Stratfor published a short statement relating to Syria.
Here is the statement: At a time when countries are about to go to war–your own included–being unaffected by fear and passion is a critical professional stance. What Stratfor is proudest of is this: we know what we know. We know what we don’t know. And we don’t substitute opinion to fill in the blanks.
Stratfor’s job is to analyze the world as objectively as possible, and the situation in Syria is among the most difficult we have seen. The problem is we really don’t know what happened. The general consensus is Syrian President Bashar Assad ordered the use of chemical weapons against his enemies. The problem is trying to figure out why he would do it. He was not losing the civil war. In fact, he had achieved some limited military success recently. He knew that U.S. President Obama had said the use of chemical weapons would cross a red line. Yet Assad did it.
Or did he? Could the rebels have staged the attack in order to draw in an attack on al-Assad? Could the pictures have been faked? Could a third party, hoping to bog the United States down in another war, have done it? The answers to these questions are important, because they guide the U.S. and its allies’ response. The official explanation could be absolutely true–or not.
We can’t shy away from alternative explanations simply because they seem outlandish and conspiratorial. Nor can we embrace them. Stratfor’s job is to know what it knows, know what it doesn’t know and be honest about it.