Quote Originally Posted by Elmetiacos View Post
Physics being that all the Sarin in Syria so far discovered has been binary - two chemical mixtures ("precursors") stored separately which could not combine to form Sarin because a bomb drops on a warehouse. Unless we suppose that Tahrir as-Sham has an advanced chemical research facility which found a way to purify the prescursors and incorporate a stabiliser (something only one US laboratory successfully did prior to the ban on chemical weapons) nobody would have just "tanks full of sarin" sitting around. Of course, it's possible the rebels deliberately released poison gas coinciding with a government/Russian airstrike in false flag operation, but nobody has so far been sufficiently tinfoil hatted as to suggest this.
Right, this leaves us two or three possibilities.

1. Government Sarin Attack

2. Rebel Sarin (relatively) recently mixed but not yet deployed.

3. Rebel Sarin where the two chemical compounds were stored next to each other, both containers were ruptured and they mixed inside a fireball.

I'm not even sure if the last is actually possible, but of the other two the government explanation is the simplest the the government is at least as likely to use Sarin as the Rebels. Application of Ockham's Razor indicates that a government bomb is the most likely explanation.

Quote Originally Posted by Showtime View Post
Why? If you are referring to the US letting off pressure recently, I don't think Assad ever looked past the possibility that they can reverse it at any time. I am not seeing any sane reason in this thread about why this pencilneck would do something so counterproductive.

Though even with the rogue commander theory, employing chemical weapons at this level must have required some sort of set military procedure and orders.

Who knows.
One possible explanation is that Russia funnels the Sarin back to Assad from what were his own stockpiles. It's apparent Assad places no inherent value on human life, something I believe he shares with Putin.

If that is how they think, as I believe they do, then the calculation here is how far he can push the use of Sarin etc. before Western Powers (the US) intervene. Obama has mostly let Assad do what he wanted for thee past three years and when Trump took office he seemed inclined to work with Assad. So, it may be that the Syrian Dictator simply miss-calculated.