'Toontime: More Fog of War

[credit: John Darkow, Columbia Daily Tribune]

Wackdoodle sez:  Count yur toes, Barry!

The latest slip on the slippery slope that is the Syrian civil war is Russia's announcement that its UN-approved chemical munitions experts concluded the rebels used sarin gas on more than one occasion in the Syrian conflict. Their eighty page technical report said a tell-tale indication the nerve agent was not regular munitions was the "cottage industry" casings seen before in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The report was submitted to the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and a copy given to the United States. Russian experts had direct access to the Aleppo suburb where sarin was allegedly used. The Assad regime refused entry to U.N investigators after French journalists reported that Damascus used chemical weapons at Khan al-Assal and elsewhere. The attack at Khan al-Assa killed 26 people and injured 86 others.

A sarin gas without chemical stabilizers was found embedded in an unguided Basha'ir 3 rocket by Russian investigators invited by Syrian dictator Bashar Assad. Stabilizers are used in industrial manufacture to allow stockpiling. Basha'ir rocket manufacture began in February by a group affiliated with the rebel Free Syrian Army. The United States responded to the Russian technical study by saying it would examine the report, but a White House spokesperson said later it would not alter its assertion that the Assad regime crossed the "red line" by using chemical weapons. This assertion is the basis of the Current Occupant's decision to provide direct military aid to rebel forces. Al-Qaeda affiliated groups such the Al-Nursra Front are fighting in the Syrian resistance. MI-6, the British intelligence agency, said the "consequences could be catastrophic" if terrorists accessed chemical weapons. According to The Hill Congress members have moved to block funding of rebel groups in Syria by the United States for fear of inadvertently arming terrorist groups that could attack the US or its allies with weapons of mass destruction.

[credit: Steve Breen, San Diego Union-Tribune]
Wackydoodle axes: Can y'all read the last line?