Updated at 8:20 a.m. ET: The Syrian military is prepared to use chemical weapons against its own people and is awaiting final orders from President Bashar Assad, U.S. officials told NBC News on Wednesday.
The military has loaded the precursor chemicals for sarin, a deadly nerve gas, into aerial bombs that could be dropped onto the Syrian people from dozens of fighter-bombers, the officials said.
As recently as Tuesday, officials had said there was as yet no evidence that the process of mixing the “precursor” chemicals had begun. But Wednesday, they said their worst fears had been confirmed: The nerve agents were locked and loaded inside the bombs.
Sarin is an extraordinarily lethal agent. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s forces killed 5,000 Kurds with a single sarin attack on Halabja in 1988.
U.S. officials stressed that as of now, the sarin bombs hadn’t been loaded onto planes and that Assad hadn’t issued a final order to use them. But if he does, one of the officials said, “there’s little the outside world can do to stop it.”
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton reiterated U.S. warnings to Assad not to use chemical weapons, saying he would be crossing “a red line” if he did so.
What’s the end game? Weaken Assad so we can drag out the war? Put a bunch of US troops in to play world police over a conflict that doesn’t threaten us? Create a new vacuum for extremism? I realize with our long unblemished record in the region it’s tempting to get involved.
I didn’t hear much of an outcry when the US, KSA and Russia used WP munitions against occupied positions and in civilian areas in clear violation of the Geneva Convention in Fallujah, Yemen and Syria, respectively.
What would a reasonable end game even look like? I’m kinda torn between thinking that the region has been at war for millenia and that there very well may not be a good way to look forward to governing the peoples over there. On the other hand, the US has very stable, good, strong allies, like with the UAE and Jordan, both of whom are pro western and which have muslim populations. I’d imagine that the end game would probably involve lowering energy prices, forcing the various governments into bankruptcy, making them unable to keep up with their expenditures at home and abroad (including terrorists). That’s obviously a long term (multi decade) goal, so I’d guess that containment would be the primary aim until that could be achieved. Hopefully it’d disallow the ability of groups like isis to function as well because they sell their oil on the black markets so efficiently because its a commodity and not easily traceable.
Because I dont know how many lawmakers dying to spend another Trillion dollars in the ME so they can hate us more? Its not a good situation and certainly demands a response in time but what do you want to roll tanks in and “liberate” another country? GWB turned a bad but somewhat stable area into chaos, BO didnt make it any better and increased the instability, I dont know what the right answer is but Im not dying to spend a ton of money enriching the military industrial complex at the expense of social/educational programs at home for this. What ever happened to “America First”
Air Force Col. John Dorrian, the spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq, disagrees with your statement that the US has used WP munitions in a manner that violates the Geneva Convention.
“In the foreground of the photo are 155mm white phosphorous rounds, which are used for screening, obscuring, and marking. When U.S. forces use these munitions, as required by the Law of Armed Conflict, they do so in a way that fully considers possible incidental effects on civilians and civilian structures,” Dorrian said in an email. “The U.S. military takes all reasonable precautions to minimize the risk of incidental injury to non-combatants and damage to civilian structures.”
I walk past a dozen homeless people every single morning during my daily commute - many of which i believe are vets. What is taking place abroad is terrible but we have a ton of sht to take care of domestically first without exacerbating the issue (more vets, pissing off my foreign countries). What i’d like to see is a dramatic cut back on the military offense abroad - leaving the spy community intact to maintain intelligence.
WYG, have you heard the saying, what the republicans want is a big military that doesn’t go anywhere, but what the democrats want is a small military that is everywhere?
lol I agree with all of your comfortable armchair analyst comments but why do we say things like “This is the line you will not cross!!!” and then the line is crossed and we act like the tough talking bully at school who just got called on his shit meanwhile the whole playground is pointing, laughing, and calling us a pussy.
You’re referring to 2016, I’m talking about the first fight in Fallujah, 2005 in which they publicly admitted to using WP against manned positions. Given that it is a city with a large civilian population, you could easily argue it fell beyond the Geneva rules. Separately, the British Defense Ministry has also admitted the US used napalm style MK77 munitions against occupied targets. With WP, the weapon itself is not illegal, but use against an occupied position as an offensive weapon is illegal. And they later admitted to using it as such in Fallujah.
The U.S. government has now admitted its troops used white phosphorus as an incendiary weapon against Iraqis during the assault on Fallujah a year ago. Chemical weapons experts say such attacks are in violation of international law banning the use of chemical weapons. We speak with columnist George Monbiot and the news director of RAI TV, the Italian TV network that produced the film “Fallujah: The Hidden Massacre.” [includes rush transcript]
The U.S. government has now admitted its troops used white phosphorus as an incendiary weapon against Iraqis during the assault on Fallujah a year ago.
Chemical weapons experts say such attacks are in violation of international law banning the use of chemical weapons.
On Tuesday, Lt. Col. Barry Venable, another Pentagon spokesperson, admitted on the BBC that white phosphorus was used as an offensive weapon to target insurgents."
The March–April 2005 online Field Artillery magazine has confirmed the use of WP (white phosphorus) in so-called “shake 'n bake” attacks: “WP proved to be an effective and versatile munition. We used it for screening missions at two breeches and, later in the fight, as a potent psychological weapon against the insurgents in trench lines and spider holes when we could not get effects on them with [high explosives (HE)]. We fired “shake and bake” missions at the insurgents, using WP to flush them out and HE to take them out.” [P.26]
This confirmed previous reports by U.S. Marine pilots and their commanders saying they had used Mark 77 firebombs on military targets:
Then the Marine howitzers, with a range of 30 kilometers [18½ mi], opened a sustained barrage over the next eight hours. They were supported by U.S. Navy aircraft which dropped 40,000 pounds [18,000 kg] of explosives and napalm, a U.S. officer told the Herald.
“We napalmed both those [bridge] approaches,” said Colonel James Alles, commander of Marine Aircraft Group 11. “Unfortunately there were people there … you could see them in the cockpit video. They were Iraqi soldiers.”
Not sure I agree with the logic of- We did something fucked up at one point during a previous war so we don’t have the moral high ground to criticize or take actions against a dictator to stop him from using chemical weapons on civilians.
Criticizing other countries on the basis of hypocrisy is what makes the world go round. China: “You guys polluted when you were industrializing so you can’t criticize us now.” Armenia, indonesia etc “You guys took land from, and genocided the native americans, so you can’t give us shit now.”
Actually it’s a great point. Classic American though, why let our own hypocrisy get in the way of playing world police? Haha. Get your own house in order before you try to clean up another’s. But you’re right, we should get involved so we can start shooting WP artillery rounds in there too. Maybe kill a few dozen more civilians with bombing strikes. I’m sure the civilian population will benefit from a further protracted war. Good points all around.
A little different when you only have to go back to the last time we fought in the same region a decade ago to see we do the same basic sh*t. It’s like an addiction in the US. Barely a newsblip about our own violations because “it’s unpatriotic”, someone else does something, “We need to take action!”