How Assad will win this war:

[DetlefK]

Step 1: Give some chemical weapons over to UN-inspectors. Promise to fight those "terrorists" with honest means.

Step 2: Kill about a hundred of your own soldiers with a chemical attack in a false-flag-operation.

Step 3: Blame Al-Qaeda. Steer clear of conspiracy-theories, like blaming Saudi-Arabia or Turkey or the secular syrian rebels. Use the chemical-weapons-using Al-Qaeda, those foreigners, as a bogeyman the whole world, including the secular syrian rebels, can unite against.

Step 4: Watch Russia and Iran come to your aid, USA and EU sitting on the sidelines.

Step 5: Wait a week, then propose a ceasefire to the rebels to join forces to get rid of Al-Qaeda.

Step 6: Wait a further week, then hint that you are willing to negotiate for peace as long as everything is forgiven and forgotten on both sides. If the rebels accept, kill them when nobody's watching. If the rebels decline, ask Russia and Iran for military aid "against Al-Qaeda".

[VanillaRhapsody]

1. Wow the ODS is still raging around here...

Assad has his ass hanging out at this point...because the one thing you forget. Putin....what are his needs...not the other way around. Assad is only in power at all is at Putin's pleasure.

[DetlefK]

2. I don't get your point about Obama-derangement syndrome.

My post isn't about Obama.

What does Putin want: A military-harbor for his fleet in the Mediterranean Sea. A Russia-friendly regime in Syria.

My post is an example, what Assad to could do to weasel his way out of this war and to give Russia an excuse to join the fight against "Al-Qaeda in Syria". Would Russia reject bringing more military ships and military shipments to Syria's coast?

[Skidmore]

3. Assad wants his civil war.

He wants to hold onto the power he inherited. He's not a whit different than any other adult child of a dictator. He wants control over his own playpen.

[warrior1]

4. that's because you are not seeing the big picture

Obama won this.

[Aerows]

10. I'm happy to proclaim an Obama victory on this

I'm critical, but when the right thing happens, I'm also very glad to point it out.

The man isn't perfect, but he has a deft hand when it comes to certain issues. This is one of them.

[David__77]

6. Because some people think that the broader conflict is principally about Obama, which it isn't.

Nor has it been for the past 2.5 years. My criticism of Obama recently was motivated by my desire not to see US intervention against Syria, but some forces would think that opposition to US intervention was somehow motivated by a desire to "get Obama."

That both Assad and Obama would get either short-term or long-term benefit from a diplomatic solution a crazy proposition at all.

[Aerows]

12. It was good foreign relations politics

and I applaud all involved. Obama showed some great political chops by not just barging in with guns blazing.

[cali]

5. ridiculous speculation

[DetlefK]

11. So, you are suggesting:

...that Assad is willing give up his chemical weapons just like that.

...that Assad is above trickery.

...that anybody would dare to suggest that we shouldn't rush to blame Al-Qaeda. "Give these guys a break! They are mass-murderers, but maybe not this time!"

...that Russia and Iran wouldn't jump on any excuse to help Assad diplomatically.

...that Russia and Iran wouldn't use the excuse of fighting Al-Qaeda to prop up Assad militarily.

[muriel_volestrangler]

16. A 'false flag' operation against your own soldiers is pretty desperate

because you have to use other soldiers to do it. That would be a quick way to lose the loyalty of your military - it let's those who know of the operation that you think they are completely expendable. They'd be more likely to turn on you. I don't think he'd risk that unless he thought he was about to lose anyway.

[cali]

23. no. I've written repeatedly about this.

I think you take your speculation to a ridiculous place.

[Aerows]

14. Indeed.

I applaud Obama when he does the right thing, and he showed how deft of a foreign relations hand he can have with this situation.

Doing the right thing is what is important, and not who and who is not miffed at how the right thing is done. Some seem to forget that and get all tied up in ego and opinion. I don't. I LIKE it when the right thing is done.

[Raine1967]

7. This post should be in the Creative Speculation group.

Here ya go.

[NuclearDem]

18. Oh, so that's what happened to the old 9/11 forum.

[whttevrr]

21. Whoa... that's like a mental kaleidoscope...

Quite few locked and self deleted threads in there...

[whttevrr]

22. Is John Kerry a Lizard Person?

Alex Jones, and all of his activities is funded and scripted by the CIA. Hmmm... is there a chin scratch smiley?

The Multiverse!? You guys have been holding out! I was wondering where the Reincarnation and the Multiverse posts were...

[FSogol]

8. Haw!

[TeamPooka]

9. zero recs for a reason. nt

[MADem]

13. Well, there are a lot of problems with that mock-up

Not all of the "terrorists" are terrorists. There are several groups fighting against al-Assad, and they are not unified or coordinated. Some are former Syrian Army members. Some are angry at the short shrift al-Assad has given to minority groups. Others are people who just want to take care of their own village or region, in an almost tribal fashion, they object to the intrusion of the government.

Chemical weapons have a signature.

Blaming AQ falsely brings push-back...like "the real AQ" coming to toast your shit.

If al-Assad starts coloring outside the lines, he gets in hot water with Russia. He owes Putin BILLIONS for all the weaponry he's bought. He's paying it off by letting Russia use his best deepwater port for their a/c carrier and subs. Ergo, al-Assad will not fart without Pootie's permission. Otherwise he can't buy all the cute little weapons he needs to continue his strongman ways.

The real rebels consider AQ less of a threat than al-Assad. They consider Bashir and his father before him to be the devils who have destroyed Syria.

al-Assad is a minority dictator with a majority of the population of a different faith, and on the wrong side of "good times." Imbalances like this always lead to trouble.


If al-Assad wants the fighting to stop, he's going to have to try diplomacy. He's been unwilling to do that, for over two years now. He's also going to have to do a little power-sharing, and he doesn't like that idea either.

[David__77]

15. "The real rebels consider AQ less of a threat than al-Assad" - because they are allies.

AQ is fully integrated with the vast majority of the non-AQ insurgents. To say somehow that AQ is not "real rebels" is like saying that Pol Pot had a marginal role in the insurgency that overthrew Lon Nol (they were all nice Sihanouk monarchists).

[MADem]

20. No, that's not at all accurate. In fact, it's the opposite of accurate.

There are many "rebel groups" that aren't rolling with AQ, that do not have goals that are compatible with AQ, and many of these opposition forces are not "coordinating" at all.

It is difficult to know the players without a scorecard, but the bottom line is this--like it is with EVERY revolution--each group that is fighting rather foolishly believes that they will be in charge at the end of the day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_opposition

[NuclearDem]

17. I rec'd this just so I could unrec it.

[In_The_Wind]

19. lol

[Avalux]

24. Good heavens. I sometimes forget this is Democratic Underground. n/t