White House claims on Syria chemical attack ‘obviously false’ – MIT professor
Posted on April 12th, 2017
Courtesy RT
On Tuesday, the White House released a declassified intelligence brief accusing Syrian President Bashar Assad of ordering and organizing the attack, in which Syrian planes allegedly dropped chemical ordnance on civilians in the rebel-held town.
The report contains absolutely no evidence that this attack was the result of a munition being dropped from an aircraft,” wrote Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Professor Theodore Postol, who reviewed it and put together a 14-page assessment, which he provided to RT on Wednesday.
I believe it can be shown, without doubt, that the document does not provide any evidence whatsoever that the US government has concrete knowledge that the government of Syria was the source of the chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun,” wrote Postol.
A chemical attack with a nerve agent did occur, he said, but the available evidence does not support the US government’s conclusions.
I have only had a few hours to quickly review the alleged White House intelligence report. But a quick perusal shows without a lot of analysis that this report cannot be correct,” Postol wrote.
It is very clear who planned this attack, who authorized this attack and who conducted this attack itself,” Defense Secretary James Mattis told reporters at the Pentagon on Tuesday.
Earlier in the day, White House spokesman Sean Spicer also said that doubting the evidence would be doubting the entire international reporting crew documenting this.”
The report offered by the White House, however, cited a wide body of open-source material” and social media accounts” from the rebel-held area, including footage provided by the White Helmets rescue group documented to have ties with jihadist rebels, Western and Gulf Arab governments.
Postol was not convinced by such evidence.
Any competent analyst would have had questions about whether the debris in the crater was staged or real,” he wrote. No competent analyst would miss the fact that the alleged sarin canister was forcefully crushed from above, rather than exploded by a munition within it.”
Instead, the most plausible conclusion is that the sarin was dispensed by an improvised dispersal device made from a 122mm section of rocket tube filled with sarin and capped on both sides.”
We again have a situation where the White House has issued an obviously false, misleading and amateurish intelligence report,” he concluded, recalling the 2013 situation when the Obama administration claimed Assad had used chemical weapons against the rebels in Ghouta, near Damascus.
What the country is now being told by the White House cannot be true,” Postol wrote, and the fact that this information has been provided in this format raises the most serious questions about the handling of our national security.”
On Tuesday, Russian General Staff spokesman Colonel-General Sergey Rudskoy questioned the authenticity” of media reports concerning the attack. He said that using social media to reconstruct the course of events raised serious doubts” not only among the Russian military but also among many respected experts and organizations.”
Rudskoy noted that, under the 2013 agreement to give up its chemical weapons, the Syrian government destroyed its stockpiles at 10 sites that were under its control. This was verified by the Organization for Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). However, the remaining two facilities were in territory controlled by the rebels, he said, and it remains unclear what happened to the chemicals stored there.
April 12th, 2017 at 4:13 pm
There you go!
It gets WORSE. USA and KSA are behind this CHEMICAL ATTACK TOO. Remember USA-KSA backed TERRORISTS (called REBELS) launched a chemical attack in 2013? This is part 2.
These are from NATO chemical weapons arsenal in TURKEY!!
Putin should make ROAST CHICKEN out of the BALD EAGLE and TURKEY – 2 birds of a feather – sponsoring terrorism around the world.
April 12th, 2017 at 4:13 pm
Thank you for publishing RT and LW.
People should know these RED HERRING operations.
April 12th, 2017 at 5:56 pm
The BOTTOM LINE is that the Syrian Govt would have to be both STUPID & CRAZY to launch a Chemical attack when it is clearly winning the war.
There is NO WAY that the Syrian Govt can PROFIT from such an act.
The only people who PROFIT from it are the US supported Syrian Rebels who are DESPERATE to drag MORE US GOVT forces into the war, and get NO-FLY ZONES declared to make themselves immune to Air Attacks from the Syrian and Russian aircraft.
It is as SIMPLE AS THAT. This is CLEARLY A FABRICATED EVENT to create a PRETEXT for US and UN intervention, and to defame and OUST Assad.
As PUTIN has already said, expect more of this type of FABRICATED events.
Remember, this is very similar to what the Tamil Diaspora and the LTTE did in the past, and are doing even now, to convert defeated murderous terrorists into VICTORIOUS wailing victims!
April 12th, 2017 at 6:22 pm
[Quote] Remember, this is very similar to what the Tamil Diaspora and the LTTE did in the past, and are doing even now, to convert defeated murderous terrorists into VICTORIOUS wailing victims! [Unquote]
This is a good observation.
Looks like Tamil terrorists have created another terror template other terrorist groups follow. Interestingly, LTTE is the first terrorist group to kill a national leader (2 to be precise) and got away. Same LTTE tactics were used to kill the former Libyan leader by ISIS terrorists. Now they are after Assad.
Another point in Ananda’s observation is the Diaspora funding of terrorism elsewhere. This too was the invention of Tamils. It has tremendous implications for Europe home to millions strong Arabic Diaspora.
Yet another similarity is the manipulation of the UN system to save terrorists.
Terrorism experts should study the proliferation of Tamil terrorist tactics around the world. Terrorism has become another branch of the military of many powerful countries.
April 13th, 2017 at 5:26 am
This shows how desperate the Western leaders and their backers (War industry) have become. When I hear US and British intelligence, I know they are upto something really bad.
What did they do to Iraq and Libya is enough. As per CNN Trump has become the presidential, how sad – when you act thuggishly you become a hero to fake media. Not getting UN Security Council approval will qualify Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Terrorists have more rights than the ordinary folk trying to live a decent life.
April 13th, 2017 at 8:07 am
Trump is a fraud,warmonger ,lier,deceiver and war criminal. He is worse than Obama.And Obama was very bad. Putin is right. The US-Russia relationship has degraded further than under Obama.
Trump is owned by the Isreali-Jewish lobby in the United States. The Isreali-Jewish lobby wants war in the middle east for Isreal.
April 13th, 2017 at 8:18 am
Ananda-USA Yep very true.
Kumari: Yes the nefarious human rights organisation white helmets was involved. Guess where they have their HQ yes in Britain. So the white helmets is British Intelligence front, probably colluded with the Isreali mossad and CIA and staged this event to blame assad in order put together a western military intervention to help the terrorists just as the Russians and Syrians are winning the war against the Terrorists.
Sounds familiar? Remember when the Sri Lankan army was winning against the LTTE. All sorts of crazy stuff was being orchestrated by the west to blame Mahinda Rajapaksha and the advance of the Sri Lankan army. The west even threatened military intervention but Mahinda Rajapaksha wouldn’t budge and told the govt representatives from UK,US and France to get lost!
Russians under Putin and Syria under Assad shouldn’t give up until all terrorists are defeated and the war won in Syria just like Mahinda Rajapaksha and the Sri Lankan army managed to do in Sri Lanka in 2009.
These western terrorists US,UK should realise they can’t stage blatant acts like this and expect to get away with it!
April 13th, 2017 at 8:27 am
“Terrorists have more rights than the ordinary folk trying to live a decent life.”
Kumari very true thats because the terrorists are supported by nations like US and Britain who are themselves terrorist nations who inflict state sponsored terrorism on the rest of the world. Classic case is Britain supporting and allowing fund raising for the LTTE terrorists to create mayhem in Sri lanka. Even allowing them to have a functioning head office in London. So are we surprised when they behave like this against Putin and Assad.