Trump and Syria

[Kbg]

Trump bombed Syria (and the Assad government) in response to the alleged chemical attack.

* There was no proof of the chemical attack.

* There was no authorization from the U.S. Congress for the bombing (Congress, of course, is mostly silent... except for Rand Paul).

This is not the foreign policy he campaigned on. During the campaign, he said that the U.S. wasted precious blood and treasure on useless Middle East wars. Which was correct. His promise to stop Middle East intervention was one of the reasons he was elected.

But now he is doubling/tripling down. He provides the aggressiveness/short-sightedness of the neocons with the bonus of an erratic and unmoored temperament. This will not end well.

Were you there? There were forensics by credible sources that determined sarin was used.

The President doesn't require Congressional approval for this type of action...and Rand Paul knows that.

Trump categorically campaigned on getting more involved...

"ISIS is making a tremendous amount of money because they have certain oil camps, certain areas of oil that they took away," Trump said. He continued: "They have some in Syria, some in Iraq. I would bomb the s--- out of 'em. I would just bomb those suckers. That's right. I'd blow up the pipes. ... I'd blow up every single inch. There would be nothing left. And you know what, you'll get Exxon to come in there and in two months, you ever see these guys, how good they are, the great oil companies? They’ll rebuild that sucker, brand new — it'll be beautiful."

On the larger point of getting more involved...I hope we don't as well, but in this case Obama shouldn't have let his bluff get called and Trump was right to draw a line at the use of chemical weapons for many, many reasons beyond Syria.

[stuper1]

I'm highly skeptical of the proof of chemical weapons use. Why would Assad use chemical weapons now? It seems like he has been winning lately. Why would he risk raising international ire? He has plenty of other "approved" ways of killing people. Doesn't it seem fishy that all of a sudden he uses chemical weapons and every media outlet jumps all over it and agrees 100% that he definitely used them. They can't agree on much of anything, but they are certain that he used these weapons.

Now that Trump is in the business of killing people the media is finally happy with him a little bit. Our military-industrial complex has them in its grip.

[Kbg]

If the left and right press both agree, that should tell you something. (If you simply don't believe anything, I'm not sure how to help you with that.) The use of chemical weapons is very easy to confirm. If you've seen any of Nicki Halley's (sp?) UN speech today, my guess is the proof is incontrovertible. She basically said of the Russians, you are lying, you've been duped by the person you are supporting or you are incompetent or D all of the above, which is it?

The speech was very cold warriorish...likely Trump has concluded due to the domestic investigation he has to be tougher on the Russians now than anybody.

[farjean2]

If you've seen any of Nicki Halley's (sp?) UN speech today, my guess is the proof is incontrovertible.

It may very well be true but that you would cite a speech at the U.N. as proof after the Colin Powell WMD debacle seems pretty strange.

[Benko]

But now he is doubling/tripling down. He provides the aggressiveness/short-sightedness of the neocons with the bonus of an erratic and unmoored temperament. This will not end well.

If this is the start of some prolonged action you are correct and I think a really bad idea.

If this is a one time event, a signal to Assad, Russia, China and North Korea that Trump is not a dormat like the last guy it is shrewd.

More which may be of interest

http://forum.dansimmons.com/ubbthreads/ ... Post166502

[Kbg]

If you've seen any of Nicki Halley's (sp?) UN speech today, my guess is the proof is incontrovertible.

It may very well be true but that you would cite a speech at the U.N. as proof after the Colin Powell WMD debacle seems pretty strange.

Are you even listening to /watching the news or do you lead with opinion and then look for facts to support your opinion?

Who reported the deaths?

[farjean2]

If you've seen any of Nicki Halley's (sp?) UN speech today, my guess is the proof is incontrovertible.

It may very well be true but that you would cite a speech at the U.N. as proof after the Colin Powell WMD debacle seems pretty strange.

Are you even listening to /watching the news or do you lead with opinion and then look for facts to support your opinion?

Who reported the deaths?

Well, as I recall,the news was also supportive of the Iraq WMD claims at the time so I've gotten into the habit of being skeptical about such things.

[Kbg]

The Turkish statement said the sarin conclusion had been based on autopsies on three victims performed at Turkey’s Adana Forensic Medicine Institution with the participation of representatives from the World Health Organization and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, a group based in The Hague that monitors compliance with the global treaty that bans such munitions.

Yeah, it's all fake news.

[Libertarian666]

The Turkish statement said the sarin conclusion had been based on autopsies on three victims performed at Turkey’s Adana Forensic Medicine Institution with the participation of representatives from the World Health Organization and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, a group based in The Hague that monitors compliance with the global treaty that bans such munitions.

Yeah, it's all fake news.

Did the autopsies also show who launched the attack? If not, it's still fake news that Assad must be responsible.

[Kbg]

I'm sure it was the CIA. I'll bet they forced the aliens kept in Area 51 to drop it with their captured spaceships for plausible deniability.

You are either A) Russian, B) a moron or C) both. Head on back to your alternative reality. Any further posting on this thread is pointless.

[stuper1]

Let's assume for the moment that Assad did use poison gas, which as I said before, seems very implausible to me. Do you think he's an idiot?

But anyway, let's assume that he did, and that he killed 82 people including children by doing so. Okay, he's a bad guy, I get it. I don't really care if he killed them with poison gas, or chopped off their heads with swords, he's still a bad guy. I get that. What I don't get is why Trump has to shoot off some missiles. Why do we have to be the policeman for the whole world? Russia is the big ally of Syria. How about if we let the blood of Syrians fall on Russia's hands? Why is it our business? Are we thinking that Assad will be sending cruise missiles our way loaded with poison gas next?

Of course, the answer to all this is easy. The military-industrial complex wants to keep making money, so they have to keep stirring things up, and what's really amazing is that they don't even care if they are flirting with starting World War III.

If the left and right press both agree, that should tell you something.

Yes, it does tell me something. What it tells me is that most likely the truth is pretty much the opposite of whatever the main-stream media is trying to force down our throats. Who do you think essentially controls the media? Big money, that's who.

I had hopes that maybe Trump was independent of big money, since he has plenty of money for himself. But I for one am very disappointed with his decision to get involved with other people's business, and who do you think benefits? Raytheon, Lockheed, etc. The majority of American people, not so much. Even the Syrian people, not so much.

[Maddy]

Time to review the March 2007 interview with General Wesley Clark, where he discusses being informed of the plan to "take out" seven specific nations in five years, beginning with Iraq, then Syria. . .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RC1Mepk_Sw

[moda0306]

"Tomahawk Cruise Missile Makers Get Stock Boost From Syrian Airstrike"
http://constitution.com/tomahawk-cruise ... airstrike/

the military industrial complex 1 swamp draining 0

This idea that Trump campaigned on a more reserved foreign policy is a bit of a joke.

He campaigned on two things, consistently. Immigration and trade deals. Everything else was a meandering stream of contradictory bull$hit.

Remember, this is a guy who bragged about the war crimes he'd commit and the torture he'd enact, and said he would bomb the $hit out of Iraqi oil fields, put a ring of troops in and have Exxon come in and take the oil out. Yes, he also claimed to use more discretion than some of our past presidents. Which did you really was going to show up?

To be fair, if I had the mind of a five year old and got to drive the Batmobile, my little fingers would be pushing buttons all over the place.

[Libertarian666]

I'm sure it was the CIA. I'll bet they forced the aliens kept in Area 51 to drop it with their captured spaceships for plausible deniability.

You are either A) Russian, B) a moron or C) both. Head on back to your alternative reality. Any further posting on this thread is pointless.

No, I think it is you who need to bury your head back in the sand, since apparently you believe government propaganda designed to incite the populace to support war. The fact that none of it is ever true has escaped you.

Hope that helps.

[Kbg]

So actually what is going on is it is a Russian false flag of their false flag during the election. Russia was really supporting Hillary because they knew if they were seen to be supporting Trump then Americans would be outraged and not vote for Trump. However, they were caught by surprise because they didn't realize how monumentally stupid a certain portion of the American populace was. So then the Russians secretly worked with Turkey to get them to bomb using sarin gas with American supplied F-16s. This way they could blame it on the American military industrial complex who would then resupply Turkey with expended munitions canisters. And Turkey could blame it on the Kurds. But it backfired because the Americans then used Tomahawks to respond which will increase the quarterly profits of a different military supplier and the F-16 supplier is super pissed off because now they aren't going to look as good during the next reporting period. Meanwhile, Hillary and Bill are making serious bank because they control the charitable organizations that are providing the relief and they are skimming 10% off the top. The Clinton's also have secret connections to the Tomahawk supplier who is quietly funneling several million to a shell corporation in the Grand Caymans owned by but not not traceable to them.

Mitch McConnell is also involved because he worked with Mattis and convinced Mattis to insist on a military strike so that the news on Friday would be focused on the military response vs. ending the filibuster rule for supreme court justices. It gets even better though. Gorsuch's father is thought to have been a close associate of Lee Harvey Oswald and now it is very well possible that the Russians have both a President and a Supreme Court Justice in their pocket. The Democrats were close to figuring this out which is the real reason why the filibuster was ditched. Very few people know about this last connection, so please don't spread it beyond this website. Just me telling you this puts my life in extreme danger. What is amazing about this plan though, is everyone is focused on the Tomahawk launches because DoD gave the news companies old stock footage to make it seem like this was how the strike was carried out. However, I live in a state close to area 51 and I saw the UFOs flying back from their mission at about 4am the next morning.

Scully: You lied. You have seen it before, I can tell. You lied to them.

Mulder: I would never lie. I willfully participated in a campaign of misinformation.

[WiseOne]

This idea that Trump campaigned on a more reserved foreign policy is a bit of a joke.

He campaigned on two things, consistently. Immigration and trade deals. Everything else was a meandering stream of contradictory bull$hit.

Actually I thought he was pretty consistent about his criteria for conducting war: he wanted to go after ISIS in order to protect American citizens, and otherwise wanted to bow out of the role of world hegemon. I agree that this missile attack is thoroughly inconsistent with this position. Saddam Hussein did worse things to the Kurds, and those actions were later used to help justify the Iraq War - which Trump among others has decried as an extremely bad decision.

I wonder if he was convinced or manipulated into doing it in order to pull the rug out from under the Russian investigation and get himself some positive press.

[Mountaineer]

If the left and right press both agree, that should tell you something.

Yes, it does tell me something. What it tells me is that most likely the truth is pretty much the opposite of whatever the main-stream media is trying to force down our throats.

In my view, however, Trump's response is completely unjustified. My view pretty much aligns with stuper's post above.

So, for stuper1 and Tenn, since most/much of the mainstream media is throwing God out of our culture and replacing Him with hedonism, I assume you think they are wrong and there really is a God the source of all truth, in charge of all that was, is and will be, including President Trump? Thus, resistance is futile! Who are we to tell God he is wrong? Sorry, could not resist.

[farjean2]

Well, based on some things he said early in the campaign (in particular, prior to the South Carolina primary),I was persuaded that he would be less interventionist.

But, yeah, as the campaign proceeded, there was more contradictory bullshit. I was hoping against hope that he would lean non-interventionist. Sadly for lots of people, he isn't. In fact, he has escalated every conflict that Bush/Obama got the U.S. into.

Whether or not the sarin gas incident was a false flag operation I have no opinion at this time but I do know that presidents lie us into war and the media helps them spread their falsehoods and that is not an opinion but a fact of history.

There was FDR who was actually making plans to go to war at the same time he was making promises to keep us out of WWII and then Pearl Harbor happened, LBJ who said we weren't going to send American boys to do the job that Asian boys should be doing until the Gulf of Tonkin happened, Bush who campaigned on a humble foreign policy with no nation building until all those WMD's were found in Iraq. I suspect there are plenty more if anyone wants to dig deeper into history.

I guess it remains to be seen whether Trump is going to join that club but I think he is getting perilously close.

I'm now sorry I voted for him but he still might have been the lesser of two evils.

[stuper1]

So, for stuper1 and Tenn, since most/much of the mainstream media is throwing God out of our culture and replacing Him with hedonism, I assume you think they are wrong and there really is a God the source of all truth, in charge of all that was, is and will be, including President Trump? Thus, resistance is futile! Who are we to tell God he is wrong? Sorry, could not resist.

Huh?

Yes, I do believe there is a God the source of all truth.

I didn't vote for Trump. I haven't voted for 30+ years, because politics is a cesspool.

All I'm saying is that some of Trump's rhetoric had me hopeful that he wouldn't be such a tool of the miltary-industrial complex, but I'm much less hopeful of that at this point.

[Mountaineer]

So, for stuper1 and Tenn, since most/much of the mainstream media is throwing God out of our culture and replacing Him with hedonism, I assume you think they are wrong and there really is a God the source of all truth, in charge of all that was, is and will be, including President Trump? Thus, resistance is futile! Who are we to tell God he is wrong? Sorry, could not resist.

Huh?

Yes, I do believe there is a God the source of all truth.

I didn't vote for Trump. I haven't voted for 30+ years, because politics is a cesspool.

All I'm saying is that some of Trump's rhetoric had me hopeful that he wouldn't be such a tool of the miltary-industrial complex, but I'm much less hopeful of that at this point.

stuper1, sorry if you took me seriously. It was satire with a bit of sarcasm thrown in for irony's sake! I agree with you, politics is a cesspool. Nothing surprises me, well, almost nothing that the swamp critters do in the name of politics. I don't get anymore upset with Trump than I do the NK wacko or screeching Hillary or the press - they just don't seem to be able to help it. Draining the swamp only reveals more bottom feeders. But I still vote.

[Mountaineer]

So, for stuper1 and Tenn, since most/much of the mainstream media is throwing God out of our culture and replacing Him with hedonism, I assume you think they are wrong and there really is a God the source of all truth, in charge of all that was, is and will be, including President Trump? Thus, resistance is futile! Who are we to tell God he is wrong? Sorry, could not resist.

Since we're veering off topic already, let me go ahead and run us into the ditch. I can't stop thinking of Trump as our modern day King Belshazzar. And I'm impatiently awaiting the writing on the wall, at the Mar-a-Lago: "mene mene tekel upharsin."

Back to reality for a moment: For anyone surprised by Trump's change in position on foreign intervention ... this is Trump. He has changed his positions radically and frequently. Economic nationalism is a very new thing for him as well; he has a long history of hiring illegals and importing junk from China. This is what a man with no real convictions does. It appears that Bannon was the source of many of Trump's campaign positions, and with him being replaced by the ridiculously unqualified Kushner, we're probably going to be bumbling chaotically to a whole new set of "principles." Strap yourself in, this is the chaos president.

Edited to add this little article full of past Trump tweets regarding Syria:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/nine-tweets- ... 59707.html

The finger. Awesome!

[flyingpylon]

Here is another perspective:

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/20 ... stability/

[whatchamacallit]

Here is another perspective:

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/20 ... stability/

Wow. I didn't really know how I felt about the whole thing until watching that CNN clip there. Not the response they were expecting at CNN.

[dualstow]

Well, kbg, I agree with pretty much everything you said. I hope that doesn't destroy your credibility. Everything but the obviously facetious or tongue-in-cheek comments.

Stuper, as to your question back on page 1 about why Assad would want to risk raising international ire, I simply can't believe that it was ever a concern of his. He's been indiscriminate from the get go, with those barrel bombs.

I know most of these threads end up being mainstream vs fringe, but geez, guys. Sometimes the best and most accurate explanation really is the simplest one.

[ochotona]

Trump is a man who reacts very strongly and impulsively to the last thing he's seen or the last person he's spoken to. That's why he can't give up Twittter at 1 AM. He has the attention span of a grease fire.

Assad killing Syrians with sarin is not news. He did it before. And who cares if it's sarin, or barrel bombs, or whatever, he kills his own people. This is not news. What makes me very concerned is that no new news should cause no change to US posture in the region. But Trump just reacted, and now we're going who knows where.

Where is the cost-benefit analysis? Where are the vital US interests? Where is the blowback analysis for the US homeland? Where is the big picture of how it fits with Russia and ISIS and everything else?

No, the pics and movies "got" to Trump, he got all choked up, and he pushed the button. What's it going to be next, a neo-con handler showing him pics and video of starving North Koreans, and he attacks North Korean, and Kim nukes Japan?

Chaos President, for sure.