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Sturgeon's House

Syrian conflict.


LoooSeR

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To be fair, what are their chances of even acquiring full NBC suits? 

 

With or without a gas attack, there isn't much room now for a US policy shift in Syria. They've already determined they are going to exit. Not immediately, but soon enough. And in the meantime, they hold ,like, 2 small and almost meaningless outposts in Syria that are more of a political tripmine than anything. Whatever interests they have in the middle east, they can protect them from any of the bases they have in the region, and Syria is just a lost cause for them.

 

Political clashes and tensions with Russia are not a US interest either. They're just a byproduct of both parties having different interests in the region. It makes absolutely no sense for the US to stage an attack either. 

 

So even if we assume that Russia and USA, along with their respective proxies on the ground were not responsible or related to the incident in any way, which makes sense to me, why even publicize the whole thing? Only a small portion of the gas attacks in Syria and Iraq have actually made headlines anywhere. I assume only when there were clear interests in doing so.

 

EDIT: Another way to look at it is that due to Trump's withdrawal announcement, such an attack could force him to make a decision that would either make him appear strong (attack in a way similar to last time) but also inconsistent and unreliable (not actually withdrawing troops and extending their stay), or appear consistent but weak (withdrawal but no attack) and somewhat supportive of a regime that is considered, in the west, to be too brutal. Trump could really use a withdrawal from Afghanistan AND Syria to appease the crowd that doesn't seem very favorable towards him. Russia has either nothing to lose on this one, or a lot, if it would push Assad to do it. I can't really determine which one of them. Either way, the first scenario seems most plausible to me - none of the major parties is responsible.

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Finding young men to handle dangerous things without proper protection is not that hard.

 

 

I always think of the time the BBC staff got gassed by Iranians mishandling a mustard gas shell in iran/iraq.

 

https://youtu.be/IJeDZ0bmcTU

 

It looks like the officer has some nice suit everyone else has a basic coverage and the lowest guy on the ladder has jack shit and has to handle the shell.

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Been watching local news (Israel) as per my evening routine and they have mentioned that shortly after the chemical attack the rebel bois or terrorists or whatever, in Douma, asked for a ceasefire or a truce. Cant remember exactly what. So it appears to be quite effective.

 

They also speculated that he's trying to get deterrence before new assaults into Idlib and Golan which kinda shows this war is coming to an end. Not so much is left to retake now.

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3 hours ago, Donward said:

I like how everything is a "false flag operation" these days.

 

For the record, I'm not saying this is a provocation conducted by opposition forces under the pretense that it was a government attack, I'm saying it's goddamn obviously fake.

 

What sort of sorry-ass chemical weapons only kill forty something people in a dense city, and leaves the bodies clean enough to handle without protective equipment soon enough afterwards that the drool and vomit on the victims is still wet?  Second-generation nerve agents kill through skin contact in milligram doses and persist in the environment for about a week.  And yes, the rebels have claimed that this was a nerve gas attack.

Why would the Assad regime use chemical weapons on a front where they were about to win a crushing victory?  The rebels in Douma were completely surrounded, and their allies in two nearby pockets had just thrown in the towel and agreed to a ceasefire and evacuation agreement.

 

It's even thinner evidence than the alleged chemical attacks in 2017, which also happened, by miraculous coincidence, right before the rebels were about to get clobbered by Russian air power and Syrian ground forces, and was substantiated by soil samples that were provided by the Turkish government.  You know, that completely disinterested party that is in the process of annexing part of northern Syria as we speak.

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5 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

EDIT: Another way to look at it is that due to Trump's withdrawal announcement, such an attack could force him to make a decision that would either make him appear strong (attack in a way similar to last time) but also inconsistent and unreliable (not actually withdrawing troops and extending their stay), or appear consistent but weak (withdrawal but no attack) and somewhat supportive of a regime that is considered, in the west, to be too brutal. Trump could really use a withdrawal from Afghanistan AND Syria to appease the crowd that doesn't seem very favorable towards him. Russia has either nothing to lose on this one, or a lot, if it would push Assad to do it. I can't really determine which one of them. Either way, the first scenario seems most plausible to me - none of the major parties is responsible.

 

 

I don't think your analysis of the US political equation is correct, but that is understandable if you don't live in the USA.


Trump's supporters are not a monolithic group.  They are a large number of groups of people with different, and sometimes conflicting goals.

 

Trump himself, prior to becoming president, was extremely consistent and outspoken in his opposition to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.  In general, he has expressed his opposition to expensive foreign interventions that accomplish nothing and cost lots of money and lives.  Trump is clearly correct about this.

 

However, Trump got to the presidency by hijacking the Republican Party, and part of that package are a lot of people who favor military interventions.  Some of these people are ranking officers in the US military itself.  They favor military interventions, cynically because command experience during an actual war would help their careers, and perhaps more charitably because working in the US military gives them great faith in the ability of that institution to change the world for the better.

 

Trump badly, badly wants the support of the US military right now.  He is convinced that the majority of US government bureaucrats hate him, and have been plotting against him and spying on him since his campaign in 2016, and that given a chance they would try to push him out of power one way or another.  There is probably at least some truth to Trump's assessment.

 

But if Trump can keep the support of the military, it greatly complicates his enemies' plans.  An Obama-era DOD pencil-pusher (albeit a fairly unimportant one) has seriously suggested that a military coup would be one way to get rid of Trump.  So Trump is inclined to err on the side of keeping the military happy with him.  So if the military thinks that bombing Syria is the way to go, Trump will (most likely reluctantly) agree.

 

By the way, this happens with every US President, not just Trump.  The president's ability to steer the course of the various government agencies that they oversee is, in practice, limited, so their actual policy ends up being less of a departure from the status quo than they said it would be while they were campaigning.  Trump is just a more extreme example.

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12 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

To be fair, what are their chances of even acquiring full NBC suits? 

   During Khan Sheikhun gas attack (that led to Shairat AB cruise missiles strike) i posted in this thread screengrabs from a video with militants wearing full NBC suits in a storage area near villages several weeks before event happened.

 

12 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

With or without a gas attack, there isn't much room now for a US policy shift in Syria. They've already determined they are going to exit. Not immediately, but soon enough. And in the meantime, they hold ,like, 2 small and almost meaningless outposts in Syria that are more of a political tripmine than anything. Whatever interests they have in the middle east, they can protect them from any of the bases they have in the region, and Syria is just a lost cause for them.

With gas attack there is a way to shift US policy as Trump announced that he want to get out, but now there is a chance to escalate.

 

12 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

Political clashes and tensions with Russia are not a US interest either. They're just a byproduct of both parties having different interests in the region. It makes absolutely no sense for the US to stage an attack either. 

   Tensions with Russia is in interest some of politicians (and not politicians) in US, which is evident by sanctions, support of nazis in Ukraine and so on. Also, attack was IMO staged in Douma by part of Jaish Al-Islam that don't want to be greenbused and they warned\hinted their patrons about that, so other (incl. US) could have theatrical perfomance about 40 dead random people, ignoring number of periodically happening shelling of Damascus by Jaish Al-Islam.

 

12 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

So even if we assume that Russia and USA, along with their respective proxies on the ground were not responsible or related to the incident in any way, which makes sense to me, why even publicize the whole thing? Only a small portion of the gas attacks in Syria and Iraq have actually made headlines anywhere. I assume only when there were clear interests in doing so.

   Clear interest is here - islamists don't want to lose grounds, their patrons see their proxy getting kicked, "Deep state" or whatever faction is most hawk against Russia/Syria needs to poo in public ears to get another Iraq 2003.

 

 

 

 

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I think it's just a coincidence the attack on the T4 airbase was in such proximity to the gas attack.

That airbase was already attacked in February this year.

Russian news report 5 interceptions, Syrians report 8 interceptions. Either way, something hit them and killed numerous Iranians, including an estimated 3 senior commanders or high ranking officers.

 

On the gas attacks, it's important to note that on this topic a lot of intel comes from Israel, who has a clear policy of keeping such arms away from Hezbollah and preventing Iranian entrenchment in the region, but an unclear but definitely hinted interest of keeping Assad in power while negotiating with Russia to apply leverage to meet its interests. Israel has also acted on its own against Syrian stockpiles of chemical weapons in at least one ocassion I remember.

And if we look at the past gas attack, the reaction from the west, and the US in particular, was almost immediate. In this one - they say they dont know yet.

 

It raises my suspicion that the previous attack was indeed perpetrated by Assad, but this one not.

 

Though what's the logic behind Jaish gassing themselves and then asking for truce?

 

 

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32 minutes ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

Though what's the logic behind Jaish gassing themselves and then asking for truce?

If you followed situation in Douma, or read previous page 

   Jaish Al-Islam had internal conflict with part of militants wanting to get out, second part was not so much. During negotiations they changed their representative, there were reported firefights inside of Douma between militants, during negotiation ceasefire they fired at SAA (ANNA news even recorded that in their Eastern Ghouta tunnels report). After that for 2-3 days militants in Douma were shelled pretty heavily with artillery, also photos of videos of which i posted on previous pages.

   So i expect that one part of militants managed to make a deal, other were forces to accept it as they had no chances to holding Douma with minority of pre-negotiations manpower. Gasing 20-30-40 people would not make any difference as artillery pretty much killed more of them in previous 2 days.

 

 

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22 minutes ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

On the gas attacks, it's important to note that on this topic a lot of intel comes from Israel, who has a clear policy of keeping such arms away from Hezbollah and preventing Iranian entrenchment in the region, but an unclear but definitely hinted interest of keeping Assad in power while negotiating with Russia to apply leverage to meet its interests. Israel has also acted on its own against Syrian stockpiles of chemical weapons in at least one ocassion I remember.

   Please, this is laughable. Israel never striked any Al-Mukowama personal or Iranian army personal in Syria. "Keeping such arms away from Hezbollah"... when chlorine became such a rare chemical that you can track it? It's like as viable as tracking mortar rounds trafficking from Turkey. It is not that hard to get, in Eastern Ghouta you can find it without much of problems:

DaRYVmwX0AE5-Xq.jpg

 

DaRYVmwWsAAzJGe.jpg

 

DaRYVmwX4AAhIS0.jpg

 

   ANNA news in 2013 did a report speaking about militants using tube bombs filled with chlorine, militants during Aleppo liberation used it in their mortar shells, ISIS used it against Iraqis and Syrians on number of occasions.

 

ParkPatriot2018part1-066-XL.jpg

ISIS-made launcher for shells filled with toxic chemicals.

 

   I am not speaking about how Iranians managed to sneak ATGMs like Toophans, SPG-armed jeeps, or Iranian T-72S with Kataib Hezbollah and so on to Islamic Resistance through such great Israeli intelligence service that can track couple of bottles of Chlorine. I am not even speaking much about Armored vehicles corps in Quseir that Al-Mukowama use for training their AFV crews for several years, and not far from Israel.

 

22 minutes ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

And if we look at the past gas attack, the reaction from the west, and the US in particular, was almost immediate. In this one - they say they dont know yet.

Khan Sheikhun.

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Currently without eng subs

 

   In short (well, if you saw Peto's map) SAA was advancing into Douma from Western farms, no soldiers had gas masks so SAA using chemical weapons during urban combat in rather small city is kind of stupid.

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Well, we will see

 

Quote

2-Most likely #Israel used the Dolphin Class submarine in this strike, to get safe/ensured results especially after the Syrian air defense managed to down an Israeli F-16 during it last engagement with #Syria.

3-the Dolphin class is capable of launching cruise missile form its torpedo tubes including the tomahawk missile and the Israeli made cruise missiles.
And judging by the numbers of missiles that Syria managed to shot down and the missile that hit its targets
They used 2 subs

4- #Israel used this tactic back in 2013, when they tried to hit a Syrian anti-ship missiles depot (Yakhont) somewhere near #Latakia
Back then Israel used the Dolphin subs to attack.

5- tonight the Syrian Air Defense Forces managed to down 8 missiles as the Syrian state TV stated.
The interception was done by the BUK-Pantsir system.
And I’m waiting for the wreckage images to identify what kind of missile #Israel used (most likely Popeye Turbo SLCM)

 

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