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59 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
Unless they "sold" them but they were never sent because the licenses were withdrawn? 
Thanks for adding these important facts, though.
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/security/report/2013/05/14/63221/the-structure-and-organization-of-the-syrian-opposition/
Saraqeb is a city of two revolutions -- one against the Syrian government and the other against the "Islamiyeen," the jihadists and al-Qaeda linked fighters. Because of Saraqeb's size and strategic location at the junction of two major highways going to Aleppo, both Dawlat al-Islamiyya fil Iraq wal Sham (Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS)) and Jubhat al-Nusra converged to control it. Yet where these fighters had succeeded in controlling smaller towns like Binish, they were met with resistance in Saraqeb.
Through that interaction and others that I witnessed, it was clear that the Syrians did not welcome these foreign Islamists and viewed them as an evil, only second to the Syrian Regime and its allies. Indeed many Syrians suspected that there was a partnership of sorts between the "Islamiyeen" and the Regime. "While the Regime constantly targets FSA military posts," explained a Syrian man from Kafranbel, "it never targets the Jubhat or Dawlat's military posts."
None of the Syrians I spoke with knew the exact nature of the relationship between the Regime and the "Islamiyeen" but they strongly believed the Regime wanted them in Syria. "They substantiate the government's story that it is fighting terrorists," explained one man. "But rather than targeting them, the government shells us, its own people." The "Islamiyeen" also became the international community's scapegoat for declining to intervene in Syria or provide weapons to the moderate FSA. "What, the Islamiyeen are only about 9,000 fighters while the FSA are about 100,000 fighters!" told me the same man. "Yet America only talks about the Islamiyeen as if everyone else in Syria doesn't count." And of course, the "Islamiyeen" have little loyalties to the Syrians in the "liberated" areas and justify their extremist views and harsh dealings on archaic notions of religion and religious statehood. The Dawlat (ISIS) kidnapped a young Syrian videographer and activist I had met a day earlier because he wore a Metallica shirt and expressed irreligious sentiments in his private videos. To this day, his whereabouts remain unknown.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/reem-salahi/two-and-a-half-years-late_b_3810796.html
Through that interaction and others that I witnessed, it was clear that the Syrians did not welcome these foreign Islamists and viewed them as an evil, only second to the Syrian Regime and its allies. Indeed many Syrians suspected that there was a partnership of sorts between the "Islamiyeen" and the Regime. "While the Regime constantly targets FSA military posts," explained a Syrian man from Kafranbel, "it never targets the Jubhat or Dawlat's military posts."
None of the Syrians I spoke with knew the exact nature of the relationship between the Regime and the "Islamiyeen" but they strongly believed the Regime wanted them in Syria. "They substantiate the government's story that it is fighting terrorists," explained one man. "But rather than targeting them, the government shells us, its own people." The "Islamiyeen" also became the international community's scapegoat for declining to intervene in Syria or provide weapons to the moderate FSA. "What, the Islamiyeen are only about 9,000 fighters while the FSA are about 100,000 fighters!" told me the same man. "Yet America only talks about the Islamiyeen as if everyone else in Syria doesn't count." And of course, the "Islamiyeen" have little loyalties to the Syrians in the "liberated" areas and justify their extremist views and harsh dealings on archaic notions of religion and religious statehood. The Dawlat (ISIS) kidnapped a young Syrian videographer and activist I had met a day earlier because he wore a Metallica shirt and expressed irreligious sentiments in his private videos. To this day, his whereabouts remain unknown.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/reem-salahi/two-and-a-half-years-late_b_3810796.html
"Yet America only talks about the Islamiyeen as if everyone else in Syria doesn't count."
But the outrage machine must be fed daily, or else it will start eat itself.
Good post.
Sid
their stance.
"I think it disgusting that ANY Democrat prints this garbage. Since when did we not try for a diplomatic solution? This is different than disagreeing with his position on striking Syria."
"If rummy shook hands with sadam then it must be the same when the Kerrys were dining with the assads 
"
Mahalo karyn
Like it or not, we have to talk to our enemies as well as our friends and try to work out problems peacefully. Refusing to talk to them gets us nowhere. It still got us nowhere in the end, but it had to be done.
Knock off the hysteria and quit with the black and white thinking. 
Shaking Hands: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein greets Donald Rumsfeld, then special envoy of President Ronald Reagan, in Baghdad on December 20, 1983.
<...>
By the summer of 1983 Iran had been reporting Iraqi use of using chemical weapons for some time. The Geneva protocol requires that the international community respond to chemical warfare, but a diplomatically isolated Iran received only a muted response to its complaints [Note 1]. It intensified its accusations in October 1983, however, and in November asked for a United Nations Security Council investigation.
The U.S., which followed developments in the Iran-Iraq war with extraordinary intensity, had intelligence confirming Iran's accusations, and describing Iraq's "almost daily" use of chemical weapons, concurrent with its policy review and decision to support Iraq in the war [Document 24]. The intelligence indicated that Iraq used chemical weapons against Iranian forces, and, according to a November 1983 memo, against "Kurdish insurgents" as well [Document 25].
What was the Reagan administration's response? A State Department account indicates that the administration had decided to limit its "efforts against the Iraqi CW program to close monitoring because of our strict neutrality in the Gulf war, the sensitivity of sources, and the low probability of achieving desired results." But the department noted in late November 1983 that "with the essential assistance of foreign firms, Iraq ha[d] become able to deploy and use CW and probably has built up large reserves of CW for further use. Given its desperation to end the war, Iraq may again use lethal or incapacitating CW, particularly if Iran threatens to break through Iraqi lines in a large-scale attack" [Document 25]. The State Department argued that the U.S. needed to respond in some way to maintain the credibility of its official opposition to chemical warfare, and recommended that the National Security Council discuss the issue.
Following further high-level policy review, Ronald Reagan issued National Security Decision Directive (NSDD) 114, dated November 26, 1983, concerned specifically with U.S. policy toward the Iran-Iraq war. The directive reflects the administration's priorities: it calls for heightened regional military cooperation to defend oil facilities, and measures to improve U.S. military capabilities in the Persian Gulf, and directs the secretaries of state and defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to take appropriate measures to respond to tensions in the area. It states, "Because of the real and psychological impact of a curtailment in the flow of oil from the Persian Gulf on the international economic system, we must assure our readiness to deal promptly with actions aimed at disrupting that traffic." It does not mention chemical weapons [Document 26].
Soon thereafter, Donald Rumsfeld (who had served in various positions in the Nixon and Ford administrations, including as President Ford's defense secretary, and at this time headed the multinational pharmaceutical company G.D. Searle & Co.) was dispatched to the Middle East as a presidential envoy. His December 1983 tour of regional capitals included Baghdad, where he was to establish "direct contact between an envoy of President Reagan and President Saddam Hussein," while emphasizing "his close relationship" with the president [Document 28]. Rumsfeld met with Saddam, and the two discussed regional issues of mutual interest, shared enmity toward Iran and Syria, and the U.S.'s efforts to find alternative routes to transport Iraq's oil; its facilities in the Persian Gulf had been shut down by Iran, and Iran's ally, Syria, had cut off a pipeline that transported Iraqi oil through its territory. Rumsfeld made no reference to chemical weapons, according to detailed notes on the meeting [Document 31].
http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/
Reagan's secret envoy Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein ca. 1983
If i were one of these young internet whippersnappers and so inclined, why I might be tempted to build a meme that juxtaposes RummyDummySaddam with KerryAssad. Don't know how to do it.
