TRUMP vs IRAN - Weapon of Mass Distraction

Forget impeachment details, let the distraction begin......

"Iranians unite to mourn military icon Qassem Soleimani" PBS NewsHour 1/6/2020

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SUMMARY:  Hundreds of thousands of Iranians took to the streets Monday to mourn Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a U.S. airstrike Friday.  Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, led funeral prayers and wept over Soleimani's body.  But the fallout is more than emotional; as Iran and President Trump trade threats, the U.S. military is bracing for potential retaliation.  Nick Schifrin reports.

"Ambassador: Iran vows revenge, but has nothing against Americans" PBS NewsHour 1/6/2020

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SUMMARY:  The Friday killing of Iran’s best-known military commander in a U.S. airstrike prompted an outpouring of grief in Tehran -- along with vows of vengeance.  In the aftermath of Qassem Soleimani’s death, the country’s leaders and President Trump exchanged threats about what might come next.  To share Iran’s perspective, Iranian Ambassador to the United Nations Majid Takht-Ravanchi joins Judy Woodruff.

"What killing of top Iranian general means for nuclear deal and the U.S. in Middle East" PBS NewsHour 1/6/2020

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SUMMARY:  For two views on the latest developments in Iran and Iraq, Nick Schifrin speaks with Narges Bajoghli of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, author of “Iran Reframed: Anxieties of Power in the Islamic Republic,” and U.S. diplomat Ryan Crocker, who served as ambassador to Iraq, Syria, Kuwait and Lebanon and is now diplomat in residence at Princeton University.

"Iran says it has launched ballistic missiles at American air bases in Iraq" PBS NewsHour 1/7/2020

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SUMMARY:  After trading threats with the U.S., Iran said Tuesday night it launched ballistic missiles on Iraqi facilities housing U.S. troops in retaliation for the American killing of Gen. Qassem Soleimani.  The attacks come after President Trump and top U.S. officials defended the Soleimani strike, which has been blamed for pushing the U.S. and Iran closer to war.  Judy Woodruff and Nick Schifrin report.

" Foreign policy experts weigh in on Trump’s Iran strategy" PBS NewsHour 1/7/2020

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SUMMARY:  The U.S. killing of one of Iran’s top military leaders has prompted questions about whether the Trump administration has an effective strategy for Iran, Iraq and the larger Middle East.  As Iran announces it has fired missiles at Iraqi bases housing U.S. troops, Nick Schifrin talks to Mara Karlin of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and the Hudson Institute’s Michael Doran.

"After missile strikes on Iraqi bases, U.S. and Iran both appear to de-escalate" PBS NewsHour 1/8/2020

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SUMMARY:  President Trump says Iran is “standing down” after firing missiles at Iraqi bases housing U.S. troops -- but causing no casualties.  But Iran says its goal is to see U.S. forces leave the Middle East.  The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Karim Sadjadpour joins Nick Schifrin, Yamiche Alcindor and Judy Woodruff to discuss the latest developments.

"U.S. should ‘drive a wedge’ between Iranian regime and its people, says Rep. Gallagher" PBS NewsHour 1/8/2020

NOTE:  The effect is exactly opposite, the Iranian people and government are more united.

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SUMMARY:  For a congressional Republican’s perspective on the conflict between the U.S. and Iran, we turn to Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wisc.) a member of the House Armed Services Committee and a former Marine who deployed twice to Iraq as a commander of intelligence teams.  He joins Judy Woodruff to discuss why he supported the decision to kill Gen. Qassem Soleimani and what he expects next from Iran.

"Rep. Crow: Congressional questions about Soleimani strike ‘have not been answered’" PBS NewsHour 1/8/2020

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SUMMARY:  For a congressional Democrat’s take on the conflict between the U.S. and Iran, we turn to Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.) a member of the House Armed Services Committee.  Crow is a lawyer and former Army Ranger who deployed to both Iraq and Afghanistan during his military career.  He joins Judy Woodruff to discuss why he is not satisfied with the Trump administration’s handling of the Soleimani strike.

"Will fallout from Soleimani killing drive U.S. troops from Iraq?" PBS NewsHour 1/10/2020

Fallout?  Russia wins, ISIS wins, (war criminal) Bashar Hafez al-Assad wins.

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  The fallout from the Trump administration’s killing of Qasem Soleimani continues to unfold -- and it could affect the presence of U.S. forces in Iraq.  On Friday, Sec. of State Mike Pompeo rejected Iraqi calls for the U.S. to plan troop withdrawal.  Retired Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmit, who served in the George W. Bush administration, and York University’s Thabit Abdullah join Nick Schifrin to discuss.

SYRIA - Diary of a Mass Murder, Use of Cluster Bombs

"Syria Unleashes Cluster Bombs on Town, Punishing Civilians" by C. J. CHIVERS, New York Times 12/20/2012

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The plane came in from the southeast late in the afternoon, releasing its weapons in a single pass. Within seconds, scores of finned bomblets struck and exploded on the homes and narrow streets of this small Syrian town.

After the screams and the desperate gathering of the victims, the staff at the local Freedom Hospital counted 4 dead and 23 wounded. All were civilians, doctors and residents said.

Many forms of violence and hardship have befallen Syria’s people as the country’s civil war has escalated this year. But the Syrian government’s attack here on Dec. 12 pointed to one of the war’s irrefutable patterns: the deliberate targeting of civilians by President Bashar al-Assad’s military, in this case with a weapon that is impossible to use precisely.

Syrians on both sides in this fight have suffered from the bloodshed and sectarian furies given dark license by the war. The victims of the cluster bomb attacks describe the tactic as collective punishment, a mass reprisal against populations that are with the rebels.

The munitions in question — Soviet-era PTAB-2.5Ms — were designed decades ago by Communist engineers to destroy battlefield formations of Western armored vehicles and tanks. They are ejected in dense bunches from free-falling dispensers dropped from aircraft. The bomblets then scatter and descend nose-down to land and explode almost at once over a wide area, often hundreds of yards across.

Marea stands along an agricultural plain, surrounded for miles by empty fields. Even at night, or in bad weather, it cannot be mistaken for anything but what it is — the densely packed collection of small businesses, offices and homes that together form a town.

Two journalists from The New York Times were traveling toward Marea as the attack occurred and arrived not long after the exploding bomblets had rippled across its neighborhoods.

Blood pooled on the street, including beside a water-collection point at an intersection where Nabhan al-Haji, 18, was killed.

Another victim, Ahmad Najjar Asmail, had been riding a motorcycle when a submunition landed beside him. He was decapitated. Ramy Naser, 15, was also fatally wounded.

The hospital was crowded with patients. Many more were en route to hospitals in Turkey.

The use of cluster munitions is banned by much of the world, although Syria, like the United States, is not party to that international convention. In the detached parlance of military planners, they are also sometimes referred to as area weapons — ordnance with effects that cover a sprawling amount of ground.

In the attack on Marea, at least three dispensers, each containing 42 bomblets slightly smaller than a one-liter bottle and packed with a high-explosive shaped charge, were dropped squarely onto neighborhoods and homes.

SYRIA - Yes, We Have Chemical Weapons

"Syria Says It Has Chemical Weapons" by AP, Wall Street Journal 7.23.2012

The Syrian regime Monday said it had the capability to use its chemical and biological weapons in case of a foreign attack, in its first ever acknowledgment that it possesses weapons of mass destruction.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi vowed, however, that Damascus would not use its unconventional arms against its own citizens. The announcement comes as Syria faces international isolation, a tenacious rebellion that has left at least 19,000 people dead and threats by Israel to invade to prevent such weapons from falling into rebel hands.

Syria's decision to reveal the long suspected existence of its chemical weapons suggests a desperate regime deeply shaken by an increasingly bold rebellion that has scored a string of successes in the past week, including a stunning bomb attack that killed four high-level security officials, the capture of several border crossings and sustained offensives on the regime strongholds of Damascus and Aleppo.

"No chemical or biological weapons will ever be used, and I repeat, will never be used, during the crisis in Syria no matter what the developments inside Syria," Mr. Makdissi said in news conference broadcast on Syrian state TV. "All of these types of weapons are in storage and under security and the direct supervision of the Syrian armed forces and will never be used unless Syria is exposed to external aggression."

While the statement Mr. Makdissi read out promised not to use the weapons against the Syrian people, he later noted that Syria isn't facing an internal enemy in the rebellion, which the regime has described as being funded from abroad and driven by foreign extremists.

The Syrian government later tried to back off from the announcement, sending journalists an amendment to the statement read out by Makdissi adding the phrase "if any," in attempts to return to their previous position of neither confirming or denying the existence of unconventional weapons.

Syria is believed to have nerve agents as well as mustard gas, Scud missiles capable of delivering these lethal chemicals and a variety of advanced conventional arms, including antitank rockets and late-model portable antiaircraft missiles.

On Monday, Iraqi state TV said the country's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki formally authorized the entry of Syrian refugees into his country. For years, Iraqis would head to Syria to escape widespread sectarian fighting during the worst of violence in their homeland between 2005 and 2007.

COMMENT: We (the world) should be worried, he could pull a 'Saddam Hussein' but use them on the Syrian people.