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An Iraq War ‘Déjà Vu’ in Syria


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Food for thought....

 

This is admittedly long.... but might give context to an equally long war we are about to enter (it would appear)

 

 

 

An Iraq War ‘Déjà Vu’ in Syria

 

There’s an ominous sense of déjà vu as the US prepares to attack Syria: dubious WMD claims, intense pressure from self-interested lobbies, a compliant mass media, a disregard of popular opposition, even a rush to remove UN investigators. This repeat of Iraq-2003 indicts US democratic institutions, says Lawrence Davidson.

 

Middle East Online

 

If you ever doubted the erosion of popular democracy in the US, the next few weeks should set you straight. The simple fact is that the voting population is the main “constituency” of politicians only at election time. Right now it is reported that approximately 60 percent of that constituency does not want the US to attack Syria.

However, it is not election time. In the post-election period, the politician’s real constituency becomes special interests, some of which are rich enough and influential enough to substitute their own parochial interests for the interests of the nation. There are a bunch of them which are now anxious for an attack on Syria.

The media is presently rife with reports that the US government, along with other countries like the UK and France, operating with the blessing of the so-called Arab League (which has become little more than a front operation for the Gulf Arabs), are going to militarily strike Syria in just a matter of days.

This will be done to supposedly punish Damascus for the alleged use of chemical weapons in its ongoing civil war. US government officials keep saying they are sure the Assad government carried out this attack, but where are they getting their information? Well, that is rather shady.

Washington won’t really say, but one can guess at the most likely sources. These might well be: (1) the rebels fighting against the Damascus regime (a great source of disinformation), (2) Israeli and Saudi “intelligence” (the Israelis have supplied Washington with supposedly genuine communication intercepts “proving” the chemical attack was ordered by Damascus), and (3) “independent medical personnel” in the area who have allegedly blamed the Syrian government.

Like the rest of the US government’s sources, these medical accusers have not been named, and as far as I can determine, the only reliable source of this kind, the organization Doctors without Borders (DWB), has said that they cannot pinpoint the source of the attack.

Even though all of these sources (with the exception of DWB) are prejudiced against the Assad regime and would not hesitate to censor, alter and outright fake evidence, Washington is “sure enough” of the Syrian government’s guilt to position naval vessels with cruise missiles off the coast of Syria. The capacity of those missiles to kill civilians is as great or greater than any weapon in the field in Syria.

If this all sounds familiar, it is because it is roughly the same scenario played out by the Bush administration in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. In that case, the “weapons of mass destruction” that President George W. Bush and his advisors told us about for months on end turned out to be products of the administration’s overwrought imagination. This is not the kind of precedent that builds confidence in the D.C. policy makers.

If this military intervention does take place (probably right after the UN weapons inspectors leave the country), it will confirm not only the strong influence of special interests but also the corruptive consequences of that influence on the entire foreign policy making process.

That Obama can be brought to repeat the fatal stupidities of Bush so soon shows that all reference to peace and security as a goal for the nation are gone and the groundwork for future 9/11s is being laid with stubborn disregard for past mistakes.

The average citizen is not going to know what is going on except through the mass media, and we know that most of these outlets will, de facto, follow a conventional government line. Journalistic investigation of policy formation, at least among the mass media, is in abeyance in this country.

For that insight you have to go to such Web sources as Consortiumnews, Truthout, Media With a Conscience and Counterpunch, among others, and only a tiny percentage of the population does so. So mass public opinion is readily manipulated and managed.

Is our situation in this regard as bad as some of the countries we scorn for having no free speech and no “independent” media? Maybe not. However, that is because our politicians and bureaucrats have found subtler, less blunt ways of filling our brains with propaganda.

Who knows? President Obama, like his predecessor, might be the biggest true believer of them all in this latest story involving “weapons of mass destruction.” In this case, someone apparently used them, but Washington probably doesn’t really know who, and, in the end, probably doesn’t care.

 

 

Lawrence Davidson

 

 

Former CIA Analyst with an Additional Interesting Perspective in Subsequent Discussion:

 

 


Dangling Questions on Syrian War

 

Official Washington’s neocons are in full-throated war cry over Syria, creating what many of them surely hope is a momentum toward a US intervention that cooler heads won’t be able to stop. But many questions regarding this latest rush to war remain unanswered, writes ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar.

 

Middle East Online

 

With a US military attack on Syria now being discussed in the media as a question of “when” rather than “if,” let us devote more honest thought to the “why.” I am not referring to any official rationale but instead to the actual political and emotional dynamics in the United States that have gotten us to this point.

Even if, as it appears, this train has left the station and has gotten beyond the point of being able to apply well-reasoned assessment of likely consequences to well-founded objectives, maybe by being above-board now about what is propelling the train we will be better able to make sense of what happened once we survey whatever mess is left by our actions and people have moved on to the stage of recriminations, second-guessing, and lessons learned.

A major part of what is happening is that the heartstrings of non-Syrians, including Americans, are being tugged by the suffering of Syrians caught in Syria’s civil war. When what appears to be an especially grisly episode occurs in this war, the heartstrings are yanked even harder.

And so there is a constituency and domestic political market for “doing something” about what’s going on in Syria. But the satisfaction of that constituency’s yearnings is unaccompanied, at least so far, by an explanation and analysis of how something like an attack by US. air power would alleviate the Syrians’ woes — bearing in mind that any such analysis would have to take full account of responses by both the Syrian regime and the opposition, responses of outsiders, and effects on the overall tempo and trajectory of the civil war.

We should admit to ourselves that the objective is more about lessening the tension on those heartstrings and inducing a warm feeling in the tummies in the same torsos, than it is about actually improving the condition of suffering Syrians. That objective is not nearly as noble as its surface manifestation makes it appear.

Supposedly the one event that most got us to where we are today regarding policy on Syria was a reported use by the Syrian regime of chemical weapons. But the basic question of why this particular battlefield development and choice of a weapon should drive US policy toward somebody else’s civil war — even to the point of forcefully intervening in that war — remains unanswered, just as it was unanswered the first time the regime reportedly used such a weapon and President Barack Obama declared that any such use by Assad’s regime would be a “game changer.”

Why should this one reported incident be given so much more status than the non-chemical warfare, by both sides in the civil war, that has killed a hundred times more people?

What we are seeing here is partly an effect of a popular fascination with all types of unconventional weapons, because they are more intriguing than plain old bombs and bullets and they provide better material for spell-binding scare stories. It is this fascination that underlies the persistent tendency to refer to chemical agents as “weapons of mass destruction” on a par with nuclear or biological weapons, even though they aren’t that.

There is a more serious concern about chemical weapons that is expressed by what is generally known as the arms control community. That community is not usually known for belligerence, but in this case at least parts of it believe forceful action in Syria is appropriate for the purpose of deterring future use of chemical weapons.

That concern leads to many other important unanswered questions. In particular: even if protecting a norm of non-use of CW is a worthwhile goal, since when did that goal become such an overriding priority, among all the other much greater US interests at stake especially in the Middle East, that it would be given determinative weight to the point of impelling intervention in somebody else’s civil war?

The norm about non-use of CW that the arms control aficionados want to protect has not been as sturdy as some would suggest. There has been repeated use of chemical weapons since the World War I experience that led to international conventions on the subject — by Egypt in Yemen, probably by the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, and most notably by Iraq inside Iraq.

That last instance was noteworthy partly because the United States turned a blind eye toward this use of CW at a time when it was tilting toward Iraq and against Iran in the Iran-Iraq War. Especially given that well-known precedent, an attack on Syria will be seen less as a deterrence-upholding blow in favor of a non-use norm than as a use of the CW issue as an excuse to bash a regime the United States doesn’t happen to like.

It is hard to see how Bashar al-Assad himself will be deterred against use of any particular weapon in his arsenal when he is fighting for his regime’s – and probably his own – life. It is even harder to see that happening if the reported use of CW that triggered the latest surge of threats was an unauthorized action taken below the top level of the regime, as may have been the case.

And what will happen, and how will deterrence supposedly be upheld, if Assad follows up with not just increasingly lethal non-chemical operations but even with additional chemical attacks? How will it be upheld, that is, without the United States getting drawn even more deeply into the Syrian war? Oh, but the sort of air strike being talked about isn’t supposed to draw the United States in like that, is it?

Much of the propulsion for the train heading for an attack on Syria is coming from elements who have wanted all along for the United States to get involved in the war there, and for whom this business about chemical weapons is just a serendipitous selling point. These elements include those of the neoconservative persuasion who never met a US military intervention they didn’t like.

Their position leaves unanswered even broader questions: What exactly is the US national interest in this sectarian civil war? What reason could there be for favoring one side or the other when both sides are dominated by those holding values that are anathema to those of the United States? How could the United States bring about a particular outcome of the war even if one such outcome were clearly in its interests? And where does this all lead, and where does it all end?

For this part of the pro-intervention crowd, the chemical weapons issue would be, just as with the Iraq War, a rationale rather than the actual motivation for going to war. And just as with that earlier war, all the attention to did-he-or-didn’t-he questions concerning unconventional weapons are irrelevant to the matters that will prove most important after the United States resorts to military force.

As has been pointed out often, a big difference between that earlier war and the current situation regarding Syria is that the incumbent US administration is not itching to go to war. Far from selling others on the idea of military action, the Obama administration is worrying about how to deal with pressure from others to take such action.

Perhaps the President and his advisers correctly see that a victory by neither side in the Syrian war serves US interests, and the best thing to do is to let the sides bash each other. As Edward Luttwak observes, the Obama administration’s policies to date have appeared well designed to do that.

The President’s reluctance to get dragged into this war has, however, boomeranged on him regarding the CW issue. As of several months ago it may have seemed a convenient way to resist the pro-intervention pressure by saying in effect, “Not now, but if they use chemicals then I’ll do something.”

Now we hear lots of talk about how given Mr. Obama’s earlier statements on this subject, he has to act to uphold his and the country’s credibility. That is another misplaced motive, because the historical record demonstrates that governments simply do not assess the credibility of other governments that way.

But even if the notion about upholding credibility were valid, for this to be a reason to launch a military attack on Syria now would not be a case of two wrongs making a right. It would instead be an example of an administration compounding a mistake and digging itself into a deeper hole.

Perhaps the CW topic of the moment is now also serving for the administration a purpose similar to what it serves for the neocons: as a convenient peg on which to hang an intervention taken for other reasons. Except that for the administration it is not because it always wanted to intervene in Syria but instead has decided — after a couple of years of unrelenting nagging from others for it do so — that it finally has to act in some forceful way.

Using a CW incident as a peg saves it from looking like it is changing a policy for no other reason than that it is succumbing to political pressure.

A glimpse of the underlying political calculations comes through in a comment from an anonymous US official that the level of military attack being contemplated is “just enough not to get mocked.” Politically, that is an understandable calibration. But it is not a sound motive to enter a foreign war.

Some of the same people who have been pestering the administration about intervening in Syria have also been berating it more generally for being too tactical and reactive, especially in the Middle East, and not being sufficiently bold and strategic. But responding with an armed attack to a single reported use of a particular kind of weapon is about as tactical and reactive as one can get.

A truly strategic approach to the topic would not only lay out a thorough sense of what is at stake for the US in Syria and what we intend to accomplish there, but also would consider carefully the repercussions of any US military action on other important US equities in the region.

There are several of those equities that would need to be considered, but take, for example, just one: the negotiations with Iran about its nuclear program. Analysts’ views vary regarding current Iranian perspectives toward Syria, but a US military intervention would at a minimum complicate the effort to reach an agreement with Tehran and at worst would kill off what is, following the election of President Hassan Rouhani, an excellent chance to negotiate an accord.

It surely would make it politically harder inside the Iranian government to sell the making of concessions to the United States. One Western diplomat stationed in Tehran says a US attack on Syria would be “a game changer for negotiations with Iran.” So we come full circle from President Obama’s comment about Syria use of CW as a game changer.

We also come full circle on the objective of controlling proliferation of unconventional weapons. The most reliable way to preclude an Iranian nuclear weapon is through a negotiated agreement placing restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program. An attack made supposedly to deter use of one kind of unconventional weapon would thus increase the chance that another nation would develop a different kind of unconventional weapon — one that really is a weapon of mass destruction.

Of course, some of those pushing for US intervention in the Syrian war are the same ones who want to kill the prospects for a negotiated agreement with Iran. That is one of the most warped motives of all for a US attack.

Edited by Rayzur
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And another:



 

Rushing to War Against Syria


In a bizarre replay of America’s disastrous rush to judgment on Iraq, the Obama administration and the US press corps seem set on brushing aside doubts about the Syrian government’s guilt for alleged chemical weapons attacks and pulling the lever on a new war, reports Robert Parry.


Middle East Online



that whoever deployed chemicals, apparently inflicting death on hundreds of civilians last Wednesday, used “improvised tube-launched missiles,” one more factoid that should raise doubts about the Syrian government’s culpability.


The idea of an “improvised” missile would suggest the role of an irregular military force without access to regular armaments. That would seem to implicate the rebels or some paramilitary force outside the government’s direct control, although it could also be a case of the government trying to disguise its hand.


Still, the evidence that “improvised tube-launched missiles” were used poses more questions about the US certainty that President Bashar al-Assad is at fault, since homemade missiles would fall within the capability of al-Qaeda-allied rebels and such extremists are known for ruthless attacks that endanger and kill civilians.


Plus, the rebels would have a more obvious motive for staging the attack, just as Syria was allowing in UN inspectors to investigate earlier allegations of chemical-weapons use. Why Assad would launch a chemical attack at that moment is one of the head-scratching aspects of this unfolding mystery.


Some neocon commentators were quick out of the gate with their own spin on Assad’s supposed motivation – that he was spitting in Barack Obama’s face and showing his contempt for the President’s resolve, but that sounds more like neocon agit-propaganda to prod Obama to retaliate than a serious argument.


And, as this hasty march toward war progresses, there’s also the troubling behavior of Secretary of State John Kerry and his State Department subordinates who initially demanded that Syria allow UN inspectors to visit the site of the attack but then – after Syria gave its okay on Sunday – began insisting that it was “too late” to collect “credible” evidence on the ground.


The Wall Street Journal reported that US officials even pressured UN General Secretary Ban Ki-Moon to withdraw his inspectors without their going to the scene and collecting evidence. Despite Kerry’s statement, many chemical weapons experts say tell-tale signs of Sarin and other chemicals can be detected months or even years after an event.


So, another question must arise: Why would Kerry not want the UN inspectors to do their best to determine what really happened?


Though it’s possible that Kerry simply believes that other as-yet unidentified evidence proves Assad’s guilt – and that the UN team is therefore not needed – there is the troubling déjà vu of President George W. Bush’s insistence that UN inspectors leave Iraq in March 2003 before they could reach a firm conclusion that Saddam Hussein’s government lacked the WMD stockpiles that Bush falsely claimed were there.


Given that history, one might think the US government would be best served collecting as much evidence as possible – and processing it as carefully as can be done – before launching another military assault on a Middle Eastern country without approval of the UN Security Council and thus outside the UN Charter.


The Media’s Lust for War


The mainstream news media’s unseemly lust for another war also recalls those dark days before Bush’s invasion of Iraq.


On Monday, as I was waiting for a plane in the Detroit airport, television monitors showed CNN with alarmist headlines indicating that a US attack could come “in hours.” To any casual observer, it would appear that CNN had been briefed on a presidential decision to attack and the missiles would fly within hours.


Only later did CNN revise the headline to indicate that the attack could come “in hours” once the President had authorized it. In other words, no decision had been made, but if one were made, the attack could be launched “in hours” – a very big if.


But the carelessness of CNN was typical of the US news media’s reprise of its performance during the Iraq fiasco. On Wednesday, the Washington Post led its front page with more credulous reporting and the headline, “Proof against Assad at hand. Chemical Attack Timeline Mapped. US military action appears all but certain.”


The article reported that “the Obama administration believes that US intelligence has established how Syrian government forces stored, assembled and launched the chemical weapons allegedly used in last week’s attack outside Damascus, according to US officials.


“The administration is planning to release evidence, possibly as soon as Thursday, that it will say proves that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad bears responsibility for what US officials have called an ‘undeniable’ chemical attack that killed hundreds on the outskirts of the Syrian capital.


“The report, being completed by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, is one of the final steps that the administration is taking before President Obama makes a decision on a US military strike against Syria, which now appears all but certain.”


Though the article reported that the administration would map how the Assad regime carried out the attack, the only detail provided to buttress the US certainty was that “only the government has possession of the weapons and the rockets to deliver them.”


Which brings us back to the New York Times sidebar on Page A6, written by Anne Barnard from Beirut, Lebanon. If you read down to – and into the middle of – the fourth-to-the-last paragraph, you would find this sentence:


“Evidence from videos and witnesses suggested that the toxic substances in last week’s attack were delivered by improvised tube-launched missiles that could be used by smaller, more mobile units than were thought to be needed for chemical weapons.”


The next paragraph noted that “Syria’s allies Russia and Iran have said the attack was carried out by rebels, who produce many homemade weapons. But the government has also used seemingly improvised weapons in conjunction with standard ones, as when its forces dropped barrel bombs from helicopters.”


However, filling an “improvised” missile with poison gas – when you have a much safer alternative – isn’t exactly like dropping barrel bombs from a helicopter. Granted, the technique might be employed as a deception, but Syrian officials would have to know that whatever ruse was used, they would almost certainly be blamed.


The logic of firing any kind of chemical weapon at this moment in the Syrian civil war rests much more heavily on the rebels, especially some of the al-Qaeda-affiliated extremists who have little regard for killing civilians if that will advance the cause.


Such doubts regarding the possibility that the United States is being lured into a military attack on a sovereign nation by an al-Qaeda affiliate should be enough to give President Obama and his entire administration pause. They should at least avoid a rush to judgment even if that means getting baited by the neocons and a war-hungry press.


I’m told that some US intelligence analysts continue to harbor serious doubts about the certainty of Syrian guilt, unlike the administration’s senior levels. Some of these analysts say they are determined to voice their concerns whatever the personal consequences – rather than following the path of their compatriots on Iraq who put their careers ahead of their duty.





 

I find it reprehensibly disturbing that enough doubt exists to stand down, and in some nightmarish repeat of history, we're seemingly hell-bent to once again ignore anything other than what suits the need for war in the immediate. Its equally disturbing that someone was able to call it to the letter as to what we would find, days before the findings were announced... that this is all so incredibly predictable days before its announced should scare every thinking person into gobsmacked stunned silence and contemplation (and then go to Flatdawgs post and call your representatives in Washington including the President and tell em to knock it off).

 


 

Edited by Rayzur
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I am completely against attacking Syria! But Obummer has made this country look weak to the rest of the world! The way he has handled this shows he absolute incompetency!! This moron has single handedly caught the ME on fire! He should be impeached for going into Lybia without Congress approval!!!! Now he cowards down and says he will seek Congress approval to strike Syria? Where's Congress on impeaching this idiot? Pathetic loser.

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I am completely against attacking Syria! But Obummer has made this country look weak to the rest of the world! The way he has handled this shows he absolute incompetency!! This moron has single handedly caught the ME on fire! He should be impeached for going into Lybia without Congress approval!!!! Now he cowards down and says he will seek Congress approval to strike Syria? Where's Congress on impeaching this idiot? Pathetic loser.

 

 

Yep you got it SXS 

Barry makes the jimmy carter administration  look strong

Their not dancing in the streets of iran and syria 

They are laughing in the streets.

Yes we are a laughing stock.

When push comes to shove once again he showed he doesnt have the guts to do what he says he`s going to do.

I did not want him bomb syria without proof so im glad he decided to wait on congress but its the way he handled it.

" I will wait till they get back from vacation then I will see what they think.

NO NO NO BARRY !!!!!!

You call their a$$`s back to washington now.

You give them 24hrs to be in their chairs.

You give them another 24hrs to answer

Its called 

LEADERSHIP  !!!!!

If the proof is there

and you have congress`s blessing

Then you say screw the UN !!

Screw Putin !!

Screw Egypt !!

Screw Great britain !!!

and you bomb the SOB`s 

straight to Hell!!!!

 

Edited by dog53
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Yep you got it SXS 

Barry makes the jimmy carter administration  look strong

Their not dancing in the streets of iran and syria 

They are laughing in the streets.

Yes we are a laughing stock.

When push comes to shove once again he showed he doesnt have the guts to do what he says he`s going to do.

I did not want him bomb syria without proof so im glad he decided to wait on congress but its the way he handled it.

" I will wait till they get back from vacation then I will see what they think.

NO NO NO BARRY !!!!!!

You call their a$$`s back to washington now.

You give them 24hrs to be in their chairs.

You give them another 24hrs to answer

Its called 

LEADERSHIP  !!!!!

If the proof is there

and you have congress`s blessing

Then you say screw the UN !!

Screw Putin !!

Screw Egypt !!

Screw Great britain !!!

and you bomb the SOB`s 

straight to Hell!!!!

 

Well said Dog. I agree!

It won't happen, because this marxistimpostersodomite does not have any credible proof.  Play the game connect the dots. Bengazzi moving arms, chem weapons by his buddies in Syria.

It is pretty clear.  Hey just my humble opinion.

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Obama is doing just what he is suppose to be doing.  He is failing and will take the blame for all the failures.  Not going to war is for the greater good of the world.  Obama is Batman.  He is seen as a failure and as the bad guy just as Batman was in the Dark Knight Rises, the third of the trilogy.  Blamed for killing Harvey Dent and looked at by Gotham as a villain.  But in reality he is taking the blame and is destroying what is actually wrong with the world.  The plan is genius.  A well planned out performance.  Does anybody seriously believe that Obama wasn't a designer President groomed for the job he is doing?  He is exposing by failing and in a strange way is actually the most transparent Presidency ever.  

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So if Syria gets into war and loses, it would financially hurt them correct? Their money would drop I'm assuming? If this is so, someone somewhere will make money off of this, right? Money doesn't dissappear correct? So, if their is money to be made in this, how can someone get in on this?

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All Excellent Articles Rayzur! Thank You For Your Bringing Them In And Your Comments.

 

Rayzur Said: "I find it reprehensibly disturbing that enough doubt exists to stand down, and in some nightmarish repeat of history, we're seemingly hell-bent to once again ignore anything other than what suits the need for war in the immediate. Its equally disturbing that someone was able to call it to the letter as to what we would find, days before the findings were announced... that this is all so incredibly predictable days before its announced should scare every thinking person into gobsmacked stunned silence and contemplation (and then go to Flatdawgs post and call your representatives in Washington including the President and tell em to knock it off)."


The Articles Said:
 

"The media is presently rife with reports that the US government, along with other countries like the UK and France, operating with the blessing of the so-called Arab League (which has become little more than a front operation for the Gulf Arabs), are going to militarily strike Syria in just a matter of days.

 

This will be done to supposedly punish Damascus for the alleged use of chemical weapons in its ongoing civil war. US government officials keep saying they are sure the Assad government carried out this attack, but where are they getting their information? Well, that is rather shady.

 

Washington won’t really say, but one can guess at the most likely sources. These might well be:

 

(1) the rebels fighting against the Damascus regime (a great source of disinformation),

 

(2) Israeli and Saudi “intelligence” (the Israelis have supplied Washington with supposedly genuine communication intercepts “proving” the chemical attack was ordered by Damascus), and

 

(3) “independent medical personnel” in the area who have allegedly blamed the Syrian government.

 

Like the rest of the US government’s sources, these medical accusers have not been named, and as far as I can determine, the only reliable source of this kind, the organization Doctors without Borders (DWB), has said that they cannot pinpoint the source of the attack.

 

Even though all of these sources (with the exception of DWB) are prejudiced against the Assad regime and would not hesitate to censor, alter and outright fake evidence, Washington is “sure enough” of the Syrian government’s guilt to position naval vessels with cruise missiles off the coast of Syria. The capacity of those missiles to kill civilians is as great or greater than any weapon in the field in Syria.

 


In another article... please read them all, very important info and views IMHO.
 

"A truly strategic approach to the topic would not only lay out a thorough sense of what is at stake for the US in Syria and what we intend to accomplish there, but also would consider carefully the repercussions of any US military action on other important US equities in the region.

There are several of those equities that would need to be considered, but take, for example, just one: the negotiations with Iran about its nuclear program. Analysts’ views vary regarding current Iranian perspectives toward Syria, but a US military intervention would at a minimum complicate the effort to reach an agreement with Tehran and at worst would kill off what is, following the election of President Hassan Rouhani, an excellent chance to negotiate an accord.

 

It surely would make it politically harder inside the Iranian government to sell the making of concessions to the United States. One Western diplomat stationed in Tehran says a US attack on Syria would be “a game changer for negotiations with Iran.” So we come full circle from President Obama’s comment about Syria use of CW as a game changer.

 

We also come full circle on the objective of controlling proliferation of unconventional weapons. The most reliable way to preclude an Iranian nuclear weapon is through a negotiated agreement placing restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program. An attack made supposedly to deter use of one kind of unconventional weapon would thus increase the chance that another nation would develop a different kind of unconventional weapon — one that really is a weapon of mass destruction.

 

Of course, some of those pushing for US intervention in the Syrian war are the same ones who want to kill the prospects for a negotiated agreement with Iran. That is one of the most warped motives of all for a US attack."

 

 

 

Maggie Asks... Just who was it that coined the phrase "Red Line"?

 

Netanyahu Speech at UN General Assembly:

Full Transcript and Video

article_photo.jpg

Netanyahu Speech at UN General Assembly: Full Transcript and Video

 

On Thursday Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the United Nations General Assembly, one day after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad addressed the international body. Though it was anticipated that Ahmadinejad would use his time to rail against Israel, as he had done in the past, his speech was relatively tame. The bulk of his address focused on restructuring the UN, which he says is skewed toward powerful states, which dominate the world order. On Monday, Ahmadinejad delivered some opening remarks at the UN, which prompted the Israel's delegation to walk out. Netanyahu is expected to address the escalating tensions between Israel and Iran, due in large part to the latter's nuclear program. 

 

****************

 

 

 

FULL TRANSCRIPT:

"Ladies and Gentlemen,

...

 

The people of Israel live on. We say in Hebrew Am Yisrael Chai, and the Jewish state will live forever."

 

**********

2:06pm: Netanyahu breaks out a diagram:

b439c74287e435e58574152f1c49021a.png

Nice visuals!

 

 

END TRANSCRIPT

 

2:12pm: Speech over. Transcript forthcoming.  

 

2:11pm: Lauds the Obama administration. 

 

2:10pm: "I believe that faced with a clear red line, Iran will back down." 

 

2:07pm: Netanyahu literally draws a red line on his diagram to show where he thinks Iran's nuclear program would be beyond the point of no return. 

 

 

read full transcript here... interesting.

 

http://www.policymic.com/articles/15409/netanyahu-speech-at-un-general-assembly-full-transcript-and-video

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by Maggie123
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