Wow, Chris Mathews making some sense over the insanity of Obama following John McCain into Syria.
HERE IS A CUTE LITTLE VIDEO FROM THE NEW US ALLIES IN SYRIA, THE JIHADIS, THANKING THE US FOR THEIR SUPPORT:
RECALL THE BRILLIANCE OF THE US AND NATO ATTACKING LIBYA AND GETTING RID OF GHADAFFI. CHECK OUT WHAT IS HAPPENING WITH THE WEAPONS THAT WERE PUT INTO THE HANDS OF THE “REBELS” :
And guess what are new Jihadi allies in Syria have for themselves;
Sunni jihadist groups in northern Syria have secured a large supply of the type of anti-aircraft missiles that the Obama administration has urgently tried to keep away from rebel groups fighting the civil war, video footage shows.
The missiles, believed to be shoulder- launched SA-16s, are displayed in a video allegedly made by a Chechen-dominated jihadist group of foreign fighters. They are known to pose a potent risk to most types of aircraft and have been urgently sought by all rebel groups as a means of breaking the dominance over Syrian skies enjoyed by President Bashar al-Assad's air force.
The English speaker on the jihadist video, who calls himself Abu Musab, does not specify where the missiles came from, but it is believed they may have been seized during a raid on the Brigade 80 military base, on the outskirts of Aleppo airport, in February.
Separate reports suggest some opposition groups may have found an alternative supply line from outside Syria. However, while some light weapons are allowed into Syria, the CIA has led intensive efforts to ensure anti-aircraft missiles, such as the SA-16s, are not allowed across the Turkish or Jordanian borders.
The video emerged as Egypt's President Mohamed Morsi announced he had cut all diplomatic ties with Damascus. He also said he would back a no-fly zone over Syria, an intervention western diplomats say is being considered by Washington.
The video underscores the increasing organisation of foreign jihadists in the north of the country and the prominent role they are playing in some areas of the conflict almost one year after they first arrived. The Chechen-dominated group is comprised solely of foreigners who see the civil war in Syria as an important theatre for global jihad — not a battle fought to change the leadership of a nation state.
Their presence, along with homegrown Syrian jihadists, has been a key reason for the reluctance of US and other western states to support the military opposition in Syria, which remains outgunned by the regime and is struggling to hold on to parts of the country it seized during fighting over the past 12 months.
Peter Bouckaert, the emergencies director for Human Rights Watch, said the foreign groups have become more organised in recent months. "There is increasing evidence that foreign fighters are gathering under a more unified umbrella in Syria, and that the umbrella organisation may have a strong Chechen leadership," he added.
The foreign jihadists have a broadly similar worldview to the al-Qaida-aligned Jabhat al-Nusra, but operate largely independently from the group. All groups, along with the more mainstream nationalistic organisations, contest fiercely for power in northern Syrian society.
As community structures have steadily decayed over the past year, battlefield results have become an important benchmark for those seeking influence. Both the foreigners and al-Qaida groups make no secret of their determination to install an Islamic state in Syria.
The White House's decision to send military support to vetted areas of the opposition comes at the same time as extremist groups on both sides of the conflict – al-Qaida and foreign Sunni jihadists on one side, Hezbollah and Shia militants from outside Syria on the other – are playing a sharply increasing role in the conflict.
Western officials in Beirut said the decision to arm some rebels, after two years of refusal to do so, is designed largely to drive a wedge between both sides and stymie a slide into outright sectarian war that would spread beyond Syria's now fragile borders.
"The US does not want Chechens or anyone else getting their hands on these missiles, or Hezbollah getting its hands on important parts of the country," one official said.
In late April, one US intelligence official told the McClatchy news agency that they had “low or moderate confidence” that the Assad regime had used sarin gas on a small scale. Not only did the plethora of US intelligence agencies differ in their assessments, but the White House itself acknowledged that “the chain of custody [of samples] is not clear, so we cannot confirm how the exposure occurred and under what conditions”.
Two months on, the US intelligence community now believes that the Assad regime "has used chemical weapons, including the nerve agent sarin, on a small scale against the opposition multiple times over the last year", and that intelligence officials had "high confidence" in this finding. A Damascene conversion, if you will.
Naturally, the cynical view is that the White House has simply pressured its intelligence community to produce a new assessment, not on the basis of new evidence, but in response to the shifting military balance within Syria, the greater involvement of Iran and Hezbollah in key battles such as that at Qusair, and pressure from European allies like France and Britain, which collected the original samples from Syria and shared them with the US.
For over a year, the Obama administration has desperately sought to avoid the mistakes made by the US in Iraq a decade ago. Although it has facilitated the shipment of some weapons, it has otherwise proceeded with extreme caution. President Obama overruled nearly all of his top national security advisers last summer when he rejected a plan to meaningfully arm the opposition. If the US goal was a pretext for intervention, it had its pick of massacres and red lines over the past two years. It is unlikely that Obama would now take the risk of brazenly manipulating intelligence, or that he could do so without provoking a flurry of leaks from within the intelligence community.
There is only one way to clear this up. That is for the White House to release as much evidence as it responsibly can, spell out its claims about where, when, and how chemical weapons were used, and, most importantly, explain what information it received between April and June which led to this change in its position.
Intelligence agencies cannot function without protecting their sources. But they could release some samples to neutral scientific bodies for further testing, clarify how they have verified the previously uncertain chain of custody, go into detail on their reasons for concluding that the regime has full control of its chemical weapons, describe any intercept or other intelligence which demonstrates the regime ordering use of chemical weapons, and be open and honest about any remaining disagreements between different intelligence agencies within the US and between allies.
Some people's conspiratorial mindset and misreading of American intentions in Syria means that even the strongest evidence would be disregarded. But this is not a reason to opt for opacity and elision.
If western powers want to send arms to Syria to counteract Iranian influence as part of a wider strategic war, they should simply say so. Couching this policy shift in terms of chemical weapons could have pernicious long-term consequences. It is clear that the Iraq war did irreparable damage to public confidence in intelligence assessments and policymaking, to the point where it constrained future decision-makers and dealt an enduring moral blow to the global standing of western foreign policies. It is incumbent on this generation of policymakers that they demonstrate the transparency and honesty that was so lacking a decade ago. "Trust us" will no longer cut it.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States said on Saturday it will keep Patriot missiles and F-16 jet fighters in Jordan after joint military exercises end next week while Secretary of State John Kerry said a political solution to the civil war in neighboring Syria may be getting “out of reach.”
The decision to put Patriot batteries - an air and missile defense system - in Jordan has been particularly controversial for Russia, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s main global ally.
Russia is worried the missiles could be used by the United States and its allies to impose a “no-fly" zone over Syria in the first direct Western military intervention in the conflict.
The Pentagon announced the action two days before President Barack Obama meets Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday at a G8 conference in Northern Ireland to discuss Syria.
The Patriot missiles could be used to protect U.S. ally Jordan against any possible missile attack as the Syrian war threatens to widen into a more regional, sectarian conflict.
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel "has approved a request from the Kingdom of Jordan for a detachment of F-16s and Patriot Missiles to remain in Jordan following the conclusion of the Eager Lion Exercise next week," Pentagon spokesman George Little said in a statement. "All other U.S. personnel assigned to Jordan for Eager Lion will depart at the conclusion of the exercise. The United States enjoys a longstanding partnership with Jordan and is committed to its defense," Little added.
“The filthy hands which aggravate the differences between the Shi’ites and Sunni Muslims, belong neither to the Shi’ites nor the Sunnis. They are the hands of the colonialists which plan to take the Islamic countries out of our hands. The colonial powers who want to plunder our wealth through various schemes and conspiracies are the ones who hatch plots for creating division under the pretext of Shi’ism or Sunnism.”
If we had a draft, there is no way this bullshit would continue. Mathews agrees at 12:15.
ReplyDeleteAnd guess what are new Jihadi allies in Syria have for themselves;
ReplyDeleteSunni jihadist groups in northern Syria have secured a large supply of the type of anti-aircraft missiles that the Obama administration has urgently tried to keep away from rebel groups fighting the civil war, video footage shows.
The missiles, believed to be shoulder- launched SA-16s, are displayed in a video allegedly made by a Chechen-dominated jihadist group of foreign fighters. They are known to pose a potent risk to most types of aircraft and have been urgently sought by all rebel groups as a means of breaking the dominance over Syrian skies enjoyed by President Bashar al-Assad's air force.
The English speaker on the jihadist video, who calls himself Abu Musab, does not specify where the missiles came from, but it is believed they may have been seized during a raid on the Brigade 80 military base, on the outskirts of Aleppo airport, in February.
Separate reports suggest some opposition groups may have found an alternative supply line from outside Syria. However, while some light weapons are allowed into Syria, the CIA has led intensive efforts to ensure anti-aircraft missiles, such as the SA-16s, are not allowed across the Turkish or Jordanian borders.
The video emerged as Egypt's President Mohamed Morsi announced he had cut all diplomatic ties with Damascus. He also said he would back a no-fly zone over Syria, an intervention western diplomats say is being considered by Washington.
The video underscores the increasing organisation of foreign jihadists in the north of the country and the prominent role they are playing in some areas of the conflict almost one year after they first arrived. The Chechen-dominated group is comprised solely of foreigners who see the civil war in Syria as an important theatre for global jihad — not a battle fought to change the leadership of a nation state.
Their presence, along with homegrown Syrian jihadists, has been a key reason for the reluctance of US and other western states to support the military opposition in Syria, which remains outgunned by the regime and is struggling to hold on to parts of the country it seized during fighting over the past 12 months.
Peter Bouckaert, the emergencies director for Human Rights Watch, said the foreign groups have become more organised in recent months. "There is increasing evidence that foreign fighters are gathering under a more unified umbrella in Syria, and that the umbrella organisation may have a strong Chechen leadership," he added.
The foreign jihadists have a broadly similar worldview to the al-Qaida-aligned Jabhat al-Nusra, but operate largely independently from the group. All groups, along with the more mainstream nationalistic organisations, contest fiercely for power in northern Syrian society.
As community structures have steadily decayed over the past year, battlefield results have become an important benchmark for those seeking influence. Both the foreigners and al-Qaida groups make no secret of their determination to install an Islamic state in Syria.
The White House's decision to send military support to vetted areas of the opposition comes at the same time as extremist groups on both sides of the conflict – al-Qaida and foreign Sunni jihadists on one side, Hezbollah and Shia militants from outside Syria on the other – are playing a sharply increasing role in the conflict.
Western officials in Beirut said the decision to arm some rebels, after two years of refusal to do so, is designed largely to drive a wedge between both sides and stymie a slide into outright sectarian war that would spread beyond Syria's now fragile borders.
"The US does not want Chechens or anyone else getting their hands on these missiles, or Hezbollah getting its hands on important parts of the country," one official said.
OOps, the video on the previous post has been terminated. My goodness, in the land of the free no less.
ReplyDeleteWhere is Obama while all this is going?
ReplyDeleteLet’s check on his schedule:
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We get taken into war and Obama is not around. Fear not, McCain is available on a moment’s notice.
In late April, one US intelligence official told the McClatchy news agency that they had “low or moderate confidence” that the Assad regime had used sarin gas on a small scale. Not only did the plethora of US intelligence agencies differ in their assessments, but the White House itself acknowledged that “the chain of custody [of samples] is not clear, so we cannot confirm how the exposure occurred and under what conditions”.
ReplyDeleteTwo months on, the US intelligence community now believes that the Assad regime "has used chemical weapons, including the nerve agent sarin, on a small scale against the opposition multiple times over the last year", and that intelligence officials had "high confidence" in this finding. A Damascene conversion, if you will.
Naturally, the cynical view is that the White House has simply pressured its intelligence community to produce a new assessment, not on the basis of new evidence, but in response to the shifting military balance within Syria, the greater involvement of Iran and Hezbollah in key battles such as that at Qusair, and pressure from European allies like France and Britain, which collected the original samples from Syria and shared them with the US.
For over a year, the Obama administration has desperately sought to avoid the mistakes made by the US in Iraq a decade ago. Although it has facilitated the shipment of some weapons, it has otherwise proceeded with extreme caution. President Obama overruled nearly all of his top national security advisers last summer when he rejected a plan to meaningfully arm the opposition. If the US goal was a pretext for intervention, it had its pick of massacres and red lines over the past two years. It is unlikely that Obama would now take the risk of brazenly manipulating intelligence, or that he could do so without provoking a flurry of leaks from within the intelligence community.
There is only one way to clear this up. That is for the White House to release as much evidence as it responsibly can, spell out its claims about where, when, and how chemical weapons were used, and, most importantly, explain what information it received between April and June which led to this change in its position.
Intelligence agencies cannot function without protecting their sources. But they could release some samples to neutral scientific bodies for further testing, clarify how they have verified the previously uncertain chain of custody, go into detail on their reasons for concluding that the regime has full control of its chemical weapons, describe any intercept or other intelligence which demonstrates the regime ordering use of chemical weapons, and be open and honest about any remaining disagreements between different intelligence agencies within the US and between allies.
Some people's conspiratorial mindset and misreading of American intentions in Syria means that even the strongest evidence would be disregarded. But this is not a reason to opt for opacity and elision.
If western powers want to send arms to Syria to counteract Iranian influence as part of a wider strategic war, they should simply say so. Couching this policy shift in terms of chemical weapons could have pernicious long-term consequences. It is clear that the Iraq war did irreparable damage to public confidence in intelligence assessments and policymaking, to the point where it constrained future decision-makers and dealt an enduring moral blow to the global standing of western foreign policies. It is incumbent on this generation of policymakers that they demonstrate the transparency and honesty that was so lacking a decade ago. "Trust us" will no longer cut it.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States said on Saturday it will keep Patriot missiles and F-16 jet fighters in Jordan after joint military exercises end next week while Secretary of State John Kerry said a political solution to the civil war in neighboring Syria may be getting “out of reach.”
ReplyDeleteThe decision to put Patriot batteries - an air and missile defense system - in Jordan has been particularly controversial for Russia, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s main global ally.
Russia is worried the missiles could be used by the United States and its allies to impose a “no-fly" zone over Syria in the first direct Western military intervention in the conflict.
The Pentagon announced the action two days before President Barack Obama meets Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday at a G8 conference in Northern Ireland to discuss Syria.
The Patriot missiles could be used to protect U.S. ally Jordan against any possible missile attack as the Syrian war threatens to widen into a more regional, sectarian conflict.
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel "has approved a request from the Kingdom of Jordan for a detachment of F-16s and Patriot Missiles to remain in Jordan following the conclusion of the Eager Lion Exercise next week," Pentagon spokesman George Little said in a statement.
"All other U.S. personnel assigned to Jordan for Eager Lion will depart at the conclusion of the exercise. The United States enjoys a longstanding partnership with Jordan and is committed to its defense," Little added.
Why not arm scum to kill scum?
ReplyDeleteMaybe that was the plan all along...
ReplyDeletedivide and conquer.
let the games begin....
from one corner of the shia world to the other...
the sunni the same.
let the scum kill the scum.
Coming to a islamic community near you..
ReplyDeleteNot to worry... They will blame?
ReplyDelete“The filthy hands which aggravate the differences between the Shi’ites and Sunni Muslims, belong neither to the Shi’ites nor the Sunnis. They are the hands of the colonialists which plan to take the Islamic countries out of our hands. The colonial powers who want to plunder our wealth through various schemes and conspiracies are the ones who hatch plots for creating division under the pretext of Shi’ism or Sunnism.”
The famous catch all is "who will benefit"?
But in reality is scum verses scum.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1TmeBd9338
DeleteThe Islamists dont understand, we dont want their "wealth" we expect them to die.