Military to Military Seymour M. Hersh on US intelligence sharing in the Syrian war

London Review of Books ^ | December 21, 2015 | Seymour Hersh

[JPX2011]

Barack Obamas repeated insistence that Bashar al-Assad must leave office and that there are moderate rebel groups in Syria capable of defeating him has in recent years provoked quiet dissent, and even overt opposition, among some of the most senior officers on the Pentagons Joint Staff. Their criticism has focused on what they see as the administrations fixation on Assads primary ally, Vladimir Putin. In their view, Obama is captive to Cold War thinking about Russia and China, and hasnt adjusted his stance on Syria to the fact both countries share Washingtons anxiety about the spread of terrorism in and beyond Syria; like Washington, they believe that Islamic State must be stopped.

[JPX2011]

Long preview of upcoming article by Hersh. Saying a lot of the things we've been saying here. A good primer on US moves in Syria.

P.S.: Punctuation removed from excerpt for legibility.

[HarleyLady27]

I just read this article from another site, very good article and glad you posted it....

[House Atreides]

“... Obama is captive to Cold War thinking about Russia and China...”
******************************************************************************
I think it’s more that he is captive to his Muslim & leftist upbringing that instilled certain attitudes in his psyche.

[Liberty Valance]

bttt

[faithhopecharity]

Bottom line: Obama is still doing everything he can to topple the Syrian government so that his ISIS/AlQuaida/Hezbellah IslamoNazis can take over the country (just like he did in Libya, and in Egypt before the Egyptian people somehow overthrew Obama’s MB comrades, and just like he’s trying to do in Yemen, Iraq, Somalia, AFghanistan, and probably more places

(meanwhile, he and his nefarious backers are invading Europe and USA and now Canada with Islamonazi ‘immigrants’ — expect more and more terrorist attacks in the streets of your town soon)

[Gen.Blather]

Another Freeper sent me this for the hash fix.

Something I got from another FReeper (unfortunately, I can’t remember who) that will help you remove the “weird trash” from anything you want to post - it has worked very well for me thus far:

http://dan.hersam.com/tools/smart-quotes.html

I leave this link on my toolbar so I can get to it with one ‘click’.
Copy what you want to post ... article, even what another FReeper has posted that you want to reference in your post.
Paste it into the top box at the website.
Click on “convert” underneath the box.
Your material will appear, highlighted, in the box below.
Since it’s already highlighted for you, just ‘copy’ it and then paste into the FR posting screen.
‘Preview’ the FR post & make sure the “weird stuff”/trash is gone.

Hope this is helpful! ~Q

[MarvinStinson]

Is there no one left on Free Republic who knows who Seymour Hersh is?

[PIF]

If it is totalitarian, Obama’s is all over it.

[PIF]

Obama WAS doing everything he could. Putin has successfully quashed O’s moves it that direction. Witness O pulled our F-15’s out of Turkey as Russia has established a 500 mile radius no-fly zone from Latakia and those planes very well could have been shot down.

[PIF]

Money quote:
... by the summer of 2013... A former senior adviser to the Joint Chiefs told me that the document was an 'all-source' appraisal, drawing on information from signals, satellite and human intelligence, and took a dim view of the Obama administration's insistence on continuing to finance and arm the so-called moderate rebel groups. By then, the CIA had been conspiring for more than a year with allies in the UK, Saudi Arabia and Qatar to ship guns and goods - to be used for the overthrow of Assad - from Libya, via Turkey, into Syria. The new intelligence estimate singled out Turkey as a major impediment to Obama's Syria policy. The document showed, the adviser said, 'that what was started as a covert US programme to arm and support the moderate rebels fighting Assad had been co-opted by Turkey, and had morphed into an across-the-board technical, arms and logistical programme for all of the opposition, including Jabhat al-Nusra and Islamic State. The so-called moderates had evaporated and the Free Syrian Army was a rump group stationed at an airbase in Turkey.' The assessment was bleak: there was no viable 'moderate' opposition to Assad, and the US was arming extremists."

Hillary? Are you there?

[SunkenCiv]

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