Syria

Interesting quote from Assad

http://www.dw.de/russia-defends-syria-with-vigor/a-17051638


"After the fall of the USSR, the United States believed that Russia was destroyed forever," said Assad. But since Vladimir Putin has been in power, Russia has been gaining strength, consistently defending its positions, he went on. "The US objective was to diminish the role of Russia in the world, even with regard to Syria.

"Russia defends the principles that it has pursued for at least the past 100 years. These are the principles of sovereignty and non-interference in the internal affairs of other nations," Assad concluded in the Izvestia interview.
 
Most Germans really don't care for what is happening in Syria, and the politicians aren't saying much about it. It's not a big topic at all. OK, it makes headlines in the newspapers, but I simply don't have the feeling that very many people care for it. This type of foreign policy is untypical for Germany.
 
There will be a debate in British and subsequently (on purpose to know the outcome in the UK) Dutch parliament tomorrow.

edit:

There are tons of updates, and I thought these were interesting:

US: 'no avenue forward... to any meaningful' UN action
State Department Deputy Spokesperson Marie Harf begins the daily briefing.

Question: does the Obama administration feel it needs UN authorization to take military action in Syria?

This is a pretty clear "No" from Harf:

"We see no avenue forward, given continued Russian opposition, to any meaningful council action on Syria.

Harf is critical of the Russians' conduct in today's meeting of the five permanent UN security council members:

"Today we've heard nothing different from the Russians in the meeting than we've heard for months and even years," Harf says.

​
+


Harf describes the needle the United States is trying to thread on Syria, in potentially taking military action while saying there's no "military solution."

The question on the table for President Obama, Harf says, is "How best to respond to this one massive use of chemical weapons. There will be a response to that."

But she repeats:

Broadly speaking, we don't believe there's a military solution to this conflict in Syria.


+

British motion calls for time for UN to see inspectors' report
Britain says the UN security council "must" have the opportunity to review reports by weapons inspectors before military action is taken in Syria according to a copy of the motion to be placed before the UK parliament, Reuters reports.

"The United Nations Security Council must have the opportunity immediately to consider that briefing and that every effort should be made to secure a Security Council Resolution backing military action before any such action is taken," the motion, to be debated on Thursday, reads.

The US state department says it sees "no way forward" to "meaningful action" by the UN.

(source)
 
Last edited:
Yes, MPs have been recalled to Parliament for the debate tomorrow, and Cameron is dropping strong hints he wants something to happen. I'd be interested to see what the vote would be on military action. Conservatives historically tend to back military action in support of the US, and Labour now have a track record in this respect too. I suspect it'll split the Liberal Democrats, who are part of the Coalition Government. I know of at least one local Lib Dem MP who is against it. The Conservative backbenchers might also be sceptical of involvement in Syria, though. I know UKIP, which picks up disillusioned Conservative politicians and voters, is.
 
Kerry will "do a Colin Powell" if he stands up & talks shit --that's all this means. The fabrication & manipulation of what little evidence there probably is. The comparisons are fair. That aside, how can the US & allies possibly be in possession of more evidence than inspectors on the ground? I just don't get the logic. Oh yeh, this ain't about logic; it's about stuff like "WE WILL FUCK YOU UP". What a pile of crap. And we wonder why the world is full of nutcases like Assad. I've no idea what the solution is. All I know is, we should have done something earlier. As I said before: if chemical weapons use is such a big fucking red line, then what are we doing about countries with chemical weapons? And that's now, not after they've used them. Do western countries have chemical weapons?

I broadly agree with Perun: the US, France & the UK should be doing everything they can to get Russia & China onside i.e. all the countries who hold a UN veto. They should have been doing all this shit (on many issues) anyway.
 
How can they possibly change Russia's and China's opinion?

"Guys, we know you prefer to make deals with rogue states regardless of what happens with populations, we know you don't care about human rights and the possession of chemical weapons, and all the dead people out there, but would you please pretty please speak to your friend and then he surely will listen?"
 
I am not seeing Russia moving much ... if at all .. on this. They support the status quo in Syria ... which makes sense for them as does China
 
More like, "If you drop Assad, we'll look away when Gazprom rips off Naftogaz and we will forget whatever we heard about the Ukraine wanting to join the NATO." That's how deals are made.
 
That's quite a dirty deal, but if it would work, then it works.

Still, the Russians have been friends with Syria for 33 years, constantly providing them with economic support and a shitload of weapons. It's hard to imagine they will give in.
 
Really? "give in" --this is the problem. We need compromise, not our way or no way. So Russia has an ally who turns out to be a "bad guy". And? A few years back Blair was shaking Gaddafi's hand. The only difference between ourselves & Russia is that when things went bad (i.e. Gaddafi started tearing his country apart), we were brave enough to say "look, never mind our regional interests (oil contracts & all that), this isn't on". Russia, unfortunately, hasn't done this as the civil war in Syria has rumbled on. The difference in stance isn't vastly different I don't think; the gap could (& could've) been bridged, to allow the UN veto countries to have a unified response on an issue like this. I just don't think it's an impossibility. Although, now is not the time to be thrashing it all out. The horse has bolted.
 
Forostar said:
That's quite a dirty deal, but if it would work, then it works.
Click to expand...

Well, it doesn't because it's not happening. As I said before, we can come up with the best ideas in the world for all this, it remains a point somebody made on an online forum. It's not going to change anything.

Still, the Russians have been friends with Syria for 33 years, constantly providing them with economic support and a shitload of weapons. It's hard to imagine they will give in.
Click to expand...

You're confusing military alliances and vassal relationships with friendship. Syria is dependent on Russia; Russia is not dependent on Syria. They've kept the alliance going because it ensured them a foothold in western Asia and a stronger position against the west. Russia has no obligation for loyalty towards Syria; they're only keeping it up to maintain influence in the region. They can sign an alliance with Iran tomorrow, or Lebanon or whomever, and drop Syria. The only reason they're not dropping Syria is because it would mean giving in against the US for no benefit whatsoever.
 
Forostar said:
Still, the Russians have been friends with Syria for 33 years, constantly providing them with economic support and a shitload of weapons. It's hard to imagine they will give in.
Click to expand...

The US is paying billions of dollars a year funding the Egyptian army --this doesn't mean it can't stand up & say "enough is enough" when civilians start dying on the streets. It's surely possible to have this kind of relationship with your "allies". Russia could pull its support for Assad. If it's not doing this because of its relationship with the US, then this shows you where all the problems lie.
 
Thanks for that info Per, that's indeed a different perspective.

Sorry Cried, I don't have much faith in the Russians (and worse: people who can do things have neither). Remember Assad's quote in bearfan's post?
"Russia defends the principles that it has pursued for at least the past 100 years. These are the principles of sovereignty and non-interference in the internal affairs of other nations,"
Click to expand...
@Brig: Indeed, chances of a quick strike have shrunk. Labour have put the pressure on Cameron and he allegedly has changed his mind.

edit: changed his mind to strike quickly. So, I guess more time will be given, and people will wait until that report comes. More in tomorrow's debate.
 
Last edited:
That's Assad speaking, not Russia. I still maintain we're not that far apart; we ain't that different...
(Also, if this were true --then supplying weapons is hardly not interfering. These are just words; national rhetoric, etc.)
 
Assad is doing what he can to stay in power by playing the US off Russia as well as the usual Israel angle.

The proximity to Israel is what makes this most scary to me. If Syria starts falling apart and the last gasp is to try to launch gas at Israel, things will go down quickly
 
Earlier this week I saw a spokesman of Syria saying that they would attack Israel as soon as Syria would be hit. Could be a lot of bluff, just playing that angle, so to speak. But I guess it will be taken seriously. The selling rate of gas masks in Israel has increased quite a bit.
 
I feel so bad for the Syrian people. Assad was an asshole but the American government funding the "rebels" who are the real terrorist making Assad look like a saint is such a tragedy. I see it as the any one of us could have been born in Syria but we just got a better role of the dice and weren't. I don't know any Syrian on a personal level but I still feel so much sympathy for them because shit like this effects me granted not on a personal level but it just sucks that a fellow human being is just being getting such a bad end of the stick that they didn't deserve.
 
100% agree with you Seventhsonroberto. This is the tragedy of any war, its the women, children and innocent who suffer while power hungry people make decisions to further their interests. And the people just want to live their lives. What can we really do other than send aid to the people? Getting involved in this dirty war is a lose-lose situation for everyone it seems to me...
 
What contributes to the dilemma here is that a military operation against Assad's forces is a helping hand to an opposition which we don't really know. We know which groups are parts of the opposition, but we have no idea what group will take control if Assad is overturned. If we look to Libya it is too early to say what the long-term outcome will be. But we can look to Iran. What united the different fractions who took part in the revolution there? A desire to get rid of the Shah. There were many who did not want Khomeini.

And if we make this to be only about Assad's (alleged) use of chemical weapons: Will a limited strike which cannot take out his chemical weapons capacity keep him from using them again?

All I know is I'm happy I'm not in Obama's or Cameron's place.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top