Where's the Proof? -- Trump Withholds Syria-Sarin Evidence

[charrob]

Exclusive: Despite President Trump’s well-known trouble with the truth, his White House now says “trust us” on its Syrian-sarin charges while withholding the proof that it claims to have, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry

After making the provocative and dangerous charge that Russia is covering up Syria’s use of chemical weapons, the Trump administration withheld key evidence to support its core charge that a Syrian warplane dropped sarin on a northern Syrian town on April 4.

A four-page white paper, prepared by President Trump’s National Security Council staff and released by the White House on Tuesday, claimed that U.S. intelligence has proof that the plane carrying the sarin gas left from the Syrian military airfield that Trump ordered hit by Tomahawk missiles on April 6.

The paper asserted that “we have signals intelligence and geospatial intelligence,” but then added that “we cannot publicly release all available intelligence on this attack due to the need to protect sources and methods.”

I’m told that the key evidence was satellite surveillance of the area, a body of material that U.S. intelligence analysts were reviewing late last week even after the Trump-ordered bombardment of 59 Tomahawk missiles that, according to Syrian media reports, killed seven or eight Syrian soldiers and nine civilians, including four children.

Yet, it is unclear why releasing these overhead videos would be so detrimental to “sources and methods” since everyone knows the U.S. has this capability and the issue at hand – if it gets further out of hand – could lead to a nuclear confrontation with Russia.

In similarly tense situations in the past, U.S. Presidents have released sensitive intelligence to buttress U.S. government assertions, including John F. Kennedy’s disclosure of U-2 spy flights in the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis and Ronald Reagan revealing electronic intercepts after the Soviet shoot-down of Korean Airlines Flight 007 in 1983.

Yet, in this current case, as U.S.-Russian relations spiral downward into what is potentially an extermination event for the human species, Trump’s White House insists that the world must trust it despite its record of consistently misstating facts.

In the case of the April 4 chemical-weapons incident in the town of Khan Sheikhoun, which reportedly killed scores of people including young children, I was told that initially the U.S. analysts couldn’t see any warplanes over the area in Idlib province at the suspected time of the poison gas attack but later they detected a drone that they thought might have delivered the bomb.

A Drone Mystery

According to a source, the analysts struggled to identify whose drone it was and where it originated. Despite some technical difficulties in tracing its flight path, analysts eventually came to believe that the flight was launched in Jordan from a Saudi-Israeli special operations base for supporting Syrian rebels, the source said, adding that the suspected reason for the poison gas was to create an incident that would reverse the Trump administration’s announcement in late March that it was no longer seeking the removal of President Bashar al-Assad.

If indeed that was the motive — and if the source’s information is correct — the operation would have been successful, since the Trump administration has now reversed itself and is pressing Russia to join in ousting Assad who is getting blamed for the latest chemical-weapons incident.

Presumably, however, the “geospatial intelligence” cited in the four-page dossier could disprove this and other contentions if the Trump administration would only make its evidence publicly available.

The dossier stated, “Our information indicates that the chemical agent was delivered by regime Su-22 fixed-wing aircraft that took off from the regime-controlled Shayrat Airfield. These aircraft were in the vicinity of Khan Shaykhun approximately 20 minutes before reports of the chemical attack began and vacated the area shortly after the attack.”

So, that would mean – assuming that the dossier is correct – that U.S. intelligence analysts were able to trace the delivery of the poison gas to Assad’s aircraft and to the airfield that Trump ordered attacked on April 6.

Still, it remains a mystery why this intelligence assessment is not coming directly from President Trump’s intelligence chiefs as is normally the case, either with an official Intelligence Estimate or a report issued by the Director of National Intelligence.

The White House photo released late last week showing the President and a dozen senior advisers monitoring the April 6 missile strike from a room at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida was noteworthy in that neither CIA Director Mike Pompeo nor Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats was in the frame.

Now, it is the White House that has released the four-page dossier supposedly summing up the assessment of the “intelligence community.”

An Argumentative Dossier

The dossier also seems argumentative in that it assumes that Russian officials – and presumably others – who have suggested different possible explanations for the incident at Khan Sheikdoun did so in a willful cover-up, when any normal investigation seeks to evaluate different scenarios before settling on one.

It is common amid the “fog of war” for people outside the line of command – and even sometimes inside the line of command – to not understand what happened and to struggle for an explanation.

On April 6, before Trump’s missile strike, I and others received word from U.S. military intelligence officials in the Middle East that they, too, shared the belief that the poison gas may have resulted from a conventional bombing raid that ruptured containers stored by the rebels, who – in Idlib province – are dominated by Al Qaeda’s affiliate and its allies.

Those reports were cited by former U.S. intelligence officials, including more than two dozen who produced a memo to President Trump urging him to undertake a careful investigation of the incident before letting this crisis exacerbate U.S.-Russia relations.

The memo said “our U.S. Army contacts in the area” were disputing the official story of a chemical weapons attack. “Instead, a Syrian aircraft bombed an al-Qaeda-in-Syria ammunition depot that turned out to be full of noxious chemicals and a strong wind blew the chemical-laden cloud over a nearby village where many consequently died,” the memo said.

In other words, to suggest possible alternative scenarios is not evidence of a “cover-up,” even if the theories are later shown to be erroneous. It is the normal process of sorting through often conflicting initial reports.

Even in the four-page dossier, Trump’s NSC officials contradicted what other U.S. government sources have told The New York Times and other mainstream news outlets about the Syrian government’s supposed motive for launching the chemical-weapons attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun.

According to the earlier accounts, the Syrian government either was trying to terrorize the population in a remote rebel-controlled area or was celebrating its impunity after the Trump administration had announced that it was no longer seeking Assad’s removal.

But the dossier said, “We assess that Damascus launched this chemical attack in response to an opposition offensive in northern Hamah Province that threatened key infrastructure.” Although Khan Sheikhoun was not near the fighting, the dossier presented the town as an area of support for the offensive.

Assuming this assessment is correct, does that mean that the earlier explanations were part of a cover-up or a propaganda operation? The reality is that in such complex situations, the analyses should continue to be refined as more information becomes available. It should not be assumed that every false lead or discarded theory is proof of a “cover-up,” yet that is what we see here.

“The Syrian regime and its primary backer, Russia, have sought to confuse the world community about who is responsible for using chemical weapons against the Syrian people in this and earlier attacks,” the dossier declared.

But the larger point is that – given President Trump’s spotty record for getting facts straight – he and his administration should go the extra mile in presenting irrefutable evidence to support its assessments, not simply insisting that the world must “trust us.”

[In a separate analysis of the four-page dossier, Theodore Postol, a national security specialist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, concluded that the White House claims were clearly bogus, writing:

“I have reviewed the document carefully, and I believe it can be shown, without doubt, that the document does not provide any evidence whatsoever that the US government has concrete knowledge that the government of Syria was the source of the chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun, Syria at roughly 6 to 7 a.m. on April 4, 2017.

“In fact, a main piece of evidence that is cited in the document points to an attack that was executed by individuals on the ground, not from an aircraft, on the morning of April 4. This conclusion is based on an assumption made by the White House when it cited the source of the sarin release and the photographs of that source. My own assessment, is that the source was very likely tampered with or staged, so no serious conclusion could be made from the photographs cited by the White House.”]

https://consortiumnews.com/2017/04/1...arin-evidence/

[Brian4Liberty]

Proof will be hard to find in the midst of many players, all with a history of lying, where false flags, accidents, exaggerations, fictional stories and straight forward attacks all have about the same probability.

The truth is out there, but the fact is that we, the vast majority of people, will never, ever know the truth. Lies can be uncovered, but that would still not mean that the truth is revealed.

For example, imagine that a couple of local teenagers conducted a science experiment of their own, and only they know the truth. You can guarantee that the rest of the world would be positive of their erroneous, and usually agenda serving explanations.

[shakey1]

Proof???... we don't need no stinking proof.

[Jan2017]

Proof???... we don't need no stinking proof.

Just saw this . . . I guess one would go to CNN for the fake news (?)

US intelligence officials have intercepted communications that feature Syrian soldiers preparing for last week's chemical attack
that left 86 people dead, including at least 27 children.

The Syrian government forces were caught on the intercepts consulting chemical experts just hours before the sarin nerve agent attack
on the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun, a senior US official told CNN.

The official explained the US did not know prior to the attack it was going to happen.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...as-attack.html

[merkelstan]

From people who have never lied anyone into war? haha?

[klamath]

Just saw this . . . I guess one would go to CNN for the fake news (?)

US intelligence officials have intercepted communications that feature Syrian soldiers preparing for last week's chemical attack
that left 86 people dead, including at least 27 children.

The Syrian government forces were caught on the intercepts consulting chemical experts just hours before the sarin nerve agent attack
on the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun, a senior US official told CNN.

The official explained the US did not know prior to the attack it was going to happen.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...as-attack.html

Where are the transcripts???????????? Someone telling us they intercepted something doesn't cut it. Powell told us they intercepted the Iraqis talking about WMDs as well!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Jan2017]

Someone telling us they intercepted something doesn't cut it. Powell told us they intercepted the Iraqis talking about WMDs as well!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Trust the MIC-run government about 'as far as' you could throw them.

[Zippyjuan]

China breaks its support of Russia on Syria by not vetoing resolution condemning Syrian gas attack. Until this week, China had consistently joined Russia in vetoing any resolutions on Syria. Russia was the lone veto. http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/04...-abstains.html China urging political solution to Syrian crisis. Permanent members of the Security Council have veto power.

UN draft resolution on Syria attack: Vote fails with Russia veto, China abstains

A vote by the U.N. Security council on a draft resolution to condemn the chemical weapon attack in Syria failed Wednesday with a veto by Russia, but fellow member China abstained, a sign that talks with President Trump last week may have had an effect on the superpower.

The draft resolution by Britain, France and the United States called for those responsible for the attack on the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun on April 4 to be identified and brought to justice.

The resolution garnered 10 votes in favor, Russia and Bolivia against, and China, Kazakhstan and Ethiopia abstaining.

"With its veto, Russia said no to accountability," said U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley.

"Russia once again has chosen to side with Assad, even as the rest of the world, overwhelmingly comes together to condemn this murderous regime," she added.

At a press conference with secretary-general of NATO, President Donald Trump praised China for abstaining from the U.N. resolution. China usually sides with Russia in the Security Council, so the move to abstain represented a significant shift for Beijing.

Trump said it was "wonderful" that China abstained and the U.S. was "honored by that vote," which came after he met last week with Chinese leader Xi Jinping and the two spoke by phone Tuesday night.

The president said he's "very impressed" with Xi, adding he thought he means well and wants to help.

Trump added that it was "certainly possible but probably unlikely," that Russia knew in advance of Syrian chemical weapons attack.

The final draft of the resolution included a paragraph that the Russians objected to last week, which stressed Syria's requirement to provide investigators with flight plans and information about air operations on April 4 when Khan Sheikhoun was attacked, names of helicopter squadron commanders, and immediate access to air bases where they believe an attack may have been launched.

[CaptUSA]

UN Draft Resolutions are really, really, really Strongly Worded Letters.

[CPUd]

It was Assad, believe me!

[dannno]

China breaks its support of Russia on Syria by not vetoing resolution condemning Syrian gas attack. Until this week, China had consistently joined Russia in vetoing any resolutions on Syria. Russia was the lone veto. http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/04...-abstains.html China urging political solution to Syrian crisis. Permanent members of the Security Council have veto power.

Who do you think carried out the chemical weapons attack?

[Dr.3D]

It was Assad, believe me!

Well, of course, they keep telling us that on the television. We know the people on the television never lie.

[charrob]

MIT Rocket Scientist: White House Claims on Syria Chemical Attack “Cannot Be True”

One of the world’s leading rocket scientists, national security advisor and MIT Professor Theodore Postol, who has won awards for debunking claims about missile defense systems and has been a scientific adviser to the US Chief of Naval Operations, says today in a nine-page report that a four-page report released by the Trump administration yesterday intended to blame the recent chemical attack in Syria on the Syrian government “does not provide any evidence whatsoever that the US government has concrete knowledge that the government of Syria was the source of the chemical attack”.

Postol notes the “only source the document cites as evidence that the attack was by the Syrian government is the crater” left by a munition.

Postol located the crater via satellite and examined it himself, concluding it reveals “absolutely no evidence that the crater was created by a munition designed to disperse sarin after it is dropped from an aircraft”.

The “data cited by the White House”, he says, “is more consistent with the possibility that the munition was placed on the ground rather than dropped from a plane.” He says the evidence indicates that a tube of chemical agent was placed on the ground in the al Qaeda held area and then an explosive was placed on top of that and detonated, dispersing the chemical agent.

Trump’s claim that a chemical weapon was dropped from a plane is “erroneous”, and “no competent analyst” could avoid that conclusion.

Regarding a similar chemical attack in 2013, Postol notes the “Obama White House also issued an intelligence report containing obvious inaccuracies” (which are detailed in the report). While Obama initially blamed Assad for the attack, he received a briefing casting doubt on Assad’s guilt and, unlike Trump, refrained from launching an illegal attack at that time (though he continued illegally supporting proxy forces).

Postol notes that both the initial report blaming Assad made by the Obama White House and the one today by the Trump White House are “obviously false, misleading and amateurish” and may reflect politicization, similar, says Postol, to the way the W. Bush administration politicized ‘intelligence’ that was used to falsely claim ‘certainty’ that Saddam Husssein was stockpiling WMD in Iraq.

Award-winning journalist Robert Parry has noted evidence that Trump, like W. Bush, is simply excluding from meetings people he knows have information he doesn’t want to hear.

That made me wonder whether perhaps my original source did know something. The claim was that CIA Director Pompeo had briefed Trump personally on the analysts’ assessment that Assad’s forces were not responsible, but – then with Pompeo sidelined – Trump conveyed his own version of the intelligence to his senior staff.

In other words, the other officials didn’t get the direct word from Pompeo but rather received a second-hand account from the President, the source said. Did Trump choose to rely on the smug certainty from the TV shows and the mainstream news media that Assad was guilty, rather than the contrary view of U.S. intelligence analysts?

After the attack, Secretary of State Tillerson, who is not an institutional intelligence official and has little experience with the subtleties of intelligence, was the one to claim that the U.S. intelligence community assessed with a “high degree of confidence” that the Syrian government had dropped a poison gas bomb on civilians in Idlib province.

While Tillerson’s comment meshed with Official Washington’s hastily formed groupthink of Assad’s guilt, it is hard to believe that CIA analysts would have settled on such a firm conclusion so quickly, especially given the remote location of the incident and the fact that the initial information was coming from pro-rebel (or Al Qaeda) sources.

Thus, a serious question arises whether President Trump did receive that “high degree of confidence” assessment from the intelligence community or whether he shunted Pompeo aside to eliminate an obstacle to his desire to launch the April 6 rocket attack.

If so, such a dangerous deception more than anything else we’ve seen in the first two-plus months of the Trump administration would be grounds for impeachment – ignoring the opinion of the U.S. intelligence community so the President could carry out a politically popular (albeit illegal) missile strike that killed Syrians.

Postol concludes his report by noting this is a “very serious matter” and “what the country is now being told by the White House cannot be true”.

The following is the report by MIT Rocket Scientist Theodore A. Postol:

Dear Larry:

I am responding to your distribution of what I understand is a White House statement claiming intelligence findings about the nerve agent attack on April 4, 2017 in Khan Shaykhun, Syria. My understanding from your note is that this White House intelligence summary was released to you sometime on April 11, 2017.

I have reviewed the document carefully, and I believe it can be shown, without doubt, that the document does not provide any evidence whatsoever that the US government has concrete knowledge that the government of Syria was the source of the chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun, Syria at roughly 6 to 7 a.m. on April 4, 2017.

In fact, a main piece of evidence that is cited in the document points to an attack [highlighted]that was executed by individuals on the ground, not from an aircraft,[/highlight] on the morning of April 4.

This conclusion is based on an assumption made by the White House when it cited the source of the sarin release and the photographs of that source. My own assessment, is that the source was very likely tampered with or staged, so no serious conclusion could be made from the photographs cited by the White House.

However, if one assumes, as does the White House, that the source of the sarin was from this location and that the location was not tampered with, the most plausible conclusion is that the sarin was dispensed by an improvised dispersal device made from a 122 mm section of rocket tube filled with sarin and capped on both sides.

The only undisputable facts stated in the White House report is the claim that a chemical attack using nerve agent occurred in Khan Shaykhun, Syria on that morning. Although the White House statement repeats this point in many places within its report, the report contains absolutely no evidence that this attack was the result of a munition being dropped from an aircraft. In fact, the report contains absolutely no evidence that would indicate who was the perpetrator of this atrocity.

The report instead repeats observations of physical effects suffered by victims that with very little doubt indicate nerve agent poisoning.

The only source the document cites as evidence that the attack was by the Syrian government is the crater it claims to have identified on a road in the North of Khan Shaykhun.

I have located this crater using Google Earth and there is absolutely no evidence that the crater was created by a munition designed to disperse sarin after it is dropped from an aircraft.

The Google Earth map shown in Figure 1 at the end of this text section shows the location of that crater on the road in the north of Khan Shaykhun, as described in the White House statement.

The data cited by the White House is more consistent with the possibility that the munition was placed on the ground rather than dropped from a plane. This conclusion assumes that the crater was not tampered with prior to the photographs. However, by referring to the munition in this crater, the White House is indicating that this is the erroneous source of the data it used to conclude that the munition came from a Syrian aircraft.

Analysis of the debris as shown in the photographs cited by the White House clearly indicates that the munition was almost certainly placed on the ground with an external detonating explosive on top of it that crushed the container so as to disperse the alleged load of sarin.

Since time appears to be of the essence here, I have put together the summary of the evidence I have that the White House report contains false and misleading conclusions in a series of figures that follow this discussion. Each of the figures has a description below it, but I will summarize these figures next and wait for further inquiries about the basis of the conclusions I am putting forward herein.

Figure 1 shows a Google Earth image of the northeast corner of Khan Shaykhun where the crater identified as the source of the sarin attack and referred to in the White House intelligence report is located.

Also shown in the Google Earth image is the direction of the wind from the crater. At 3 AM the wind was going directly to the south at a speed of roughly 1.5 to 2.5 m/s. By 6 AM the wind was moving to the southeast at 1 to 2 m/s. The temperature was also low, 50 to 55°F near the ground. These conditions are absolutely ideal for a nerve agent attack.

When the temperature near the ground is low, and there is no sun and very slow winds, the dense cool air stays close to the ground and there is almost no upward motion of the air. This condition causes any particles, droplets, or clouds of dispersed gas to stay close to the ground as the surrounding air moves over the ground. We perceive this motion as a gentle breeze on a calm morning before sunrise.

One can think of a cloud of sarin as much like a cloud of ink generated by an escaping octopus. The ink cloud sits in the water and as the water slowly moves, so does the cloud. As the cloud is moved along by the water, it will slowly spread in all directions as it moves. If the layer of water where the ink is embedded moves so as to stay close to the ocean floor, the cloud will cover objects as it moves with the water.

This is the situation that occurs on a cool night before sunrise when the winds move only gently.

Figures 5 and 6 show tables that summarize the weather at 3 hour intervals in Khan Shaykun on the day of the attack, April 4, the day before the attack, April 3, and the day after the attack, April 5. The striking feature of the weather is that there were relatively high winds in the morning hours on both April 3 and April 5. If the gas attack were executed either the day before or the day after in the early morning, the attack would have been highly ineffective. The much higher winds would have dispersed the cloud of nerve agent and the mixing of winds from higher altitudes would have caused the nerve agent to be carried aloft from the ground. It is therefore absolutely clear that the time and day of the attack was carefully chosen and was no accident.

Figure 2 shows a high quality photograph of the crater identified in the White House report as the source of the sarin attack. Assuming that there was no tampering of evidence at the crater, one can see what the White House is claiming as a dispenser of the nerve agent.

The dispenser looks like a 122 mm pipe like that used in the manufacture of artillery rockets.

As shown in the close-up of the pipe in the crater in Figure 3, the pipe looks like it was originally sealed at the front end and the back end. Also of note is that the pipe is flattened into the crater, and also has a fractured seam that was created by the brittle failure of the metal skin when the pipe was suddenly crushed inward from above.

Figure 4 shows the possible configuration of an improvised sarin dispersal device that could have been used to create the crater and the crushed carcass of what was originally a cylindrical pipe. A good guess of how this dispersal mechanism worked (again, assuming that the crater and carcass were not staged, as assumed in the White House report) was that a slab of high explosive was placed over one end of the sarin-filled pipe and detonated.

The explosive acted on the pipe as a blunt crushing mallet. It drove the pipe into the ground while at the same time creating the crater. Since the pipe was filled with sarin, which is an incompressible fluid, as the pipe was flattened the sarin acted on the walls and ends of the pipe causing a crack along the length of the pipe and also the failure of the cap on the back end. This mechanism of dispersal is essentially the same as hitting a toothpaste tube with a large mallet, which then results in the tube failing and the toothpaste being blown in many directions depending on the exact way the toothpaste skin ruptures.

If this is in fact the mechanism used to disperse the sarin, this indicates that the sarin tube was placed on the ground by individuals on the ground and not dropped from an airplane.

Figure 8 shows the improvised sarin dispenser along with a typical 122 mm artillery rocket and the modified artillery rocket used in the sarin attack of August 21, 2013 in Damascus.

At that time (August 30, 2013) the Obama White House also issued an intelligence report containing obvious inaccuracies. For example, that report stated without equivocation that the sarin carrying artillery rocket used in Damascus had been fired from Syrian government controlled areas. As it turned out, the particular munition used in that attack could not go further than roughly 2 km, very far short of any boundary controlled by the Syrian government at that time. The White House report at that time also contained other critical and important errors that might properly be described as amateurish. For example, the report claimed that the locations of the launch and impact of points of the artillery rockets were observed by US satellites. This claim was absolutely false and any competent intelligence analyst would have known that. The rockets could be seen from the Space-Based Infrared Satellite (SBIRS) but the satellite could absolutely not see the impact locations because the impact locations were not accompanied by explosions. These errors were clear indicators that the White House intelligence report had in part been fabricated and had not been vetted by competent intelligence experts.

This same situation appears to be the case with the current White House intelligence report. No competent analyst would assume that the crater cited as the source of the sarin attack was unambiguously an indication that the munition came from an aircraft. No competent analyst would assume that the photograph of the carcass of the sarin canister was in fact a sarin canister. Any competent analyst would have had questions about whether the debris in the crater was staged or real. No competent analyst would miss the fact that the alleged sarin canister was forcefully crushed from above, rather than exploded by a munition within it. All of these highly amateurish mistakes indicate that this White House report, like the earlier Obama White House Report, was not properly vetted by the intelligence community as claimed.

I have worked with the intelligence community in the past, and I have grave concerns about the politicization of intelligence that seems to be occurring with more frequency in recent times – but I know that the intelligence community has highly capable analysts in it. And if those analysts were properly consulted about the claims in the White House document they would have not approved the document going forward.

I am available to expand on these comments substantially. I have only had a few hours to quickly review the alleged White House intelligence report. But a quick perusal shows without a lot of analysis that this report cannot be correct, and it also appears that this report was not properly vetted by the intelligence community.

This is a very serious matter.

President Obama was initially misinformed about supposed intelligence evidence that Syria was the perpetrator of the August 21, 2013 nerve agent attack in Damascus. This is a matter of public record. President Obama stated that his initially false understanding was that the intelligence clearly showed that Syria was the source of the nerve agent attack. This false information was corrected when the then Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, interrupted the President while he was in an intelligence briefing. According to President Obama, Mr. Clapper told the President that the intelligence that Syria was the perpetrator of the attack was “not a slamdunk.”

The question that needs to be answered by our nation is how was the president initially misled about such a profoundly important intelligence finding? A second equally important question is how did the White House produce an intelligence report that was obviously flawed and amateurish that was then released to the public and never corrected? The same false information in the intelligence report issued by the White House on August 30, 2013 was emphatically provided by Secretary of State John Kerry in testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee!

We again have a situation where the White House has issued an obviously false, misleading and amateurish intelligence report.

The Congress and the public have been given reports in the name of the intelligence community about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, technical evidence supposedly collected by satellite systems that any competent scientists would know is false, and now from photographs of the crater that any analyst who has any competence at all would not trust as evidence.

It is late in the evening for me, so I will end my discussion here.

I stand ready to provide the country with any analysis and help that is within my power to supply. What I can say for sure herein is that what the country is now being told by the White House cannot be true and the fact that this information has been provided in this format raises the most serious questions about the handling of our national security.

Sincerely yours,

Theodore A. Postol

Professor Emeritus of Science, Technology, and National Security Policy
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Email: postol@mit.edu
Cell Phone: 617 543-7646

Click here to link to above article showing all the additional diagrams, figures, appendices, and addendums as described above and which further explain the professor's work.

[DamianTV]

Proof will be hard to find in the midst of many players, all with a history of lying, where false flags, accidents, exaggerations, fictional stories and straight forward attacks all have about the same probability.

The truth is out there, but the fact is that we, the vast majority of people, will never, ever know the truth. Lies can be uncovered, but that would still not mean that the truth is revealed.

For example, imagine that a couple of local teenagers conducted a science experiment of their own, and only they know the truth. You can guarantee that the rest of the world would be positive of their erroneous, and usually agenda serving explanations.

+Rep

Every major conflict in the 20th century started with a False Flag, and it is only discovered later that they were.

Lusatania, Gulf of Tonkin, 9/11, do these ring any bells?

[charrob]

Daniel McAdams from the Ron Paul Institute:

Why won't the U.S. release the signals intelligence and geospatial intelligence proving that this fighter [jet] had a chemical bomb in it that it dropped? Why won't they put forth this evidence? Instead it relies on what they call "social media" and "observers on the ground". Well that part of Syria is controlled by al qaeda and the observers they are talking about are the "White Helmets" which is an extraordinarily dubious organization funded by the United States Government. --Hardly objective.

[...]

It looks like 'Amateur Hour' for the U.S.: The U.S. is the 800 pound bully that is going around wrecking things. You don't change policy on a dime over an event that you can't provide any proof that even occurred.

At minute 6:43 in the above video the RT Reporter states:

"Another sticking point on Syria that remains is Tillerson steadfast on knowing the Syrian government was responsible for that alleged chemical weapon's attack in Idlib province last week despite no evidence being revealed to support that conclusion. On this Sergey Lavrov re-asserted that there was no U.N. investigation results to support this claim as yet."

Tillerson: [...]

Lavrov: "I can only confirm, once again, that just like with so-called Russian hackers, we'd like to get factual evidence regarding "chemical incidents" in Syria without numerous claims."

In the following video which contains the entire Tillerson/Lavrov Press Conference, the Russian translator translated Lavrov's last statement a little differently, instead saying:

Lavrov: "I can only say, once again, that just like the case of the so-called Russian hackers, with the chemical incidents in Syria -- we would very much like to get some concrete evidence -- not just words. So far we have not seen any facts."

If you don't want to listen to the entire press conference in the above video, here is the part of the video where that last line plays: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-El3F_1xDz8&t=48m13s

This proves without any doubt that Tillerson, in his visit to Putin/Lavrov in Moscow, shared no U.S. "evidence" that confirms Assad was behind the chemical attack. Tillerson gave the Russians nothing but words.

Here's one more part of the press conference which may be worth noting:

Above video at minute 21:58: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-El3F_1xDz8&t=21m58s

Lavrov:
"All the accusations against the Syrian Arab Republic's Government of having used the chemical weapons, all these accusations are based on the so-called remote evidence provided by some [NGOs] - the White Helmets that have discredited themselves on many occasions. They have been found to be guilty of fraud."

"Now as for all the evidence we've got of chemical weapons having been used, in the territory under the control of the opposition. I can say that on many occasions both the Russian armed forces and the Syrian government have provided physical evidence including samples required to conduct an investigation to the OPCW. These were not some "remote evidence"; these were pieces of physical evidence. The study of this material evidence has been dragging on for quite some time. I'm not trying to level accusations at anyone, nor are we trying to exonerate anyone. We just insist that there should be an investigation into what has happened. [...] We believe there should be an international, unbiased and frank investigation into this incident. A group of professionals -- unbiased experts -- has to be dispatched to the place where chemical weapons were used as well as to the airport where --as our American partners say-- was used as the starting point from which took off the planes delivering the chemical weapons."

[charrob]

Mattis: "Assad Never Used Sarin Gas/Nerve Agent on His People Before Now"

According to https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3148621/, the Chemical Weapons [CW] agents used in warfare are classified into 7 categories:

• Nerve agents
• Vesicants (blistering agents)
• Bloods agents (cyanogenic agents)
• Choking agents (pulmonary agents)
• Riot-control agents (tear gases)
• Psychomimetic agents
• Toxins

Sarin Gas is classified as a 'Nerve Agent'. Chlorine is not a nerve agent, but rather classified as a 'Choking Agent'.

This is important because the MSM (and Trump) continues to blame Assad for the Sarin Attack in East Gouta in 2013 (ie. Obama's "red line"), despite there being volumes of evidence that dispute that claim and which proves the "rebels", backed by Turkish Intelligence, had perpetrated that attack. With this video we have, on record, Mattis stating that Assad had not attacked his own people (prior to the current charge) with a nerve agent such as Sarin. And since the 2013 East Gouta attack (Obama's red line) was an attack perpetrated by specifically using Sarin, this is therefore indirectly an acknowledgement by Mattis that that East Gouta attack had not been perpetrated by Assad. Which completely negates what Trump endlessly wails about regarding 'Obama's red line'.

So in this video, Mattis is completely contradicting his boss, Trump:

[pcosmar]

Who do you think carried out the chemical weapons attack?

operatives of the Saudi and Israeli governments (ISIS),, likely with Turkish help.

[merkelstan]

Did you notice Tillerson, in the photo-ops, kept pulling putin's arm towards his side (symbolic gesture of dominance?)

[Galileo Galilei]

Anyone who questions the truth in this matter is cozying up to conspiracy theory and puts the entire Ron Paul movement in jeopardy of ridicule.

[Jan2017]

UN Ambassador Sacha Llorenti of Bolivia at emergency United Nations meeting Friday April 7, 2017
with photo reminder to the council of what transpired on February 5,2003.

[osan]

Proof will be hard to find in the midst of many players, all with a history of lying, where false flags, accidents, exaggerations, fictional stories and straight forward attacks all have about the same probability.

BINGO.

The truth is out there, but the fact is that we, the vast majority of people, will never, ever know the truth. Lies can be uncovered, but that would still not mean that the truth is revealed.

BINGO^2

My latest understanding is that the Pentagon released the flight path of the plane that administered the gas. Whether this is true, I don't know. Whether what the Pentagon is alleged to have released is true, I am equally in the dark.

That all said, we have no business in that business.

That said, there is a practical reason for doing what Trump has done. It is not pretty and normatively speaking it is abhorrent, but may still be necessary if certain outcomes are to be avoided.

Obama left us in horrible shape in terms of foreign policy. One would have thought he could not have brought us any lower than Bush^2 had, and yet the talented gay hooker from Indonesia managed to surprise the rational men of the world. Trump inherits the stink of Obama and has a choice to make in the face of a world whose first priority will be to poke and prod the new president to test his mettle. Trump, therefore, has a choice: show the world he has a pair or not. While I prefer the latter, I am not sure it is the wisest choice.

The positive world is not out normative world. It is $#@!.

[charrob]

Proof will be hard to find in the midst of many players, all with a history of lying, where false flags, accidents, exaggerations, fictional stories and straight forward attacks all have about the same probability. [...] The truth is out there, but the fact is that we, the vast majority of people, will never, ever know the truth. Lies can be uncovered, but that would still not mean that the truth is revealed.

BINGO.
BINGO^2

I also agree with Brian that we may never know the truth. The reason i created the thread was just to get all the current information i could find out there before people forget about it. There possibly could be additional things to add to this thread if future whistleblowers come forth or anything is learned by the U.N. investigation. And it was important to get on record that Mattis actually admitted before this current alleged attack by Assad, that Assad had not before used Sarin or a nerve agent on his own people.

My latest understanding is that the Pentagon released the flight path of the plane that administered the gas. Whether this is true, I don't know. Whether what the Pentagon is alleged to have released is true, I am equally in the dark.

This is an important point. I also read this a few days ago. However what the article i read pointed out was that while the satellite imaging/geospatial analysis can show the flight path of a plane and/or it's rockets/missiles, it does not have the capability of identifying whether or not there is a chemical weapon being carried by that plane/rocket/missile. I don't know what the U.S. geospatial capabilities are, and the government isn't telling us anything. Do you know if the U.S. actually has the capability of telling whether a rocket contains chemical weapons?

That all said, we have no business in that business.

That's exactly how i feel. Even if Assad did this my view is to point blank stop all U.S. intervention overseas. It is the U.S. intervention with the endless U.S. military/cia training of jihadists, U.S. giving weapons to jihadists [Al Qaeda Is Attacking Major Syrian Cities with US Weapons — but You Wouldn't Know That from the Media], and U.S. funding of jihadists that has caused Syria to break apart and hundreds of thousands of innocents to lose their lives. Additionally there was no ISIS in Syria before the U.S. intervened. According to Kucinich who wrote an article on the RonPaulInstitute site, __90__ countries are now fighting inside Syria, [I've read previously that this includes thousands of Chinese Uighers and Chechens who are living in the previous homes of Syrians who have escaped the country and are now refugees]. What the U.S. has done to that country is sick.

Nevertheless with regard to Assad, with seemingly no solid proof given to us by the U.S. government, it can't harm, and may help, by just trying to accumulate and compile any new facts and understandings of the attack that come about. There's nothing that angers me more than a witch hunt and masses of the stupid populace jumping on the MSM/U.S. government witch-hunt train because it's the easy choice rather than doing the hard work of a thorough honest investigation.

Also, the endless lies being spewed by the MSM and Sean Spicer that chemical weapons have not been used since WW1 is sickening. The U.S. and Reagan sold Saddam chemical weapons even after Reagan knew Saddam gassed and killed 5,000 kurds with those weapons: Reagan's excuse? "We have to kill the Iranians."

How Did Iraq Get Its WMD? - We Sold Them To Saddam
By Neil Mackay and Felicity Arbuthnot
The Sunday Herald - UK
9-6-2

The US and Britain sold Saddam Hussein the technology and materials Iraq needed to develop nuclear, chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction.

Reports by the US Senate's committee on banking, housing and urban affairs -- which oversees American exports policy -- reveal that the US, under the successive administrations of Ronald Reagan and George Bush Snr, sold materials including anthrax, VX nerve gas, West Nile fever germs and botulism to Iraq right up until March 1992, as well as germs similar to tuberculosis and pneumonia. Other bacteria sold included brucella melitensis, which damages major organs, and clostridium perfringens, which causes gas gangrene.

Classified US Defence Department documents also seen by the Sunday Herald show that Britain sold Iraq the drug pralidoxine, an antidote to nerve gas, in March 1992, after the end of the Gulf war. Pralidoxine can be reverse engineered to create nerve gas.

The Senate committee's reports on 'US Chemical and Biological Warfare-Related Dual-Use Exports to Iraq', undertaken in 1992 in the wake of the Gulf war, give the date and destination of all US exports. The reports show, for example, that on May 2, 1986, two batches of bacillus anthracis -- the micro-organism that causes anthrax -- were shipped to the Iraqi Ministry of Higher Education, along with two batches of the bacterium clostridium botulinum, the agent that causes deadly botulism poisoning.

One batch each of salmonella and E coli were shipped to the Iraqi State Company for Drug Industries on August 31, 1987. Other shipments went from the US to the Iraq Atomic Energy Commission on July 11, 1988; the Department of Biology at the University of Basrah in November 1989; the Department of Microbiology at Baghdad University in June 1985; the Ministry of Health in April 1985 and Officers' City, a military complex in Baghdad, in March and April 1986.

The shipments to Iraq went on even after Saddam Hussein ordered the gassing of the Kurdish town of Halabja, in which at least 5000 men, women and children died. The atrocity, which shocked the world, took place in March 1988, but a month later the components and materials of weapons of mass destruction were continuing to arrive in Baghdad from the US.

The Senate report also makes clear that: 'The United States provided the government of Iraq with 'dual use' licensed materials which assisted in the development of Iraqi chemical, biological and missile-system programmes.'

This assistance, according to the report, included 'chemical warfare-agent precursors, chemical warfare-agent production facility plans and technical drawings, chemical warfare filling equipment, biological warfare-related materials, missile fabrication equipment and missile system guidance equipment'.

Donald Riegle, then chairman of the committee, said: 'UN inspectors had identified many United States manufactured items that had been exported from the United States to Iraq under licences issued by the Department of Commerce, and [established] that these items were used to further Iraq's chemical and nuclear weapons development and its missile delivery system development programmes.'

Riegle added that, between January 1985 and August 1990, the 'executive branch of our government approved 771 different export licences for sale of dual-use technology to Iraq. I think that is a devastating record'.

It is thought the information contained in the Senate committee reports is likely to make up much of the 'evidence of proof' that Bush and Blair will reveal in the coming days to justify the US and Britain going to war with Iraq. It is unlikely, however, that the two leaders will admit it was the Western powers that armed Saddam with these weapons of mass destruction.

http://www.sundayherald.com/27572

link: http://rense.com/general29/wesold.htm

That said, there is a practical reason for doing what Trump has done. It is not pretty and normatively speaking it is abhorrent, but may still be necessary if certain outcomes are to be avoided. Obama left us in horrible shape in terms of foreign policy. One would have thought he could not have brought us any lower than Bush^2 had, and yet the talented gay hooker from Indonesia managed to surprise the rational men of the world. Trump inherits the stink of Obama and has a choice to make in the face of a world whose first priority will be to poke and prod the new president to test his mettle. Trump, therefore, has a choice: show the world he has a pair or not. While I prefer the latter, I am not sure it is the wisest choice. The positive world is not out normative world. It is $#@!.

I agree Obama left U.S. foreign policy a mess. But i would argue it is far more courageous in fighting the deep state (like Tulsi Gabbard is doing despite people like Howard Dean insisting she resign) than dropping bombs on people. Dropping bombs on people is yellow and weak and irresponsible and lazy. It takes hard work to solve crisis without force.

[osan]

I also agree with Brian that we may never know the truth. The reason i created the thread was just to get all the current information i could find out there before people forget about it.

In a world closer to rational I would call it an appropriate effort. In a world gone mad, I am not so sure. Make no mistake about it, the mean world taken as a whole, is gone right 'round the bend.

There possibly could be additional things to add to this thread if future whistleblowers come forth or anything is learned by the U.N. investigation. And it was important to get on record that Mattis actually admitted before this current alleged attack by Assad, that Assad had not before used Sarin or a nerve agent on his own people.

To what end? Look at the explosive things Wikileaks released. About the most it accomplished, if we can even credit such information with the result, was the defeat of Hillary Clinton. The world has changed no iota, save perhaps to have gone further into perilous insanity, and Trump remains a question mark. It is remains early, but I am seeing no indication of even the barest movement away from the course heading prior to Jan. 20.

This is an important point. I also read this a few days ago. However what the article i read pointed out was that while the satellite imaging/geospatial analysis can show the flight path of a plane and/or it's rockets/missiles, it does not have the capability of identifying whether or not there is a chemical weapon being carried by that plane/rocket/missile. I don't know what the U.S. geospatial capabilities are, and the government isn't telling us anything. Do you know if the U.S. actually has the capability of telling whether a rocket contains chemical weapons?

I would be surprised if they didn't have the means of reading a weapon's chemical signature, once deployed. Explosives, certainly. Chemical weapons... perhaps through elimination? Given that on which I have myself worked for a year, almost anything claimed in the way of capability should be taken at least as provisionally plausible. There is a nightmare out there of which most people are wholly unaware. Why it remains "black", I am not certain. Perhaps the automation or other perfection of central control eludes Themme. Were I to guess, it is control that is central to successful use of such tech. All the weaponry in the world avails one nothing if it cannot be controlled properly. If super-duper weapons exist but the people who'd be tasked with their use cannot be trusted to be on board with your apparent political agenda, those weapons become not just useless, but a threat because of the potential for turning them against yourself. This is why AI is so endlessly critical to Theire ultimate success: it can be programmed to perfect obedience. Once that is perfected as well as the hardware for making it effective in the real world, liberty will be 100% defeated. It will no longer matter what survived in men's hearts; perfectly obedient machinery will be their watchers.

But I digress.

That's exactly how i feel. Even if Assad did this my view is to point blank stop all U.S. intervention overseas.

That is my normative position. I am not sure of my practical view precisely because of my deep ignorance of the reality. I trust nothing from media, MSM or otherwise. My little brother knows $#@! we all wish we knew, but cannot speak of it. Despite his state of immense connectedness into all of the world's top intelligence, I am not convinced he has the full and true picture of the politics. Anyone can be fooled, even him.

Nevertheless with regard to Assad, with seemingly no solid proof given to us by the U.S. government, it can't harm, and may help,

That's the bit of which I am not sure.

There's nothing that angers me more than a witch hunt and masses of the stupid populace jumping on the MSM/U.S. government witch-hunt train because it's the easy choice rather than doing the hard work of a thorough honest investigation.

Repworthy-doubleplus.

Also, the endless lies being spewed by the MSM and Sean Spicer that chemical weapons have not been used since WW1 is sickening. The U.S. and Reagan sold Saddam chemical weapons even after Reagan knew Saddam gassed and killed 5,000 kurds with those weapons: Reagan's excuse? "We have to kill the Iranians."

It all boggles the mind. I think people go into mental overload and revert into simplistic mode as matters of pure survival.

I agree Obama left U.S. foreign policy a mess. But i would argue it is far more courageous in fighting the deep state (like Tulsi Gabbard is doing despite people like Howard Dean insisting she resign) than dropping bombs on people. Dropping bombs on people is yellow and weak and irresponsible and lazy. It takes hard work to solve crisis without force.

Courage may not be what is needed here. I am not sure what is, but I suspect there are elements in play that render our normative solutions unfeasible.

Great is the mess into which some of us have dragged the world. It reminds me of a lyric fragment from Genesis' "Lamb Lies Down On Broadway". The track "Back In NYC" quips: "this is your mess I'm stuck in, I really don't belong". I suspect there is a vast multiplicity of humans who feel this way. I am one of them, and this is precisely why warrior culture is so necessary, because it is the ONLY thing that stands the least chance of holding at bay the statistical forces that drive humanity to Empire, which is the very definition of tyranny. People in government need to face pain of death or other, even worse horrors as reward for violating the rights of those whom they ostensibly serve. Freedom loving people MUST be warriors or they stand no chance of surviving, much less flourishing. Mine is a VERY unpopular view on such matters, some people thinking those such as myself deserving of prison and death for so much as suggesting such things, but unless we are prepared to kill in cold blood those who violate us without authority, we stand no hope of being anything even remotely resembling free. This is among the costs to be free - the will to kill other men in defense of one's liberty. We as a people have allowed ourselves to be turned away from this attitude, having been taught that it is wrong in a voice even more strident that that against child-rape. It's the voice that tells us that "government" is God. It is the voice of the devil himself and we are dancing to his song for all we are worth.

[charrob]

Courage may not be what is needed here. I am not sure what is, but I suspect there are elements in play that render our normative solutions unfeasible.

Great is the mess into which some of us have dragged the world. It reminds me of a lyric fragment from Genesis' "Lamb Lies Down On Broadway". The track "Back In NYC" quips: "this is your mess I'm stuck in, I really don't belong". I suspect there is a vast multiplicity of humans who feel this way. I am one of them, and this is precisely why warrior culture is so necessary, because it is the ONLY thing that stands the least chance of holding at bay the statistical forces that drive humanity to Empire, which is the very definition of tyranny. People in government need to face pain of death or other, even worse horrors as reward for violating the rights of those whom they ostensibly serve. Freedom loving people MUST be warriors or they stand no chance of surviving, much less flourishing. Mine is a VERY unpopular view on such matters, some people thinking those such as myself deserving of prison and death for so much as suggesting such things, but unless we are prepared to kill in cold blood those who violate us without authority, we stand no hope of being anything even remotely resembling free. This is among the costs to be free - the will to kill other men in defense of one's liberty. We as a people have allowed ourselves to be turned away from this attitude, having been taught that it is wrong in a voice even more strident that that against child-rape. It's the voice that tells us that "government" is God. It is the voice of the devil himself and we are dancing to his song for all we are worth.

I agree, it is the voice of the devil himself and we are dancing to his song for all we are worth. There needs to be a distinction between the warrior culture created by government (U.S. military, CIA-- many of which are mindless flag-waving dupes or evil enablers of empire) and the warrior culture (if it exists) of Americans unaffiliated with government. Like you, "this is the mess I'm stuck in, and I really don't belong". It's refreshing that you feel that there's a vast multiplicity of humans who feel this way. I am surrounded in life by flag-waving dupes who endlessly thank the U.S. military for their 'service' and cheer every war that comes along. I pray that my surroundings of family and, even extended family down to second cousins and nephews, is not the normal American experience. The jingoism is thick like quicksand and is difficult to escape from. I hope you are right, that there's many other realities out there in America that differ.

One area I would fight for would be the breakup of this country into say 5 or 6 countries. Too many people with differing agendas are trying to live under one country's rules and few are happy about it. It makes sense to split up and choose to live in a country where ones ideals are respected and implemented and self-determination of that country's inhabitants (so long as force on others is prohibited) is the ultimate goal.

Thanks for your thoughtful, and kind, responses.

[osan]

There needs to be a distinction between the warrior culture created by government (U.S. military, CIA-- many of which are mindless flag-waving dupes or evil enablers of empire) and the warrior culture (if it exists) of Americans unaffiliated with government.

There IS no "government" warrior culture. At best, it is a soldier's culture. The chasm between a warrior and a soldier is vast. Typical American armed forces are soldiers. They blindly follow orders almost no matter how criminal because that is what soldiers are about: obedience. That they go to foreign lands and kill on command does not make the warriors. Very much the opposite, in fact. One can be a warrior without ever having drawn a weapon in anger. Tesshu was such a man. For anyone interested in learning more of this difference, "Sword Of No Sword" is a good place to begin. Several copies are available here. Tesshu was a penultimate warrior, yet never once in his life drew his sword in combat. He died in zazen, testament to his warrior spirit.

Like you, "this is the mess I'm stuck in, and I really don't belong". It's refreshing that you feel that there's a vast multiplicity of humans who feel this way. I am surrounded in life by flag-waving dupes who endlessly thank the U.S. military for their 'service' and cheer every war that comes along.

Can it really be called "service", to willingly aid and abet the invasion of another land and the wholesale murder of its people? Perhaps it can and I am simply too stupid to see it.

I pray that my surroundings of family and, even extended family down to second cousins and nephews, is not the normal American experience. The jingoism is thick like quicksand and is difficult to escape from. I hope you are right, that there's many other realities out there in America that differ.

I will not excuse such miserable ignorance and attitudes, but it pays to understand it. Are these basically good people? Do not forget that if this is all they know, how can they be held overly responsible for their narrowly simplistic views? The basic assumptions under which most of us labor throughout our lives are often so tacit and deeply embedded that we cannot even see them. I have devoted a goodly chunk of my life uncovering my own and in doing so have learned much. For me the key in all this is the attitude of willingness to embark on such discovery. Few are willing.

And as I wrote previously, for many the stresses and complexities of today's reality drive them to retreat into the darkness of simplistic thinking as a matter of mental survival. This world is hard on a man, especially if he dares think beyond the end of his nose, however petit it may be. It's a $#@!ty and very dark world in which we live. We are so deeply marinating in outright evil that we can no longer see it, the majority of us.

I also see a great conflict in people. On the gross, overt side of things, it seems most people want the glitz and trickery of the modern world - the tech, the porno-sex, the absence of accountability for basically anything, and so forth. On the other side, the internal world of the average man has a terrible time coping with all the stresses and other strings that attach to this life. Subconsciously, they want simpler living. Basically, they want their cake and eat it too, which drives them to simplistic thought and opinion. They think they can have it all, but they cannot. Ignorance has a deep and destructive price, not just to oneself, but to all those around him.

I could write several books on this aspect of contemporary humanity, but what a convoluted and Gordian a knot into which all the elements and aspects are woven.

One area I would fight for would be the breakup of this country into say 5 or 6 countries.

Non-solution. As I wrote elsewhere a week or two ago, it would only result in that many smaller but equally vicious tyrannies. The problem lies not in the form of government, but the form of human thought and attitude. There is NOTHING wrong with our form of governance in sé, but with us. Consider that drugs and even firearms end up in the hands of inmates in maximum security prisons. Is the administrative architecture of such places faulty? No. Human nature tends to the brands of corruption that leads to such results. Therefore, one can design the perfect prison and it will still fail so long as people are as we currently find their habits.

As things stand at the time of this typing, the race of men is unequivocally, absolutely, and unarguably hopeless. We have no future as anything better than slaves due to the corruptions of fear, avarice, ignorance, and lassitude that we choose to rule our lives. It is as simple as that. There is nothing more to the story than this. Choose the warrior life, assuming the risks and acting pursuant to the greater truths, come what may, and the world would be greatly improved. But people are not interested in such things, preferring the low-rent comfort and ease that going along to get along buys. Talk about the tyranny of low expectations... Nothing is more appalling in the human animal than this.

Too many people with differing agendas are trying to live under one country's rules and few are happy about it. It makes sense to split up and choose to live in a country where ones ideals are respected and implemented and self-determination of that country's inhabitants (so long as force on others is prohibited) is the ultimate goal.

True, but it behooves us to identify and understand the root causes of this. Most people seem incapable or unwilling to go there. Too much work for people too corrupted with lassitude.

The Four Necessities have been expertly cultivated in Americans, as well as most of the rest of the people of this world. In fact, the people of places like Europe, Asia, Australia, and so forth are far worse than the average American. Sadly, that says not much anymore because the mean American is now well past the thresholds of corruption such that hope for better times approaches vanishing.

We have chosen this for ourselves. You have. I have. Every last one, save for the few that usually end up in body bags. Remember the Freemen? Most don't, nor could they care less. Our state of existence is pitiful, mostly because we are too timid, greedy, and lazy to aspire to something better. We have been dictated a menu of virtues - that for which someone else tells us we should aspire; the house, the BMW, trophy wives, wealthy husbands and every other vapidity that is set before us and after which we salivate as so many Pavlovian dogs. To bear witness to the length and breadth and depth of the absence of self-possession in the average man is to be staggered where one stands. Such men are the wholly-owned bitches of interests whose faces they shall never know, all the while fancying themselves "their own men".

There is no solution to this, save to stop dead in one's tracks and through a persistent act of supreme will decide that this condition shall no longer stand in one's life. I see virtually zero interest in such endeavors. In this we are much like the filthy boozer and drug addict who beats his chest, professing how he can quit any time he wants to. It is a lie. He cannot because he will not. The buzz is always better than reality, no matter how wretched one's condition. It is all at once sad, pitiful, and despicable.

Pray for a reset-event, for it is the only hope that remains to us.

[Todd]

http://www.counterpunch.org/2017/04/...haykhun-syria/




Professor Theodore Postol is Professor Emeritus of Science, Technology, and National Security Policy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

We again have a situation where the White House has issued an obviously false, misleading and amateurish intelligence report.

The Congress and the public have been given reports in the name of the intelligence community about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, technical evidence supposedly collected by satellite systems that any competent scientists would know is false, and now from photographs of the crater that any analyst who has any competent at all would not trust as evidence.

[phill4paul]

"fool me once, shame on - shame on you. Fool me - you can't get fooled again."

[Jan2017]

We again have a situation where the White House has issued an obviously false, misleading and amateurish intelligence report.

[shakey1]

[Todd]

I never rule out the possibility it could be, but professor Postol at least took an effort to actually look into the matter, study, assess and offer what looks like a reasonable scientific assessment of the attack.

.....which is more than anyone can say for the Zero effort the US intelligence community put into their effort to sell the public this $#@!.

Some people believe who they wish to believe.