Human Rights Watch: Vast Majority Killed with Non-Military Ordinance on 8/21
Last edited Sat Sep 14, 2013, 12:28 PM - Edit history (4)
On September 10, Human Rights Watch (HRW) published its 22-page report on the chemical attacks in suburban Damascus. http://www.hrw.org/reports/2013/09/10/attacks-ghouta-0 That paper follows similar reports by the U.S. State Department, the Government of France, but offers a wealth of information and details missing in the governmental assessments.
HRW: Doubts Raised About Number of Areas Targeted, All Rockets Launched from Regime-Controlled Territory
Details of the HRW report have caused this writer to reassess some earlier conclusions, but it has also reinforced some other doubts raised about the accuracy and completeness of the U.S. and French reports. The HRW study does not back up the U.S. report that the deadliest attacks on eastern Damascus were launched from a "regime controlled" area, the number of neighborhoods attacked, or the number of rockets launched. Most fundamentally, it casts doubt on the conclusions drawn that the deadliest of these attacks had to be carried out by regime forces using military weapons.
One issue which HRW has helped to correct previous confusion regards the types of ordinance used. It had been previously thought that large numbers of rockets, each carrying a relatively small amount of Sarin were required to produce fatalities that number upwards of hundreds killed to 1426 claimed by the Kerry Report. Earlier assessments that many dozens of rockets had to used were predicated upon information that each rocket held only 1-2 liters of Sarin each. This report now makes it clear that there were in fact two types of chemical rockets used on separate neighborhoods, and that by far the deadlier attacks were carried out with a small number -- as few as eight -- crude but deadly improvised rockets of the type that have been previously used by militias inside Syria and by insurgent groups in several Mideast countries.
In contrast, the neighborhood in western Damascus targeted with standard Syrian Army munitions suffered relatively light casualties, and HRW finds there is no evidence of the type of military ordinance used there ever having been employed before in the civil war. The neighborhood closest to the military airbase and headquarters of the 4th Armored Brigade was attacked by seven or eight 140mm artillery rockets, a standard type of Soviet-era munition. Each of these rounds is relatively accurate but capable of carrying only 2 liters of Sarin over a range of up to about six miles. According to HRW, fewer than one-in-six of the fatalities occurred in that area where these military munitions were used.
However, according to the HRW Report, at least 8 larger improvised gas rockets (333mm in diameter) impacted in the eastern part of the city. Improvised Rocket-Assisted Munitions (IRAMs), these bigger, deadlier, but clumsier devices are not standard military ordinance. During the same night, these improvised rockets were fired into the eastern Damascus suburbs in the area of Zamalka, and this type is estimated by HRW’s experts to have a capacity to carry upwards of 50 liters of Sarin in each warhead. While it carries a far larger amount of poisonous agent, and are proportionately more deadly over a larger area, these improvised devices are described as having poor flight characteristics with a more limited range and poor accuracy, except very close to the target:
Improvised Rocket-Assisted Munition (IRAM)of Same Type Used in 8/21 Damascus Attack:
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HRW Report Silent About State Dept. Allegation that All Attacks Launched from Regime-Controlled Territory
1) HRW Map of Targeted Damascus Neighborhoods (highlighted in Red)
One interesting aspect of the HRW report is that while the authors cite witnesses as stating that the smaller, more accurate rockets were observed to have come from the direction of Syrian military bases, the report is silent as to where the larger, deadlier improvised rockets were launched.* Nonetheless, the HRW paper specifies that the improvised devices killed far more people:
HRW states that witnesses counted some seven or eight of the smaller but more accurate 140mm rockets launched into the southwestern neighborhoods of Moadamiya near the military airfield at Mezzeh. The report states:
The other Sarin gas strikes were in a distant neighborhood identified as Zamalka, 16 kilometers to the East on the other side of Damascus. It becomes clear that these improvised rockets could not have been launched from the same site, as they simply do not have the range to reach any of the eastern targets, particularly the easternmost neighborhood of Duma that is 20 kilometers away from the Mezzah airfield and army base:
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Our analysis does not exclude the possibility that additional weapons delivery systems were used in the Eastern and Western Ghouta attacks that have not yet been identified and analyzed. However, the two analyzed by Human Rights Watch are the only known rocket systems identified as associated with the attacks, according to local activists who have closely inspected both the affected areas.
I therefore must revise my earlier assessment, and now acknowledge that in the Eastern suburbs it is entirely possible for just a handful of these larger rockets to have killed several hundreds of people by area saturation with large amounts of poison gas. Please, see, http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023576617
Something else that HRW tells us is that the large improvised rockets had to have been launched from relatively close range only a few kilometers away. Here, my earlier thinking appears to be confirmed. The State Dept. report alleges that all the rockets fired that night were from “regime-controlled territory”. However, when we look at the State Department map, below, and compare it with the HRW map, a couple things become clear. First, the area in the pink (regime-controlled) is at least six or seven miles from Duma, which the State Dept. identified as the easternmost target. Therefore, either the map or the State Department’s statement that it located the launching site for the larger rockets in western Damascus appears to be incorrect. Furthermore, HRW casts doubt on the conclusion drawn by the State Dept. that all the gas rockets were launched from inside the indicated government-controlled area. Finally, HRW was unable to confirm most of alleged target areas identified by the Kerry report, of which the State Department shows 12 (see 2nd map, at bottom of article) and the HRW could only confirm two.
2) State Department Report Map:
That brings us to the final question raised here. Why would the Syrian Army use crude, improvised munitions when as the French Report points out, it has large numbers of other types of modern chemical munitions and rockets, some of them with ranges that reach out to 75 kilometers and further with greater accuracy.
Indeed, this just reinforces persistent doubts that the Syrian Army units under the control of the Assad regime used these improvised munitions that killed most of the victims on 8/21. As Brown Moses Blog pointed out in June, these things were introduced into Syria last year and have previously been used there with conventional high explosive warheads by Hezbollah militias. Below, we see an IRAM that was previously identified by that source as having been used by a militia, not the Syrian military. One can see that it is closely related to the type, shown above, used in the Damascus gas attack. http://brown-moses.blogspot.com/2013/06/diy-weapons-in-syria-hezbollah-deploys.html
IRAM Used Inside Syria by Militia Prior to 8/21
The HRW report and other new evidence do not support the conclusion drawn that the Syrian regime controlled all the gas rockets launched that night. While video has been presented that the military has tested or had demonstrated this type of rocket, by no means is it established beyond a reasonable doubt that it was units under orders of the civilian authorities that actually carried out the attack on Zamalka using improvised rockets.
It appears, contrary to the assertions made, that a lot of people in the Mideast besides the Syrian military have cobbled together their own IRAMs and could have both the means and motive to have used them in Eastern Damascus that terrible night. Details of the HRW report raise additional questions about the accuracy of key parts of the State Department report, including the location and number of targets, and that the Syrian military, alone, had the means to carry out the 8/21 attacks.
Al-Qaeda IRAM:
Similar IRAMs have been manufactured and used by a variety of groups, including al-Qaeda, across the region as we see here:
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* Note that the Sept. 10 HRW study does not repeat initial reports from opposition activists that located the possible launch point of the rockets that struck Zamalka as the October War Museum, which is a mere 1.25 miles northwest of Zamalka, where most of the casualties occurred: "Activists in the area told him that 18 missiles, carrying what they said was a chemical agent, fired from the direction of the October War Panorama, a military museum in Damascus city, and of Mezzeh military airport, hit Zamalka, Ayn Tarma, Douma, and Moadamiya." http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/08/21/syria-witnesses-describe-alleged-chemical-attacks
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That's a lot of reading and it's late, so I'm frankly not sure what to make of all of it... but i see you've put a lot of information down here, sourced, and referenced, so here's hoping someone can break it down into bite-sized chunks my sleep-deprived brain can digest 
