for that?
Seems to me the rest of the world is not at all impressed so far with the solidity of it all.
My interpretation is that you are talking about vapor that came of the sludge, instead of something you could look at and say, hey thats not sludge at all.
I m not too sure if the economic climate is all that good for faith based sales.
It is an answer to BooMan’s objections, which are based on faulty information.
Could you drop your sales pitch for ten seconds, and make an effort to deal with the facts?
How about a release of the smoking gun tapes? That can’t be too hard.
In your position, I’d want to change the subject from the idiotic rebel conspiracy theory you’ve been pushing, too.
That wasn’t responsive, joe, but in your bootlicking position don’t you think that in order to kill people we ought to at least hear the tape? Or have you never heard of the party game “telephone”? Sometimes third-person paraphrases aren’t the same as actually hearing it directly.
What is the faulty information?
Lord knows there is enough of it going around, but Juan Cole is wrong about who is operating in the area, as I demonstrated with multiple links. Even the areas where the fire originated from (according to the NYTs) is in at least partial rebel hands. And the rebels have been seizing and using weapons in those neighborhoods.
Note, also, that I’m citing mainly pre-attack reporting on the location of different brigades.
Answered below.
You did not demonstrate that Cole was wrong about the location of the Nusra Front. You demonstrated that he was right. You seem to have lumped together the names of a number of different places that begin with the letter Q.
You are correct that the al-Nusra front is northwest of the target area.
However, you are more confident than the government:
So, stop trying to be the government’s enforcer.
Could you please drop the sales pitch for ten seconds?
There was a question of fact on the table: the geography of the attacks.
And when those facts turned out to be inconvenient, you just went into your next talking point.
This is just like the Iraq War run up in a way, except this time, it is the doves who are straining so hard to fix the intelligence around the policy.
I’m not even going to address your “some” quote, at least not here.
You’re not even trying to get at the truth. You’re just fighting a rear-guard action. I asked you yesterday if you were going to deal forthrightly with the facts when they come up, and you said you would.
Your debating style is very awkward and relies on tenuous logical links.
First, I conceded a point you made, which is that I had mislocated the location of a town by about 40 miles.
Second, you think this means you’ve undermined my main point, when what you’ve done is undermined one piece of evidence I provided.
Third, while the physical location of the al-Nusra front is important, it doesn’t somehow change the fact that rebel forces have been suspected of using chemical agents, and I provided links to substantiate that allegation, including the detention of rebels at the Turkish border.
Fourth, the presence of Ansar al-Islam in the targeted area is evidence that Islamist groups are operating there. That group and its closely associated groups broke from al-Nusra in April, but they aren’t all that different.
Finally, the government includes people who are just as open-minded as I am about the possibility of a rebel attack, they just won’t allow it in the intelligence assessment. Is that cool with you?
Debating style?
Logical links?
Undermined your main point?
I’m answering questions of fact. Those of us in the reality-based community like to do that.
I haven’t written a conclusion.
You aren’t talking about my debating style or what these geographic facts mean to me. You’re talking about your own and what they mean to you.
The facts on the question at hand looked bad, so how did you deal with that?
You dealt with it like an party hack on a cable talk show, and I’m not fucking playing that game.
I believed you yesterday when you said you would deal with the evidence in good faith, BooMan.
I took you at your word, as a person with honor.
I won’t make that mistake again.
Is there anything left but the campaign operative anymore?
Who am I campaign operative for, then?
Dennis Kucinich? Newt Gingrich?
I provided you with a bunch of text with some parts bolded. As part of that, I bolded a town linked to al-Nusra that I shouldn’t have because I misread the article and didn’t double-check the location of that town. I conceded my error when it was pointed out to me, but I never said Cole is wrong because al-Nusra. I was addressing his allegation that the impacted area only had local boys who would never attack their own clans. Moreover, the area Cole mentioned is large, and includes to town I erroneously placed in the chemical zone.
So, you seize on one error, and you try to make it appear that you’ve refuted my point. You made a chip in my argument that I am happy to concede, but that is all.
Points that remain:
Many Islamist groups that include non-Jordanian foreign fighters are operating in the area, despite Cole’s claims. Therefore, his argument that none of the rebels would attack their own clan is an erroneous assumption.
Plausible, if not proven, allegations that the rebels have some CW’s are not driven out of existence by begging the question, as the British are attempting to do.
Logical construct:
Premise: There have been credible allegations that the rebels have CW.
Premise: If they have CW they could have used them.
Conclusion: There are no credible allegations that the rebels have CW.
That’s an invalid argument because the conclusion doesn’t follow from the premises. Instead, it is merely argumentative.
In it’s begging the question form.
Premise: The rebels do not have CW.
Conclusion: The rebels did not use CW because they did not have them.
When you include the conclusion in the premise, you’ve committed a logical fallacy.
In its present form, the British argument is fallacious and, therefore, utterly unconvincing.
That’s a problem, whether you want to stomp and shout about it or not.
Argue with Ed.
This isn’t your fault, it’s mine.
…and the frog asked, “Why?”
And the scorpion said, “It’s my nature. You knew what I was when you picked me up.”
If I’m honest with myself, this has been a long time coming.
Good bye.
Wow.
Slain by (plain-worded) symbolic logic.
That was easy.
No no, you’re not getting it.
Joe’s dog eats poop AND prime rib.
Case closed.
Gee, Joe, before you let the door hit you on the way, how about some proof?
Gee, others who are not convinced:
Oh no! Did Joe leave?! But I was finally getting really, really good at ignoring him, and now I won’t be able to enjoy my newly-acquired skill anymore.
Boohoo, Joe.
You’re still presuming without knowing, based on the the evolving story of the very government that lied us into two wars of occupation. That’s called shaky ground.
You don’t know where that sarin came from.
You’ve heard of the concept of false flag operations, right? You think that the rebels wouldn’t sacrifice some women and children as a loss leader for getting American airpower on their side? Or is that too much for you to allow yourself to believe, because after all, they are “freedom fighters”. Just like the Contras, right?
And while you think that the “freedom fighters” wander the desert in robes of spun gold you are quite sure that Assad is not only cold-blooded, but he used sarin gas fifteen kilometers from where the UN inspectors were in their hotel?
Really?
This is reminiscent of Colin Powell’s infamous “interception” of a radio conversation allegedly between two Iraqi military officers discussing hiding chemical weapons. The translation presented was simply laughable – nobody talks that way, and in any case an accurate translation suggests that they were not talking about hiding chemical weapons at all. I don’t think anyone knows who those two people in the “intercepted transmission” really were.
Why do you suppose that suspicion “was not included in the official intelligence report, according to the official who described the report?”
Because it is merely a suspicion, right? While challenging evidence for ‘doing something,’ as you dismissively put it, is fair enough the evidence that the rebels have access to sarin or a similar lethal nerve agent or have used it in the past are pretty thin. And their alleged motives tendentious.
If you spend any amount of time reading up on sarin one is struck by the inherent difficulties of producing, storing, handling and deploying these weapons. That’s why most chemical weapons development programs leave a signature that is visible to the outside world, as in the case of the Assad regime.
It seems to me there is an unspoken assumption that doing nothing requires a lower standard of evidence than doing something; which is fair enough in a conventional criminal case. But it also seems to me that in this instance a ‘crime against humanity’ requires a more rigorous pursuit of resolution than ‘case dismissed for lack of evidence.’ It sets a precedent we might have cause to regret in future.
Honestly, how would you really feel if Obama or Kerry announced tomorrow, essentially, “Aw, stuff it, this is all too hard and nobody cares.” The UK has already set that precedent. You certainly couldn’t then plausibly resurrect this ‘suspicion’ if another such incident occurred, could you?
This is poorly argued and places the weight for using military force below that of obtaining a criminal conviction for a normal crime.
Requires “more rigorous pursuit of resolution.” That does not necessarily mean ‘using military force’ it means not giving up on identifying the culprit and continuing to exert moral authority and political capital to achieve that end. If we walk away from this as the UK has done we will have cause to regret it.
“Poorly argued?” The evidence implicating the rebels is thin, the overheads and risks of handling nerve agents are challenging and the notion that the rebels would be given a weapon of mass destruction by a hypothetical intelligence agency to use on innocent civilians exceeds mythical Nigerian yellowcake by several orders of conspiratorial magnitude. You are better than this. If you don’t want the US to respond then just say so, you needn’t fabricate a context where there is only one reasonable course and everything else is warmongering, neo-conservatism, naivete or ‘poorly argued.’
My question still stands; you couldn’t use the same argument for a second such incident because the motive of the rebels, having failed initially, must be discounted. Right?
I have spent considerable time in my life researching the history of intelligence agencies, learning basic spycraft, studying exposed or blown operations, talking with former intelligence agents, and so forth.
I have learned many things.
One thing I’ve learned is that an ordinary operation of this sort is supposed to not only have built in deniability, but it is actually supposed to point to someone else. When I say “this sort,” I don’t mean the ostensible story of some general getting an itchy finger and firing off a ton of CW without the authority to do so. Nor do I mean a more straightforward attack by a military against a rebel force.
What I mean is that when an intelligence agency is involved, and that is one hypothesis here among many, you should not only have trouble fingering that agency, but the most obvious interpretation of the facts will point somewhere else.
The most common way in which this is done is that the recruiter misrepresents who he works for. The agent/recruit is actually deceived about who they are spying for. For example, an Israeli spy seeking to recruit an Iranian atomic scientist might pose as an Egyptian or whatever they can pass as. This helps the Israelis get information from sources that would not willingly spy for them.
But you can also take it deeper and actually recruit assassins in this way. Or, is the most elaborate scenario, a small team specially trained for an operation.
If the operatives think they are doing something for a different government, you are protected even if they are captured and tortured.
This may sound crazy, but it’s actually exactly how spy agencies prefer to work. In many cases, it isn’t possible to disguise your true nationality, so there are plenty of straightforward spy/agent relationships. But they are restricted to informational relationships rather than operational relationships.
You don’t want someone doing something that you will have to deny if they know who they’re working for.
Another category for recruitment are the true believers who ardently agree with your country’s goals. We did great recruiting Poles and Greeks during the Cold War, both as officers and informants, because they hated the Russians every bit as much as we did, and they didn’t need an excuse to try to fuck them.
Some of the them would willingly die rather than implicate their sponsors.
So, we have a variety of ways that can recruit people and utilize them, and these are fairly universal practices that the Brits taught to us, we learned from fighting the Soviets, and we trained other nations to follow.
Here is I would devise a set-up of the Assad regime if I were, say, the Saudis and I wanted to get this civil war over with. I’d recruit people who thought I was Iranian. I’d buy some Soviet-issue components that are in Syria’s inventory. I’d brew up some nasty cocktail and train them in firing it. And then I’d place them somewhere near where the Syrians are regularly firing artillery. I’d tell them some b.s. story about why they were on this particular mission. And I’d tell them to wait until the next nighttime Syrian barrage to fire off their weapons in the same direction.
Am I saying that this is what happened? Absolutely not.
What I am trying to do is to get you to understand how an operation of this type is designed when it is designed.
My scenario has the required redundancy.
If they are caught before hand, they will implicate the Iranians and, therefore, the Syrians.
If they are caught afterwards, they will implicate the Iranians, and therefore, the Syrians.
If they are never caught, their actions will implicate the Syrians.
That is how you design a foolproof operation.
Now, I don’t expect your average Joe to have that kind of imagination, but no self-respecting competent intelligence agency would otherwise an operation of this type that didn’t have those kinds of redundancies built-in.
And this is a big deal, the decision we’re making here.
I really appreciate your lengthy and thoughtful reply. I agree it is possible to construct a scenario so labyrinth and redundant as to defy all subsequent investigation and analysis as to the perpetrator; in the case of a Western-aligned actor it would be a vital necessity.
I’m sure it happens, too. As you point out we would have absolutely no way of knowing. Which is why motive and opportunity need to be addressed; not just the facts in evidence. What evidence could one find compelling to dismiss such a theory, anyway, in such a world of smoke and mirrors?
However, in this particular scenario you have constructed, wouldn’t it be fair to say that if the US did nothing in response that the plan had failed?
And that if another lethal chemical weapon incident occurred later one would be strongly compelled to discount the original theory?
We live in such a world of smoke and mirrors. I assure you of this.
But that doesn’t mean that nothing it as it seems. Sometimes, things are exactly as they seem. So, you look at the evidence first, and then you try to figure out if you are seeing an illusion.
In this scenario, if the West did not put its fingers on the scales, then the operation would not have achieved its objective.
And if another lethal chemical weapon incident occurred, we’d have to decide if we were witnessing an upping of the ante or if our theory had been disproved.
Not doubting that it happens sometimes. Appreciate your cordial good will in discussing this.
…as well as misidentifying a number of local Syrian forces as part of the Nusra Front, because they have Islamic-sounding names.
A link might sort this out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_Islamic_Liberation_Front
You’re not avoiding the fact that you don’t know what chemical was used or how it was delivered, are you? Because knitpicking without you having a firm argument is really a waste of your gray matter.
Juan Cole is very good on some things, and not-so-good to terrible on others. His analysis on Iraq was so far off so much of the time that I stopped reading him for anything meaningful. He just doesn’t know Iraq at all, and to the best of my knowledge he knows Syria no better.
link
Video.
NYT:
From a August 9th assessment:
The village of Qaldun is located about 40 miles northwest of Damascus. That’s the closest you’ve been able to get the Nusra Front to Damascus.
Notice the difference between the two forces, and their locations, in your Xinhua link. Local Coordinating Committee-related forces made gains in the eastern suburbs near Damascus. Meanwhile, in Qaldoun (that is, more than 30 miles away), the Nusra Front took some targets. This is the closest you are able to get the Nusra Front to the site of the chemical massacre.
Liwa al-Islam, the Mughaweer Battalion, Ansar al-Islam and the Qalamoun Martyrs Battalion are local Syrian fighting groups, not the al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front.
The town of Moadamiya, one of the sites of the chemical attack, is located a few miles southwest of Damascus – that is, a good 40 miles from the Nusra Front.
Also, from your August 9th assessment:
Which is to say, Professor Cole is right. Local Syrian forces made advances into and just outside of Damascus, contrary to the claims that the Syrian government was winning. Chemical weapons were then launched, far from the area controlled by the Nusra Front, into the area of local-Syrian-rebel gains.
Cripes, I didn’t even provide the map:
http://www.indexmundi.com/z/?lat=33.8833333&lon=36.6833333&t=p&r=5780&p=qaldun&c
c=sy&c=syria
That’s Qaldoun. Scroll up, and the large town is Al Nabk.
You can then go to a google map of Syria, find Damascus and Al Nabk, and see the distances we’re talking about.
Thanks for the useful discussion you and Joe are having. I’ve learned a lot about the rebel factions and geography today.
What a twisted mess.
Were having.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2013/8/29/13337/7054#34
I don’t even want to gloat about the fact that he needed to do this.
The guy is nothing but an ad guy anymore.
Are you saying this about Booman?
“The guy is nothing but an ad guy anymore.”
Yup. Look above.
If Booman isn’t satisfying your high standards, I strongly suggest you find a different site to visit.
He’s not, and I will.
When he writes about campaign tactics, I’ll read that, because it’s what he knows, what he cares about, and what he does.
When he writes about everything else, that’s just campaign tactics too.
This was a very enlightening day.
Joe, before you leave, I believe asked you for proof that it was not Assad’s forces that used the poison gas.
If the government were shelling the area, wouldn’t that by definition mean that it was in some rebel group’s hands? That would mean that some rebel group, or their CIA handlers, had access to the area to deploy poison gas?
But your answer is that they are too noble to do such a thing.
Yeah, never mind. You lost the argument and you know it.
But Boo, Joe from Lowell knows where all trucks and donkey carts in Syria have traveled since August 3, and he sees into the hearts of all the rebels and he knows that they would never use poison gas against innocent women and children. He KNOWS.
Geez, Boo, don’t you know how orderly a war zone is? It’s like a game of Risk, and Joe doesn’t see the right piece in the right place.
That’s complete crap. I wouldn’t expect the Syrian regime or the people it continues to protect to ever become nonchalant about their 29 month long civil war of survival. Winning is kind of imperative. Perhaps by any means necessary when you’ve been on the frontlines for so long.
There doesn’t need to have been any great military strategy behind it. Soldiers backed up against the void have done far worse over our species’ history.
They’re under pressure, but they are not backed up against the void.
This move, to do a massive gas attack right under the nose of the UN inspectors, makes much less than zero strategic sense, and is hard to justify even tactically.
Please see the comments Cole made on Aug 27. (I put them up in a comment below.)
JeffL, Juan Cole is very good on Iran. That is his area of expertise. Most of his Iraq analysis was badly off, which is not surprising because despite being touted as an Iraq expert he had never set foot in the country, and didn’t even understand the terrain, let alone the society, social history, economy, culture or politics of the place. I would not trust him to know his stuff any better when it comes to Syria. To the best of my knowledge he has never set foot there either.
As Pepe Escobar wrote in Asia Times:
The Obama administration has ruled that Assad allowed UN chemical weapons inspectors into Syria, and to celebrate their arrival unleashed a chemical weapons attack mostly against women and children only 15 kilometers away from the inspectors’ hotel. If you don’t believe it, you subscribe to a conspiracy theory.
Given the facts that have become available, perhaps its time to put a little less faith in snark.
You mean your snark? I’m waiting for the facts you have to become available. Prove that it was Assad’s forces and not the rebels.
Because these facts are taking a long time for them to be becoming known from you.
What say you? Aluminum tubes?
Oh, now THAT’s hilarious coming from someone who rarely has posted anything BUT snark here.
They’re under pressure, but they are not backed up against the void.
We’ve come quite a distance from “They’re winning, so why would they launch a chemical attack?”
Are you making an honest effort to deal objectively with the facts, or are you fighting a rear-guard action?
I’m dealing objectively with your lack of facts. Show us proof that Assad did it.
Thanking you in advance for your thorough response.
They don’t have to be backed up against the void for chemical weapons to look like a good idea. The arguments that it would be completely crazy for Assad to use chemical weapons all depend on the notion that chemical weapons use would invite a swift and devastating response from the West… but there’s no real reason to believe that’s the case. The motive itself is the most obvious in the world–they wanted to kill a bunch of rebels and terrorize the civilian population that’s been sheltering and supporting them.
I’m not going to be upset if the “lack of proof” ends up derailing plans to launch airstrikes against Syria, because I’d much rather see us decide not to fight a stupid war for bad reasons than start a stupid war for good reasons. But the whole “false flag” theory never made much sense, and while I don’t think the US intelligence community the most trustworthy sources of information in the world, I trust them a whole hell of a lot more than I trust the Syrian ambassador or the Russian intelligence agency.
It’s interesting that Cameron is going to Parliament. My understanding of the British constitution is that the PM is not required to do this. This is because declaring war is considered a Royal Prerogative – which the Queen is allowed to do in consultation with her cabinet – which means that effectively the right to make war falls on the PM. Do you happen to know if they went to Parliament for previous conflicts (i.e. Iraq, Kosovo)? (Somewhat off-topic, I know, but I find the British constitution endlessly fascinating.)
Cameron probably feels like he needs to sell this and get as much cover as possible to be viable for re-election. Obama is not going to be on the ballot ever again but we’ll see if this becomes a midterm issue. Most of the Republican prospects for 2016 seem to be taking the side of non-intervention. They can read the polls as well as anyone else.
I find the info from the MSF website quite convincing that there was a chemical attack. As for who probably did it? Juan Cole has some more detailed analysis from Aug 27:
Because the al Nusra and al Qaeda are too damned decent…
No, because the Nusra Front isn’t anywhere near the area.
Could you please knock off the sales pitch for ten seconds and work on the facts?
Great, prove that you know where every individual in al Nusra and al Qaeda are. They must be wearing ankle bracelets for you, right? Because we know that they only travel in swarms and you won’t find one away from the hive.
Joe, you’re making yourself look like an idiot. You don’t have proof as to who deployed that sarin. You don’t. Otherwise you would have shared the information hours ago.
Is it your faith in our government or is your faith in al Nusra or al Qaeda or the rebels or Qatar or Saudi Arabia or the CIA? Who do you trust so much that you’re ready to kill people on a rumor? That would be informative.
Nobody at this site is happy about this situation. All of us are trying to dig for facts or failing facts some analysis that makes sense.
Is the childish, snide tone in your comments brought on because not enough of us are playing Chicken Little? Not enough poutrage for you?
I’ll give you a hint. I don’t need an answer from you. You’ve established yourself in this diary as nothing more than a troll? Bye bye.
It’s impossible because we know the Syrian rebels aren’t as militarized as Aum Shinrikyo.
If the reports back in May that said al-Nusra was hauling sarin gas around the Turkish border turn out to be true, do we get to bomb them? I mean, after we withdraw the CIA operatives?
My favorite comment circulating the internet:
If Iraq had a son it would look like Syria.
Too much of the pinning of responsibility relies on information about the nature of the attack, and that is not clear yet. It is not clear what chemical agent was used (which would set the limits of possible attackers) nor is the means of delivery clear (again setting the range of attacker).
Those with motives fill a list befitting a British mystery novel. But they tend to fall into two groups. (1) Those who a change of the regime (for various motives) and (2) those who want the US to intervene backing up it “crossing a red line” rhetoric (for motives ranging from bringing down Assad to involving the US in another quagmire). Arguing from motive is the easiest argument to make.
Arguing from the means is the second most difficult to make, given the scant information.
Arguing from opportunity is the most difficult to make. Who had the means in the required locations during the time frame of the attack?
Jean-Philippe Rémy of Le Monde, who was on the ground in the area (effectively embedded with rebel forces) reports gas attacks carried out by the government of Syria.
I guess we can conclude that British intelligence doesn’t think too much of the Syrian ambassador’s claim yesterday that (some) rebels have used CW in the recent past.
Bushco’s Iraq invasion seems to have thrown some sort of a monkey wrench into the Traditional “Trust Us” Method of conflict escalation/War Fever. Seems like some unseemly questions are being asked, even by elected officials…
I’ve followed all the many informed postings/comments here over the past few days. Not that it’s all that relevant, but is there any polling on the popularity of a new Syrian intervention by the US of A?
Curiously, I haven’t seen any polls about the percentage of Americans who want to go to war. There’s Joe From Lowell.
However, the Seahawks are 12-1 to win the Super Bowl.
Found some. Looks like its popularity may be limited to the Beltway!
And Joe from Lowell. Lowell’s kinda on the 128 Beltway around Boston, right? Or close enough for government work.
I’m satisfied that the Syrian army launched the chem attacks. I am not satisfied that this decision was made at the top levels.
If the point of strikes is to punish the regime, then the regime is helpless in the face of Gen. Ahmed D. Ripper triggering the Doomsday Machine.
At best, some idiot commander screwed up. At worst, this was done by the regime.
The problem is that it’s impossible to know what the truth is. Impossible.
The “idiot commander” appears to be Bashar Assad’s brother.
Maybe Bashir’s brother appears to be wearing a dress. You didn’t see it and you haven’t offered us proof.
So at least you finally admit that you’re basing murder on appearances. Thanks.
Justin Sink, The Hill: White House spokesman comes under press fire for criticizing anonymous sources
It seems the Village is divided.
I have recently suggested what is arguably a plausible motive for the regime or regime factions here, here, here and here. That you would categorically assert there is no discernible motive, and then use this as evidence in support of dismissing the case seems a little disingenuous. I realise there is little determinative evidence at this point, beyond the growing certainty that sarin or some equally egregious nerve agent was employed. But that seems adequate reason to take at least entry-level precautions of fairness in our discussions.
There seems little point otherwise in engaging in the laborious minutiae of evidence for conflicting claims, as tempting and entertaining as that might be.
If the regime’s motive were to expose the post-Bush era United States as a nation with all the apparent moral authority of Luxembourg it would seem to have already succeeded.
Sure, Assad may have motives to use chemical warfare. So do the rebels, especially if they can blame it on Assad while UN inspectors are in their hotels fifteen kilometers away.
My question is: Who has proof?
And my corollary: How much better are Iraq and Afghanistan since our interventions?
Wasn’t arguing proof at this point. Just that we probably should be making a fair judgement, insofar as that is possible and when plausible evidence is presented.
For example, your comment regarding the military invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan seems freighted with arguments which might not even apply in these circumstances; one certainly hopes not.
Well, if we’re not arguing proof then we’re just kinda speculating who is more likely. Hmm, al Qaeda. They’ve got a clean record. No problems there. The US, they’ve never lied to us. The CIA, they’ve never used false flag ops.
Well, let the speculating continue, as long as no one gets hurt.
We were arguing motive. It was clearly stated in the diary that there was no plausible established motive for the regime to use chemical weapons. I stated otherwise and proposed what I felt was a plausible motive. I even said there was no point arguing evidence, in other words proof, if we couldn’t even agree that there was a plausible motive.
Then you come along and claim that there is no proof. As you have done about a half-dozen times in this thread alone. I patiently responded that I “wasn’t arguing proof” at this point, just trying to establish a plausible motive; half suspecting you hadn’t even read my comment in the first instance.
Your response? “Well, if we’re not arguing proof then we’re just kinda speculating who is more likely.” Whereas, as I have repeatedly mentioned, the point was to establish a plausible motive. Sheesh. Sometimes I think some of my interlocutors are attempting to win their arguments by sheer stenographic attrition; I have to actually think about what I am writing. It is tiresome, Bob, explaining what should be obvious.
It’s been pretty clear that the US, as represented by the CIA, have been on the side of the rebels for two years now. Qatar and Saudi Arabia are funding them. Turkey is in the NATO camp. They want Assad gone.
The US would love to sink Assad, additionally, because they are allies of Russia and Iran. The Syrians, Iraqis and Iranians have plans for a natural gas pipeline to run through those three countries to the coast in Lebanon, where it will compete with natural gas from the Gulf States.
MONEY. Money is a motive. Money is always the motive. It’s just that usually the people in the trenches, and I’ll extend that to you, seem to think that it’s got to do with something else.
Maybe you never noticed any of the positioning and propaganda over the last two years. Maybe, in your search for a motive you overlooked all the geopolitical and economic motives that are staring you in the face.
My bad.
I don’t disagree with much of what you assert, frankly, with the obvious exception of your speculation that I have been paying little or no attention to these issues, not to dwell on the illogical construct that in straining to find a motive I had negated two years of regional geopolitics. There didn’t seem, however, to be a single coherent point made which you wanted to discuss but I am willing to give it a try.
The pipeline. Let’s work with that if you like, I have written a bit on this in the past and feel competent and familiar. Are you suggesting the CIA conspired to kill all those people for the sake of blocking this pipeline?
Nevermind, Shaun. I hope you understand what you just did. When Germany invaded Poland at the beginning of WWII their story was that Poland had, in fact, invaded Germany.
You don’t think that the Germans lied about that and killed all those people to….
I know that the Germans lied about that and killed ‘all those people;’ well, at least Franciszek Honiok at Gliewitz, according to Naujocks, and probably another dozen or so elsewhere. But I still don’t get your point. Are you suggesting that you think it more likely that the CIA is responsible, for example, than the regime? A simple yes or no will be fine.
If you don’t want to discuss it further just say so. I’m failing to see what is being served by this discussion, frankly.
I’m saying “more likely” is useless in discussing this. The West has many reasons for tilting the fight in favor of the rebels. Prince Bandar and the Saudi intelligence would like nothing better than to suck US airpower into this mess. As Booman said elsewhere, most tiny countries don’t see an advantage of sucking the US into a war against them.
And I’m also saying that we’ve got plenty of characters who would love to run a false flag operation to knock out Assad.
So “more likely” considering the morality of all the players involved here, is a pretty useless concept.
Just seeing this comment now, and I went back and read your previous relevant comments.
Your argument is that Syria may have intentionally incited the wrath of the West for the purpose of getting themselves attacked, which they assume will leave them in a stronger position because it will pull them tighter to Russia and Iran and prevent any kind of softening in hostilities between those two countries and the West.
I give you points for creativity.
It’s worth debating.
But, you must admit, any plan that involves inciting the United States that plans on coming out ahead is either insane or stunningly brilliant (if it works).
A fair hearing is all I am asking for in this instance.
As for the brilliance or insanity of such a plan it may be easier to see it as mere pragmatism to a regime which is plausibly getting mixed signals from its immediate allies just a the moment; remembering that Russia, while fending of the NATO nations, has been overtly proposing dragging Assad into negotiations all along. Iran equally must have some misgivings although there motives and aspirations are elusive; the Rouhani presidency seems founded on rapprochement as least as far as getting sanctions lifted is concerned.
From the regime’s perspective these developments might be manifesting in alarming ways. Just sayin’. Assad or whomever seems disinclined to give up any iota of autonomy or freedom of action and has been disinclined to negotiate anything with anybody since the outset.
If one were to develop this thesis it would be tempting to make the following argument regarding the conventional wisdom of who is ‘winning’ or ‘losing’ the civil war in Syria.
First it was the insurgents, right? Then after the Sunni extremists started to get the upper hand among the rebels the West got cold feet and Hezbollah threw its weight in and turned the tide. So conventional wisdom is that Assad is on the rebound. But it ain’t exactly so. Seems to me that most of Hezbollah’s aspirations have already been met; it re-established their military chops, spiked the Sunni militants’ guns in and around the Lebanese border and the Golan and basically showed Assad who his friends really were.
But it opened a can of worms of sectarian violence in Lebanon and Iraq and made lots of other Sunni states with Shi’ite minorities extremely nervous and somewhat repressive as a consequence. Not the kind of thing the spiritual leadership of the international Shi’ite community can just shrug off.
It seems to me that Hezbollah has achieved just about all it can before diminishing returns kick in; especially at home in Lebanon. I would guess that while Iran can now turn the tap on and off whenever they see fit that it has been turned down a bit lately. And it seems the insurgents are getting a second wind.
Assuming Assad used these weapons let’s remember where they are being used; in the suburbs of Damascus where he has been slowly losing ground lately. If we are going to be forced to make judgements based on conjecture and ambiguous evidence we really need to be as clear as we can about the context.
Another view:
The UN Human Rights Commission made a referral of several Gadhafi officials to the ICC and an investigation was begun. The end of the revolution in Libya made the issue moot by killing many of those charged. “After the overthrow of the regime, Gaddafi was arrested on 19 November 2011 in southern Libya and flown to Zintan by plane, where he continues to be detained.” (Wikipedia)
What an ICC action would do is force those alleging a chemical weapons attack to present their evidence to the judges, who would then appoint an investigator.
It is not the only thing to do, but it is one thing that would honor international law and set a precedent in situations like this one.
This is a nice approach in theory. But unclear that the model of a judicial proceeding will work to find the truth in a hot war. For instance, the discovery process becomes a bit fraught when the witnesses on both sides have guns.
It seemed to be a good enough approach when the US was bringing it against the Gadhafi regime. And even in war it provides a way to independently vet the charges and place the investigation in the hands of someone not directly involved.
And the Court did call for arrests of certain people in a reasonable amount of time. What complicates that it that it restricts those people from travel to nations that have ratified the Treaty of Rome.
If the US wants to press its case, it needs the opinion of an independent body to vet its case in order to validate its credibility. Prior to the Bush administration, the US did this vetting as a matter of rolling out it case for action. The fact that the State Department especially does not want to do that same thing now seems pretty sketchy.
Given that the Obama administration has virtually no chance of promoting effective action in the UN, has lost the support of the UK and faces the disapprobation of the Republicans and the bulk of the American public I hope he goes with any proposal for a military response, now or in the future, to Congress and lets them lift the burden of this decision from his administration. I would be very interested to see what the outcome of such a vote might be.
While I certainly endorse waiting for ‘compelling evidence,’ as the British Labour Party puts it, before undertaking any military response it seems to me from the discussion in this forum over recent days that the level of proof which would genuinely satisfy most commentators here is arguably unattainable. While it seems to me the circumstantial evidence strongly suggests that the Syrian regime is responsible that is clearly a minority view in this community and any amount of, hopefully, informed discussion has made no discernible impression. Let me restate that I am not proposing military action in the absence of evidence. I am just questioning the standard to which that evidence would be subjected.
So let the awful moral responsibility of ignoring this crime against humanity be on all of our heads collectively, if that’s the outcome. It seems unfair to place it entirely on the administration under the circumstances.
Ernesto Londoño, Washington Post: U.S. military officers have deep doubts about impact, wisdom of a U.S. strike on Syria
Julian Pecquet, The Hill: Unclassified Syria briefing exposes rifts among key lawmakers
Final count: 26 members of Congress on tonight’s Syria briefing call, according to the White House. Out of 535.
Great, prove that you know where every individual in al Nusra and al Qaeda are. They must be wearing ankle bracelets for you, right? Because we know that they only travel in swarms and you won’t find one away from the hive.
Spybubble
Let’s get this straight.
Syria is allowed to kill its own civilians as long as it uses regular bombs and bullets, and not chemicals.
If Syria does use chemicals instead of bombs and bullets, it gives the United States permission to use bombs and bullets to kill Syrians?
USA! USA! USA!
I couldn’t have said it this well if I tried! Well done, well stated.