Late last night we flagged the New York Times report claiming that “momentum for Western military strikes against Syria appeared to slow,” following the UK Parliament’s stunning vote to reject military intervention there, after Prime Minister David Cameron’s government released a fairly thin intelligence assessment and a less-than-persuasive legal theory for taking such action.
Today, the U.S. released its own unclassified intelligence community assessment of what they describe as “high confidence” that the Syrian regime — at least someone within it — launched a large chemical weapons attack on neighborhoods near Damascus on August 21.
The attack, the assessment says, resulted in the death of 1,429 people, “including at least 426 children”. According to the document, the “high confidence” assessment is “the strongest position that the U.S. Intelligence Community can take short of confirmation.”
Along with the release of that assessment, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry offered a very straightforward statement (worth reading in full). Please note, however, that the intel assessment, as well as Kerry’s statement, did not include the actual first-hand evidence from which the intelligence community is making their assessment, only their evaluation and summary of that evidence. The Administration says they are sharing more of the actual, still-classified assessment and/or evidence with members of Congress.
Kerry noted during his remarks that the intelligence community has been “more than mindful of the Iraq experience,” and promised, “We will not repeat that moment.” He also added: “the American people are tired of war. Believe me, I am too. But fatigue does not absolve us of our responsibility.”
For his part, the President, in a statement made just before a White House meeting this afternoon, announced that he has made no final decision on action in Syria, but is currently considering a “limited narrow act” which, he says, “in no way involves boots on the ground” or a “long term campaign.”
While both Kerry’s remarks and Obama’s brief comments referenced “consultation” with Congress, neither noted either the legal or Constitutional requirement to receive authorization from them, as we called for earlier, before launching a military intervention, “limited”, “narrow” or otherwise, other than in a case of “national emergency”.
Both men did, however, offer the case that we must demonstrate the world means what it says about the use of chemical weapons, as banned by the Geneva Convention after WWI and again in various treaties in the nearly 100 years since then.
With all of that in mind — and, for now, taking the U.S. intelligence assessment at face value for the purposes of this article — the central point here seems to be that, while killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people with conventional weapons is, apparently, tolerable, using chemical weapons to kill some of them is a war crime. And war crimes, we are told, are a bridge too far.
Really?…
It should also be noted that Kerry asked rhetorically, while describing the necessity of taking action in order to send a message to “Iran…Hezbollah, and North Korea, and every other terrorist group or dictator that might ever again contemplate the use of weapons of mass destruction”:
Wait. Our “limited narrow act” would be enough to “stop…those weapons’ current or future use”? That would be an impressive “limited narrow act.”
Moreover, the question remains, even if one takes the evidence at face value — which, at this point, remains a matter of “do you trust the U.S. government to give you accurate information or not?” — what should be done about it by our country, and is it the job of the U.S. to do so, particularly on its own?
To that end, here’s a quick, sharp point, related to all of this and very much worth noting. It was made by David Atkins at Hullabaloo yesterday morning. (NOTE: It was written prior to today’s remarks by Kerry and Obama, and before the U.S. assessment that some 1,400 were killed in a chemical weapons attack, as opposed to the “few hundreds” Atkins references)…
…
None of us mere mortals have access to the intelligence briefings the White House gets. But what has been leaked down from on high suggests that the attack was probably not sanctioned by Assad himself (after all, it would be a woefully ill-considered strategic move on his part) but by rogue elements allied to his regime. Current discussion of a bombing campaign seems to be targeted toward punishing those rogue elements in particular. If, in fact, that is what happened.
Intervention in this situation is somewhat perplexing. After watching tens of thousands of Syrians die in a brutal civil war, the United States seems determined to use bombs on a rogue faction of an oppressive regime based on murky intelligence in order not to alter the course of the civil war, but to defend the narrow principle that it’s OK to kill people with bombs but not with poisonous gas. That doesn’t sound like a great idea.
Either it’s worth taking a side in the Syrian civil war, or it isn’t. Either it’s worth the blood and treasure to end the conflict and hold the war criminals to account, or it isn’t. Bombing a country to prove a point about observing internationally sanctioned methods of killing seems unjustifiable. If the United States is less intent on saving lives in Syria than on proving to the United Nations how much we care about observing international war crimes law, we would do better to begin by delivering Dick Cheney to the Hague, instead.
Good point.
For more, see our article from last night, calling on Congress to convene, debate and vote up or down — just as the British Parliament did yesterday, when they flatly rejected the idea, for now — on whether the President should be given legal and/or Constitutional authorization to intervene militarily in Syria.
“Moreover, the question remains, even if one takes the evidence at face value — which, at this point, remains a matter of “do you trust the U.S. government to give you accurate information or not?” ”
At this point, NOT. Not after the ridiculous things the Gov’t has told us with the Snowden leaks. Every time they say something, documents come out and prove them to be liars. I’m looking at you, Clapper & Co.
Those rabid dog idiots at RAWSTORY are sure that Obama ‘ginned up’ this horrendous atrocity as a threat to U.S. interests (Israel) just to show off what the NSA can do.
Snowden even leaked more info on overseas spying possibly on the very day of this.
The great NSA captured for example the telephone calls between commanders confirming the mass murder and conveying worries about being discovered. The U.S. knows some missiles came from a stronghold of General Maher Assad.
My beef is that the NSA, CIA and Obama must know in detail the horrors of Syria for the prior 2 years, and only now action can be carried out.
A long list of War Crimes by Assad, but he cannily only murders 5 – 25- 250 at a time, ignored by the world mostly.
Coverage on radio – only NPR (nothing we can do) and Democracy Now (stooges of Assad) is it.
Irwin Mainway spewed @ 2:
Wow, very jihadist of you, Irwin. Keep up the ridiculously bad and irresponsible work!
On All In With Chris Hayes 90 minutes ago – “what about Fallujah and white phosphorus” (paraphrased) is how Amy Goodman started off.
First time in years this has been brought up on a major network.
Admitting to a war crime (2005 NBCNEWS): “Lt. Col. Barry Venable, a Pentagon spokesman, said Tuesday that while white phosphorus is most frequently used to mark targets or obscure a position, it was used at times in Fallujah as an incendiary weapon against enemy combatants.”
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/10064711/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/t/us-denies-using-phosphorus-against-civilians/#.UiFPaH_hccI
Doesn’t mean we just sit on our hands as Assad bombs more schools in Aleppo with incendiary weapons. That happened today.
FWIW, I found this piece about Bandar (Bush) being the supplier of Chemical weapons to the rebels in Syria. http://www.syrianews.cc/syrians-ghouta-chemicals-saudi-arabia/
Credibility of the military NSA is an issue.
That is why they should never do dragnet lying or carpet bombing with propaganda.
Trusting them now is blind faith.
They have the burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Their feudal cognition reeks of selfish ideology not befitting a democracy:
(American Feudalism – 3). Their self-interest which they have surreptitiously crafted during the past decade of warlust has taken us back to the dark ages.
So, someone needs to ask Kerry and Obama, “How many Syrians do we have to kill to stop the senseless killing of Syrians?”
So, if we commit an act of war against a country that we are currently not at war with – Syria – that gives them the right to counter attack us, right? Casus Belli, the justification for an act of war. Assad would have it at that point. Do we assume he’s a totally rational actor who is just going to stand by and take his punishment for his supposed atrocity? What if he decides to actually turn chemical weapon armed missiles on a U. S. warship engaged in attacking him? What would happen if Obama suddenly had several hundred dead U. S. sailors on his hands? Scorched Earth response of an all-out attack on the Syrian Presidential palace? Take out Assad and we would own Syria and whatever happens there next, and it probably would not be an outcome we would like.
I’m no fan of Assad, or any other dictator for that matter. As far as I’m concerned, there is no such thing as a legitimate dictatorship in the 21st Century, and the people living under such governments have every right to overthrow them and kill their leaders in the slowest, cruelest, most painful way they can devise, and then parade their heads around on a pike as a warning to others who would usurp the democratic process. That said, it is up to the people of Syria to resolve this. Every time we get involved in this sort of thing we make it worse. And if Obama does this on his own, as far as I’m concerned it’s another impeachable offense to be added to the growing list of those he has already committed, but none of which either major party wants to talk about.
Obama, Kerry, and all the other Syrian war hawks are not right in the head. After all the lies, war crimes, violations of international and domestic law, and acts of terrorism committed by this country over the last decade plus(to say nothing of our previous decades of hypocrisy and lawlessness), to posture as if we are operating from some moral high ground is utter and despicable madness.
That our “leaders”(and so many others in the media and citizenry) seem incapable of understanding that more acts of war only worsen situations in need of remedy is horrifying, unconscionable, and mystifying.
Eqbal Ahmad had it right in this 1998 speech and he’s still right. Here it is again–Terrorism: Theirs and Ours
http://www.sangam.org/ANALYSIS/Ahmad.htm