Hundreds (allegedly) dead in Syrian chemical weapons attack

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**Frazzled**

I'm not.

**Easy E**

I think my "favorite" part of all this is listening to some Republican lawmakers talk about using the International Criminal Court in the Hague to deal with the Assad and his use of Chemical Weapons. That made my day.

**Frazzled**

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/05/world/middleeast/brutality-of-syrian-rebels-pose-dilemma-in-west.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130905&_r=1&

**PhantomViper**

Frazzled wrote:

Exactly. Further. Oil and gas flows from the Middle East flow to Europe, not the US. Once again the US is saving Europe's ass.

Saving Europe's ass in the last few years can also be translated to: "Destabilizing the middle east with fake wars so that the oil price in the international markets is inflated and we can have higher profits when we start selling oil ourselves"...

Excuse me while I go get a fresh new batch of tin foil hats, my previous stock has just ran out.

**Dreadclaw69**

BaronIveagh wrote:
I say just pressure the UN to make mercs legal via a licensing system with contracts on file. Sure, it's a lot of paperwork, but it deals with the problem AND keeps it limited to parties who want to be involved. Don't want ot send your own army? Get out your check book.

An alleged PMC/Operator calling for the legitimization of his supposed profession? No conflict of interests there

Frazzled wrote:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/05/world/middleeast/brutality-of-syrian-rebels-pose-dilemma-in-west.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130905&_r=1&

For the work blocked -

The Syrian rebels posed casually, standing over their prisoners with firearms pointed down at the shirtless and terrified men.

The prisoners, seven in all, were captured Syrian soldiers. Five were trussed, their backs marked with red welts. They kept their faces pressed to the dirt as the rebels’ commander recited a bitter revolutionary verse.

“For fifty years, they are companions to corruption,” he said. “We swear to the Lord of the Throne, that this is our oath: We will take revenge.”

The moment the poem ended, the commander, known as “the Uncle,” fired a bullet into the back of the first prisoner’s head. His gunmen followed suit, promptly killing all the men at their feet.

This scene, documented in a video smuggled out of Syria a few days ago by a former rebel who grew disgusted by the killings, offers a dark insight into how many rebels have adopted some of the same brutal and ruthless tactics as the regime they are trying to overthrow.

As the United States debates whether to support the Obama administration’s proposal that Syrian forces should be attacked for using chemical weapons against civilians, this video, shot in April, joins a growing body of evidence of an increasingly criminal environment populated by gangs of highwaymen, kidnappers and killers.

The video also offers a reminder of the foreign policy puzzle the United States faces in finding rebel allies as some members of Congress, including Senator John McCain, press for more robust military support for the opposition.

In the more than two years this civil war has carried on, a large part of the Syrian opposition has formed a loose command structure that has found support from several Arab nations, and, to a more limited degree, the West. Other elements of the opposition have assumed an extremist cast, and openly allied with Al Qaeda.

Across much of Syria, where rebels with Western support live and fight, areas outside of government influence have evolved into a complex guerrilla and criminal landscape.

That has raised the prospect that American military action could inadvertently strengthen Islamic extremists and criminals.

Abdul Samad Issa, 37, the rebel commander leading his fighters through the executions of the captured soldiers, illustrates that very risk.

Known in northern Syria as “the Uncle” because two of his deputies are his nephews, Mr. Issa leads a relatively unknown group of fewer than 300 fighters, one of his former aides said. The former aide, who smuggled the video out of Syria, is not being identified for security reasons.

A trader and livestock herder before the war, Mr. Issa formed a fighting group early in the uprising by using his own money to buy weapons and underwrite the fighters’ expenses.

His motivation, his former aide said, was just as the poem he recited said: revenge.

In Washington on Wednesday, Secretary of State John Kerry addressed the issue of radicalized rebels in an exchange with Representative Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican. Mr. Kerry insisted, “There is a real moderate opposition that exists.”

Mr. Kerry said that there were 70,000 to 100,000 “oppositionists.” Of these, he said, some 15 percent to 20 percent were “bad guys” or extremists.

Mr. McCaul responded by saying he had been told in briefings that half of the opposition fighters were extremists.

Much of the concern among American officials has focused on two groups that acknowledge ties to Al Qaeda. These groups — the Nusra Front and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria — have attracted foreign jihadis, used terrorist tactics and vowed to create a society in Syria ruled by their severe interpretation of Islamic law.

They have established a firm presence in parts of Aleppo and Idlib Provinces and in the northern provincial capital of Raqqa and in Deir al-Zour, to the east on the Iraqi border.

While the jihadis claim to be superior fighters, and have collaborated with secular Syrian rebels, some analysts and diplomats also note that they can appear less focused on toppling President Bashar al-Assad. Instead, they said, they focus more on establishing a zone of influence spanning Iraq’s Anbar Province and the desert eastern areas of Syria, and eventually establishing an Islamic territory under their administration.

Other areas are under more secular control, including the suburbs of Damascus. In East Ghouta, for example, the suburbs east of the capital where the chemical attack took place, jihadis are not dominant, according to people who live and work there.

And while the United States has said it seeks policies that would strengthen secular rebels and isolate extremists, the dynamic on the ground, as seen in the execution video from Idlib and in a spate of other documented crimes, is more complicated than a contest between secular and religious groups.

Mr. Issa’s father was opposed to President Hafez al-Assad, the father of Syria’s current president. He disappeared in 1982, according to Mr. Issa’s accounts.

Mr. Issa, the aide said, believes his father was killed during a 27-day government crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood that year, known as the Hama massacre.

By the time he was a young man, Mr. Issa was vocally antigovernment and was arrested and imprisoned twice for a total of nine months, the aide said.

When the uprising against Bashar al-Assad started two and a half years ago, the family saw it as a means to try to settle old scores.

At first, people who know Mr. Issa said, he was a protester, and then he led fighters in small skirmishes. By last year he was running a training camp in the highlands near Turkey.

By this year, the aide said, he was gathering weapons from relatives and Arab businessmen he knew from his work as a trader and, at least once, from the Western-supported Supreme Military Council of the Free Syrian Army, the rebel forces.

(Two representatives of the military council declined to comment on the council’s military collaboration or logistical support for Mr. Issa’s group. Mr. Issa could not be reached for comment over two days this week.)

By the spring, his group had taken a resonant name: Jund al-Sham, which it shares with three international terrorist groups, and another group in Syria.

Its relationship — if any — with these other groups is not clear.

Mr. Issa’s former aide and two other men who have met or investigated him said he appears to assume identities of convenience.

But, they said, one of his tactics has been to promise to his fighters what he calls “the extermination” of Alawites — the minority Islamic sect to which the Assad family belongs, and which Mr. Issa blames for Syria’s suffering.

This sentiment may have driven Mr. Issa’s decision to execute his prisoners in the video, his former aide said. The soldiers had been captured when Mr. Issa’s fighters overran a government checkpoint north of Idlib in March.

Their cellphones, the former aide said, had videos of soldiers raping Syrian civilians and looting.

Mr. Issa declared them all criminals, he said, and a revolutionary trial was held. They were found guilty.

Mr. Issa, the former aide said, then arranged for their execution to be videotaped in April so he could show his work against Mr. Assad and his military to donors, and seek more financing.

The video ends abruptly after his fighters dump the soldiers’ broken bodies into a well.

One of the participants, a young man wearing a purple fleece jacket, looks into the camera and smiles.

**whembly**

Yeesh... Russia is offering Syria a Missile Defense Shield...

**Dreadclaw69**

whembly wrote:
Yeesh... Russia is offering Syria a Missile Defense Shield...

He's been supplying them with weapons, money, trainers, and AAA so this is the next logical step. It frustrates Obama, and it means their system might get in some actual combat testing against the weapon systems it was designed to work against.

**BaronIveagh**

Jihadin wrote:UN authorizing the status of "Mercs". All we need now is a place called "Outreach"

ROFL. I'll gladly take the first madcat off the Lockheed assembly line (you know, since compact fusion reactors seem to be their thing now). The Japanese have already built a huge mech suit. We just need something to power it and an ipod to play anime theme music on external speakers. Mount you some missile launchers, convince Rhinemetal to produce a Gatling gun in 105mm and go Gundam on someone's ass. (We all know it's coming, along with power armored marines and cybernetilly modified soldiers.) Sadly, I'm betting maint on it would be a huge bitch in the field. Probably better to stick to tanks for now.

Dreadclaw69 wrote:
An alleged PMC/Operator calling for the legitimization of his supposed profession? No conflict of interests there

It's the best sort of solution: everyone gets what they want!

**Dreadclaw69**

BaronIveagh wrote:
Dreadclaw69 wrote:
An alleged PMC/Operator calling for the legitimization of his supposed profession? No conflict of interests there

It's the best sort of solution: everyone gets what they want!

Translation; I'm in favour of getting involved in a messy civil war with no clear side to back, with no clear objective, with no long term solution, at not benefit to the US simply because I want paid

**BaronIveagh**

Dreadclaw69 wrote:

Translation; I'm in favour of getting involved in a messy civil war with no clear side to back, with no clear objective, with no long term solution, at not benefit to the US simply because I want paid

Well, think on it this way: is the money worth the lack of your own kids bleeding out in the sand someplace when it eventually becomes a really big problem? I know the US's answer to that in locations where you replace the word 'sand' with 'jungle' in the previous sentence is Yes.

**Dreadclaw69**

BaronIveagh wrote:
Dreadclaw69 wrote:

Translation; I'm in favour of getting involved in a messy civil war with no clear side to back, with no clear objective, with no long term solution, at not benefit to the US simply because I want paid

Well, think on it this way: is the money worth the lack of your own kids bleeding out in the sand someplace when it eventually becomes a really big problem? I know the US's answer to that in locations where you replace the word 'sand' with 'jungle' in the previous sentence is Yes.

Hmmmm.... sounds a little Danegeld to me.
Best solution - don't get involved. That way we aren't sending our servicemen and women into a pointless conflict, and we aren't handing money over to mercenaries either.

**Frazzled**

Dreadclaw69 wrote:
BaronIveagh wrote:
Dreadclaw69 wrote:

Translation; I'm in favour of getting involved in a messy civil war with no clear side to back, with no clear objective, with no long term solution, at not benefit to the US simply because I want paid

Well, think on it this way: is the money worth the lack of your own kids bleeding out in the sand someplace when it eventually becomes a really big problem? I know the US's answer to that in locations where you replace the word 'sand' with 'jungle' in the previous sentence is Yes.

Hmmmm.... sounds a little Danegeld to me.
Best solution - don't get involved. That way we aren't sending our servicemen and women into a pointless conflict, and we aren't handing money over to mercenaries either.

There you go. Alternatively, if you want to get involved as a nation, do it on the humanitarian front.
After all, if you really had the will to make a statement, the site it was launched from, and the headquarters of the Assad regime would be nuked, as a warning to the rest of the world, that WMDs will be met with WMDs.

**Easy E**

Nah, we should gas attack them.

Tit for Tat and what not.

**Dreadclaw69**

Easy E wrote:
Nah, we should gas attack them.

I'm sure Frazz could mention a few Mexican places near him that would produce the desired results

**Frazzled**

Dreadclaw69 wrote:
Easy E wrote:
Nah, we should gas attack them.

I'm sure Frazz could mention a few Mexican places near him that would produce the desired results

Ooooo yeaa...although the effect would be more of a thermobaric bomb then sarin. Bwoosh!

**BaronIveagh**

Dreadclaw69 wrote:

Best solution - don't get involved.

I hate to point this out, but 'not being involved' hasn't been viable or even possible since about the invention of the Telephone, and is absolutely a myth in the era of Wal-Mart and the 24 hour news network. You would be astonished the level of 'involved' that goes on in this world these days, and it all winds it's way back to big money and the corridors of power, whether in Moscow, Beijing or, Washington. I'm told, and I'm not sure I believe this, but it doesn't seem impossible, that companies in the US and Europe own 80% of the mineral right in Africa, by one means or another (the trial of Bosco Ntaganda will be quite interesting, I think, to see where all the money that financed him came from. You want to know why the US never intervened? Dollars to Krugerrands because they were financing part of the horror there).

**KalashnikovMarine**

Easy E wrote:
Nah, we should gas attack them.

Tit for Tat and what not.

Per current U.S. policy as regards to warfare, a chemical, is a germ/bug, is a nuke. Since we don't practice chemical or biological warfare, the use of such things against us can and will be met with nuclear retaliation.

Edit:

Meanwhile, here's something I think every American can agree on.

Poll: Majority Of Americans Approve Of Sending Congress To Syria

WASHINGTON—As President Obama continues to push for a plan of limited military intervention in Syria, a new poll of Americans has found that though the nation remains wary over the prospect of becoming involved in another Middle Eastern war, the vast majority of U.S. citizens strongly approve of sending Congress to Syria.

The New York Times/CBS News poll showed that though just 1 in 4 Americans believe that the United States has a responsibility to intervene in the Syrian conflict, more than 90 percent of the public is convinced that putting all 535 representatives of the United States Congress on the ground in Syria—including Senate pro tempore Patrick Leahy, House Speaker John Boehner, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and, in fact, all current members of the House and Senate—is the best course of action at this time.

“I believe it is in the best interest of the United States, and the global community as a whole, to move forward with the deployment of all U.S. congressional leaders to Syria immediately,” respondent Carol Abare, 50, said in the nationwide telephone survey, echoing the thoughts of an estimated 9 in 10 Americans who said they “strongly support” any plan of action that involves putting the U.S. House and Senate on the ground in the war-torn Middle Eastern state. “With violence intensifying every day, now is absolutely the right moment—the perfect moment, really—for the United States to send our legislators to the region.”

“In fact, my preference would have been for Congress to be deployed months ago,” she added.

Citing overwhelming support from the international community—including that of the Arab League, Turkey, and France, as well as Great Britain, Iraq, Iran, Russia, Japan, Mexico, China, and Canada, all of whom are reported to be unilaterally in favor of sending the U.S. Congress to Syria—the majority of survey respondents said they believe the United States should refocus its entire approach to Syria’s civil war on the ground deployment of U.S. senators and representatives, regardless of whether the Assad regime used chemical weapons or not.

In fact, 91 percent of those surveyed agreed that the active use of sarin gas attacks by the Syrian government would, if anything, only increase poll respondents’ desire to send Congress to Syria.

Public opinion was essentially unchanged when survey respondents were asked about a broader range of attacks, with more than 79 percent of Americans saying they would strongly support sending Congress to Syria in cases of bomb and missile attacks, 78 percent supporting intervention in cases of kidnappings and executions, and 75 percent saying representatives should be deployed in cases where government forces were found to have used torture.

When asked if they believe that Sen. Rand Paul should be deployed to Syria, 100 percent of respondents said yes.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that sending Congress to Syria—or, at the very least, sending the major congressional leaders in both parties—is the correct course of action,” survey respondent and Iraq war veteran Maj. Gen. John Mill said, noting that his opinion was informed by four tours of duty in which he saw dozens of close friends sustain physical as well as emotional injury and post-traumatic stress. “There is a clear solution to our problems staring us right in the face here, and we need to take action.”

“Sooner rather than later, too,” Mill added. “This war isn’t going to last forever.

http://www.theonion.com/articles/poll-majority-of-americans-approve-of-sending-cong,33752/

Pity it's The Onion.

**Dreadclaw69**

BaronIveagh wrote:
I hate to point this out, but 'not being involved' hasn't been viable or even possible since about the invention of the Telephone, and is absolutely a myth in the era of Wal-Mart and the 24 hour news network. You would be astonished the level of 'involved' that goes on in this world these days, and it all winds it's way back to big money and the corridors of power, whether in Moscow, Beijing or, Washington. I'm told, and I'm not sure I believe this, but it doesn't seem impossible, that companies in the US and Europe own 80% of the mineral right in Africa, by one means or another (the trial of Bosco Ntaganda will be quite interesting, I think, to see where all the money that financed him came from. You want to know why the US never intervened? Dollars to Krugerrands because they were financing part of the horror there).

More trite statements about things that don't really concern the topic at hand?
Yes we can not get involved. We've done it successfully elsewhere, we can do it here too. We should have stayed out of Syria, we should have kept our mouths shut, we should have just let Russia keep funding Assad, and made sure that it stayed not our problem. Instead we've painted ourselves into a corner to possibly take military action that achieves little to nothing in the short, medium, or long term. If we need to make a response lets make it humanitarian. It stops us getting embroiled in a pointless conflict, and stops us handing money over to PMCs desperate for a payday.

**Ouze**

Easy E wrote:
I think my "favorite" part of all this is listening to some Republican lawmakers talk about using the International Criminal Court in the Hague to deal with the Assad and his use of Chemical Weapons. That made my day.

Lulz in the direction from which it came aside, why is this a bad idea? Syria is a signatory, even though the US is not.

Dreadclaw69 wrote:
It stops us getting embroiled in a pointless conflict, and stops us handing money over to PMCs desperate for a payday.

Serious question, bro: why do you hate freedom?

**Andrew1975**

**Relapse**

I think this is just about the right line of thought whether the whether the guys holding the signs are real military or not.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/soldiers-protest-war-syria-facebook-article-1.1444535

**Hordini**

Relapse wrote:
I think this is just about the right line of thought whether the whether the guys holding the signs are real military or not.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/soldiers-protest-war-syria-facebook-article-1.1444535

It certainly seems like the popular way to oversimplify a complex situation, at least.

**Jihadin**

I'm behind them 110%

**Ouze**

While it's an oversimplification, there sure is an awful big nugget of truth in there (putting aside the fact that once you sign up, you don't get to pick which wars you fight in).

I mean, it's indisputable that, lets say we take decisive action and totally remove Assad from power. Sure, that's totally, utterly not going to happen. But lets say it does - then what?

What is the actual, functional difference between supporting these guys now and supporting the Taliban back in the day? Maybe there is one, this is a legit question.

I still vacillate on this, really hard. I think since all of our options are pretty terrible, we should pick the least worst one; i.e. the one that doesn't leave us with dead Americans and millions (if not billions) of dollars spent feeding our ever-hungry war machine.

**Hordini**

Ouze wrote:

What is the actual, functional difference between supporting these guys now and supporting the Taliban back in the day? Maybe there is one, this is a legit question.

Part of the difference would stem from the fact that the rebels aren't a completely unified group. As I mentioned in a previous post, there are a ton of different FSA units, some made up primarily of Syrian Armed Forces defectors, some made up of people from various and diverse ethnic groups and religions, including Syrian Turks, Syrian Kurds, Muslims, Christians, and Druze, as well as foreign fighters from a bunch of different countries.

Theoretically, we could only support the factions that aren't Al Qaeda affiliates, which currently seem to be the majority. Of course, there is the problem that if we give weapons or support to the FSA or other FSA-affiliated militias, there's probably a good chance some of the Al Qaeda-linked groups could get their hands on some of that as well.

So yes, it is complex and I'm not saying there's an easy answer, but supporting the rebels or the FSA isn't necessarily the equivalent of fighting for Al Qaeda in a Syrian civil war.

The Taliban, on the other hand, are a much less diverse, more unified group driven by a single religion and ideology, at least when compared to the rebels in Syria.

**Ouze**

Isn't the lack of cohesion even worse?

**Hordini**

Ouze wrote:
Isn't the lack of cohesion even worse?

In the sense that we could end up inadvertently supporting groups that we don't want to if our weapons spread through multiple groups, probably yes. In the sense that we have more options in regards to who we directly support, no. There's always a risk of any weapons or support we send ending up in the wrong hands though. Even if the FSA was a completely unified body and we decided to support them and give them weapons, there would be a chance that Assad's Syrian Armed Forces could end up getting some of our weapons intended for the FSA.

The lack of cohesion means there are more factors to consider and we certainly need to be careful about it, but it doesn't necessarily mean that it would be worse. It could open up some options, as well as close others. It's probably not a straightforward better/worse comparison.

**Jihadin**

Even though we probably be supplying whatever groups that are friendly to the West. Perception is the most of the Anti Assad forces has AL and other faction not real friendly towards the West. Rebels win the war but the groups that US favors is in the minority. Wasted effort. Who can predict after removing Assad out the picture that the next group in power is more brutal then the current regime

**cadbren**

CptJake wrote:
cadbren wrote:
Aside from spurious accusations of supporting Hesbollah or whoever, what has Iran actually done against the West?

Only 'spurious accusations? Seriously?

Spurious was probably the wrong word. What I meant was that the attacks of Hesbollah have not been aimed at the West so Iran's support of them or not is irrelevant.

**CptJake**

cadbren wrote:
CptJake wrote:
cadbren wrote:
Aside from spurious accusations of supporting Hesbollah or whoever, what has Iran actually done against the West?

Only 'spurious accusations? Seriously?

Spurious was probably the wrong word. What I meant was that the attacks of Hesbollah have not been aimed at the West so Iran's support of them or not is irrelevant.

And that statement would be wrong too. You may want to look up the 1983 bombing in Beirut which very specifically targeted US marines and French troops. That is not close to the only attack. Plenty of other bombings and kidnappings where US citizens were the targets. Some of their ops in South and Central America have targeted our interests too.

And using Hez is not the only way Iran has acted violently against US and other Western nations. Others have pointed out the Iranian provided IEDs used against US troops in Iraq, I'll also point out the Quds force troops captured and in a couple cases killed in Iraq. Of course the taking of the US Embassy in '79 wasn't exactly peaceful. There are lots of examples over the last few decades.

You may be able to argue the 'why' there have been attacks, to deny they ever occurred is willful ignorance.