I didn’t think the Syrian fiasco could get much worse. Now it has. Fearing the near certainty that Congress would not authorize an attack on Syria, Obama has supported a Russian proposal to have Assad turn over his chemical weapons to an international agency, presumably all of this to be supervised by Russia. Actually the proposal first came out of the mouth of the Metternich of this administration: John “Reporting for Duty!” Kerry, sans any Russian involvement, in an off hand response to a question. What is wrong with this:
1. Assad will Cheat-Assad is fighting a life and death struggle to hang on to power. The idea that he will not hang on to, and use, any chemical weapons he deems necessary to prevail is rubbish, and is a tribute to policy-as-make-believe that infests this administration and its supporters.
2. Putin-Yeah, we can always rely upon this ex-KGB thug to act in the best interests of America.
3. War Goes On-The Syrian opposition will not stop fighting until they are all dead or Assad is a corpse or fled. Chemical weapon use is a symptom of a desperate civil war and that will go on.
4. Russian influence in the Middle East-Obama has opened the door to renewed Russian influence in the Middle East, helping to ensure that future conflicts in the Middle East will have the possibility of a US-Russian clash.
5. Paper Tiger-Mao in 1956 on the US: “In appearance it is very powerful but in reality it is nothing to be afraid of; it is a paper tiger. Outwardly a tiger, it is made of paper, unable to withstand the wind and the rain. I believe that is nothing but a paper tiger.”
In a very dangerous part of the world Obama is making sure that our enemies treat with complete contempt US threats and warnings, at least so long as he is President.
Karl Marx once said that history does repeat itself: first as tragedy, second as farce. In the second term of the interminable Obama administration, Obama and his clown posse seem to be in the farce stage, but I would not bet against dire tragedy coming quickly on its heels.
Obama to his credit never really wanted to fundamentally transform the Middle East; he reserves that for the US. If the proposed attack on Syria is really to send a message to Iran, why don’t Krauthammer and the AIPAC advocate attacking Iran and see how that flies. The very clever McNamara lost the war in Vietnam by sending bombing messages that North Vietnam refused to read. I must say I enjoy immensely the sight of the Russians employing jiu-jitsu against the war-mongers. Marvin Heir even brought in the ever serviceable Holocaust story. At the end of this ideally all WMD including those possessed by Israel and Iran should be on the table.
Rubbish from start to finish Ivan. Obama’s weakness as a leader invites a major war in the Middle East and Putin is only too happy to take advantage of his fecklessness in order to prop up the Russian client state of Syria which supplies the Russians with their naval base in the Mediterranean. The idea of Iran being convinced diplomatically to give up its quest for a nuclear weapon is absurd, along with your bizarre equation of Iran’s bomb lust with Israel’s defensive nuclear arsenal. Whenever people look to Russia as a solution to a crisis I know I have entered Cloud Kookooland.
2. No, really! I place greater reliance on Putin than Joe, Barry and Kerry to act in America’s best interests.
I’m with the majority (Onion polling) of Americans that believe that 535 Washington-based, Capitol idiots, and Barry and Joe need to get their boots bloody dusty in Syria.
Ivan’s correct. The war (to save America from fundamental transformation) is to be fought in Washington not Afghanistan, Syria or the Mid-East.
Anyone who trusts Putin for a nano-second T. Shaw is a total fool. I oppose the Syrian intervention because I see no advantage for the US in it. That does not mean that I do not perceive Assad as an enemy of this country along with Putin. Obama and Kerry are idiots who are weakening this country, but those who think we have no stake in what occurs in the Middle East are also idiots.
How many Iranians do you personally know Donald? I’ve known a few, Muslim and peaceable. The Iranians have a new president, its no longer the Mahdi man in charge if he ever was. This is a nation of seventy millions that we are talking about, patriotic to their own country who have a natural right to defend their own when attacked. As to the big bad Iranian nuclear arsenal, the NIE way back in 2007 assessed that the Iranians are not pursuing one, so far that has proved accurate. In my rebound from the lies of the Likudniks, I’d take the NIE’s word over that of pundits both in Israel and America, who have popped up every few months or so from 2006 to the present assuring us that an Iranian bomb was around the corner. Israel finds itself is in a part of the world that is unstable and riven by tribalism and religious discord. It is has to do what is necessary to secure peace. My concern, for what it is worth, is that all American interference has achieved since 2003 is to destroy the fragile Christians communities who have their own modus vivendi with the Muslims. The spectacle of some pundits enjoying from their “Villa in the Jungle”, the sight of Arabs slaughtering each other leaves a bad taste in the mouth.
“How many Iranians do you personally know Donald?”
That sounds precisely Ivan like those idiots in England who could not believe that Nazi Germany was a threat because they had met Germans who were so nice and polite. (I have known several Iranians, all over here because the Iranian government would persecute them if they could.)
“This is a nation of seventy millions that we are talking about, patriotic to their own country who have a natural right to defend their own when attacked.”
And whose leaders routinely talk about using nuclear weapons.
” As to the big bad Iranian nuclear arsenal, the NIE way back in 2007 assessed that the Iranians are not pursuing one,”
Rubbish:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2011/nov/09/iran-nuclear-programme-iaea-report
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/09/us-iran-nuclear-iaea-idUSBRE9880B620130909
http://www.almanar.com.lb/english/adetails.php?eid=109723&frid=19&seccatid=32&cid=19&fromval=1
Ivan, what is the basis for your first statement that Obama does not want to bring about change in the middle east?
After his Cairo speech and his peace prize he stated his support for the creation of a Palestinian state. His and announced that his job is to make peace with muslims, and seems to cast doubt on our long time friendship with Israel.
His approach to the factionalized muslims makes his approach and intentions very hard to read.
His “after the election I will have more flexibility” statement also indicates that he does have some intentions for action of some kind.
Ivan your tone is a bit smart alecky: if Krauthammer thinks this could have an impact ultimately on Iran why does he just advocate attacking Iran. Please.
Saying that you enjoy the jujitsu of Putin on the world stage is like a gawker in the depth of the crowd at a tragic event, mocking and ridiculing and jeering without understaning the weight of what is going on.
[…] the rapid back flips today from the same liberals who were all in favor of the Syrian intervention prior to Putin’s proposal. In the age of Obama, all backing of him should come with an automatic, “until he changes […]
Donald, either the Iranians are too stupid to duplicate in a decade what the US achieved in four years in WWII, in which case there is little to worry about, or their programme has been sufficiently disrupted that it poses little threat. Iran is not Nazi Germany which could work on weapons of the future whatever the difficulties the Allies imposed. Apart from Israel, the Iranian Shiites have to deal with the ambitions of the Turks, Saudis and the Pakistanis all Sunnis. There is clearly little love lost between them. When I was a 110% supporter of Israel, I had welcomed the idea that these people should kill each other. The fact is peace in the Middle-East require sacrifices from all, and this includes poor, helpless, powerless, land-grabbing, nuclear-armed Israel.
Analyze, I have followed Israeli news from the time I was a boy in the early seventies – the Yom Kippur War onwards, and I know that the Obama, his meaningless rhetoric aside, is the one president whom the Israelis have to fear the least. This is not to say that there was a conspiracy afoot. There was none. It is not Obama’s fault that brain-dead Christian Zionists, myself included, had tagged him as a crypto-Muslim. Obama has done nothing to undermine Israel in any way, in any forum, hell there isn’t even the usual make-believe shuttle diplomacy between the Israelis and the Palestinians which is obligatory for second-term presidents.
If I were a Likudnik, I’d worry not about Obama, but how ineptly the AIPAC and such like have handled this, in the middle of a poor economy, battle fatigue and resurgent isolationism. For the apogee of Israel’s support in the US has passed, the numbers may hold for a while, but the general perception that the US is being inveigled into another war for Israel in the name of WMD, will definitely mark down any support for action against Iran should that prove necessary.
Mac,
Trust? I’m highly uncertain whether Puting’s hatred of America is less than Barry’s.
“Donald, either the Iranians are too stupid to duplicate in a decade what the US achieved in four years in WWII, in which case there is little to worry about,”
Apples and rock salt. What the Iranians have been doing makes absolutely no sense unless they wish to attain nuclear weapons.
http://www.irantracker.org/nuclear-program/zarif-timelines-data-estimates-july-10-2013
http://blog.rizwanladha.com/2012/05/iran-nuclear-weapons-not-energy.html
Iran at any time could call a halt to this. That they have not indicates that nuclear weapon possession is the main goal of Iranian foreign policy.
I don’t speak for brain dead anybody, or political party. Neither did I indicate any thought of a conspiracy. I say that Obama is still largely. Mystery, an unknown . Unlike you I can not clAim to KNOW his thoughts and policy plans in the Middle East ,
“Anyone who trusts Putin for a nano-second T. Shaw is a total fool.”
I trust Putin – to do anything that advances whatever Putin wants at anyone else’s expense.
That said, I don’ t think we should go to war in Syria. Let Assad and the rebels fight it out. Both sides are using chemical weapons and both sides are evil. Sadly, it is the innocent who are suffering and dying.
🙁
Apples and rock salt. What the Iranians have been doing makes absolutely no sense unless they wish to attain nuclear weapons.”
Correct. Why does everyone talk about Iran’s gas centrifuges being used to enrich U-235 to weapons grade, but nothing about Iran’s heavy water reactor that is being used to breed Pu-239 from U-238 by the U-238 absorption of a neutron, becoming U-239, which beta decays to Np-239 which also beta decays to Pu-239. If Iran does it right, then it can extract the Pu-239 and make a bomb, or at least a very dirty (radiologically speaking) weapon. No centrifuges needed. Iran is using a two-pronged approach to a nuclear weapon, one a U-235 bomb and the other a Pu-239 bomb.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IR-40
Paul, you are indispensable for this blog when nuclear issues arise!
I am against intervening in Syria because there is no up side for the US in intervening. I rather hope that Putin as a result of this debacle caused by Obama decides to pour weapons and money into Syria in support of Assad, as I suspect that Assad, eventually, will be on the short end of this conflict no matter how much material Putin gives him.
I think Obama is just trying to uphold the honor of his Nobel Peace prize: if a leader doesn’t start a war or two—Libya, Syria—people won’t think he is really serious about peace.
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7. Putin and Assad questionably give up the use of poison gas in exchange for avoiding a pin prick but substantial response, or something, from our ego wounded warrior Obama. Poison gas is not a strategic weapon like a nuke (such as is the goal of Iran) and is only a useful tactical weapon when delivered through artillery for bombardment on massing troops as was done in the Iran Iraq war, or as a terror weapon to be used on innocent civilians as was done by Iraq against the Kurds. Conventional weapons like napalm, frac and cluster bombs are far more effective tools of war not dependent on weather and wind conditions, etc. As a weapon in a civil and guerrilla war, gas has almost no tactical value at all making it less likely that assad had any preference for the use of gas—it simply does not make sense. So the day after Putin checkmates Obama, Assad launches a massive offensive and is being re-supplied mightily by Russia. In the meantime, the Turks, Jordanians and Saudis recognize that Obama abandoned his pledge to aid their surrogate Sunni terrorists. And finally, Iran now recognizes with absolute certainty that Obama is indeed a paper tiger, and thus is proceeding with its strategic nuclear ambitions while Russia supplies Iran with its advanced missile defense system to ward off an attack by Israel while at the same time using the court of low information world “leaders” to advance a condition that the US back off from its tour de farce in the Med. In the meantime, Obama is gutting the military in armament, preparedness, morale, and even purpose.
Bottom line—Assad and Putin gave up nothing. The world is now becoming exponentially more dangerous due to our mastermind POTUS….and the obamabots march on.