The GCHQ listening post on Mount Troodos in Cyprus is arguably the most valued asset which the UK contributes to UK/US intelligence cooperation. The communications intercept agencies, GCHQ in the UK and NSA in the US, share all their intelligence reports (as do the CIA and MI6). Troodos is valued enormously by the NSA. It monitors all radio, satellite and microwave traffic across the Middle East, ranging from Egypt and Eastern Libya right through to the Caucasus. Even almost all landline telephone communication in this region is routed through microwave links at some stage, picked up on Troodos.
Troodos is highly effective – the jewel in the crown of British intelligence. Its capacity and efficiency, as well as its reach, is staggering. The US do not have their own comparable facility for the Middle East. I should state that I have actually been inside all of this facility and been fully briefed on its operations and capabilities, while I was head of the FCO Cyprus Section in the early 1990s. This is fact, not speculation.
It is therefore very strange, to say the least, that John Kerry claims to have access to communications intercepts of Syrian military and officials organising chemical weapons attacks, which intercepts were not available to the British Joint Intelligence Committee.
On one level the explanation is simple. The intercept evidence was provided to the USA by Mossad,according to my own well placed source in the Washington intelligence community. Intelligence provided by a third party is not automatically shared with the UK, and indeed Israel specifies it should not be.
But the inescapable question is this. Mossad have nothing comparable to the Troodos operation. The reported content of the conversations fits exactly with key tasking for Troodos, and would have tripped all the triggers. How can Troodos have missed this if Mossad got it? The only remote possibility is that all the conversations went on a purely landline route, on which Mossad have a physical wire tap, but that is very unlikely in a number of ways – not least nowadays the purely landline route.
Israel has repeatedly been involved in the Syrian civil war, carrying out a number of illegal bombings and missile strikes over many months. This absolutely illegal activity by Israel- which has killed a great many civilians, including children – has brought no condemnation at all from the West. Israel has now provided “intelligence” to the United States designed to allow the United States to join in with Israel’s bombing and missile campaign.
The answer to the Troodos Conundrum is simple. Troodos did not pick up the intercepts because they do not exist. Mossad fabricated them. John Kerry’s “evidence” is the shabbiest of tricks. More children may now be blown to pieces by massive American missile blasts. It is nothing to do with humanitarian intervention. It is, yet again, the USA acting at the behest of Israel.
U.S. to release information about Syria’s chemical weapons use
(CNN) — The Obama administration will release declassified intelligence Friday backing up a government assessment that the Syrian regime was responsible for a chemical weapons attack, a senior administration official said.
[U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel’s response to the vote was more diplomatic.
The United States respects the results, he told journalists in Manila, the Philippines. “Every nation has a responsibility to make their own decisions.”
The United States will continue to consult with the British government and still hope for “international collaboration.”
“Our approach is to continue to find an international coalition that will act together,” he said .]
This comes amid talk among major powers of a military response against the forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The administration has said that the information would be made public by the end of the week.
But diplomatic and political developments this week raised the chances of the United States going it alone in a military intervention.
A U.N. Security Council meeting on Syria ended in deadlock, and in the U.S. Congress, doubts about military intervention are making the rounds.
And the United States’ closest ally, Great Britain, backed out of a possible coalition when its lawmakers voted down a proposal on military intervention.
British Prime Minister David Cameron said it is important for the United Kingdom to have a “robust response to the use of chemical weapons, and there are a series of things that (Britain) will continue to do.”British involvement in a military action “won’t be happening,” he said.
But diplomacy is continuing. Speaking in televised comments aired Friday, Cameron said he expects to speak to President Obama over the “next day or so.”
On Friday afternoon, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon intends to consult with countries at the United Nations on developments in Syria and is scheduled to meet with permanent members of the U.N. Security Council at noon Friday.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is scheduled to speak about Syria at the State Department on Friday at 12:30 p.m. ET.
Iran: U.S. military action in Syria would spark ‘disaster’
Alone or together?
After the British vote, a senior U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told CNN that going it alone was a real prospect.
“We care what they think. We value the process. But we’re going to make the decision we need to make,” the official said.
Former President George W. Bush said Obama’s “got a tough choice to make.”
“I was not a fan of Mr. Assad. He’s an ally of Iran, he’s made mischief,” he told Fox News on Friday. “If he (Obama) decides to use the military, he’s got the greatest military in the world backing him up.”
In a statement released Friday, former President Jimmy Carter said “a punitive military response without a U.N. Security Council mandate or broad support from NATO and the Arab League would be illegal under international law and unlikely to alter the course of the war.”
A former director of the CIA says he believes Obama would face off with al-Assad alone.
“I can’t conceive he would back down from a very serious course of action,” retired Gen. Michael Hayden told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.
[…]
Chemical weapons in Syria: How did we get here?
The government of France supports military intervention, if evidence incriminates the government of using poison gas against civilians.
But on Friday, President Francois Hollande told French newspaper Le Monde that intervention should be limited and not include al-Assad’s overthrow.
Public opinion
Skeptics of military action have pointed at the decision to use force in Iraq, where the United States government under Bush marched to war based on a thin claim that former dictator Saddam Hussein was harboring weapons of mass destruction.
Opponents are conjuring up a possible repeat of that scenario in Syria, though the intelligence being gathered on the use of WMDs in Syria may be more sound.
Half of all Americans say they oppose possible U.S. military action against Syria, according to an NBC News survey released Friday.
Nearly eight in 10 of those questioned say Obama should be required to get congressional approval before launching any military attack against al-Assad’s forces
The poll, conducted Wednesday and Thursday, indicates that 50% of the public says the United States should not take military action against Damascus in response to the Syrian government’s alleged use of chemical weapons against its own citizens, with 42% saying military action is appropriate.
But the survey suggests that if any military action is confined to air strikes using cruise missiles, support rises. Fifty percent of a smaller sample asked that question say they support such an attack, with 44% opposing a cruise missile attack meant to destroy military units and infrastructure that have been used to carry out chemical attacks.
“Only 25% of the American people support military action in Syria,” former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Bill Richardson told CNN’s Piers Morgan on Thursday.
Convincing evidence
To shake off the specter of the Iraq war, the public needs convincing that chemical weapons were used and that al-Assad’s regime was behind it.
“You have to have almost incontrovertible proof,” Richardson told CNN’s Piers Morgan on Thursday.
It’s there, said Arizona Sen. John McCain, and will be visible soon. He thinks that comparisons to Iraq are overblown and that doubts are unfounded.
“Come on. Does anybody really believe that those aren’t chemical weapons — those bodies of those children stacked up?” the Republican senator asked Morgan.
Al-Assad’s government has claimed that jihadists fighting with the opposition carried out the chemical weapons attacks on August 21 to turn global sentiments against it.
Read UK intelligence on chemical weapons
McCain doesn’t buy it.
“The rebels don’t have those weapons,” he said.
The president also needs to assure Congress that a possible intervention would not get out of hand, said Democratic Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland.
“The action has to have a very limited purpose, and the purpose is to deter future use of chemical weapons,” he said.
Why Russia, Iran and China are standing by al-Assad
Haunted by Iraq
The parliamentarians in London shot down the proposal in spite of intelligence allegedly incriminating the Assad government.
Britain’s Joint Intelligence Committee has concluded it was “highly likely” that Syrian government forces used poison gas outside Damascus last week in an attack that killed at least 350 people, according to a summary of the committee’s findings released Thursday.
A yes vote would not have sent the UK straight into a deployment.
Cameron had said his government would not act without first hearing from the U.N. inspectors and giving Parliament another chance to vote on military action. But his opposition seemed to be reminded of the Iraq war.
Opinion: For the U.S., Syria is a problem from hell
“I think today the House of Commons spoke for the British people who said they didn’t want a rush to war, and I was determined we learned the lessons of Iraq, and I’m glad we’ve made the prime minister see sense this evening,” Labour Party leader Ed Miliband told the Press Association.
The no vote came after a long day of debate, and it appeared to catch Cameron and his supporters by surprise.
For days, the prime minister has been sounding a call for action, lending support to talk of a U.S.- or Western-led strike against Syria.
“I strongly believe in the need for a tough response to the use of chemical weapons, but I also believe in respecting the will of this House of Commons,” the prime minister said.
“We will not be taking part in military action,” Cameron said Friday. “The British Parliament has spoken very, very clearly,” he said.
Though Cameron did not need parliamentary approval to commit to an intervention, he felt it important “to act as a democrat, to act a different way to previous prime ministers and properly consult Parliament,” he said Friday.
He regrets not being able to build a consensus of lawmakers, he said.
Letter from al-Assad
Before the vote, Syria’s government offered its own arguments against such an intervention. In an open letter to British lawmakers, the speaker of Syria’s parliament riffed on British literary hero William Shakespeare, saying: “If you bomb us, shall we not bleed?”
But the letter also invoked Iraq, a conflict justified on the grounds that Iraq had amassed stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons and was working toward a nuclear bomb — claims that were discovered to have been false after the 2003 invasion.
“Those who want to send others to fight will talk in the Commons of the casualties in the Syrian conflict. But before you rush over the cliffs of war, would it not be wise to pause? Remember the thousands of British soldiers killed and maimed in Afghanistan and Iraq, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi dead, both in the war and in the continuing chaos.”
British Commons Speaker John Bercow published the letter.
U.N. deadlock
Lack of support for military intervention at the United Nations on Thursday was less of a surprise.
Russia, which holds a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council, is one of Syria’s closest allies and is most certain to veto any resolution against al-Assad’s government that involves military action.
Moscow reiterated the stance Friday.
“Russia is against any resolution of the U.N. Security Council, which may contain an option for use of force,” Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov said Friday.
Map: U.S. and allied assets around Syria
A closed-door Security Council meeting called by Russia ended with no agreement on a resolution to address the growing crisis in Syria, a Western diplomat told CNN’s Nick Paton Walsh on condition of anonymity.
U.N. weapons inspectors are now in Syria trying to confirm the use of chemical weapons. The inspectors are expected to leave the country by Saturday morning.
They are to brief U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who, in turn, will swiftly brief the Security Council on the findings.
Congressional jitters
The president is facing doubts at home as well: More than 160 members of Congress, including 63 Democrats, have now signed letters calling for either a vote or at least a “full debate” before any U.S. action.
The author of one of those letters, Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee of California, said Obama should seek “an affirmative decision of Congress” before committing American forces.
More than 90 members of Congress, most of them Republican, signed another letter by GOP Rep. Scott Rigell of Virginia. That letter urged Obama “to consult and receive authorization” before authorizing any such military action.
Congress is in recess until September 9.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Obama was still weighing a potential response to the chemical weapons attacks.
The president has said that he is not considering a no-fly zone and has ruled out U.S. boots on the ground in Syria.
Al-Assad has vowed to defend his country against any outside attack.
UK Government’s legal position on Syrian regime’s chemical weapon use
Syria: Al-Nusra With “Chemical Weapons” Sourced From Turkey
One of the three alleged “chemical weapon” attacks in Syria was done by chlorine on a checkpoint of the Syrian army. Fifteen soldiers died.
Two other attacks which Israel Britain and France alleged were done by the Syrian army and were somewhat mysterious. With collaboration of two bloggers and a photographer the incidents are now likely to be interpreted very different than Israel, Britain and France alleged.
Eliot Higgins, who blogs as Brown Moses, analyzed pictures of ammunition debris found at the two alleged attack sides.
The photographer Jeffry Ruigendijk photographed a salafist Al-Nusra fighter carrying a riot control gas canister that looks very similar to the ammunition debris found at the attacked places.
Small arms expert N.R. Jenzen-Jones identified the producer of these canisters and the likely way they found their way into Al-Nusra hands:
[T]he munitions do appear quite similar to those produced by the Indian Border Security Force’s Tear Smoke Unit (TSU), at their plant in Tekanpur, Madhya Pradesh. Several of their production items appear to share physical similarities with the unidentified grenade, but the closest visual match is their ‘Tear Smoke Chilli Grenade’, seen below. This grenade contains a combination of CS gas ( 2-chlorobenzalmalononitrile) and ‘synthetic chilli’ (likely a synthetic capsaicin, such as nonivamide) – both common riot control agents.
Riot control agents like tear gas or pepper spray can be deadly when, for example, used in closed rooms. They symptoms vary (pdf) but there are usually respiratory problems just as those described by those people who were under the alleged “chemical weapons attack.
So how did the Al-Nusra fighters get their hands on a Indian Border Security Force’s Tear Smoke Unit grenade?
This Indian news article notes that Turkey purchased 10,025 munitions from TSU in 2007, which may indicate a possible avenue of supply, particularly if the grenades were in the hands of rebel forces, as the image at top appears to indicate.
The “chemical weapon” attacks were not done by the Syrian army. They were done by so called “rebels” with chlorine and with riot control agents by jihadist insurgencies who sourced the gas by stealing it from a Syrian factory and somehow obtained riot control agents from official Turkish state stocks.
The Israeli, the British and the French government tried to instigate a wider war on Syria by making false allegations about “chemical weapon” attacks by the Syrian army. The U.S. nearly joined them in their allegations. Will all those op-ed writers and tried to use the “fact” of chemical weapon usage now call for all out war on Al-Nusra?
Don’t bet on it.
via M of A – Syria: Al-Nusra With “Chemical Weapons” Sourced From Turkey.
Syria’s chemical weapons compound is heavily guarded, with the state fully aware of the consequences of a security lapse, German journalist Manuel Ochsenreiter told RT, noting the opposition could have acquired the weapons through Turkey.
In this image made available by the Syrian News Agency (SANA) on March 19, 2013, a man is brought to a hospital in the Khan al-Assal region in the northern Aleppo province, as Syria’s government accused rebel forces of using chemical weapons for the first time (AFP Photo / Sana)
The Western-backed theory that chemical weapons were taken from the Syrian government’s military compound is very doubtful, according to Ochsenreiter, because “the military compound where gas is stored is heavily guarded. The Syrian government knows exactly what might happen if this gas comes out.”
He said that the weapons might have been from Turkey as it is one of the “most important players in the conflict, which supports the so-called armed opposition” and “Turkey already used chemical weapons in battles against the Kurdish population and militia.”
There have been false statements before, for example the blame of the Syrian government for the June 2012 Houla massacre, which was later refuted “but it didn’t have any affect or result in diplomatic means” noted the German journalist.
Peace activist and journalist Ryan Dawson told RT that it would be difficult to determine where the weapons originated from as the so-called opposition has many outside sources financing it and aiding with weapons.
“We have the Gulf monarchs and Israel. Probably not directly from the US and Israel, because they like to have plausible deniability – they probably went through Qatar or Turkey.”
RT: There’s been widespread opinion, promoted by some major world powers that any chemical weapons use in Syria would only ever be down to the Assad regime. So are you surprised to hear it may have been the rebels using them?
Ryan Dawson: I’m not surprised, because we’ve heard that before, back in December there was a scare about chemical weapons and red lines being crossed. That turned out to be the terrorist mercenaries in Syria. And there was an Israeli airstrike following that in January. So this is the exact same scenario.
RT: If it turns out to be true, where would the rebels have got them from?
RD: It will be difficult to pen down because the so-called opposition has so many outside sources financing them and aiding with weapons. We have the Gulf monarchs and Israel. Probably not directly from the US and Israel, because they like to have plausible deniability – they probably went through Qatar or Turkey.
RT: This investigation is separate from the one launched by the UN’s own chief – so why are there two different probes being carried out by the same body?
RD: The first party to call for the UN investigation was the Syrian government themselves, that’s how confident they were that the mercenaries used the chemical weapons. When you look at it, the US and Israel don’t have a leg to stand on to be lecturing anybody about having or using chemical weapons
RT: Syria was hit this weekend by a series of Israeli airstrikes – do you have any ideas why the attacks took place? Was it really self-defense?
RD: Of course not. But its hard to explain Israel’s actions. You are not talking about a rational player. It’s not the first time Israel has struck inside of Syria. Israel from time to time invades Gaza, attacks Syria, they are trying to bolster their image in the Middle East and get the fear factor and deterrent for themselves. Yet again Israel will claim that Syria was shipping weapons to Hezbollah, which they consider a terrorist group. Though the Israelis are aiding the mercenaries in Syria, which have killed up to 70, 000 people. So concerning the chemical weapons killing a dozen or so people – that is just a red line, they are just looking for a pretext. The wanted to strike anyway.
RT: There are so many blank spaces in the story, mostly because Israel’s avoiding all questions about the strikes – Why is that? Do you think international bodies will move in to shatter this silent strategy?
RD: Israel is fishing for escalation; the mercenaries are starting to lose. You’ll see the Western powers backing the mercenary groups just enough to keep the perpetual conflict going. But there are no decisive battles. That’s the whole point, the profit from it, to destroy Syria from within.
RT: Could Israel face justice here?
RD: They ought to, but they won’t. Israel has absolute immunity from international bodies, because the US and Canada back them up no matter what they do. We are talking about a state that has open apartheid, open ethnic cleansing, they are colonizing Palestine, they shoot children at will – they are breaking UN resolutions and nothing ever happens. Israel felt confident that they could go on a clumsy pretext of chemical weapons and bomb whatever they want and get away with it.
via ‘Chemical weapons for Syrian opposition may have come from Turkey’ — RT Op-Edge.
REYHANLI, Turkey — Doctors in Turkey say initial tests of blood samples from victims of a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria last month are negative for sarin gas.
A Syrian boy holds an AK-47 assault rifle in the majority-Kurdish Sheikh Maqsud district of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo. US intelligence agencies determined with “some degree of varying confidence” that chemical weapons have been used in Syria as of April 25, 2013. (DIMITAR DILKOFF/AFP/Getty Images)
Medics tested the blood samples — which were taken from some 13 victims of an attack that included white powder in the northern village of Saraqeb on April 29 — at the Reyhanli hospital on the same day, but did not find anything unusual, they said.
They tested the blood specifically for sarin gas — a nerve agent — and also ran regular bloodwork.
The samples from the victims, who suffered from dizziness, vomiting and respiratory difficulties, have since been sent to the Turkish capital, Ankara, for further testing.
The development comes as Israeli fighter jets are reported to have carried out at least several airstrikes on weapons convoys near Damascus over the weekend.
Employees at the Istanbul headquarters of the Council of Forensic Medicine, the institute testing the blood in Ankara, were unable to answer GlobalPost inquiries on the status of the additional tests.
Doctors in Reyhanli, in Turkey’s Hatay province, say they believe the Turkish government will keep the final results a secret due to the potential global political consequences of either negative or positive results.
US President Barack Obama had previously said chemical weapons use in the now two-year-long civil war would be a “red line”, and potentially provoke a US-led intervention against the government forces of Syrian president Bashar al Assad.
Both Israeli and US officials have in recent weeks said they believe that chemical weapons, including sarin gas, have been used in the fighting in Syria but it is unclear in what capacity and from where the chemicals originated.
More from GlobalPost: Syria: The horrific chemical weapons attack that probably wasn’t a chemical weapons attack (Graphic video)
But while some Syrians say chemical weapons have been used on civilian neighborhoods in several locations throughout the country, they remain difficult to identify.
“The symptoms were consistent with those caused by a chemical, and the effects of this chemical were very serious and potentially fatal,” said Dr. Ubada Alabrash, who treated the victims at Reyhanli hospital. “But we couldn’t identify what the chemical was.”
In Saraqeb and in an earlier attack on April 13 where white powder was dispersed in a Kurdish suburb of Aleppo, the civilian victims were displaying similar symptoms: dizziness, vomiting, headaches and breathing problems.
Also, based on photos and videos uploaded to YouTube — and catalogued by independent blogger and weapons monitor, Eliot Higgins — the spent munitions or canisters witnesses said disseminated the chemicals appeared to be virtually identical.
More from GlobalPost: Complete Coverage from Inside Syria
“It appears to be a very strong match to the remnants of devices that were supposedly used in an earlier attack in Sheikh Maghsoud, Aleppo,” Higgins writes of the canisters left behind in Saraqeb on his blog, “Brown Moses.” His work tracking and identifying weapons used in the Syrian conflict is cited widely by both rights groups and international media.
“This leads me to believe the same devices and chemical were used in both attacks,” he writes.
However, both weapons and medical experts are urging caution.
While the same agent could have been used in both attacks, it could have been tear gas or some other kind of generated smoke, normally used for riot control, some weapons experts said.
The telltale sign of a sarin gas attack is myosis, or constricting of the pupils, and fasciculations, the medical term for tremors. While GlobalPost confirmed that some of the victims in the April 13 attack suffered from tremors, it was unable to confirm any of them had myosis.
More from GlobalPost: UN clarifies statement, says ‘no conclusive findings’ on chemical weapons in Syria
While three people were killed in the attack in Aleppo and another person died from the attack on Saraqeb, the majority of victims recovered after just several days.
In Aleppo, the doctors who treated the patients also later suffered similar symptoms to the victims. In Reyahanli, the medics reportedly wore protective suits.
“My effects were mild, but one doctor had to be admitted to the ICU,” said Dr. Kawa Hassan of the Avreen Hospital that admitted the 22 victims of the attack in Aleppo.
When the patients began to arrive on April 13, Dr. Hassan said he was scared not only for himself but for the entire country.
“If he begins a chemical war, he will kill us all,” he said.
Tracey Shelton reported from Aleppo and Afrin, Syria and Reyhanli, Turkey.
ANKARA, Turkey — Turkish border authorities decontaminated a group of wounded Syrians as they entered Turkey and hospital staff wore protective equipment to treat them because some claimed they may have come under a chemical attack in Syria, an official said Tuesday.
However, there was no indication that chemical weapons were used against them and the hospital near the border with Syria soon returned to normal operations, an aide to the governor of Hatay province told The Associated Press. He spoke on condition of anonymity citing government rules that bar civil servants from speaking to journalists without authorization.
via Turkey decontaminates wounded Syrians over chemical attack claims; alert soon called off – The Washington Post.
