Last April, in one of the Trump administration's first "diplomatic" ventures, the US fired 59 Tomahawk missiles on Syria, in stated retaliation for the latest alleged chemical attack by the Assad regime, the same "false flag" excuse which was used by the US to officially enter the conflict back in 2013 when military tensions between the US and Russia nearly resulted in a regional war.
Well, it appears that Assad is a relentless glutton for punishment, because not even a year later, the WaPo reported two weeks ago that the US is considering a new military action against Syria for - what else - retaliation against Assad's latest chemical attack, which took place several weeks earlier.
How do we know Assad (and apparently, Russia) was behind the attack? We don't: in fact, former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, in a moment of bizarre honesty, admitted that he really doesn't know much at all about "whoever conducted the attacks."
But hey: just like it is "highly likely" that Russia poisoned the former Russian double agent in the UK - with no proof yet - so it is "highly likely" that a clearly irrational Assad was once again behind an attack which he knew would provoke violent and aggressive retaliation by the US, and once again destabilize his regime.
And so we now wait for that flashing, red headline saying that US ships in the Mediterranean have launched a missile attack on Syria, just like a year ago.
Only this time Russia - which is allied with the Assad regime - is not planning to be on the defensive, and according to Russia’s Defense Ministry, "US instructors" are currently training militants to stage false flag chemical attacks in south Syria, i.e., the catalyst that will be used to justify the US attack on Assad.
The incidents, the ministry said, will be used a pretext for airstrikes on Syrian government troops and infrastructure.
“We have reliable information at our disposal that US instructors have trained a number of militant groups in the vicinity of the town of At-Tanf, to stage provocations involving chemical warfare agents in southern Syria,” Russian General Staff spokesman General Sergey Rudskoy said at a news briefing on Saturday.
According to the Russian, "early in March, the saboteur groups were deployed to the southern de-escalation zone to the city of Deraa, where the units of the so-called Free Syrian Army are stationed."
"They are preparing a series of chemical munitions explosions. This fact will be used to blame the government forces.
The components to produce chemical munitions have been already delivered to the southern de-escalation zone under the guise of humanitarian convoys of a number of NGOs."
And, using the exact same worn out narrative as last April, and every prior "chemical attack by the Assad Regime", the "planned provocations will be widely covered in the Western media and will ultimately be used as a pretext by the US-led coalition to launch strikes on Syria", Rudskoy warned.
"The provocations will be used as a pretext by the United States and its allies to launch strikes on military and government infrastructure in Syria."
Confirming the WaPo's report from early March, it now appears that an attack is imminent.
“We’re registering the signs of the preparations for the possible strikes. Strike groups of the cruise missile carriers have been formed in the east of the Mediterranean Sea, Persian Gulf and Red Sea.”
Rudskoy also warned that another false flag chemical attack is being prepared in the province of Idlib by the “Al-Nusra Front terrorist group, in coordination with the White Helmets.” The militants have already received 20 containers of chlorine to stage the incident, he said.
Moscow and Damascus have repeatedly warned about upcoming chemical provocations, and have highlighted that banned warfare agents have been used by the militants. Of course, none of that matters to the Western press which has its marching orders to expose the bloodthirsty killer Assad as an irrational despot who will use the exact same military method month after month and year after year, knowing well the response he will get from the US.
Meanwhile, just a few days ago, Syrian government forces reportedly captured a well-equipped chemical laboratory in Eastern Ghouta. Footage from the facility has been published by the SANA news agency.
The installation contained modern industrial-grade hardware of foreign origins, large amounts of chemical substances as well as crude homemade munitions ad their parts. It was unclear if the chemical lab was capable of synthesizing the novachok nerve gas used in the attempted murder of the Russian agent in the UK that has resulted in the latest diplomatic scandal involving Russia and the west.
At this critical juncture in modern history where tensions run at an all-time high between world powers that possess extensive nuclear weapons supplies, the United States and the United Kingdom would do well to re-educate themselves on the art of diplomacy.
Instead, the United Kingdom has put its foot on the throttle, openly blaming Russia for poisoning a former Russian spy and his daughter in the U.K.
Together with France, Germany and the United States, this western alliance has called on Russia to explain the military-grade novichok nerve toxin attack on Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury, England. They both remain in critical condition.
U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May was one of the first to openly blame Russia for the incident, calling it a “brazen” act and expelling 23 Russian diplomats almost immediately. She also cut off high-level contact with Moscow for the attack on U.K. soil.
U.S. President Donald Trump also came out behind the U.K., stating it “certainly looks like the Russians were behind” the incident. Apparently, Trump is happy to believe conspiracy theories regarding Russian interference as long as he is not the subject matter.
Do we know the full facts regarding what happened to Skripal? No. But the minute western governments not only claim to know what happened but also take further action to demonize the state in question, we should immediately be skeptical.
Let’s take a hypothetical scenario. Supposing someone wanted to kill Skripal but hoped to make it look like the Russian government was behind it, would it really be that hard for someone else to use the novichok nerve toxin in the commission of the killing?
Diplomacy is an art form. Right now, we don’t need world powers escalating tensions and blaming Russia for every single thing that goes wrong across the globe.
Just how powerful is Russia, exactly? We are not only supposed to believe that the former Soviet Union can elect presidents at whim in the world’s most powerful country, but that it is also openly going around trying to assassinate people on British soil using chemical weapons that would directly implicate itself as the perpetrator.
Former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan Craig Murray wrote in a blog post:
“The same people who assured you that Saddam Hussein had WMD’s now assure you Russian ‘novochok’ nerve agents are being wielded by Vladimir Putin to attack people on British soil.
As with the Iraqi WMD dossier, it is essential to comb the evidence very finely. A vital missing word from Theresa May’s statement yesterday was ‘only.’ She did not state that the nerve agent used was manufactured ONLY by Russia. She rather stated this group of nerve agents had been ‘developed by’ Russia. Antibiotics were first developed by a Scotsman, but that is not evidence that all antibiotics are today administered by Scots.”
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