I don’t know if it’ll sway you at all. But since I first agreed with you, I’ve had the chance to hear from a few military analysts (pros of covering A&D) and read similar accounts all saying that because of the technology and type of gas involved it’s almost an impossibility that the rebels could have been responsible or even possessed the gas.
^what does their analysis say about the reasoning behind it?
That’s interesting because Saddam used a lot of gas during his time to kill civs, and a lot of bathists were involved in starting Isis, so you’d think the reasoning would stand up more. Oh well
I honestly think they just thought they could get away with it. I think the small scale of the attack (the US isolated it to a single aircraft) and the remoteness of the town involved could have meant they were just dipping a toe in the water to gauge our reaction thinking we wouldn’t counterattack. Maybe depending on the response they would have gone further with it to speed the war. It’s been a bloody war on all sides. Beats me, but then again, I’m looking at it from an outside view.
Given the Reagan parallel and tough guy image that Trump is pushing, that seems like a particularly poor plan.
shooting a few missiles at an empty airfield is sending a message? Its not like Syria doesnt already know we could steamroll them. Its just as likely Trump administration and Russia are “creating” some tension to throw off calls of collusion btw Trump admin & Russia who knows. Im with BS, if this is an Isolated response and were not dicking around there Im fine with it. But lets not act like we know all the facts and this is some huge deal, its a shame if Assad used chemical weapons but again I dont see why? Seems silly but then again world leaders always do stupid things that have little upside.
I agree with you, but the airfield wasn’t empty. We purposely didn’t hit Russian aircraft that were parked there but destroyed a number of Syrian aircraft, bunkers and facilities in the process. It will definitely cripple their ability to operate from that base and cost them north of $100M if we got even a few F16’s. It also sends a nice warning not to continue down this path, which is really all anyone wanted. Apparently CNN just mentioned that despite being warned, the Russians didn’t use surface to air batteries they had in place that could have shot those missiles down, so they chose to be complicit in this as well. In my mind, if the world can just move on and agree to not use more chemical weapons in Syria (obviously remains to be seen) this was a success.
At the same time, it occurred to me that this may have been part of a bigger picture. Realize that after chemical weapons were used earlier in this war, in 2013, Russia signed an agreement to disarm Syria’s chemical weapons. Clearly that didn’t occur. As we’re meeting with China about North Korea the administration uses this low risk, low damage way to add some pressure to that conversation.
As disgusting as this sounds, weakening the Assad regime will only make Syria and the region more dangerous. There is no moderate, stable government “in waiting”. The alternative is worse and in such a lose-lose scenario it’s wiser to stay out of things.
I get the feeling this was just a “practice round” for when Trump bombs North Korea or other places…
^^^ oh yea i misspoke in that sense, i meant as in i believe i read no reported deaths when i said empty. Yea i dont think this is a huge deal, i dont hate trump for it im hardly going to praise him. Not exactly much different from the drone strikes and JSOC raids weve been doing since the mid 2000’s imo.
I really dont know how much value this adds to any discussion with China. China doesnt need to fear the US in any way shape or form, much as Russia doesnt. They will all continue to keep playing with their proxies at the expense of the lives of people in those countries unfortunately. Although it does appear China is growing tired of dealing with NK
I just meant in that China may up pressure with NK to avoid us taking action against NK.
I agree. I don’t think this attack was meant in any way to sway the balance.
Going to be interesting to see what the fallout is going to be after the missile launch.
its possible, China could certainly use more cooperation on NK as leverage to get some thing they want as well. Interested to see what happens with the Xi meetings as there are certainly a lot of possible outcomes
I don’t know why, but I have this image of Trump and Xi sitting together watching a live feed of the strike on Trump’s iPhone and giggling like little girls every time something explodes.
This is why you can’t have inexperienced people in the state department. This all started with Tillerson basically saying we would stay out of Syria which either emboldened Assad to use chemical weapons or pissed off the resistance (ISIS) enough for them to use them to try and draw us in.
LB, its not my understanding that the administration goes out of its way to ascertain what the state department/other departments think about things that they decide they want to do (see travel ban)
Interesting, bbc is reporting that Russia is, in response, going to arm the Syrian regime to better counteract air strikes. They’ve also “suspended a deal with the US designed to avoid collisions between their air forces over Syria”
