I hope that the people who get this VERY, VERY EASY question wrong will be every bit as discredited as the Iraq War pundits deserved to be for getting the question of Iraqi WMDs wrong.
It's amazing what people can manage not to know, when they're really determined.
I hope that the people who get this VERY, VERY EASY question wrong will be every bit as discredited as the Iraq War pundits deserved to be for getting the question of Iraqi WMDs wrong.
Guerrilla fighters trained by the West began moving towards Damascus in mid-August, French newspaper Le Figaro reported on Thursday.
Le Figaro reported that this is the reason behind the Assad regime's alleged chemical weapons attack in Damascus on Wednesday morning, as UN inspectors were allowed into the country to investigate allegations of WMD use.
While this was going on, the NF "best fighters in the rebellion" were getting unceremoniously driven out of Homs by the government.
The Allies didn’t fight Nazi Germany to save Jews from extermination any more, and even less so, than the North fought the South in the American Civil War in order to free the slaves. Both were welcome side benefits and occasionally effective strategies or justifications.
Wouldn't the conclusion one could draw from these observations be that that speculations about motives are less important than the actual issues at stake, and likely outcomes?
You might add, the Vietnamese didn't invade Cambodia and overthrow the Khmer Rouge for reasons of selfless humanitarianism, and yet doing so was no less of a boon for humanity. If overthrowing the KR was a good thing, then the motivation of the Vietnamese government doesn't make it any less good.
If the Russians have been playing "good cop" this whole time, and the good-cop-bad-cop routine works, the global-security issue of chemical warfare's return can be handled without military strikes.
Let's hope the Russian's aren't merely "proposing" this as a pose for international consumption, but are actually using their leverage to make this happen.
The truth is either one, or the other. Either the Assad regime launched the chemical warfare attacks, or the rebels did.
It is my sincere hope that the people who get this vital question wrong are every bit as discredited in the future as the Iraq War Pundits, who got the question of Iraqi WMDs so very wrong, deserved to be.
It's good to see that there is at least one person in the anti-strike faction who is willing to acknowledge that the Syrian Arab Spring faction of the rebellion are not Skeery Al Qaeda Mooslems. On this, as on knocking down the idiotic "false flag" conspiracy theory, you have set a standard for integrity that the rest of the anti-strike partisans would do well to emulate.
I havet to take issue with the term "second front," though. The front currently around the south of Damascus, contested by the Syrian forces that grew out of the Arab Spring protests, is both the first and the primary front in the war. It's not as though they are trying to start something new in a war that has mainly been fought in the north between NF/AQI and the Assad forces. That fight is the sideshow here.
I don't understand #1. Since when is "sharing" a non-renewable energy resource a cause of friendly relations, as opposed to a source of tension and competition?
I'm thinking of the Kurds and Sunni Iraqis "sharing" the Kirkuk field, or Iraq and Kuwait "sharing" the resources in the border area.
The "tiny" definition of chemical weapons from the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention:
1. "Chemical Weapons" means the following, together or separately:
(a) Toxic chemicals and their precursors, except where intended for purposes not prohibited under this Convention, as long as the types and quantities are consistent with such purposes;
(b) Munitions and devices, specifically designed to cause death or other harm through the toxic properties of those toxic chemicals specified in subparagraph (a), which would be released as a result of the employment of such munitions and devices;
(c) Any equipment specifically designed for use directly in connection with the employment of munitions and devices specified in subparagraph (b).
I couldn’t find a poll of American Jews on the issue of a US attack on Syria, but I’d be surprised if it isn’t actually less popular among them than among the non-Jewish population.
I wouldn't be surprised if the population in American society that has the most recent experience with poison gas turns out to be more hawkish on chemical warfare than the population as a whole.
Brian, if the USA, and the rest of the world, didn't feel that way, why did they sign the Geneva Protocols of 1925? Why did they sign the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993?
This is not remotely an open question - or, at least, isn't wasn't until last Wednesday.
I live 40 miles from a US military stockpile of 800,000 rounds of artillery that are loaded with mustard gas.
The USA has more chem weapons than any other country.
Weapons they are in the process of destroying. The initial estimate would be that they would be gone by 2012, but they process is behind schedule. Nonetheless, the US is the world leader in chemical weapons destruction, including the arsenals of other countries, who ship them here because the US has the largest and most advanced facilities.
"a victim of poison gas is no more dead than a gunshot victim."
Thank you for your opinion. The people who lived through World War I, and who knew more every kind of death in wartime than you or I ever will, didn't agree with you. What do you think you know that they didn't?
Now does the fact that they were killed with chemicals make it more heinous than if they were killed with conventional ammunitions? I’m not persuaded.
You know what I'm not persuaded by? People who started believing that chemical weapons are not different from conventional weapons, and that chemical warfare isn't really a unique problem, only after the fascist dictator massacred 1500 people with sarin bombs.
Chemical warfare has been treated as a special horror, a war crime above and beyond ordinary means of war, for 90 years. Suddenly, people like Andrew Bacevich decide that it's really nothing special, a genuine and heart-feld belief they've held since, oh, last Wednesday.
Funny how none of them ever gave any indication of feeling this way, despite that being international law for their entire lives, until it became a useful thing to say when arguing for the policy they want at this particular moment in time.
If Andrew Bacevich had five minutes to talk to the President of the United States about the situation in Syria, he wouldn't say anything on the subject of chemical warfare?
When he opened up with, "This isn't about Syria...," I assumed that's where he was going, but instead of getting into the actually important, relevant issue (which is, indeed, larger than the outcome of the Syrian Civil War), he went into general theorizing about geopolitics and an agenda for the Middle East, and didn't even touch on chemical warfare.
Problem is, this one will be much tougher than Libya
And effort with the same aims as Libya would be much harder than Libya, because Syria is larger, better armed, has tougher terrain, has a better military, and is backed by Russia and China.
However, the administration doesn't have the same aims as in Libya. Remember, the planes were flying over Libya just a few weeks after Gadhaffi's forces starting shooting the Arab Spring protesters. In Syria, they've been doing so, and the opposition shooting back, for more than 30 months.
This is about chemical warfare, and the outcome of the Syrian Civil War is a secondary issue.
"My sources for this nonsense, besides an overactive imagination ?
RT, Press TV and such."
Wow. Good for you.
Now, the quality of your information aside, your entire argument is based on eliding the difference between providing material support for the rebels (something we are, indeed, doing, but only since the June 2012 chemical attacks), and direct military intervention, something this President has not done, despite there being organized, powerful interests that have been pushing for it since early 2011.
No, Spiral, "we," meaning me, are calling things chemical weapons when they meet the definitions on the Chemical Weapons Convention, or are found on Schedules 1, 2, or 3 of the Convention.
This is a not a matter of opinion. The Convention and the schedules are easily googled. I didn't write them, so don't shoot the messenger.
"BTW, white phosphorus and napalm are banned items, but only for ohers."
No, they are not. Please stop checking your gut, and making statements that are flat-out factually incorrect.
"Finally,we did not attack saddam when he attacked iran with CW or gassed the kurds, in fact we gave a helping hand by providing saddam with target information."
Yes, Ronald Reagan sucked. I propose we do exactly the opposite of Ronald Reagan. "Ronald Reagan did this, so who are we to do differently?" must be the worse argument in the history of the internet.
Oh, and the term 'international norms' goes back a great deal further than President Obama. Really, this would be a better conversation if it was being conducted with some level of factual and historical knowledge.
RANDOM BAD STUFF 'BOUT AMERICA is a dodge, a self-congratulatory pat on the back by people who don't want to trouble their pretty little heads with the real questions.
"Not hard to understand what such supposed allies of yours are doing. They really disapprove of joining the war, but for various reasons do not want to appear opposed to the USA."
Or vice-versa: they want "somebody" to take care of the situation for them, but want to maintain their own plausible deniability.
A situation that describes a whole lot of public anti-war voices, who want to live in a world without chemical warfare, while also maintaining their self-image as holier-than-thou pacifists.
"The authoritarian war monger will probably NOT note that."
"The authoritarian war monger" has been opposed to military action in Syria for the past two years, before chemical warfare reared its ugly head.
There is one of us in this conversation who is basing his opinion on his ideological preferences and psychiatric attributes, rather than the facts on the ground, and it's not me, El Guapo.
I said "European," not "EU" for a reason. Yes, the Europeans are looking down their noses at Turkey, but it is still a European country in addition to being a Middle Eastern one.
They didn’t have any when the bombed Falluja and used depleted uranium in Iraq. Or napalm in Vietnam.
Perhaps that's because none of those things are chemical weapons. Or because none of the Presidents when those things happened were Barack Obama.
Why does a Democrate president look for new wars
In point of fact, this President spent two years pushing back against intervention in Syria before the chemical warfare massacre. Look, you don't have to agree that chemical warfare warrants a forceful response, but it would be nice if people would actually address the issue instead of ignoring it because they are more comfortable talking about something else.
instead of financing a better education system, more health care, innovation in green energy, etc. ?
This President has done every single one of those things.
Nor in this one: "President Obama found himself isolated on the Syria issue at the G20 conference in St. Petersburg on Thursday."
In fact, President Obama found himself enjoying the support of a majority of the G20 for the position on the Syria issue that he articulated at the meeting.
Meanwhile, that majority of the G20 isolated - actual, non-imaginary meaning - Russia and China with the statement: Signatories have consistently supported a strong UN Security Council Resolution, given the Security Council’s responsibilities to lead the international response, but recognize that the Council remains paralyzed as it has been for two and a half years.The world cannot wait for endless failed processes that can only lead to increased suffering in Syria and regional instability. We support efforts undertaken by the United States and other countries to reinforce the prohibition on the use of chemical weapons.
Bill, the EU member countries that are part of the G20 mainly sided with the US. Professor Cole is talking about the lone EU representative, and apparently trying to elide the difference between that representative and the constituent members.
Actually, the European governments sided with the US. Of the five European members of the G20 - France, UK, Germany, Turkey, Italy - four (all except Germany) cosponsored the US statement I quoted below.
Australia, Canada, France, Italy, Japan, Republic of Korea, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Turkey and the United Kingdom joined the United States, which is contemplating a missile strike in Syria, in issuing the statement:
The international norm against the use of chemical weapons is longstanding and universal. The use of chemical weapons anywhere diminishes the security of people everywhere. Left unchallenged, it increases the risk of further use and proliferation of these weapons.
We condemn in the strongest terms the horrific chemical weapons attack in the suburbs of Damascus on August 21st that claimed the lives of so many men, women, and children. The evidence clearly points to the Syrian government being responsible for the attack, which is part of a pattern of chemical weapons use by the regime.
We call for a strong international response to this grave violation of the world’s rules and conscience that will send a clear message that this kind of atrocity can never be repeated. Those who perpetrated these crimes must be held accountable.
Signatories have consistently supported a strong UN Security Council Resolution, given the Security Council's responsibilities to lead the international response, but recognize that the Council remains paralyzed as it has been for two and a half years. The world cannot wait for endless failed processes that can only lead to increased suffering in Syria and regional instability. We support efforts undertaken by the United States and other countries to reinforce the prohibition on the use of chemical weapons.
I've never thought that including Russia the category BRICS made sense.
The BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) are often anti-intervention. As rising world economies, they feel they suffered from imperial interventions themselves.
Russia isn't a rising world economy, but a declining one. They were a global superpower a few years ago, and now they've dropped into the second tier, and are being surpassed by the other, actually-rising economies therein. Absent the recent high oil prices, Russia would be Belorus East.
And Russia isn't being driven by a sense of having suffered from imperial interventions, but by the pursuit of its own great-power interests (the benefits of its alliance with Syria, checking the US).
It really doesn't make sense, in this case or in most cases, to lump in Russia with the rising powers in that list.
If Professor Cole ever wrote a word about a negotiated settlement being plausible, before today when it is used as an argument against the anti-chemical warfare strikes, I certainly don't recall seeing it.
When you first heard about the killing of Trayvon Martin, was your response to go through the list of racist actions by Florida law enforcement in order to argue that they lacked the "moral high ground" to prosecute George Zimmerman?
1400 people, including women and children, just died in a sarin gas attack, and what you have to say is that United State better not do anything.
Congratulations. That's some really high ground you've got there.
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas!(7) Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent(14) for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.
The special status of chemical weapons is a "fetish?"
The people who lived through World War I, and who knew more about how people die in wartime than you or I ever will, singled out chemical weapons for special condemnation and bans because of a "fethish?"
What do you think you know that they didn't?
Here are some things they knew: you can't control chemical weapons. They cannot be used a manner that provides for the protection of civilians. You can aim a bullet or an artillery shell here, where the soldiers are dug in, and not over there, where the women and children are hiding in basements, but you cannot do that with a gas cloud. The winds shifts a little, and the cloud floats away from the soldiers and over the town.
Something else they knew: the soldiers, in a war involving chemical weapons, will be equipped with gas masks and medical facilities capable of protecting them, while the civilians will not be.
You know, these assertions that chemical weapons are no different from other weapons would be a great deal easier to take if any of the people making them had given the slightest indication they felt that way before, oh, last Wednesday. This sudden, conveniently-timed conversion is about as plausible as Dick Cheney's paeans to Middle Eastern democracy.
Understandable skepticism is a feeling - and an admirable one. But we didn't just have feelings that the Bush administration was lying. We also didn't merely have rules we just made up on the internet to disqualify evidence. We caught them in lie after lie, and we didn't have to fall back on our feelings.
As for Kerry's "cakewalk," no incumbent wartime President has ever lost an election in American history. Something that has never happened before is not a cakewalk. The challenger who came closest to unseating an incumbent wartime President was...John Kerry.
We had the same confident statements about WMD prior to the Iraq war.
Claims that kept falling apart almost as soon as they were made.
I can't help but notice that none of the people assuring me that Kerry must by lying because Bush was lying have been able to come up with anything comparable to the "yellowcake" claim, the "aluminum tubes" claim, or the "Breaking Bad campers o' death" claim. Heck, they haven't even been able to point to any absurdities like "Saddam is going to give WMDs to al Qaeda." Instead, the sides seem to have switched, with the hawks hewing vigorously to the facts, and the doves pushing outlandish conspiracy theories.
Posts like this are why I come here. Excellent, insightful coverage that digs down into the internal politics of MENA countries. Iranian politics are still mainly discussed in the US as if the country was a strongman dictatorship.
I've been wondering whether the Iranians' experience with chemical warfare would come into play. Would it be safe to say that there is a generational split?
Depends on where the strikes are. The Nusra Front is in an entirely different part of the country than the FSA, and they haven't been on the receiving end of the chemical attacks.
It is often the case that fascists and military strongmen confuse democracy with weakness - Napoleon's "Nation of shopkeepers" remark, or Hitler's misapprehension that the United States was soft.
It appears that the Israeli right is showing its rather brown colors.
Johnboy, I guess I wasn't clear: I meant that the Libya operation was an outlier in that Russia and China did not veto the mission in the UNSC. I was responding to Mike Munk's claim about Russian UN action, and why they would be skeptical of a resolution to authorize force.
There are also serious questions as to whether the President is legally constrained by that resolution.
Questions that will never be answered, because the Supreme Court refused to rule on its constitutionality, dubbing the matter of what force a President can use absent authorization from Congress a "political question."
Which, come to think of it, looks an awful lot like a statement that the question belongs in the realm of politics, not constitutional interpretation.
This is an ahistorical myth, that ignores the long history of Russia and China opposing international operations, and the unique nature of their acquiescence in Libya.
Their actions since then are merely a return to the norm, and require no explanation. It's their one-off breaking of their form during the Libya debate that needs to be explained.
At the end of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," there actually is a wolf, and the boy gets eaten.
Then Obama’s own intelligence links cast doubt on whether President Bashar al-Assad had actively ordered the chemical weapons attack of August 21, which seems more likely the action of a local colonel who either went rogue or made an error in mixing too much sarin into crowd control gases.
A dozen times? This was not the first chemical attack by the Syrian government. British intelligence estimates 14 attacks. Were they all rogue colonels?
This whole fiasco of being unable to deal with possible chemical warfare has been caused by Obama who has painted himself into a corner with his ‘red line’ and his self-imposed deadlines.
That's runny, I thought it was caused by the government that gassed hundreds of people with sarin.
Does that reality come into your thinking at all, or do you have much bigger fish to fry than the mere return of chemical warfare as part of modern war?
If the United States had used sarin in a war, this place would be a shrieking hive of denunciations of the war crime, and rightfully so.
There has to be something more than just rooting against that country you hate so much.
No, May, white phosphorus is not a chemical weapon. It is in incendiary.
It does not meet the definition of chemical weapons in any international treaty, and is not included in any of the three schedules of chemical weapons.
You might as well argue that gasoline is banned by the chemical weapons convention.
If chemical warfare comes back onto the world scene because Russia vetoes efforts to punish and deter Assad, the United Nations will be in the same position as the League of Nations after the Italian chemical attack on Abyssinia.
I was talking more about bungling than pursuing (successfully) a policy direction I don't like.
Reagan certainly wasn't my cup of tea, but he wasn't, for the most part, a screw-up.
Bush screwed up the case for Iraq, the occupation of Iraq, the handling of Katrina, the federal budget, the financial system...it just goes on and on. He didn't get the outcomes he wanted, which I didn't want. He set to accomplish certain things, and completely fell on his face.
Interesting trivia: An American-French operation would be the first bilateral military action by those two countries since the Battle of Yorktown in the American War of Independence.
So the goal is to kill people to send the message that killing people will chemical weapons is wrong?
Yes. Chemical weapons are a special horror, different in kind and degree than conventional warfare.
I would take these arguments that chemical weapons are no big deal a lot more seriously if any of the people making them had provided even the slightest indication that they felt that way before, oh, last Thursday. But then a fascist dictator gassed 1400 people, and the United States objected, and suddenly the oh-so-principled among us discovered that sarin actually helps give chili that extra kick.
Neither Agent Orange, nor depleted uranium, nor white phosphorus is a chemical weapon.
Agent orange was not a munition. Neither d.u. nor w.p. are used for the purpose of killing or harming through their toxic properties. The Chemical Weapons Convention specifies that only toxic chemicals used for the purpose of killing or harming via their toxic properties are chemical weapons.
Yes, Saddam's use of chemical weapons violated the international norm. Norms function not only when they prevent something entirely, but also by minimizing the number of uses that do occur.
Double standard anyone? Since Ronald Reagan is dead, and not a zombie wearing a Barack Obama mask, I'd have to say "No."
I actually used to laugh at people when they claimed that Saddam's use of chemical weapons in 1988 was relevant to the question of whether to invade Iraq in 2003. As if the changed circumstances over a quarter century were irrelevant! That was a decade ago.
There is no spectre of UN intervention. Russia hold a veto.
Bashar Assad could make a You Tube video of himself ordering chemical warfare and dancing the tango through the hospital wards full of victims, and the Russians would still veto an action.
Which puts the UNSC in the same position as the League of Nations after the Italian gas attack on Ethiopia.
Less than one per cent of casualties in Syria are even being attributed to CW claims...If CW have been used in Syria, then preventing its further use in no way suggests that Syrian casualties and suffering will be reduced, given that at least 99% of deaths are not attributable to CW.
Interesting parallel: about 1% of deaths in World War One were attributed to chemical warfare.
Every time that western countries bypass or act outside of the UN Security Council we undermine international legality and collective security, which is not in our long term interest.
A consideration of the League of Nations and the world's inaction in response to Mussolini's chemical war in Ethiopia would probably be worth considering for those who believe in collective security, international legality, and the long-term interest of those nations that adhere to those values.
It does apply to all matters of state, but I'd say that charges of WMD usage, or planned usage, made as part of a case for war need to be weighed very, very heavily.
The comments here have shifted pretty dramatically from "Where's the intelligence?" to "I'm not going to believe the intelligence" over the past 24 hours.
The predictions and deductions people have been making about the chemical attack in Syria should count every bit as much when assessing their credibility as their predictions and deductions about Iraqi WMDs.
There will be people who were right, and people who were wrong. Once that is sorted out, I hope we don't end up with yet another "Iraq War Pundits" situation, in which the people whose deductions, predictions, and responses to the administration's case turned out to be completely wrong are still holding forth, and being listened to, as if they hadn't just completely blundered.
That the people who get this question wrong should approach similar questions in the future with a little humility is something everyone can agree on, right?
A norm does not cease being a norm because it is occasionally violated. Norms function to reduce the scope and severity of the taboo behavior, even when they fail to prevent it entirely.
I don't recall dismissing the example of the Iraqi use, any more than I dismissed the history of racist law enforcement in Florida. What I dismissed is the argument that the old history means the right thing to do is turn a blind eye today.
Napalm, DU, and white phosphorus are also not found on any of the three Schedules that are appendixes to the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Of the two "Hey, look over theres!" being bandied about, the one that is merely removed from the situation by time, party, person, and ideology is probably better than the one that is removed from the situation by the laws of physics.
Shooting a machine gun at the enemy is much less likely to kill hundreds of men, women, and children a mile away if the winds change.
I notice you switched between "a city" and "a target you want cleared of enemy troops" in your second example. Was this because you needed to throw some civilians into the former situation in order to obscure the difference between the weapons?
These conveniently-timed denunciations of the almost century-old norm against chemical weapons usage would be a lot more credible if anyone had thought to make them before, oh, last Wednesday.
Fortunately, the definition of banned weapons is laid down in international law, so we don't have to rely upon the impressions of blog commenters:
1. “Chemical Weapons” means the following, together or separately:
(a) Toxic chemicals and their precursors, except where intended for purposes not prohibited under this Convention, as long as the types and quantities are consistent with such purposes;
(b) Munitions and devices, specifically designed to cause death or other harm through the toxic properties of those toxic chemicals specified in subparagraph (a), which would be released as a result of the employment of such munitions and devices;
(c) Any equipment specifically designed for use directly in connection with the employment of munitions and devices specified in subparagraph (b).
© 2024 All Rights Reserved
I'm quite aware of both, thanks.
That is not a golden ticket for you to make up whatever baseless fantasies you consider convenient at any particular moment.
Imagination. Great, you go with imagination. I'm sure that will bring you exactly where you want, as long as you don't want truth all that much.
And I continue to castigate people for trafficking in wholly-baseless conspiracy theories, such as the rebels gassing themselves.
And I will continue to do so, and I hope very, very much that you (plural) will continue to associate yourself with this absurd fantasy.
Brian,
I am not acknowledging anything of the sort.
Your conspiracy theory is ridiculous nonsense, the equivalent of the Reagan CIA blaming Saddam's chemical strike against the Kurds on Iran.
This is not a remotely open question. Whether you are a propaganda victim or a victimizer, you are spreading nonsense.
That’s interesting, because most of the people pushing for this war on Syria are the same people who got it horribly wrong on Iraq.
You mean like Barack Obama?
I can't help but notice that you didn't agree with me about hoping the people who get this wrong being discredited.
Why would that be, Bill? Wouldn't you want people who perpetrate a Big Lie to be discredited?
I hope that the people who get this VERY, VERY EASY question wrong will be every bit as discredited as the Iraq War pundits deserved to be for getting the question of Iraqi WMDs wrong.
How about you,Bill?
Do you hope that?
"Joe from Lo,
it really isn’t a well-known fact."
It's amazing what people can manage not to know, when they're really determined.
I hope that the people who get this VERY, VERY EASY question wrong will be every bit as discredited as the Iraq War pundits deserved to be for getting the question of Iraqi WMDs wrong.
How about you, Brian? Do you hope that?
the hopeless FSA that gets their lunches eaten by the AQ crowd
Your information is a little out of date.
http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Report-Syrian-rebel-forces-trained-by-West-are-moving-towards-Damascus-324033
Guerrilla fighters trained by the West began moving towards Damascus in mid-August, French newspaper Le Figaro reported on Thursday.
Le Figaro reported that this is the reason behind the Assad regime's alleged chemical weapons attack in Damascus on Wednesday morning, as UN inspectors were allowed into the country to investigate allegations of WMD use.
While this was going on, the NF "best fighters in the rebellion" were getting unceremoniously driven out of Homs by the government.
The Allies didn’t fight Nazi Germany to save Jews from extermination any more, and even less so, than the North fought the South in the American Civil War in order to free the slaves. Both were welcome side benefits and occasionally effective strategies or justifications.
Wouldn't the conclusion one could draw from these observations be that that speculations about motives are less important than the actual issues at stake, and likely outcomes?
You might add, the Vietnamese didn't invade Cambodia and overthrow the Khmer Rouge for reasons of selfless humanitarianism, and yet doing so was no less of a boon for humanity. If overthrowing the KR was a good thing, then the motivation of the Vietnamese government doesn't make it any less good.
Please please please let this be true.
If the Russians have been playing "good cop" this whole time, and the good-cop-bad-cop routine works, the global-security issue of chemical warfare's return can be handled without military strikes.
Let's hope the Russian's aren't merely "proposing" this as a pose for international consumption, but are actually using their leverage to make this happen.
The truth is either one, or the other. Either the Assad regime launched the chemical warfare attacks, or the rebels did.
It is my sincere hope that the people who get this vital question wrong are every bit as discredited in the future as the Iraq War Pundits, who got the question of Iraqi WMDs so very wrong, deserved to be.
"And why are we so keen to assign responsibility we can’t even wait for the UN inspectors report"
Because the UN inspectors weren't charged with determining who launched the attack.
I think you're misreading the passage.
That the Assad forces launched a chemical warfare attack is not what "seems likely." It is a a well-known fact, like the moon landing.
What "seems likely," according to Professor Cole, is the motive for this attack: the progress by the particular rebel force in question.
It's good to see that there is at least one person in the anti-strike faction who is willing to acknowledge that the Syrian Arab Spring faction of the rebellion are not Skeery Al Qaeda Mooslems. On this, as on knocking down the idiotic "false flag" conspiracy theory, you have set a standard for integrity that the rest of the anti-strike partisans would do well to emulate.
I havet to take issue with the term "second front," though. The front currently around the south of Damascus, contested by the Syrian forces that grew out of the Arab Spring protests, is both the first and the primary front in the war. It's not as though they are trying to start something new in a war that has mainly been fought in the north between NF/AQI and the Assad forces. That fight is the sideshow here.
I don't understand #1. Since when is "sharing" a non-renewable energy resource a cause of friendly relations, as opposed to a source of tension and competition?
I'm thinking of the Kurds and Sunni Iraqis "sharing" the Kirkuk field, or Iraq and Kuwait "sharing" the resources in the border area.
The NSA spying issue is very important to a very small number of people, and they would all have opposed strikes on Syria regardless.
If I'm wrong - if the chemical war wasn't launched by the Syrian regime - I'll stop commenting entirely on this site.
How about you, JT?
The "tiny" definition of chemical weapons from the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention:
http://www.opcw.org/chemical-weapons-convention/articles/
Wow. That's pretty tiny.
Hopefully, the people who get this question wrong will be discredited in a way that the Iraq War Pundits were not.
Uh...congratulations?
Is there a reason other that inconvenience for a debate on the internet that makes this so difficult for you to acknowledge?
I remember when consideration of oil prices was considered a bad reason to decide questions of war and peace, at least on the left.
"some tiny definition it’s not a chemical weapon"
A "tiny definition" called the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Is there anything, JT, that isn't just an opportunity to read off the note card that happens on be on top of your stack?
The subject was public opinion among Jewish Americans, not "whatever JT decides to threadjack the conversation to."
I couldn’t find a poll of American Jews on the issue of a US attack on Syria, but I’d be surprised if it isn’t actually less popular among them than among the non-Jewish population.
I wouldn't be surprised if the population in American society that has the most recent experience with poison gas turns out to be more hawkish on chemical warfare than the population as a whole.
Yes, Ronald Reagan was a terrible person.
I suggest we not follow his lead in turning a bling eye towards chemical warfare; how about you?
Pro-Reagan position, or anti-Reagan position?
If Ronald Reagan did something, he must be right?
That is the worst argument in the history of the internet.
Brian, if the USA, and the rest of the world, didn't feel that way, why did they sign the Geneva Protocols of 1925? Why did they sign the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993?
This is not remotely an open question - or, at least, isn't wasn't until last Wednesday.
I live 40 miles from a US military stockpile of 800,000 rounds of artillery that are loaded with mustard gas.
The USA has more chem weapons than any other country.
Weapons they are in the process of destroying. The initial estimate would be that they would be gone by 2012, but they process is behind schedule. Nonetheless, the US is the world leader in chemical weapons destruction, including the arsenals of other countries, who ship them here because the US has the largest and most advanced facilities.
"a victim of poison gas is no more dead than a gunshot victim."
Thank you for your opinion. The people who lived through World War I, and who knew more every kind of death in wartime than you or I ever will, didn't agree with you. What do you think you know that they didn't?
Now does the fact that they were killed with chemicals make it more heinous than if they were killed with conventional ammunitions? I’m not persuaded.
You know what I'm not persuaded by? People who started believing that chemical weapons are not different from conventional weapons, and that chemical warfare isn't really a unique problem, only after the fascist dictator massacred 1500 people with sarin bombs.
Chemical warfare has been treated as a special horror, a war crime above and beyond ordinary means of war, for 90 years. Suddenly, people like Andrew Bacevich decide that it's really nothing special, a genuine and heart-feld belief they've held since, oh, last Wednesday.
Funny how none of them ever gave any indication of feeling this way, despite that being international law for their entire lives, until it became a useful thing to say when arguing for the policy they want at this particular moment in time.
If Andrew Bacevich had five minutes to talk to the President of the United States about the situation in Syria, he wouldn't say anything on the subject of chemical warfare?
When he opened up with, "This isn't about Syria...," I assumed that's where he was going, but instead of getting into the actually important, relevant issue (which is, indeed, larger than the outcome of the Syrian Civil War), he went into general theorizing about geopolitics and an agenda for the Middle East, and didn't even touch on chemical warfare.
That's pretty astounding.
It's illegal to vote against Bill Bodden?
Problem is, this one will be much tougher than Libya
And effort with the same aims as Libya would be much harder than Libya, because Syria is larger, better armed, has tougher terrain, has a better military, and is backed by Russia and China.
However, the administration doesn't have the same aims as in Libya. Remember, the planes were flying over Libya just a few weeks after Gadhaffi's forces starting shooting the Arab Spring protesters. In Syria, they've been doing so, and the opposition shooting back, for more than 30 months.
This is about chemical warfare, and the outcome of the Syrian Civil War is a secondary issue.
"My sources for this nonsense, besides an overactive imagination ?
RT, Press TV and such."
Wow. Good for you.
Now, the quality of your information aside, your entire argument is based on eliding the difference between providing material support for the rebels (something we are, indeed, doing, but only since the June 2012 chemical attacks), and direct military intervention, something this President has not done, despite there being organized, powerful interests that have been pushing for it since early 2011.
No, Spiral, "we," meaning me, are calling things chemical weapons when they meet the definitions on the Chemical Weapons Convention, or are found on Schedules 1, 2, or 3 of the Convention.
This is a not a matter of opinion. The Convention and the schedules are easily googled. I didn't write them, so don't shoot the messenger.
"BTW, white phosphorus and napalm are banned items, but only for ohers."
No, they are not. Please stop checking your gut, and making statements that are flat-out factually incorrect.
"Finally,we did not attack saddam when he attacked iran with CW or gassed the kurds, in fact we gave a helping hand by providing saddam with target information."
Yes, Ronald Reagan sucked. I propose we do exactly the opposite of Ronald Reagan. "Ronald Reagan did this, so who are we to do differently?" must be the worse argument in the history of the internet.
Oh, and the term 'international norms' goes back a great deal further than President Obama. Really, this would be a better conversation if it was being conducted with some level of factual and historical knowledge.
RANDOM BAD STUFF 'BOUT AMERICA is a dodge, a self-congratulatory pat on the back by people who don't want to trouble their pretty little heads with the real questions.
"Not hard to understand what such supposed allies of yours are doing. They really disapprove of joining the war, but for various reasons do not want to appear opposed to the USA."
Or vice-versa: they want "somebody" to take care of the situation for them, but want to maintain their own plausible deniability.
A situation that describes a whole lot of public anti-war voices, who want to live in a world without chemical warfare, while also maintaining their self-image as holier-than-thou pacifists.
"The authoritarian war monger will probably NOT note that."
"The authoritarian war monger" has been opposed to military action in Syria for the past two years, before chemical warfare reared its ugly head.
There is one of us in this conversation who is basing his opinion on his ideological preferences and psychiatric attributes, rather than the facts on the ground, and it's not me, El Guapo.
Maybe Italy, but Turkey has already indicated its willingness to help out. They've been pushing the US to do more for the Syrian opposition for years.
I said "European," not "EU" for a reason. Yes, the Europeans are looking down their noses at Turkey, but it is still a European country in addition to being a Middle Eastern one.
They didn’t have any when the bombed Falluja and used depleted uranium in Iraq. Or napalm in Vietnam.
Perhaps that's because none of those things are chemical weapons. Or because none of the Presidents when those things happened were Barack Obama.
Why does a Democrate president look for new wars
In point of fact, this President spent two years pushing back against intervention in Syria before the chemical warfare massacre. Look, you don't have to agree that chemical warfare warrants a forceful response, but it would be nice if people would actually address the issue instead of ignoring it because they are more comfortable talking about something else.
instead of financing a better education system, more health care, innovation in green energy, etc. ?
This President has done every single one of those things.
Nor in this one: "President Obama found himself isolated on the Syria issue at the G20 conference in St. Petersburg on Thursday."
In fact, President Obama found himself enjoying the support of a majority of the G20 for the position on the Syria issue that he articulated at the meeting.
Meanwhile, that majority of the G20 isolated - actual, non-imaginary meaning - Russia and China with the statement: Signatories have consistently supported a strong UN Security Council Resolution, given the Security Council’s responsibilities to lead the international response, but recognize that the Council remains paralyzed as it has been for two and a half years.The world cannot wait for endless failed processes that can only lead to increased suffering in Syria and regional instability. We support efforts undertaken by the United States and other countries to reinforce the prohibition on the use of chemical weapons.
Bill, the EU member countries that are part of the G20 mainly sided with the US. Professor Cole is talking about the lone EU representative, and apparently trying to elide the difference between that representative and the constituent members.
Actually, the European governments sided with the US. Of the five European members of the G20 - France, UK, Germany, Turkey, Italy - four (all except Germany) cosponsored the US statement I quoted below.
It's the so-called BRICs that dissented.
Australia, Canada, France, Italy, Japan, Republic of Korea, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Turkey and the United Kingdom joined the United States, which is contemplating a missile strike in Syria, in issuing the statement:
Wow. That's pretty isolated.
I've never thought that including Russia the category BRICS made sense.
The BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) are often anti-intervention. As rising world economies, they feel they suffered from imperial interventions themselves.
Russia isn't a rising world economy, but a declining one. They were a global superpower a few years ago, and now they've dropped into the second tier, and are being surpassed by the other, actually-rising economies therein. Absent the recent high oil prices, Russia would be Belorus East.
And Russia isn't being driven by a sense of having suffered from imperial interventions, but by the pursuit of its own great-power interests (the benefits of its alliance with Syria, checking the US).
It really doesn't make sense, in this case or in most cases, to lump in Russia with the rising powers in that list.
What's the oil interest in Somalia, then?
You know, nations do use military force for reasons other than oil. You don't even have to agree with those reasons to acknowledge this.
When John Kerry mouths off and has to walk it back, it tends to be a situation of accidentally speaking a truth, rather than making something up.
I wonder what's behind his statement that the Pakistan strikes will be coming to an end shortly?
The prospect of the American attack comes at a time when Eastern Christians feel fragile and under the gun.
IOW, it's understandable why they'd need to shore up their bona fides with the Assad government.
"Soooo bombing, hitting and killing innocent people to retaliate for killing innocent people is gonna fix everything??"
And you're complaining that it's the other side taking a facile, shallow view of the situation.
Syria borders Iran?
My maps seem to show an Iranian ally in between them.
If Professor Cole ever wrote a word about a negotiated settlement being plausible, before today when it is used as an argument against the anti-chemical warfare strikes, I certainly don't recall seeing it.
When you first heard about the killing of Trayvon Martin, was your response to go through the list of racist actions by Florida law enforcement in order to argue that they lacked the "moral high ground" to prosecute George Zimmerman?
1400 people, including women and children, just died in a sarin gas attack, and what you have to say is that United State better not do anything.
Congratulations. That's some really high ground you've got there.
DULCE ET DECORUM EST
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas!(7) Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent(14) for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Wilfred Owen
8 October 1917 - March, 1918
Maybe he should have titled it "My Fetish."
A fetish?
The special status of chemical weapons is a "fetish?"
The people who lived through World War I, and who knew more about how people die in wartime than you or I ever will, singled out chemical weapons for special condemnation and bans because of a "fethish?"
What do you think you know that they didn't?
Here are some things they knew: you can't control chemical weapons. They cannot be used a manner that provides for the protection of civilians. You can aim a bullet or an artillery shell here, where the soldiers are dug in, and not over there, where the women and children are hiding in basements, but you cannot do that with a gas cloud. The winds shifts a little, and the cloud floats away from the soldiers and over the town.
Something else they knew: the soldiers, in a war involving chemical weapons, will be equipped with gas masks and medical facilities capable of protecting them, while the civilians will not be.
You know, these assertions that chemical weapons are no different from other weapons would be a great deal easier to take if any of the people making them had given the slightest indication they felt that way before, oh, last Wednesday. This sudden, conveniently-timed conversion is about as plausible as Dick Cheney's paeans to Middle Eastern democracy.
Libya brought democracy to itself.
It takes an imperialistic, America-centered mindset to write the Libyan people out of their own history.
Understandable skepticism is a feeling - and an admirable one. But we didn't just have feelings that the Bush administration was lying. We also didn't merely have rules we just made up on the internet to disqualify evidence. We caught them in lie after lie, and we didn't have to fall back on our feelings.
As for Kerry's "cakewalk," no incumbent wartime President has ever lost an election in American history. Something that has never happened before is not a cakewalk. The challenger who came closest to unseating an incumbent wartime President was...John Kerry.
We had the same confident statements about WMD prior to the Iraq war.
Claims that kept falling apart almost as soon as they were made.
I can't help but notice that none of the people assuring me that Kerry must by lying because Bush was lying have been able to come up with anything comparable to the "yellowcake" claim, the "aluminum tubes" claim, or the "Breaking Bad campers o' death" claim. Heck, they haven't even been able to point to any absurdities like "Saddam is going to give WMDs to al Qaeda." Instead, the sides seem to have switched, with the hawks hewing vigorously to the facts, and the doves pushing outlandish conspiracy theories.
Posts like this are why I come here. Excellent, insightful coverage that digs down into the internal politics of MENA countries. Iranian politics are still mainly discussed in the US as if the country was a strongman dictatorship.
I've been wondering whether the Iranians' experience with chemical warfare would come into play. Would it be safe to say that there is a generational split?
Depends on where the strikes are. The Nusra Front is in an entirely different part of the country than the FSA, and they haven't been on the receiving end of the chemical attacks.
It is often the case that fascists and military strongmen confuse democracy with weakness - Napoleon's "Nation of shopkeepers" remark, or Hitler's misapprehension that the United States was soft.
It appears that the Israeli right is showing its rather brown colors.
Well, there goes the use of those Iranian bases.
Wait...what?
Why would American aircraft overfly Iraq to get to Syria (and western Syria for that matter?)
I haven't seen anything about al-Sadr in the American press in years.
It's an interesting journey he's taken.
It's not easy to be nuanced in the middle of a war.
Johnboy, I guess I wasn't clear: I meant that the Libya operation was an outlier in that Russia and China did not veto the mission in the UNSC. I was responding to Mike Munk's claim about Russian UN action, and why they would be skeptical of a resolution to authorize force.
Spiral,
So what?
There was an actual conversation going on. There are other topics in the world besides "America sucks!" and "Israel sucks!"
There are also serious questions as to whether the President is legally constrained by that resolution.
Questions that will never be answered, because the Supreme Court refused to rule on its constitutionality, dubbing the matter of what force a President can use absent authorization from Congress a "political question."
Which, come to think of it, looks an awful lot like a statement that the question belongs in the realm of politics, not constitutional interpretation.
Oh, well, if the Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesman said so....
Hey, don't worry, fellow with the twitching limbs; the order for the sarin attack went no higher than a colonel.
One-star at the most.
This is an ahistorical myth, that ignores the long history of Russia and China opposing international operations, and the unique nature of their acquiescence in Libya.
Their actions since then are merely a return to the norm, and require no explanation. It's their one-off breaking of their form during the Libya debate that needs to be explained.
At the end of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," there actually is a wolf, and the boy gets eaten.
Then Obama’s own intelligence links cast doubt on whether President Bashar al-Assad had actively ordered the chemical weapons attack of August 21, which seems more likely the action of a local colonel who either went rogue or made an error in mixing too much sarin into crowd control gases.
A dozen times? This was not the first chemical attack by the Syrian government. British intelligence estimates 14 attacks. Were they all rogue colonels?
The story of the Boy Who Cried Wolf ends with a wolf showing up and killing the boy.
The moral of the story is not that there are no wolves, but about the danger of setting up a situation in which no one responds to a real wolf.
This whole fiasco of being unable to deal with possible chemical warfare has been caused by Obama who has painted himself into a corner with his ‘red line’ and his self-imposed deadlines.
That's runny, I thought it was caused by the government that gassed hundreds of people with sarin.
Does that reality come into your thinking at all, or do you have much bigger fish to fry than the mere return of chemical warfare as part of modern war?
If the United States had used sarin in a war, this place would be a shrieking hive of denunciations of the war crime, and rightfully so.
There has to be something more than just rooting against that country you hate so much.
No, May, white phosphorus is not a chemical weapon. It is in incendiary.
It does not meet the definition of chemical weapons in any international treaty, and is not included in any of the three schedules of chemical weapons.
You might as well argue that gasoline is banned by the chemical weapons convention.
Chemical warfare is already on the world scene
Wrong.
The norm against chemical weapons remains in play - no serious scholar of international relations believes otherwise.
The rest of your comment is mere mud slinging and misdirection, and doesn't warrant comment.
But you're just elaborating on my point.
The League failed to punish Italy, and shortly thereafter, it was a dead letter.
The Coalition of the Billing.
If chemical warfare comes back onto the world scene because Russia vetoes efforts to punish and deter Assad, the United Nations will be in the same position as the League of Nations after the Italian chemical attack on Abyssinia.
That is, a dead letter.
It is principled.
Sadly, that principle is 'we fascists have to stick together against the democrats and Islamists.'
I was talking more about bungling than pursuing (successfully) a policy direction I don't like.
Reagan certainly wasn't my cup of tea, but he wasn't, for the most part, a screw-up.
Bush screwed up the case for Iraq, the occupation of Iraq, the handling of Katrina, the federal budget, the financial system...it just goes on and on. He didn't get the outcomes he wanted, which I didn't want. He set to accomplish certain things, and completely fell on his face.
Interesting trivia: An American-French operation would be the first bilateral military action by those two countries since the Battle of Yorktown in the American War of Independence.
Usually, bad presidents manage to damage their country only for their terms, perhaps will a litter spillover into the next term.
The US, and the world, are going to be recovering from the Bush presidency for decades.
So the goal is to kill people to send the message that killing people will chemical weapons is wrong?
Yes. Chemical weapons are a special horror, different in kind and degree than conventional warfare.
I would take these arguments that chemical weapons are no big deal a lot more seriously if any of the people making them had provided even the slightest indication that they felt that way before, oh, last Thursday. But then a fascist dictator gassed 1400 people, and the United States objected, and suddenly the oh-so-principled among us discovered that sarin actually helps give chili that extra kick.
Neither Agent Orange, nor depleted uranium, nor white phosphorus is a chemical weapon.
Agent orange was not a munition. Neither d.u. nor w.p. are used for the purpose of killing or harming through their toxic properties. The Chemical Weapons Convention specifies that only toxic chemicals used for the purpose of killing or harming via their toxic properties are chemical weapons.
Yes, Saddam's use of chemical weapons violated the international norm. Norms function not only when they prevent something entirely, but also by minimizing the number of uses that do occur.
Double standard anyone? Since Ronald Reagan is dead, and not a zombie wearing a Barack Obama mask, I'd have to say "No."
I actually used to laugh at people when they claimed that Saddam's use of chemical weapons in 1988 was relevant to the question of whether to invade Iraq in 2003. As if the changed circumstances over a quarter century were irrelevant! That was a decade ago.
There is no spectre of UN intervention. Russia hold a veto.
Bashar Assad could make a You Tube video of himself ordering chemical warfare and dancing the tango through the hospital wards full of victims, and the Russians would still veto an action.
Which puts the UNSC in the same position as the League of Nations after the Italian gas attack on Ethiopia.
Faces, how?
Shall we mail them a summons with a court date?
Less than one per cent of casualties in Syria are even being attributed to CW claims...If CW have been used in Syria, then preventing its further use in no way suggests that Syrian casualties and suffering will be reduced, given that at least 99% of deaths are not attributable to CW.
Interesting parallel: about 1% of deaths in World War One were attributed to chemical warfare.
Every time that western countries bypass or act outside of the UN Security Council we undermine international legality and collective security, which is not in our long term interest.
A consideration of the League of Nations and the world's inaction in response to Mussolini's chemical war in Ethiopia would probably be worth considering for those who believe in collective security, international legality, and the long-term interest of those nations that adhere to those values.
We make an effort, JT.
We make sure the things we say have more behind them than "I can imagine it" and "It would be convenient if this was true."
It does apply to all matters of state, but I'd say that charges of WMD usage, or planned usage, made as part of a case for war need to be weighed very, very heavily.
It is a BFD to get that wrong.
And when you aren't wrong, you shouldn't back down to people who have nothing but silly conspiracy theories and no evidence.
The comments here have shifted pretty dramatically from "Where's the intelligence?" to "I'm not going to believe the intelligence" over the past 24 hours.
Crackpot is crackpot.
How about we stick with reality-based?
Do you really think the "problem with al Qaeda" has to do with fighting against a government?
Not "back down," "hold off."
Doing what needs to be done next week is not different from doing it tomorrow.
The predictions and deductions people have been making about the chemical attack in Syria should count every bit as much when assessing their credibility as their predictions and deductions about Iraqi WMDs.
There will be people who were right, and people who were wrong. Once that is sorted out, I hope we don't end up with yet another "Iraq War Pundits" situation, in which the people whose deductions, predictions, and responses to the administration's case turned out to be completely wrong are still holding forth, and being listened to, as if they hadn't just completely blundered.
That the people who get this question wrong should approach similar questions in the future with a little humility is something everyone can agree on, right?
A norm does not cease being a norm because it is occasionally violated. Norms function to reduce the scope and severity of the taboo behavior, even when they fail to prevent it entirely.
I don't recall dismissing the example of the Iraqi use, any more than I dismissed the history of racist law enforcement in Florida. What I dismissed is the argument that the old history means the right thing to do is turn a blind eye today.
Yes, a couple days later, after gathering further intel.
The international norm against chemical weapons itself was only developed in the 1920s, with the signing of the Geneva Protocol.
Actually, the United States is the world's largest donor to the Syrian Humanitarian Resistance Response Plan. #2 is Great Britain, #3 Kuwait.
For the dictators who do Washington’s bidding, it’s all kumbaya even to the point of supplying their death squads with guns and bullets.
You might want to run that by Hosni Mubarak, Muammar Gadhaffi, and Mohammed ben Ali.
As it turns out, Barack Obama is not John Foster Dulles.
Napalm, DU, and white phosphorus are also not found on any of the three Schedules that are appendixes to the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Of the two "Hey, look over theres!" being bandied about, the one that is merely removed from the situation by time, party, person, and ideology is probably better than the one that is removed from the situation by the laws of physics.
Florida law enforcement has done a lot of racist things, and lot more recently than 1988.
So, really, they lack the moral standing to prosecute George Zimmerman. They should have just let him go, because really, who are they to judge?
Shooting a machine gun at the enemy is much less likely to kill hundreds of men, women, and children a mile away if the winds change.
I notice you switched between "a city" and "a target you want cleared of enemy troops" in your second example. Was this because you needed to throw some civilians into the former situation in order to obscure the difference between the weapons?
These conveniently-timed denunciations of the almost century-old norm against chemical weapons usage would be a lot more credible if anyone had thought to make them before, oh, last Wednesday.
Yes, John Kerry should be ashamed of his role in the Iraqi government's chemical attacks.
Wait...what?
Fortunately, the definition of banned weapons is laid down in international law, so we don't have to rely upon the impressions of blog commenters: