Posted on 07/19/2012 4:20:07 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
It may be too early to speak of endgame in Syria, but four days of fighting in the heart of the capital, Damascus, underline what should have been obvious from the start: The Assad regime’s policy of rule by massacre has failed to crush the nationwide uprising.
More dramatically, the confusion caused by the fighting may have facilitated yesterday’s attack on the headquarters of the security services (the backbone of the regime). The attack claimed the lives of Defense Minister Gen. Daoud Rajha and Security Chief Assef Shawkat, a brother-in-law of President Bashar al-Assad.
At least a dozen other top officials, including two other generals, Hisham al-Ikhtiar and Muhammad Ibrahim al-Shi’ar, were seriously wounded. Later, the government announced that two more generals were also killed.
But who was behind the daring attack? Syrian sources offer contradictory answers.
Some claim it was an inside job — organized by the president’s younger brother, Maher al-Assad, to get rid of top figures who might have been tempted into staging a coup.
Defense Minister Rajha, a Christian, had indicated his unhappiness with Assad’s policy in a note demanding that orders to the army to fire on civilians should henceforth come in writing. And Gen. Shawkat, the brother-in-law and security chief, had been excluded from a family “kitchen cabinet” that reportedly includes the president, Maher, their mother and Bashar’s wife Asma.
Then, too, the recent defection of Gen. Manaf Tlas, a longtime friend of the president, indicated that the top brass is no longer as united as some assumed.
Syrian sources cite another reason why the attack might have been an inside job. Maher Assad had been scheduled to attend the fatal meeting, but canceled at the last moment.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Assad leaving, big deal! Send in the next lunatic Islamic terrorist dictator.
The “leadership changes” in the Middle East remind me of the change of politicians in Harlem and Chicago. The bloodletting will continue, just under different leadership.
Let's wait and see -- the 'October Surprise' might be Putin allowing Obama to look like a BIG MAN over Syria...
If Syria falls, we may learn the true fate of Alois Brunner.
I get this uneasy feeling...like it’s July 1914 again.
All these alliances. Russia, Iran, China, Syria, Turkey, NATO, Israel...etc etc.
Assad will launch chem/bio against Israel if he comes to the conclusion he is done for and has nothing to lose.
Then Israel obliterates Syria, Russia gets pissed off about it and makes some stupid move. Zero pulls some stupid stunt because he’s a moron.....where this sort of thing can lead is unknown.
In 1914 a teenager shot the Archduke Ferdinand and his Wife Sophie and because of all the blustering autocratic fools who were heads of state it became a worldwide conflagration.
(And those rulers were all cousins, nephews..etc)
This situation seems even more likely to lead to disaster.
When I was young many of us didn't understand immoral ruthless dictators - but now - in light of places like Chicago and Detroit we understand... Every liberal city is becoming a hellhole.
As Assad regime teeters on collapse, the world braces for the worst
Fairly guaranteed at this point that a regional war will occur followed by a possible world war. We are still being led by basically the same idiots who brought us WW I and WW II. They actually think that Assad will not use his Chemical WMD because the world will be horrified at his use of them. Did Hitler care what Chamberlain thought of him after he invaded France ? Russia and China will not stop backing Assad if he used Chemical WMD. In fact, they will support him even more. That is how World Wars start. The only way to stop it now is to have every one stop and back up a lot. That cannot happen now because the Arab uprising in Syria has been taken over by Jihadists. Just as it was in Libya and Egypt.
The King of Jordan knows its coming.
As Assad regime teeters on collapse, the world braces for the worst
“It’s getting very, very messy,” Jordan’s King Abdullah warned hours after an assassination strike Wednesday ripped through a meeting of Mr. al-Assad’s inner circle at a war cabinet meeting.
“There is no coming back from the abyss,” warned the Jordanian leader, who, like all of the region’s unelected rulers is also grappling with the sweeping changes of the Arab Spring. But Syria, with its delicate mix of Arab and Kurd, Christian and Druze, Alawite and Sunni, poses perhaps the Arab world’s most volatile and dangerous mix.
“If it breaks down, if civil order breaks down to the point of no return, then it’ll take years to fix Syria,” King Abdullah warned.
As that collapse of the Assad regime suddenly seemed an imminent possibility, senior Obama administration officials, including military planners, were scrambling to work up contingency plans for worst-case scenarios.
A collapse into the fires of war may result in a better place afterward. For the survivors and their progeny, at any rate.
It’s a big deal to Obama. Assad is Shia (like Obama) and that’s why Obama has kept his hands off as much as possible. Obama hates Sunnis and will not be happy if they take over in Syria.
Obama coddles: Iran, Al Sadr, Hezbollah (all are Shia).
Obama kills or helps kill Sunni: Saddam’s ruling Sunni group, Gaddafi, Osama Bin Laden, drone attacks on Sunnni Taliban and Sunni Al Qaeda.
Rome and the Mongols managed to make it work, but the way they did it was to kill EVERYBODY in the troublesome area, and then recolonize with more manageable people. Iran, in partnership with Assad, could do it by moving a few million of their people in, and drive the Sunnis out completely.
That was my first thought!!!
He could still be alive...he’d be 100.
The NY Post’s title is ludicrous. Assad isn’t ruling by massacre. Tiananmen Square was rule by massacre - thousands of dead in a single day. The casualty rates coming out of Syria, about 10K dead over 16 months, are lower than the average annual stats coming out of Iraq, which peaked at around 30K per year in 2006/2007. I understand that Sunnis outnumber Alawites 200 to 1 as far as the world population count goes, and are extremely well-represented in the press corps but this level of bias is ludicrous.
How bad do you think this is going to get?
According to the New York Times, Pentagon officials were huddling with Israeli commanders to consider the merits of air strikes to destroy Syria’s aresenal of chemical weapons.
Aside from grave risk that any outside air attack could ignite a full-blown regional war, there is considerable danger of setting off an uncontrolled release of deadly chemical weapons attempting to destroy stockpiles by bombing.
Scary - and interesting link - thanks for sharing.
Of course massacres work. Assad hasn’t killed enough of the rebels to make them notice. Time to employ chemical weapons.
The King of Jordan knows the situation better then anyone here in the states. And he refers to it as falling into the abyss. That is the educated guess at this point. What does the abyss mean ?
Assad firing Chemical WMD on the insurgents. Al Qeada gets it hands on chemical and biological WMD. Assad gives chemical and biological warheads to Hezbollah. Who just recently said they have a new surprise for Israel. A few terrorist chemical WMD attacks occur in the region. Turkey and Jordan start to invade to secure the WMD. Syria fires scuds with Chemical WMD's into Turkish Cities and Jordanian Cities. The Israelis coming under terrorist WMD attacks. Israel declares all out war. Russian citizens getting killed in Syria. Russia enters the cluster puck followed by China. At that point, its time to find a nice cave.
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