SummerSnow
SummerSnow's JournalOpinion: THE RISKS OF TRUMP'S STRIKE ON ASSAD IN SYRIA
http://www.newsweek.com/assad-trump-bomb-syria-putin-russia-obama-sarin-chemical-weapons-iran-580319Trump's strike is far riskier than one would have been under Obama because of the presence of Russian troops and military hardware—including sophisticated anti-aircraft units—in the country. “There obviously needs to be a healthy fear of great powers clashing,” says Schanzer. Moscow doesn’t advertise just how many troops it has now in Syria, but analysts estimate around 10,000, and that includes special forces units, some of whom are now embedded with fighters from Iranian Republican Guard Corps and with Hezbollah. Assad’s forces have been so weakened during the war, in fact, that both Russian and Iranian troops are now threaded throughout the Syrian military—even at Assad’s air bases, including the one from which the sarin attack was launched. “At this point there is no meaningful difference between the Syrian military, Hezbollah and Iranian forces. They’re acting as one,” says Jennifer Cafarella, lead intelligence planner at the ISW.
So for Trump, not only does Thursday's strike carry considerable risk, so does any further military action. The Pentagon is now mulling a no fly zone, to prevent Syrian air attacks against the rebels. But Moscow has air defense and strike aircraft in Syria as well, and while Russia and the U.S. set up a “deconfliction line”—precisely because they’re both operating in the country—there still have been close calls and mistakes: six months ago the U.S. struck a Syrian troop position when it thought it was hitting ISIS fighters. More than 60 people died.
Another option for Trump would be creating safe zones in the country, something many have long called for. These safe zones have their own risks since they would need to be constantly defended from the air. One possibility: setting up a safe zone near the Iraqi border in southeastern Syria, far from where Russian and Iranian troops are operating, and where the U.S. has been hitting ISIS targets.
The complications of striking Assad are such that they may require diplomacy with Moscow. U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley has already tried shaming the Russians in the wake of the sarin attack, an effort to prepare the battlefield at the Security Council for a resolution condemning Assad. But any overture to get the Russians to back off their support for the regime (they have said in the past that their support is not “unconditional”) will be more difficult now because of the anti-Moscow, “they stole our election” hysteria in Washington.
Whether drawing another red line has made things better or worse is entirely unclear.
Coincidence or not?
Trump attacks Syrian target the same day he host the Chinese President. Hmm?
Putin stands by Assad as firm evidence of chemical attack mounts
Vladimir Putin has doubled down on his support for the Syrian government despite the release of postmortem results by Turkey that confirmed chemical weapons were used in an attack that killed at least 72 people in north Syria.
The Russian president attacked “groundless accusations” that Damascus was responsible for the assault, and called for a “detailed and unbiased investigation” into the deaths, a Kremlin statement said.
Russia’s defence ministry has argued that Syrian planes were destroying chemical weapons, not deploying them, and said the airstrikes targeted a rebel storage depot for toxins. That claim has been widely dismissed as implausible by experts.
As firm evidence of chemical weapons use mounted – along with calls for Russia to restrain the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad – Putin’s spokesman attempted to put some distance between the two allies.
“Unconditional support is not possible in this current world,” Dmitry Peskov told Associated Press, adding that Russia could not control the Syrian leader.
But Peskov also offered implicit support to the Damascus regime by repeating the argument that the chemical weapons that killed so many had belonged to rebels. Asked for proof, he said Russia’s military presence in Syria mean t it had “more wide information” about what was “going on there”.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/06/postmortems-confirm-syria-chemical-attack-turkey-says
Waiting for Russia's response to this attack
I bet Trump will get rid of Nikki Haley...
she blamed Russia for the Syrian attack at the UN and he can't have that. tick...tock...tick...tock...tick...tock
Do you think Bannon will retaliate?
https://twitter.com/BraddJaffy/status/849794582363734017&index=1&list=PLiZxWe0ejyv_UEXlZwy0UotvLrF0BqxXd
The Blame Game. Trump Edition
List of people Trump will blame next....add your own
1. Justin Bieber
2. Morgan Freeman
3. Queen Elizabeth
4. Oprah
5.The Simpsons
6. Eskimos
7. The Geico gecko
8. The state of Oregon
9. The NFL except for Tom Brady
10. dreams
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