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Breaking: US Attacks Syria
President Donald Trump announced military operations against Syria as a response to their use of chemical weapons last week. In a 9 pm ET national address Friday, Trump said that the US is working in conjunction with the United Kingdom and France to strike targets associated with the Assad regime.
From the Washington Post:
President Trump ordered a military attack against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Friday, joining allies Britain and France in launching missile strikes in retaliation for what Western nations said was the deliberate gassing of Syrian civilians.
The coordinated strike marked the second time in a year that Trump has used force against Assad, who U.S. officials believe has continued to test the West’s willingness to accept gruesome chemical attacks.
Trump announced the strikes in an address to the nation Friday evening. He said, “The purpose of our action tonight is to establish a strong deterrent” against the production and use of chemical weapons, describing the issue as vital to national security. Trump added that the U.S. is prepared “to sustain this response” until its aims are met.
Trump asked both Russia and Iran, both Assad backers, “what kind of nation wants to be associated” with mass murder and suggested that some day the U.S. might be able to g”et along” with both if they change their policies.
A Pentagon briefing has been scheduled for 10 pm ET Friday.
https://twitter.com/passantino/status/984963247915851776
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Published in General
I happen to agree with every President since the War Powers Act was adopted in 1973 that it is an unconstitutional infringement on the President’s Constitutional authority as Commander in Chief. However, every President except Obama has actually gone Congress for support (not necessarily authority, but support) before embarking on a campaign that involved significant use of American military force. On the other hand, no President has asked Congress for authority to conduct smaller operations, such as a limited air strike, or even Reagan’s invasion of Grenada. We were already engaged in military actions against ISIS in the Syria/Iraq region. It is my humble opinion that it would be insane to ask Congress to authorize specific targets for military action in an ongoing conflict. Talk about politicizing the military!
I would imagine that some conservatives do care. Otherwise, the question is answered at #39, above.
You people are reading this all wrong. Trump will be showered with praise for doing this.
Anytime a president orders the military to bomb people he gets praise for looking “presidential.”
That’s probably true, especially when the people are in a chemical weapons storage facility.
Oh joy!
It was an okay movie.
Wait Trump faked it. Because I heard from the Russians that the Brits faked it.
Yeah, that worked so well for Johnson in Vietnam that he didn’t even dare to run for reelection. It worked so well for Bush 43 in Iraq that he left us Obama, loss of the House, and a filibuster-proof majority of Dems in the Senate. Everyone loves a war, right? Or maybe not so much.
You know, Fred, you are a fine writer. You can be persuasive. Among other things, you have persuaded a lot of people here that libertarians are automatically in favor of open borders and isolationist foreign policy; both of which happen to be untrue. Not only untrue, but an excellent example of cognitive dissonance. At least if you’re going to support letting the rest of the world go to hell in a handbasket, then support keeping the rest of the world out. In the old days, isolationists would talk about “Fortress America.” I don’t get the point of retreating into Fortress America, if you want to tear down the walls of the fortress and let any terrorist or basket case who wants to stroll across the border.
History shows, without a doubt, that there are many terrible wars that could have been avoided by a much smaller use of military force early on. Most notably, in living memory, the rise of Hitler. Sometimes, knee jerk pacifism leads to existential conflicts, total war, and tens of millions of deaths. Fred, you don’t seem willing to acknowledge that fact. I will not even try to debate whether we currently have the opportunity to prevent a larger conflict by using military force, because what is the point if your interlocutor doesn’t even acknowledge the possibility of that being true?
Conservatives that care don’t have a voice.
I must have missed something. Just five days ago we had a considerable conversation about whether anything should be done at all: One of the suggestions was to make sure we were in fact going after the guilty party (was it really Assad? and not somebody else with no regard for human life?) I missed the incontrovertible proof it really was him, but whatever. Since we now know for sure, I hope he’s personally on the list of targets. Just glad it wasn’t something Putin dreamed up to make us reprehensible to the Syrian in the street: Then what would we do?
Well, it was only an “enigma” one President ago.
We have no such right according to Constitution or law.
You could argue that we are entitled to the evidence.
Stormy Daniels faked it to.
I think you mean that no one is listening to their voice. We all have voices.
1st runner-up as Ricochet’s comment of the day.
fair enough.
A more cynical view:
I’m thinking Yemen.
Why so cynical? Or, why so cynical in that way? Why couldn’t the gas attack be a ploy by some faction on the ground in Syria to keep the US and other western nations involved in order to give said faction a fighting chance against Assad? Isn’t it possible the West is being manipulated? Cui bono? And, don’t tell me arms manufacturers. They’re not strapped for cash given the omnibus bill! Have you watched the Tucker Carlson segment?
Also, I’m extremely ignorant of the Yemen situation, but I resent being manipulated by the “starving children” story line. People are starving is sufficient to make the point. Why isn’t one of the “political solutions” the surrender of the rebel forces? Why isn’t Iran held to account for these starving people? If you don’t like what the Saudis are doing, what do you propose to resolve the situation? Diplomacy is almost always just a temporary stay of execution for the pawns on the board. One side needs to admit defeat and, sadly, starvation is effective for securing victory.
War is bloody hell. Maybe proxy wars can be bloodless through starvation, but they’re still hell. Righteous indignation is too easy.
Almost everything gets decided by force.
You’re right.
So if ‘punishing Syria for using chemical weapons’ makes no difference on the ground – except that Assad is now restricted to using barrel bombs and starvation to wear down civilian opposition – why do it?
Cui bono?
Syrian civilians? Arguably not – about as many of them end up dead anyway. So who?
I sometimes wonder if it isn’t a version of security theatre, with the target audience a domestic one.
Well, I’m questioning the gas attack first. Assad clearly didn’t benefit from this now — right after Trump has been making noise about getting out of Syria. The timing of the gas attack is suspicious and it’s also suspicious that it was so limited (this is all from Tucker Carlson’s observations). Almost as if someone in Syria other than Assad wanted a limited strike that would bring the US back into the conflict in a big (helpful to them) way.
If that’s the case, the American/western response might be seen as naive (easily manipulated), but not so cynically as to believe it is being done other than for the reasons stated — to deter further chemical warfare everywhere (not just in Syria).
Is there solid evidence it was Assad’s gas attack? I’m pretty sure the other factions have their hands on gas weapons as well.
@westernchauvinist – Robert Fisk, reporting from Douma, shares your scepticism (in fact kicks it up a notch).
He is reliably ‘off message’.
Well, yeah, it was long and I didn’t read the whole thing, but that’s what I’m talking about. I don’t think we know the whole truth of the matter and lots of factions with competing motives attempt to be narrators in the story. I’m skeptical of all of it. I don’t believe Assad is a decent man, but until someone explains how a gas attack at this time would be beneficial to his ambitions, I’ll believe this is manipulation on the part of others with different aims.
Thanks for the link, Zafar.
It’s incredibly easy to explain. You’re really overthinking it.
The first thing that you have to understand, is that Assad is under different incentives as a dictator in a weak position, than most other nation states or you in your armchair. Therefore, decisions that do not seem rational at all to us are actually very rational to them.
Even though Assad is winning the Civil War, he is still too weak to control the country. That’s why the war isn’t over yet. He does not have limitless resources to wage this war. Also, like other dictators, his power is only secure if the cadre of other powerful people in Syria continue to support him. Thus, he has an incentive to use chemical weapons on rebels, because it saves the effort that would be required to conventionally fight them, demonstrates to his supporters that he will be tough, and obviously terrorizes the civilian population into obedience.
Assad has judged correctly that the United States is not going to commit to regime change in the event that he uses chemical weapons; Obama did nothing and Trump just said he doesn’t want US forces to be there. So, the United States is less of a threat to his regime than internal elements that would seek to overthrow him if he didn’t demonstrate “strength.” Therefore, using chemical weapons is a relatively low-risk choice for him. If the US does nothing, he demonstrates that he’s stronger than the US to everyone in Syria. If he gets bombed, he still has his regime, his support from Russia and Iran, and his advantages over the rebels. Even without the chemical weapons program he will win eventually, so the costs of not using chemical weapons are actually greater to him than not using them.
Finally, if you’re still going to doubt that Assad carried out the gas attack, you need to identify someone else who was capable of carrying it out. Assad is the only person who is capable of doing it and has a motive. The rebels do not have the capability to deploy sarin nerve gas; they don’t have it or aircraft to drop it. The only other people who do would be Russia, the United States, or maybe Israel. It would be stupid for Russia to do it, Israel doesn’t have a reason to do it, and United States would only do it if this were a particularly bad season of 24.
While I don’t go as far as @westernchauvinist in thinking it wasn’t Assad until shown otherwise, I’m not ready to take it at face value that it was Assad, necessarily. I mean, everyone just seems to assume it was done on his orders. I see no reason that some of rebels couldn’t have captured some nerve gas sometime during the war and decided to use it to set up Assad and try to keep the U.S. from pulling out. The fact that it happened right after Trump said he was considering pulling out of the area might be a coincidence, but maybe not.
I’m not saying that’s what happened, but it doesn’t seem like a ridiculous scenario, either.
Let’s stop for a second and consider what is required for this scenario to be valid.
These attacks are usually carried out by aircraft. At least one of weapons used is presumed to be a bomb dropped from a plane. Let’s assume that is accurate. In order for a rebel force to succeed in staging this attack, they would have to:
1. Capture a Syrian aircraft, presumably from a military installation. Which installation is it? Has Assad lost any airfields?
2. Capture a chemical bomb, possibly from the same installation or maybe another location.
3. Keep the stolen aircraft and bomb hidden for an indetermine length of time while Assad has managed to recapture large areas of disputed territory.
4. Safely handle a chemical bomb this entire time (not a trivial task, even for experts under safe conditions)
5. Launch this aircraft, despite having no bases from which to launch aircraft, no jet fuel supply, and no pilots.
6. Fly over the target completely undetected by American, Russian, and Assad’s forces, without being intercepted. (Or, they would have to be complicit in this plot).
7. Bomb the target
8. Fly back to whatever base it launched from without being intercepted or detected (if they were shot down, that would be evidence that would give away the game right?)
9. Do all of these things, despite not having any skilled pilots or the infrastructure to do it by themselves. Which implies they need help from someone (e.g. Russia, America, Israel, UK, France) to do it. Who helped them? Nobody has a compelling reason to.
Bonus point: if the rebels did it, the smart thing for Russia to do would be to allow full inspections of the target area to prove that. The only reason to disallow that is of there is evidence that would show they are somehow complicit in the attack, if you assume Assad didn’t do it. How does it make sense for Russia to be complicit in an attack launched by Syrian rebels? It doesn’t.
Why must we assume this is accurate? Again, I’m not arguing that it must have been rebels. I just haven’t seen any evidence either way, and so have an open mind about it. “Usually” and “presumed” aren’t evidence.
No it doesn’t make sense on its surface, based on our limited knowledge. But neither does launching a chemical attack that’s guaranteed to stir up American reaction immediately after Trump expressed a desire to withdraw.
Nor have I read that the gas attack was a bombing. From the article posted by Zafar, the reporter seems to indicate this took place underground (I didn’t read carefully and it was long…). Also, I’ve heard from more than one source that chlorine gas was involved. I don’t think that’s nearly as difficult to deliver — I practically gas myself every time I wash my whites with bleach!
http://www.oann.com/oans-pearson-sharp-refutes-mainstream-media-reports-of-alleged-syrian-chemical-attack/