Combs Spouts Off

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Posts Tagged ‘syria’

Quagmire in the making: understanding the Syria situation

Posted by Richard on July 3, 2017

NetRightDaily has posted an excellent Syria explainer by Printus LeBlanc. How did the Syrian civil war come about? What foreign powers are entangled in it and why? Well, it’s about the Arab Spring. And it’s about the Sunni-Shia conflict. And it’s about gas and oil pipelines. And it’s about Russia’s only naval base on the Mediterranean Sea.

LeBlanc’s conclusion:

Regardless if this is a religious conflict, a political conflict, pipeline politics, or more likely a combination of all three, President Donald Trump must weigh all options — and get authorization from Congress — before acting to get the U.S. involved with a civil war with so many possibilities to become a wider regional or even global conflict.

A student of history might look at the situation in Syria, and see Europe leading up to WWI. One misstep could trigger alliances and defense pacts that lead to all-out war.

Indeed™.

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Mind-boggling self-assessment at the State Department

Posted by Richard on December 29, 2015

Yes, John Effin’ Kerry has replaced Hillary as Secretary of State, but you can’t tell from the State Department’s year-in-review. It’s just so … Clintonesque. Reason Hit & Run has details:

Ahh, Syria circa 2015: an idyllic land of peace, prosperity, and security… said no one ever. Well, except for the U.S. State Department, which counts “bringing peace [and] security to Syria” among its top 2015 accomplishments. In a year-in-review post on the department’s official blog, it also takes credit for “step[ping] up to to aid the Syrian people during their time of need” and developing a plan for “political transition” that “is responsive to the needs of the Syrian people.”

… Other things the department sees fit to brag about as top 2015 accomplishments include “winning [the] fight against violent extremists,” by which it means holding a conference with that title; Secretary of State John Kerry assuming a two-year chairmanship of the Arctic Council; and making a pie-in-the-sky pact with other nations to “end poverty” and “ensure prosperity for all.”

On second thought, it could fairly be called Kerryesque. Clintonesque and Kerryesque are very different stylistically, but actually have a lot in common. Mendacity, self-aggrandizement, …

On third thought, the State Department has been a cesspool for many years, so neither Clinton nor Kerry is entirely responsible for this latest bit of bushwah.

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Obama’s dangerous fantasies

Posted by Richard on February 6, 2012

In an interview with the Today Show’s Matt Lauer, President Obama reiterated what he’s maintained for the past 3 years, that we can dissuade Iran from building nuclear weapons (and using them against Israel) by persuading them that they don’t really want any (emphasis added):

The president elaborated on Iran’s nuclear capability — and how he plans to prevent it. “My goal is to try to resolve this diplomatically, mainly because the only way over the long term we can assure Iran doesn’t get a nuclear weapon is by getting them to understand it’s not in their interest,” Obama told Lauer.

The Washington Times quotes the President as also claiming that Iran’s goals are a mystery:

Mr. Obama also said in an interview that the U.S. has “a very good estimate” of the state of Iran’s nuclear development, but is having a more difficult time assessing its leadership’s intentions, as well as the political dynamics within the Islamic Republic.

Here’s a hint — this is what they’re saying right now in Iranian media outlets (government-controlled and thus with at least tacit approval):

The Iranian government, through a website proxy, has laid out the legal and religious justification for the destruction of Israel and the slaughter of its people.

The doctrine includes wiping out Israeli assets and Jewish people worldwide.

Calling Israel a danger to Islam, the conservative website Alef, with ties to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said the opportunity must not be lost to remove “this corrupting material. It is a “‘jurisprudential justification” to kill all the Jews and annihilate Israel, and in that, the Islamic government of Iran must take the helm.”

The article, written by Alireza Forghani, an analyst and a strategy specialist in Khamenei’s camp, now is being run on most state-owned sites, including the Revolutionary Guards’ Fars News Agency, showing that the regime endorses this doctrine.

Does the Obama administration really think that Hillary Clinton (a mere female) or even the silver-tongued Obama himself can somehow persuade this genocidal and tyrannical regime that having nukes is not in its interests, when its interests include killing every Jew on the planet??

Meanwhile, Bashir Assad, whom Hillary defended as a “reformer,” continues to slaughter civilians in growing numbers, and in the same interview Lauer asked why the U.S. and U.N. would act to stop such slaughter in one case, but not another:

“I said at the time with respect to Libya that we would be making these decisions…on a case by case basis based on how unified the international community was,” Obama said. …

The repressive regimes of Russia and China have blocked a U.N. resolution merely condemning the brutal repression in Syria, so I guess the Obama administration will shrug and say the international community isn’t sufficiently unified.

As for the home front, for the umpteenth time the President bemoaned the fact that he can’t just impose his will on the nation:

“What’s frustrated people is that I have not be able to force Congress to implement every aspect of what I said in 2008,” he said.

This man is full of dangerous fantasies, foreign and domestic. In the former case, 60s peace-and-love generation fantasies; in the latter case, fantasies of autocracy.

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What about Syria?

Posted by Richard on March 26, 2011

Various critics have wondered why President Obama felt compelled to stop Moammar Gaddafi from attacking his own people, but doesn't feel compelled to stop Bashar Assad from attacking the Syrian people. I say give it time.

The Obama administration debated and dithered for 4-5 weeks after the slaughter of civilians in Libya began before it acted. The Syrian army has only been gunning down civilians for a few days.

It's quite possible that the US will be ready to take action against Syria by mid to late April. Assuming, of course, that Samantha Power, Susan Rice, and Hillary Clinton — the three women with the big cojones in this administration — prevail again.

Some conservatives have pointed out that if you're going to use the US military to protect civilians from their own governments, there are multiple candidates in Africa, starting with Zimbabwe. I think there's zero chance of that. Robert Mugabe is a hard-core Marxist. And one thing is clear about this administration: it has no bone to pick with Marxists or socialists anywhere. 

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