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Jonathan J Tibbs:. To Syria or not too Syria

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JACKSONVILLE FL- A weapon of mass destruction (WMD) is a weapon that can kill and bring significant harm to a large number of humans and/or cause great damage to man-made structures, natural structures, or the biosphere in general. The scope and application of the term has evolved and been disputed, often signifying more politically than technically. Coined in reference to aerial bombing with chemical explosives, it has come to distinguish large-scale weaponry of other technologies, such as chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear...

The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) is the most recent arms control agreement with the force of International law. Its full name is the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their destruction. This agreement outlaws the production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons. It is administered by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), an independent organization based in The Hague...

In the aftermath of the September 11 attacks in the United States in 2001, the Syrian Government began limited cooperation with U.S. in the war against terror... Syria’s opposition to the Iraq War deteriorated relations. Serious contention arose because the Syria Government failed to prevent foreign fighters from using Syrian borders to enter Iraq and refused to deport the elements from the former Saddam Hussein regime that support Iraqi insurgency...

As early as April 1987, the Iraqis used chemical weapons to remove Kurds from their villages in northern Iraq during the Anfal campaign. It is estimated that chemical weapons were used on approximately 40 Kurdish villages, with the largest of these attacks occurring on March 16, 1988 against the Kurdish town of Halabja by Sadam Hussein...

The two countries, Iran and Syria, shared a common animosity towards Saddam Hussein *,although not cooperative with the US,* and coordination against the United States and Israel. Syria cooperates with Iran in smuggling arms to the Hisbollah in Lebanon, since Israel has attacked Syria...

The U.S. indictment of bin Laden filed in 1998 stated that Al-Qaeda "forged alliances . . . with the government of Iran and its associated terrorist group Hezbollah for the purpose of working together against their perceived common enemies..."

On January 29, 2002, American President Bush gave his "Axis of evil" speech, describing Iran, along with North Korea and Iraq, as an axis of evil and warning that the proliferation of long-range missiles developed by these countries constituted terrorism and threatened the United States. The speech caused outrage in Iran and was condemned by reformists and conservatives...
Since 2003, the United States has been flying unmanned aerial vehicles, launched from Iraq, over Iran to obtain intelligence on Iran's nuclear program, reportedly providing little new information... The Iranian government has described the surveillance as illegal... In January 2006, James Risen, a New York Times reporter, stated in his book State of War that the CIA carried out a Clinton-approved operation in 2000 (Operation Merlin) intended to delay Iran's nuclear energy program. According to Risen, the United States fed Iran flawed blueprints missing key components, but the plan backfired and may have aided Iran, as the flaw was likely corrected by the former Soviet nuclear scientist who headed the delivery operation...

Syrian estimates of deaths in the conflict vary widely, with figures, per opposition activist groups, ranging from 80,350 and 106,425... On 2 January 2013, the United Nations stated that 60,000 had been killed since the civil war began, with U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay saying "The number of casualties is much higher than we expected, and is truly shocking." Four months later, the U.N.'s updated figure for the death toll had reached 80,000... On 13 June the UN released an updated figure of people killed since fighting began, the figure being exactly 92,901, for up to the end of April 2013. Navi Pillay, UN high commissioner for human rights, stated that: "This is most likely a minimum casualty figure." The real toll was guessed to be over 100,000... Some areas of the country have been affected disproportionately by the war; by some estimates, as many as a third of all deaths have occurred in the city of Homs...

The Syrian army has been accused of crimes against humanity, both before the start of the revolution and after. Amnesty International has reported that the Syrian army does not attempt to differentiate between rebels and civilians, often killing a number of innocents... The Syrian Arab Army has also been accused of not differentiating between rebels and civilians in their air attacks... In June 2013, a prison was captured by the Free Syrian Army, revealing ongoing torture of political prisoners...

The Syrian government uses food deprivation as a weapon of war... The Syrian army enforces food-blockades on rebel controlled districts, particularly that of the city of Homs, where food and medicine has to be smuggled... In Syrian government controlled areas, houses of people suspected to be anti-Assad are bulldozed as collective punishment...

In the meantime, Jihadist groups are accused of violence against civilians who do not follow Sunni Islam. Christians report religious cleansing of their neighborhoods in Homs and Qsair as well as rapes and kidnappings for ransom... Through the fighting, Islamist groups such as fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq, Al-Qaeda, and Syria have lost support from international powers and Syrian citizens, reportedly over a "spate of abuse"

In a nutshell, The U.S. has also condemned Syria for the movement of extremist foreign fighter groups affiliated with Al Qaeda in Iraq which increase destabilization in Iraq... The movement of these foreign fighters peaked during 2005-2007, and with international pressure significant Syrian efforts to decrease them with increased border monitoring, and better screening practices of those crossing the border. Since 2009 the Syrian government has indicated willingness to increase border security cooperation between Iraqi and U.S. forces...

"It is only logical for Al-Qaeda to reach out to the Syrian Rebels to re-locate defensive forces... Although, in my logic shall be understated due to the clash of liberal opinion within the majority of Syrian public... Hezbollah is a terrorist organization founded upon the principals of Bin-Laden and although Syrian disdain toward Saddam Hussein existed... was not strong enough to deter U.S occupation. If not the existence of the use of chemical weapons by the Saddam's regime. One might also imply the timing and success factor into the equation... Why did Assad protect Saddam Hussein when he had quarrel with the dictator... was there a greater cause or as the Muslim Brotherhood states "protectors of their homeland..."

http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-1020673

"Dictators can only destroy themselves... that is with the murder of thousands with international defiance... President Obama has to weigh public opinion with international opinion... Turning the bloody red-line created by fighters of Hezbollah into his reality and basis for appeal... The war on terror has escalated a scrambled middle east, prior being the division of Islam... Our one hope is this feeling called middle-eastern liberalism... we call it Democracy... Our efforts are not only to create Democratic governments, but to nurture them into existence... As not to repeat the process again until success... To end this appeal, the brutal killing of innocent people in an act of sin, created because of sin, death and hell on earth... " - Jon

Jonathan J Tibbs

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