Syria: It appears Assad did do it, at least this time

The UN investigation looking at the Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack in Damascus, though not given the assignment of blame as part of its remits, ties the attacks to senior officers of President Bashar Assad. And, contrary my previous guesstimates, given that these appear to have been Republican Guard troops, unless President Assad has been a hostage of his generals for a month and counting, we can't say that these are rogue troops.

So, pending further information that would drastically change things, I stand corrected. And I'm willing to admit that.

That said, the UN is planning on investigating other reported uses of chemical weapons. And, some of those may have been by rebels, or generals not directly connected to Assad. Stay tuned.

All of that said, per the oft-cited piece by William Polk at the Atlantic? His "cui bono" was, and still is, a good question. And, if part of why he wrote that piece was pushback, given America's generally poor history of regime change in the Middle East, the neocons leading the charge again on this one and Obama not having a Syria exit plan, the shoot-first warmongers can still look themselves in the mirror.

That includes Obamiac friends on Facebook and elsewhere. Because, as I note in that link immediately above, a "pinprick" will not change who's in command. And "more than a pinprick," per Dear Leader's own warmongering comments, can only effect such change if its boots on the ground. This is not Libya, where there was a semi-coherent, semi-unified opposition there. That said, per the attack on our CIA spook shack in Benghazi, we've seen what happens even with a semi-coherent, semi-unified opposition when there's not a bunch of American boots on the ground.

My position on that still stands. So, since this removes a lot of measure of doubt, and Obama will probably be making another speech to the nation by the end of this month, I want more specifics, including a realistic exit plan and realistic listing of hoped-for achievements. Until then, I will continue to oppose intervention in Syria.

Meanwhile, it's no surprise the Russians are doing everything they can to tear down the credibility of the report.

And, now, a day later, Vlad the Impaler Putin is just being a fucking idiot, playing Alex Jones and saying this was a rebel false flag operation.

The one remaining question is: In Britain, will David Cameron try to run a second vote on Syria action by Parliament? If so, will he get his whips on line and will they get the coalition on line?

Now, back to the original blog post.