dagblog - Comments for "Democratic Syria hawks love Trump's airstrikes"

Chemical weapons are heinous.

rmrd0000 — Mon, 10 Apr 2017 15:53:22 +0000

Chemical weapons are heinous. I simply don't trust Trump. The Russians got a heads up on the airfield attack. They did not object to bombing the airfield despite the fact that Putin says Assad had nothing to do with the Sarin attack. Russians now say they are fortifying air defenses. The Tomahawks were launched from ships. I think we are being played for fools.

Chemical weapons are an

PeraclesPlease — Mon, 10 Apr 2017 15:48:13 +0000

In reply to Chemical weapons are an

Chemical weapons are an extremely low cost way of putting yourself and country on the blacklist/enemy list above every rogue state in the world, even above nuke producers since those are invariably bluffing about using their devices, while chemical use is common enough and abhorred.

The only reason I could see Assad using them is if he already thought the greater powers were going to attempt regime change and this was his way of telling them it would get quite ugly. But the sequence of events appears quite the opposite.

Chemical weapons are an

Obey — Mon, 10 Apr 2017 15:11:15 +0000

In reply to The area The was gassed is

Chemical weapons are an extremely low cost way of causing mass casualties and apparently have a special terror-inducing feature to boot. There is something to be said for drawing a line at their use. I don't think it is completely arbitrary. If the west decides to indicate that parties every low-intensity conflict in developing countries can use chemical weapons without consequences, then that is going to make the world a much more dangerous place.

I think in Kosovo the big

PeraclesPlease — Mon, 10 Apr 2017 10:01:36 +0000

In reply to Comes to mind that a refugee

I think in Kosovo the big refugee rush happened after, in *response* to US bombing threats, in which Milosevic the fox surprised us by uprooting all the Kosovar civilians and sent them packing for the borders.

But our ability to leave millions of refugees in another country, not resolving the issue for decades, makes taking in new refugees a rather poison pill.

... Czech Amb. to the U.S.

PeraclesPlease — Mon, 10 Apr 2017 09:44:20 +0000

In reply to Democratic Syria hawks love Trump's airstrikes

... Czech Amb. to the U.S. Hynek Kmoníček told Czech TV on Thur. that there is not a single logical reason for Bashar al-Assad to carry out something like a chemical-weapons attack three days after receiving everything he was yearning for all this time (a change in U.S. policy on removing him). "Assad is everything," Kmoníček said, "except an illogical crazy man." Asked if he didn't think Assad had motivation to carry out such an attack, Kmoníček said he sees lots of motivation on the part of others. That's about as close as a diplomat of an EU/Nato country can get to saying that Assad might have been framed by a rogue group that wanted to reverse Trump's policy of tolerance toward the Syrian leader.

- Erik Best, FleetSheet (Final Word)

McCain: Trump administration

artappraiser — Sun, 09 Apr 2017 19:26:58 +0000

In reply to Democratic Syria hawks love Trump's airstrikes

McCain: Trump administration 'partially to blame' for Syrian chemical attack

By POLITICO Staff, 04/09

Trump tweets that the reason

artappraiser — Sun, 09 Apr 2017 19:11:12 +0000

In reply to Democratic Syria hawks love Trump's airstrikes

Trump tweets the reason the runway in Syria was not hit, @ ABC News

Also see WaPo Fact Checker:

artappraiser — Sun, 09 Apr 2017 17:43:08 +0000

In reply to Trump’s Syria Strike Has Some

Also see WaPo Fact Checker: Ryan and McConnell flip-flop on use of force in Syria to deter chemical weapons

Steve Coll @ The New Yorker:

artappraiser — Sun, 09 Apr 2017 17:33:30 +0000

In reply to Alt-right who feel betrayed,

Steve Coll @ The New Yorker labels it "confusing" and says: If President Trump broadens his aims against Assad, he will enter the very morass that Candidate Trump warned against.

That's a pretty simplistic

PeraclesPlease — Sun, 09 Apr 2017 15:45:00 +0000

In reply to A reminder that Trump has

That's a pretty simplistic similarity. Clinton didn't spend a ton of time on diplomacy before any strikes? Remember the Dayton Accords, the days of negotiation leading up to Kosovo, the *inaction* in Rwanda, the years of Iraq overflights and UN wheedling before the Iraq strike, etc, etc, and (most?) everything was with international cooperation.