SYRIA thread

[Sarmatian]

So the Syrian government would never make poison gas, but the Chinese, Iraqi and Turkish governments, they all would, and then they'd sell it to terrorists?

Iraqi government would have little reason to sell the gas to terrorists, but the Iraqi government isn't in control of the whole of Iraq, or all of its military and other facilities.
Elements from Turkey which may or may not be connected to Turkish government have already proved to be capable of doing business with the terrorists, like buying and reselling their oil, providing them with supplies etc...

On the other hand, it seems the majority of attacks, the vast majority, have been directed at non-government forces.

1) majority of the attacks were against civilians
2) even if it was used against non government forces, that doesn't immediately spell that government forces did it. There are dozens of armed factions in the region, and they generally don't like each other.

There are no records of confirmed Sarin attacks by rebels since 2013 which is consistent with looting supply dumps in the initial madness of the war. Since 2013 most attacks have been with Chlorine.

Ok. No disagreements but I don't see how is that relevant for your argument.

I suspect that the identification of Sarin in this case has a lot to do the reports immediately after the attack which mention nothing of odour.

Actually, MSF doctors who treated the patients mentioned the smell of bleach. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...-a7669011.html.

So, chlorine was most definitely used - there's no way of confusing chlorine with sarin as sarin is odorless.

Symptoms some of the patients had were consistent with a gas like sarin, and in fact MSF is suspecting that people were exposed to at least two different agents, which may give credence to the Russian story, that a bomb hit a workshop/storage.

In any case, there's no reason to believe it's not the regime.

I wouldn't be so sure. The last, and arguably most important piece of the puzzle is qui bono, as Frags mentioned.

Assad already agreed to surrender and destroy everything Syria had, and according to the OCPW the government of Syria was always fully cooperative (their Fact Finding Teams had more issues with rebels).
He did that because he was very aware of the potential consequences. To think that he was willing to destroy everything he had in storage and all production facilities and keep a minute amount hidden somewhere so that he could drop it out of spite, and invite western outrage all over again because...

... he is just that crazy?

The west was losing interest in the conflict and the new American president actually had some nice words (in between bad words) about his regime, so he got bored and decided it was more fun when western countries were actively considering military solution? He decided it was too easy, now that he controls most of Aleppo?

I'm having troubles believing Damascus ordered or even consented to this. A rogue commander is a possibility, though.

It's also worth noting the Syrian Air Force continues to bomb the town - suggesting there's a reason they targeted it with gas, possible a high-value target has gone to ground there.

It is also perfectly consistent with the story that they were bombing the area to defeat the rebels and they continue to bomb it because they still haven't done it, like with hundreds of other areas in Syria.