US Attacks Syria with UK, France

[Gameface]

There are several million expatriate Iranians who wish we'd help them make a democracy of Iran. We could've given them the cash. I'd have targeted the return of the cash to coincide with the first democratically-elected non-terrorist supporting Iranian government.

Sure, me too, but it doesn't change the fact that you lied. Try to be honest. Try to represent both sides accurately. Try not to be deceptive. There's this thing called intellectual honesty that you don't seem to understand.

You want to make 1500 word posts and sound intellectual? Avoid propaganda speech. You sound dumb as **** when you do that, and you almost always do that. You're a microphone and relay station for partisan hacks. It makes you seem more simple than you are.

 

[fishonjazz]

Who really knows. America and allies say it is and Russia and allies deny an attack even took place. I find both scenarios plausible tbh. Assad would use chemical weapons to win IMO and I can see how leaders like Macron and Trump use this to appear strong and improve poll numbers. But so far the only retaliation we know of was Russia submitting a resolution to the Security Council condemning the attack. 3 countries voted for it and 8 voted against it.

It won't be Russia and America that start a massive mid east war. It will be Israel and Iran. Isreal has already struck inside Syria a couple times, Syria has shot down an Israeli jet, Iran is using the land route through Iraq and Syria to reinforce Lebanon and Hezbollah and set up a military presence in Syria. Israel is on record as saying it will pay any price to stop Iran from having their military on their border. This is where war will come from.

I tell my wife that you are my foreign affairs/war info source. Why do you know so much? Do you just read about it a lot or watch lots of news tv? Or does it have to do with your job?

 

[Stoked]

I tell my wife that you are my foreign affairs/war info source. Why do you know so much? Do you just read about it a lot or watch lots of news tv? Or does it have to do with your job?

I find it interesting and so I read up on it. I try to be decently informed but its hard with so many sides with so much history.

 

[babe]

The money Obama gave to Iran was Iranian money that we had been holding since the 70s.

So I take it this is where you are saying I lied. What was it, about 1979 when Carter was President and Iran took Americans hostage? We seized Iranian assets sitting in American banks from people we thought had a part in the Khomeni government, oil producers and exporters?

How much of Obama's financial package was those funds, and how much did American taxpayers actually fork over for that deal? I don't see much accurate information anywhere. Who knows?

Typically, in a legal spat like a divorce or bankruptcy, possession is nine points out of ten. Could we consider the Iranian assets damages for taking hostages and for our expenses in getting them back. I think so. I think that seized money is actually American money. We should have just said so, and said go pound sand.

No lie.

 

[addictionary]

so many sides with so much history.

Smart man.

 

[Stoked]

Lots of reports coming out about dramatically rising tensions between Iran and Israel. That the Iranian drone that violated Israeli airspace was armed, that the recent Israeli bombing attack hit Iranian positions and killed 7 Irainians including the Oranian Col. I charge of their drone program.

That was a double first. The first time each country has directly targeted the other and not through proxies.

Now Iran is believed to be planning a direct strike on Israel by members of their Revolutionary Guard. Israel in response is said to be preparing defenses and a counter attack on several supposed Iranian air bases in Syria.

Iran v Israel will be the next phase of the Syrian war.

 

[Red]

Lots of reports coming out about dramatically rising tensions between Iran and Israel. That the Iranian drone that violated Israeli airspace was armed, that the recent Israeli bombing attack hit Iranian positions and killed 7 Irainians including the Oranian Col. I charge of their drone program.

That was a double first. The first time each country has directly targeted the other and not through proxies.

Now Iran is believed to be planning a direct strike on Israel by members of their Revolutionary Guard. Israel in response is said to be preparing defenses and a counter attack on several supposed Iranian air bases in Syria.

Iran v Israel will be the next phase of the Syrian war.

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/04/iran-syria-israel/558080/

Distilled to its essence, Tehran’s steadfast support for Assad is not driven by the geopolitical or financial interests of the Iranian nation, nor the religious convictions of the Islamic Republic, but by a visceral and seemingly inextinguishable hatred for the state of Israel. As senior Iranian officials like Ali Akbar Velayati, a close adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, have commonly said, “The chain of Resistance against Israel by Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, the new Iraqi government and Hamas passes through the Syrian highway. … Syria is the golden ring of the chain of resistance against Israel.” So long as the 78-year-old Khamenei remains in power, this hatred will justify Tehran’s continued commitment of blood and treasure to support Assad’s use of all means necessary—including chemical weapons—to preserve his rule.....

......In ostensibly trying to avenge what he portrays as one injustice, however, Tehran has helped Assad perpetrate a far greater one. The number of Syrian deaths since 2011 (an estimated 500,000, though the UN has stopped counting) is more than five times greater than the approximately 90,000 Arabs (roughly 20-30 percent of them Palestinian) killed in the last 70 years of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, while more than twice as many Syrians (12 million) as Palestinians have been displaced. Indeed since 2011 far more Palestinians have been killed by Assad (nearly 3,700) than by Israel, including by chemical weapons. “If their way to return Palestinians back home is displacing millions of Syrians,” said my friend Kassem Eid, one of around half a million Palestinian refugees who grew up in Syria, and a victim of one of Assad’s chemical weapons attack, “I don't want to go back to Palestine.”.......

.....Today the Tehran-Damascus axis has come to resemble a mutually exploitative love affair: Iran likes Syria for its body (which borders Israel and serves as Tehran’s waystation to Hezbollah), and Syria likes Iran for its money. In exchange for Iranian largesse, Assad has forsaken his sovereignty. “Syria is occupied by the Iranian regime,” said former Syrian Prime Minister Riad Hijab. “The person who runs the country is not Bashar al-Assad but [Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commander] Qassem Suleimani.” ......

 

[Stoked]

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/04/iran-syria-israel/558080/

Distilled to its essence, Tehran’s steadfast support for Assad is not driven by the geopolitical or financial interests of the Iranian nation, nor the religious convictions of the Islamic Republic, but by a visceral and seemingly inextinguishable hatred for the state of Israel. As senior Iranian officials like Ali Akbar Velayati, a close adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, have commonly said, “The chain of Resistance against Israel by Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, the new Iraqi government and Hamas passes through the Syrian highway. … Syria is the golden ring of the chain of resistance against Israel.” So long as the 78-year-old Khamenei remains in power, this hatred will justify Tehran’s continued commitment of blood and treasure to support Assad’s use of all means necessary—including chemical weapons—to preserve his rule.....

......In ostensibly trying to avenge what he portrays as one injustice, however, Tehran has helped Assad perpetrate a far greater one. The number of Syrian deaths since 2011 (an estimated 500,000, though the UN has stopped counting) is more than five times greater than the approximately 90,000 Arabs (roughly 20-30 percent of them Palestinian) killed in the last 70 years of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, while more than twice as many Syrians (12 million) as Palestinians have been displaced. Indeed since 2011 far more Palestinians have been killed by Assad (nearly 3,700) than by Israel, including by chemical weapons. “If their way to return Palestinians back home is displacing millions of Syrians,” said my friend Kassem Eid, one of around half a million Palestinian refugees who grew up in Syria, and a victim of one of Assad’s chemical weapons attack, “I don't want to go back to Palestine.”.......

.....Today the Tehran-Damascus axis has come to resemble a mutually exploitative love affair: Iran likes Syria for its body (which borders Israel and serves as Tehran’s waystation to Hezbollah), and Syria likes Iran for its money. In exchange for Iranian largesse, Assad has forsaken his sovereignty. “Syria is occupied by the Iranian regime,” said former Syrian Prime Minister Riad Hijab. “The person who runs the country is not Bashar al-Assad but [Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commander] Qassem Suleimani.” ......

One of the reports I had read as well. On the whole The Atlantic is one of my favorites.

 

[Harambe]

WMD was the lie the US used to get their hands on the oil.

I hate to take a step back to Saturday, but this implication is a lie.

That might be too harsh. Perhaps it's gentler to say the statement isn't entirely based in truth, but is accurately based on your perception. Maybe you're just a bit bamboozled on the subject. I know I was when I first looked.

First, Yellowcake Uranium was found. So there's that. But that wasn't a big deal. It had already been documented by the UN.

The "big deal", is where we're at today, just packaged differently. When you say WMD, everyone thinks Nuclear... or at least we did 17 years ago. But chemical weapons are just as much classified as weapons of mass destruction.

A weapon of mass destruction is a nuclear, radiological, chemical, biological or other weapon that can kill and bring significant harm to a large number of humans or cause great damage to human-made structures (e.g., buildings), natural structures (e.g., mountains), or the biosphere.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_...estruction#Post-war_discoveries_and_incidents

Sarin and Mustard Gas. All of which were deemed "from before" or "long forgotten" by the Iraq government. From that same link, you see some information on Operation Avarice, which yielded over 400 rockets, missiles, and other chemical weapons in varying states of operation. These were confirmed from the Iran-Iraq war. I cringe a little bit because of the Iran-Contra affair happening at the same time. These weapons we bought... we might have just bought back.

So, as much as I hate to eat crow, I have to. Georgie Dub's regime was right about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. I feel they were misleading. I feel we still should not have gone charging in. But...

 

[Red]

US officials are saying that Israel appears to be preparing for a war with Iran:

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/mideast/israel-seems-be-preparing-war-iran-say-u-s-officials-n870051

 

[Stoked]

US officials are saying that Israel appears to be preparing for a war with Iran:

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/mideast/israel-seems-be-preparing-war-iran-say-u-s-officials-n870051

Yup, and Iran with Israel. They have been smuggling weapons and missiles to their agents in Syria and Lebanon. Neither one of these sides are what I would call moderate or peaceful. The two of the most rabid dogs in the world are now eyeing each other up. It's only a matter of time.

What worries me is will the big dogs behind the various sides be forced to step in. Russia and China behind Iran and America and EU behind Israel.

 

[Stoked]

And an interesting twist in all of this is the Sunni nations led by Saudi Arabia (Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Somalia...) are taking a much harder line against Iran and their Shia nations (Lebanon, Iraq, Houthi, Oman and Syria). They also appear to be reconciling quickly with the Israelis. For example the Saudi Crown Prince just publicly told the Palestinians to shut up or make peace with Israel.

I think if this does blow it will at least bring in the Shia nations and possibly Afghanistan and Pakistan on Iran's side and the Sunni nations on Israel's side. Hopefully we don't see it spread to Europe, Asia and America...