Massive use of chemical weapons in Syria, 1,429 killed including 426 children

[Crazy_Ivan80]

What's more, they've changed the continental breakfast spread to croissants.   

how austrian :p

[Razgovory]

From a Brit paper that wants me to pay:

British military chiefs are being ejected from US meetings about Syria in the first direct consequence of David Cameron's refusal to join military action.
The role of senior British officers based at US Central Command in Tampa, Florida, has been downgraded because they cannot be trusted with high-level intelligence about a conflict with which they are no longer involved, military sources say.

That's fantastic.

[CountDeMoney]

Once again, French HUMINT totally smokes the CIA.

French Spies Provide New Details on Assad's Chemical Weapons Program
Posted By David Kenner Tuesday, September 3, 2013 - 5:49 AM


As Congress debates whether to authorize a military strike on Syria, the French government has released its declassified intelligence report on the Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack in the eastern Damascus suburbs.

France, the United States' only remaining potential partner for military intervention in Syria, agrees in broad strokes with the White House's view of the attack. Both governments present evidence that the Syrian regime launched chemical weapons on rebel-held neighborhoods, likely killing over 1,000 people. But in terms of its level of detail, the French report puts the U.S. intelligence assessment to shame.

While the American report focuses solely on the most recent attack, the French provide a comprehensive look at the nature of the Syrian chemical weapons program. It includes a breakdown of the toxic agents that President Bashar al-Assad's regime is believed to have obtained: Hundreds of tons of mustard gas, tens of tons of VX gas, and several hundred tons of sarin gas.

Assad's sarin stockpiles, which is the United States says were used in the Aug. 21 attack, reveal a "technological mastery" of chemical weapons, according to the French. The sarin is stored in binary form - the two chemical precursors necessary to make the gas are kept separate, and only mixed immediately before use. This technological sophistication may be a key point when the U.N. investigators report on the Damascus attack: If they find that the toxic agent was an advanced form of sarin - containing chemical stabilizers and dispersal agents - the weapon will most likely have come from Syrian regime stockpiles.

While U.S. officials have conceded that they don't know if Assad himself ordered the use of chemical weapons, the French assessment rebuts claims that the Aug. 21 attack could have been the work of a rogue officer. France traces Syria's chemical weapons program to "Branch 450" of the innocuously named Center of Scientific Studies and Research, which Israel bombed in May. Only Assad and top members of his regime, the report says, have authority to order the branch to employ its deadly weapons. Nor does the report give credence to the idea of a rogue element within Branch 450 itself: The unit, it says, is "composed solely of Alawite military personnel...[and] distinguished by a high level of loyalty to the regime."

Like the United States, the French relied on Youtube videos of the Aug. 21 attack for clues as to what occurred - and even published six of the videos used in its analysis. The French were only able to confirm 281 casualties from the attack using open-source videos, far less than the 1,429 deaths that the U.S. assessment claims. However, the French report says that its modeling efforts, which attempt to project the full impact of the strike, are consistent with the higher death toll.

One of the biggest mysteries of this episode is why Assad would risk the ire of the United States by using chemical weapons. While some analyses suggested the rebels were making gains in Damascus, the conventional wisdom was that Assad was making military progress without the use of chemical weapons. The French report, however, suggests that Assad's position in the capital was weaker than had been supposed: "Our information confirms that the regime feared a large-scale opposition attack in Damascus," the assessment reads. The attack, it says, was intended to "secure strategic sites" that would allow Assad to control the capital, such as the Mezze military airport.

Following Aug. 21, the French claim that Assad embarked on a massive cover-up to conceal the use of chemical weapons. The Syrian military launched ground and air strikes on the eastern Damascus suburbs and denied investigators access to the area in the days following the attack, the report says. It also accuses Syrian soldiers of starting fires to "purify the atmosphere" of toxic agents. Such actions, the French assessment states, "confirm a clear intention of destroying evidence."

The French report may not change anyone's basic understanding of the Aug. 21 attack. But for those of us who try to understand the scope of the Syrian chemical weapons program, how it is operated, and the regime's assessment of its own strength, it contains clues that will be useful long after the current debate ends.

http://www.gouvernement.fr/sites/default/files/fichiers_joints/syrie_synthese_nationale_de_renseignement_declassifie_02_09_2013.pdf

[CountDeMoney]

I disagree.  I think they could. 

'France cannot go in alone' on Syria, official says
By Nancy Ing and F. Brinley Bruton, NBC News

PARIS -  A French official said his country would not act alone against Syria after President Barack Obama said he would seek approval from Congress before launching any military action to punish the government of Bashar Assad for a gas attack that killed hundreds, making Paris the last main ally in the coalition to back off an immediate attack.

"France cannot go in alone," French Interior Minister Manuel Valls said in a radio interview amid growing pressure on President Francois Hollande to put the question of intervention to a vote in French parliament. "A coalition is necessary."

"We are entering a new phase. We now have some time and with this time, we must put it to good use so that things move," he added.

The statement followed several days of prevarication among supporters of Western military intervention.

Only hours after Secretary of State John Kerry called Assad "a thug and a murderer" and accused the government of using chemical weapons to kill 1,429 people, President Barack Obama changed his mind about when and how to intervene.

On Saturday, Obama announced that he would seek approval from Congress before launching any military action against Syria. The move surprised many of his own advisers as well as military analysts who predicted U.S. Navy ships were on the brink of firing missiles into areas around Damascus. 

In a shock vote on Thursday, Britain's parliament rejected a proposal for military action in Syria.

Despite saying France needed to wait, Valls said that Assad needed to be punished.

"Chemical massacre by Damascus cannot go unpunished and the determination of the President of the Republic is intact," he said. "To gas a population constitutes a crime against humanity and it would be worse to do nothing."

Also on Sunday, a Syrian state-run newspaper on Sunday called President Barack Obama's decision to seek congressional approval before taking military action against Syria "the start of the historic American retreat," according to The Associated Press.

[Razgovory]

It's nice to know that someone in Europe can get their shit together.

I'm beginning to favor intervention.  Sorry Assad, I love you man, but gas is a no-no.

[Viking]

The idea that Viking was ever on the side of a party whose supporters are largely religious strikes me as funny.

I am a classical liberal. McCain was the best man for a classical liberal. He is also a honourable, decent and capable man who identified the agents of intolerance and actively opposed them. He was specifically and explicitly against the "largely religious" nutjobs that have no taken over the party and turned it into a joke. By picking her he shamed himself and compromised his own values.

He believes in a god.  You are utterly incapable of liking him.

ah, sigh, but just to clarify this, belief in god isn't the issue, acting in a professional capacity as a believer isn't. McCain is a functional atheist (i.e. secular) as a senator, which is what the constitution demands. I don't mind Clinton, Obama, Ford, Eisenhower, Nixon, Kennedy and Truman belonging to religions. It is just that they conducted their office in a secular manner. Seriously, Nixon was a Quaker and nothing in his professional career suggests that his religion had any effect on his policy.

[Razgovory]

Yeah, there's not indication that a guy who puts "In God we Trust" on the coinage is influenced by religion.

[jimmy olsen]

Syrian refugees have nearly increased tenfold from 230,670 a year ago to over 2 million today.

http://www.unhcr.org/522495669.html

[Jacob]

For those keeping track - the Danes (Social-Democrat prime minister, by the way) are saying that "we trust our closest allies - the US and France - when they say that they have evidence of chemical attacks by Assad; thus we are ready to support a military strike."

[Ed Anger]

Shifty Danes.

[CountDeMoney]

Danes are little Barney Badasses.

[11B4V]

I disagree.  I think they could. 

[HVC]

For those keeping track - the Danes (Social-Democrat prime minister, by the way) are saying that "we trust our closest allies - the US and France - when they say that they have evidence of chemical attacks by Assad; thus we are ready to support a military strike."

excellent. While the Danes are distracted Canada will take back our damn island.

[Ed Anger]

Canadians. 

Eggplants. 

[HVC]

Canadians. 

Eggplants. 

hey, we can't all bomb us some Muslims, we have to take what we can get. in Canada's case, that's a frozen island. let us have our dignity.