The Russians are coming.

[Michael]

I'm not discussing terminology anymore.

El queso es viejo y mohoso.

That's why the use of the term barrel bombs by Pres. Obama and all those Western reporters' interviews I linked is problematic. It's a loaded term that connotes a kind of subliminal accusation that doesn't hold up to examination.

[grzegorz]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wor ... bs-in-war/

When the U.S. dropped barrel bombs in war

By Ishaan Tharoor February 16

People inspect damage at a site hit by what activists said were barrel bombs dropped by forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo's district of al-Sukari on March 7, 2014. (Hosam Katan/Reuters)
"It's a childish story that keeps repeating in the West," smiled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, in an interview with the BBC last week. He was dismissing allegations that his regime is attacking Syrian civilians with barrel bombs, crude devices packed with fuel and shrapnel that inflict brutal, indiscriminate damage.

"I haven't heard of the army using barrels, or maybe, cooking pots," Assad said, and then repeated when pressed again: "They're called bombs. We have bombs, missiles and bullets. There [are] no barrel bombs, we don't have barrels."

If you think Assad doth protest too much, you're probably right. Human rights organizations, witness testimony and foreign governments all point to the Syrian government's frequent use of barrel bombs in densely packed urban areas, including a suspected attack last week in a devastated suburb of Damascus. The fact that it's a deliberately indiscriminate weapon of war makes the Assad regime liable for war crimes.

Here's footage, uploaded to YouTube by Syrian activists last year, of a suspected regime barrel bomb attack in the capital's environs.


Assad is not alone in allegedly using barrel bombs. Last summer, Human Rights Watch accused the government in neighboring Iraq of dropping barrel bombs in civilian-populated areas during its clashes with the militants of the Islamic State.

Look a bit further into the past, and you'll find that barrel bombs were featured in an American military campaign, too.

A smart post on the War Is Boring blog details when the United States dropped barrels packed with fuel in an attempt to burn foliage in the dense forests of Vietnam and smoke out Viet Cong guerrillas:

Army crews kicked the incendiary drums out of Chinook helicopters onto suspected enemy camps. They strapped white phosphorus smoke grenades to the cylinders to set them alight.

The Air Force took the concept one step further and tried to start raging forest fires in Viet Cong base areas. The flying branch used fire barrels as well as normal incendiary bombs.

In April 1968, the United States carried out "Operation Inferno," in which 14 C-130 cargo planes dropped dozens of 55-gallon incendiary barrels filled with fuel over southern Vietnam's U Minh forest. The sorties sparked raging fires, but they had limited effect, as they all tended to die down once the fuel burned out. The United States also dropped barrels full of a chemical equivalent of tear gas, aimed at flushing insurgent fighters out of their bunkered hideaways.

The barrel bombings in Vietnam were not aimed at heavily populated areas, and did not exact the human costs that the Assad regime probably has in its desperate fight with rebel forces.

More is remembered about the other controversial methods the United States employed during the lengthy conflict. These include the widespread use of toxic agents: between 1962 and 1971, the United States let loose about 18 million gallons of herbicides over 20 percent of South Vietnam’s jungles and more than a third of its mangrove forests. And worse was the widespread U.S. use of cluster munitions in its campaigns.

In its covert campaign over Laos, which served as a thoroughfare for Viet Cong fighters, the United States dropped 2.5 million tons of bombs on the Southeast Asian country, including 270 million cluster bomblets. A video visualizes the scope of the bombing runs.


A survey done in 2009 found that about 20,000 Laotian civilians had died since 1973, when the Vietnam war ended, as a consequence of stumbling upon unexploded ordnance dropped by the United States.


Ishaan Tharoor writes about foreign affairs for The Washington Post.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wor ... bs-in-war/

[Steve James]

Fwiw, a "barrel bomb" is so-called because it is generally improvised from ordinary materials. Iow, explosives loaded into barrels. They are specifically "not" guided. "Daisy cutters" have been around since the Vietnam era. They are area-clearing bombs: iow, if a landing zone for helos was needed asap, a daisy cutter could level a large area. Iinm, they were replaced later on by the MOAB series (for "massive ordinance air blast." They're also called the "mother of all bombs." They're the largest non-nuclear bombs made. My point is that they are definitely not the same as the "barrel bombs." And, the criticism is that the bombs are being used on civilian populations. Yeah, what does the gov't do when the rebels are dispersed among civilians? Bomb them all, and be assured of getting at least some of the rebels? Or, how about having elections?

[Michael]

Syria had elections a year and a half ago.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/04/bashar-al-assad-winds-reelection-in-landslide-victory

[Steve James]

I followed the link and read the first sentence.

Assad captures another seven-year term after winning almost 90% of the vote, with polling only held in government-held areas

So, I take back what I said about elections

[Michael]

I followed the link and read the first sentence.

Assad captures another seven-year term after winning almost 90% of the vote, with polling only held in government-held areas

So, I take back what I said about elections

Did you watch that Frontline video Greg linked? A man on the street in Damascus explained that at the moment, during the war, they have no choice but to support Bashir al-Assad.

[Steve James]

Well, right, they have no choice. The problem is that "they" are getting bombed. That's why so many are fleeing.
But, I was serious about taking back what I said about the need for elections. If 90% of the result is for one candidate, it means that few of his opponents participated. If Assad had the support of 90% of the people, there wouldn't be such a big conflict. He'd have wiped them out way back in 2010.

[Michael]

If this were a civil war only among Syrians, then I think you're right, a leader with 90% of the vote would have won. The essence of this war is not a civil war, it is an internationally coordinated war upon Syria with several states, such as Saudi Arabia, Quatar, Jordan, Turkey, France and the USA paying, transporting and supplying mercenary jihadists from countries all over the world in order to make war upon the Syrian people. This is why the war can never end as long as these state participants are able to direct the war with impunity, outside of the reach of the combat, so the recent effort to bring the major players together to end the war, including all those mentioned above, is underway.

[Steve James]

supplying mercenary jihadists from countries all over the world in order to make war upon the Syrian people.

It's probably a bit more complicated than "the Syrian people." Clearly, there are Syrians who oppose Assad. Defining it as a civil war or not becomes irrelevant if the issue we've been arguing is Assad's role in bombing his own people. He's not bombing US, France, etc. And his forces are not fighting against US, France, etc. forces at all.

[Michael]

Who is the Syrian Army bombing, the terrorists or the civilians? Obviously they're bombing the terrorists in a war and civilians are being hurt and killed as well, by both sides. That's war. Whether or not it's a civil war is relevant to understand what's actually going on and why some tactics are being used. If there is an endless stream of foreign mercenaries being flown into your country who are taking positions inside populated neighborhoods and shooting mortars into nearby areas and killing civilians indiscriminately, and if the government has been fighting 4 years and is low on soldiers (the video Greg posted from Frontline included an announcement by Assad in late July that because of low troop levels they would have to abandon some Syrian areas to the terrorists for strategic purposes), then the Syrian Army might have to press the air advantage resulting in civilian casualties based on the calculus of how many soldier casualties they can afford as well as how many civilians the terrorists are killing compared to how many will be killed by Syrian air operations in populated areas. Obviously, these conditions are relevant to the discussion about civilian casualties.

He's not bombing US, France, etc. And his forces are not fighting against US, France, etc. forces at all.

No, he's bombing forces supported by France and the USA, as well as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, etc. Is this not relevant?

US just announced 50 special ops forces to go into Syria as advisers, but concern was immediately expressed they might be injured by Russian bombing campaign against ISIS.

[Michael]

USA, who recently bombed a hospital in Kundun, Afghanistan, operated by Doctors Without Borders (MDF), and then after protests from MDF and others, US military drove a tank through the front gate of the hospital that was still in operation, claiming both times they didn't know it was a hospital. Tank drivers now working in braille, apparently.

The latest USA protests against Russia's bombing of ISIS are allegations that Russia bombed a Syrian hospital. When asked for any evidence or asked if USA had confronted Russia with the allegation, US State Dept. spokesman created some straw and responded thusly in this two minute clip.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LA8nDgaEvNk

[Michael]

Moderate Syrian rebels place caged Alawite prisoners around their district of Ghouta in response to government attacks.

https://news.vice.com/article/footage-shows-syrian-rebels-parading-caged-prisoners-through-the-streets



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krjTdY4YrY8

Is this a moderate response? The longer the war goes on, the more severe is the fighting.

[Michael]

Russia Defense Ministry says 5 of 6 of alleged hospitals don't exist and denies bombing the sixth one.

http://sputniknews.com/middleeast/20151102/1029484605/syria-russia-airstrikes-n-hospitals.html

[windwalker]

USA, who recently bombed a hospital in Kundun, Afghanistan, operated by Doctors Without Borders (MDF), and then after protests from MDF and others, US military drove a tank through the front gate of the hospital that was still in operation, claiming both times they didn't know it was a hospital. Tank drivers now working in braille, apparently.

Kinda surprised in one way, in another way not....

For Russia allegations of war crimes "we have reports that would lead us to believe" wow, it never fails "we know it but cant tell you" pretty standard US line.
seems like they would have a listing of the hospitals bombed or something.

On the other hand, the US did it,, at first it was an accident, no wait they asked the US to bomb it,
no wait there must have been some terrorist in it,
no wait in a little while people will forget about it and stop asking about it

problem solved

[Steve James]

"Definition: civil war (noun) a war between citizens of the same country."

Saying "it's a war" and "civilians are being hurt and killed as well, by both sides" is an argument that anyone can use to justify anything.

You can argue that Assad is fighting France and the US, but you can't argue that he's not killing his own people to do so. His people are not being used as human shields by Americans or Frenchmen. It's a civil war.

I don't know enough about the geopolitics to explain why the US et al suddenly became an enemy of Assad after standing aside for decades while his father committed his atrocities. He was as bad as Saddam, and was also propped up by the US. So, no, I tend to use my common sense and not pretend I'm a secretary of state with expert knowledge of what is actually going on. I don't think that the US and France, etc., support IS. I think there have always been opponents to the Assad regimes, both inside and outside Syria. I think that Russia and the US both support leaders and states that are beneficial to their interests.

The states involved are not acting for moral or humanitarian reasons. Otoh, those are the only issues that interest me. I would prefer if it were not necessary to put US troops in that region in harm's way or force them to kill. I'd prefer if we spent more on domestic social issues and programs. If not, though, I'd rather the money be used to support humanitarian efforts elsewhere, such as on refugee, health and hunger programs.

Oh yeah, regarding the spec ops forces being sent. That wouldn't have happened without people having been on the ground there prior. The difference is the visibility of their role. Right. If they're embedded, they might be hit by Russian air strikes --that are directed at rebel forces, not IS. That's the strategic point. The rebel forces (our "friends") are also under attack by IS (our and Assad's "enemies"). We want to help our friends fight IS because we don't want IS to win. We certainly don't want IS and the rebels to ally with each other. So, that's why the 50 spec op troops would be deployed. Hey, no matter what, there'll be those here who'll say that they aren't enough. The same crew will argue that the drone program is killing too many.