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12 US intelligence officials tell Obama that Assad did not use chemical weapons

Ikari said:
Perhaps, I do have reality in mind though.
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In Libya, coalition forces only killed 1k civilians. That's reality.
 
CRUE CAB said:
The reasons given for war are for what he DID, not what he could do or might do.
This false capitulation only gives Obama a chance at saving face, if it is smart enough to take it.
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There IS NO ****ING EVIDENCE, why must you people continue pimping Obama's lie for him?
 
ecofarm said:
In Libya, coalition forces only killed 1k civilians. That's reality.
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Only ONE THOUSAND!! The resolution approved by the UN was for use of force to PROTECT civilians, not kill them! You warmongers have a very twisted concept of humanitarian aid/service.
 
Montecresto said:
There IS NO ****ING EVIDENCE, why must you people continue pimping Obama's lie for him?
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Who cares about specifics? Chems were used, time for the dictator currently slaughtering tens of thousands to go.
 
Montecresto said:
There IS NO ****ING EVIDENCE, why must you people continue pimping Obama's lie for him?
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So you have seen all the evidence to conclude there is no evidence? Wow, you must have a clearance higher than everyone in Congress. Do tell us what the classified information is then.
 
Montecresto said:
Only ONE THOUSAND!! The resolution approved by the UN was for use of force to PROTECT civilians, not kill them! You warmongers have a very twisted concept of humanitarian aid/service.
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And you don't mind Assad killing tens of thousands?
 
Montecresto said:
There IS NO ****ING EVIDENCE, why must you people continue pimping Obama's lie for him?
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Wow, you totally have mis read what I have posted on this.
I see NO reason to go to war and Obama will say its for what Assad DID and not what he may do.
 
CRUE CAB said:
I dont mind a bit.
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Isolationism in the modern global world is like creationism. Extreme isolationism is not taken seriously outside playgrounds.
 
CRUE CAB said:
I see NO reason to go to war and Obama will say its for what Assad DID and not what he may do.
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I think that claim is justified. Enough of the Assad regime.
 
ecofarm said:
And you don't mind Assad killing tens of thousands?
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We should be paying him a bounty for each Al Queda jihadi he kills. One of my neighbors is a truly ignorant, illiterate moron and he thinks we should invade Syria, but I can forgive him because he is illiterate and a genuine moron. How about a little link so you know what is going on in Syria?

Are we Going To War with Syria over a Natural Gas Pipeline? | Veterans Today

"Wayne Madsen, moveover, has learned from multiple intelligence sources in Washington, London, Beirut, and Paris, that Saudi intelligence chief Prince Bandar bin Sultan has paid off key members of the U.S. Senate and House leadership, as well as key ministers of the French government, with “incentive cash” to support an American and French “shock and awe” military strike on not only Syria but Hezbollah positions in Lebanon:


Republican and Democratic members of the Senate and House leadership, including Senators Harry Reid, John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Barbara Boxer, and Robert Menendez, as well as House Speaker John Boehner, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, House Intelligence Committee chairman Mike Rogers, New York’s Peter King, Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, and others have seen their campaign chests grow substantially as a result of Bandar’s financial largesse, according to our multiple sources.
"
Top 10 Unproven Claims for War Against Syria | Alternet

"


Here are some key questions which President Obama has yet to answer in the call for congressional approval for war against Syria. This article is a call for independent thinking and congressional oversight, which rises above partisan considerations.

The questions the Obama administration needs to answer before Congress can even consider voting on Syria:

Claim #1. The administration claims a chemical weapon was used.

The UN inspectors are still completing their independent evaluation.

Who provided the physiological samples of sarin gas on which your evaluation is based? Were any other non-weaponized chemical agents discovered or sampled?

Who from the United States was responsible for the chain of custody?

Where was the laboratory analysis conducted?

Were U.S. officials present during the analysis of the samples? Does your sample show military grade or lower grade sarin gas?

Can you verify that your sample matches the exact composition of the alleged Syrian government composition?

Further reading: Brown Moses blog; McClatchy News report; Global Research report.

Claim #2: The administration claims the opposition has not used chemical weapons.

Which opposition?

Are you speaking of a specific group, or all groups working in Syria to overthrow President Assad and his government?

Has your administration independently and categorically dismissed the reports of rebel use of chemical weapons which have come from such disparate sources as Russia, the United Nations, and the Turkish state newspaper?

Have you investigated the rumors that the Saudis may have supplied the rebels with chemicals that could be weaponized?

Has the administration considered the ramifications of inadvertently supporting al Qaeda-affiliated Syrian rebels?

Was any intelligence received in the last year by the U.S. government indicating that sarin gas was brought into Syria by rebel factions, with or without the help of a foreign government or intelligence agents?

Further reading: Global Research report; Wall Street Journal article; Reuters story; Zaman story (in Turkish -- see Google translate from Turkish to English); Atlantic Sentinelstory; AP story

Claim #3: The administration claims chemical weapons were used because the regime's conventional weapons were insufficient

Who is responsible for the conjecture that the reason chemical weapons were used against the Damascus suburbs is that Assad's conventional weapons were insufficient to secure "large portions of Damascus"?

Claim #4: The administration claims to have intelligence relating to the mixing of chemical weapons by regime elements

Who saw the chemical weapons being mixed from August 18th on?

Was any warning afforded to the Syria opposition and if not, why not?

If, on August 21st a "regime element" was preparing for a chemical weapons attack, has an assessment been made which could definitively determine whether such preparation (using gas masks) was for purpose of defense, and not offense?

Further reading: McClatchy report; Brown Moses blog

Claim #5: The administration claims intelligence that Assad's brother ordered the attack

What is the type of and source of intelligence which alleges that Assad's brother personally ordered the attack?

Who made the determination that Assad's brother ordered the attack, based on which intelligence, from what source?

Further reading: here

Claim #6: The administration claims poison gas was released in a rocket attack

Who was tracking the rocket and the artillery attack which preceded the poison gas release?

Did these events occur simultaneously or consecutively?

Could these events, the rocket launches and the release of poison gas, have been conflated?

Based upon the evidence, is it possible that a rocket attack by the Syrian government was aimed at rebels stationed among civilians and a chemical weapons attack was launched by rebels against the civilian population an hour and a half later?

Is it possible that chemical weapons were released by the rebels -- unintentionally?

Explain the 90-minute time interval between the rocket launch and chemical weapon attacks.

Has forensic evidence been gathered at the scene of the attack which would confirm the use of rockets to deliver the gas?

If there was a rocket launch would you supply evidence of wounds from the rockets impact and explosion?

What is the source of the government's analysis?

If the rockets were being tracked via "geospatial intelligence," what were the geospatial coordinates of the launching sites and termination locations?

Further reading: FAIR.org report

Claim #7: The administration claims 1,429 people died in the attack

Secretary Kerry claimed 1,429 deaths, including 426 children. From whom did that number first originate?

Further reading: McClatchy report

Claim #8: The administration has made repeated references to videos and photos of the attack as a basis for military action against Syria

When and where were the videos taken of the aftermath of the poison gas attack?

Further reading: FAIR.org report

Claim #9: The administration claims a key intercept proves the Assad regime's complicity in the chemical weapons attack

Will you release the original transcripts in the language in which it was recorded as well as the translations relied upon to determine the nature of the conversation allegedly intercepted?

What is the source of this transcript? What was the exact time of the intercept? Was it a U.S. intercept or supplied from a non-U.S. source?

Have you determined the transcripts' authenticity? Have you considered that the transcripts could have been doctored or fake?

Was the "senior official," whose communications were intercepted, a member of Assad's government?

How was he "familiar" with the offensive? Through a surprised acknowledgement that such an attack had taken place? Or through actual coordination of said attack? Release the transcripts!

Was he an intelligence asset of the U.S., or our allies? In what manner had he "confirmed" chemical weapons were used by the regime?

Who made the assessment that his intercepted communications were a confirmation of the use of chemical weapons by the regime on August 21st?

What is the source of information that the Syrian chemical weapons personnel were "directed to cease operations"?

Is this the same source who witnessed regime officials mixing the chemicals?

Does the transcript indicate whether the operations they were "directed to cease" were related to ceasing conventional or chemical attacks?

Will you release the transcripts and identify sources of this claim?

Do you have transcripts, eyewitness accounts or electronic intercepts of communications between Syrian commanders or other regime officials which link the CW attack directly to President Assad?

Who are the intelligence officials who made the assessment -- are they U.S. intelligence officials or did the initial analysis come from a non-U.S. source?

Further reading: FAIR.org report and AP story; Washington Post editorial

Claim #10: The administration claims that sustained shelling occurred after the chemical weapons attack in order to cover up the traces of the attack

Please release all intelligence and military assessments as to the reason for the sustained shelling, which is reported to have occurred after the chemical weapons attack.

Who made the determination that was this intended to cover up a chemical weapon attack? Or was it to counterattack those who released chemicals?

How does shelling make the residue of sarin gas disappear?

Further reading: here

The American people have a right to a full release and vetting of all facts before their elected representatives are asked to make a decision of great consequence for America, Syria and the world. Congress must be provided answers prior to the vote, in open hearings, not in closed sessions where information can be manipulated in the service of war. We've been there before. It's called Iraq."
 
ecofarm said:
I volunteered airborne infantry during Gulf 1.
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Another worthless war. That got us Gulf II and Afghanistan. Isnt enough, enough? OR you willing to go back and or send your kids.
In Kuwait there was the veneer of a honorable cause, not in this instance.
 
CRUE CAB said:
Another worthless war. That got us Gulf II and Afghanistan. Isnt enough, enough? OR you willing to go back and or send your kids.
In Kuwait there was the veneer of a honorable cause, not in this instance.
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I plan to go to rural Kenya and teach, a fledgling open democracy there is doing well. Hopefully Iran will be more like Libya than Iraq.
 
CRUE CAB said:
Another worthless war. That got us Gulf II and Afghanistan. Isnt enough, enough? OR you willing to go back and or send your kids.
In Kuwait there was the veneer of a honorable cause, not in this instance.
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Oh, I don't know. When I look back at history at "the things we have done that we are proud of", it seems that standing against murderous bastards is usually one of them. There is quite a lot of honor to be found in protecting people from chemical attacks, shepherding innocents out of a warzone, and punishing a regime as evil as that one.
 
cpwill said:
Oh, I don't know. When I look back at history at "the things we have done that we are proud of", it seems that standing against murderous bastards is usually one of them. There is quite a lot of honor to be found in protecting people from chemical attacks, shepherding innocents out of a warzone, and punishing a regime as evil as that one.
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Then do it, dont tell the "murderous bastard" you are going to do it for three weeks then sabre rattle some more before giving a speech about it.
 
cpwill said:
No one is "going" - we're discussing using missiles and stealth bombers.
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Keep thinking that. Kerry already said its an option to send in troops.
This strike would be wrong on every level of security of the US and Israel.
 
Does anybody else find it peculiar that Hillary has been mysteriously silent through all of this Syria stuff.
 
MaggieD said:
But here's what I think: We've GOT to change what we're doing overall. It's not working. We are simply reacting.
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I strongly agree. The absence of a coherent foreign policy strategy rooted in a clear understanding of American interests has badly handicapped U.S. foreign policy in areas where developments have been rapid. Unfortunately, the geopolitically important and highly unstable Middle East is the area where the lack of a clear strategy has relegated the U.S. to bystander status and reacting to events, even as the U.S. has critical interests in parts of the region.
 
CRUE CAB said:
Keep thinking that. Kerry already said its an option to send in troops.
This strike would be wrong on every level of security of the US and Israel.
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"every level of security"?

I'm unaware of that IR term, could you elucidate for us?
 
donsutherland1 said:
I strongly agree. The absence of a coherent foreign policy strategy rooted in a clear understanding of American interests has badly handicapped U.S. foreign policy in areas where developments have been rapid. Unfortunately, the geopolitically important and highly unstable Middle East is the area where the lack of a clear strategy has relegated the U.S. to bystander status and reacting to events, even as the U.S. has critical interests in parts of the region.
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......it's almost as if we elected a college adjunct with no executive experience to speak of to be our Commander in Chief.......
 
cpwill said:
"every level of security"?

I'm unaware of that IR term, could you elucidate for us?
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Figure it out. Our security will be at greater risk, Israels security will be at greater risk. And with Russia getting involved? Who knows what crazy direction things could take.
The way Putin is man handling Obama, he probably thinks he could push us out of the ME all together.
 
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