Opposition says up to 1,300 killed in‘chemical weapons attacks by Assad forces´ on Damascus..

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/syrias-darkest-day-opposition-says-up-to-1300-killed-inchemical-weapons-attacks-by-assad-forces-on-damascus-8777527.html

.

The Syrian government has denied the allegations, describing them as "illogical and fabricated". The Syrian army said the opposition made up the claims to divert attention from the huge losses its forces had suffered recently...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-23790335

..

.

 Hundreds of people are believed to have been killed in an apparent gas attack on rebel-held parts of eastern Damascus that is thought to be the most significant use of chemical weapons since thousands of Kurds were gassed by Saddam Hussein in Halabja 25 years ago.

..

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/21/syria-conflcit-chemical-weapons-hundreds-killed

..

Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said, displaying little doubt as to their authenticity. He added that the Turkish intelligence had provided officials with some additional videos of the attack, and urged the international community to react...

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/syria-chemical-attack-images-intolerable-fm-davutoglu-says-urging-international-action.aspx?pageID=238&nID=52950&NewsCatID=338

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Though we are not sure who is the blame at this moment but this is a crime against humanity, a crime committed against all of us ..

http://www.aljazeera.com/video/2013823181349586368.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-23822440

The Pentagon is moving forces closer to Syria as the US weighs its options in the conflict there, Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel has suggested...

=================

I think this is the dilemma we keep facing: We dont like USA interfering with other countries internal affairs. That is fine. But what about if some countries are ruled by a dictator who is not afraid of killing his own people to stay in power? I think in the end, the world might end up with a rapid force given to UN or something similar to use in these type of situations.

"

Nearly 50 years before the war in Iraq, Britain and America sought a secretive “regime change” in another Arab country they accused of spreading terror and threatening the west’s oil supplies, by planning the invasion of Syria and the assassination of leading figures. Newly discovered documents show how in 1957 Harold Macmillan and President Dwight Eisenhower approved a CIA-MI6 plan to stage fake border incidents as an excuse for an invasion by Syria’s pro-western neighbours, and then to “eliminate” the most influential triumvirate in Damascus.

The plans, frighteningly frank in their discussion, were discovered in the private papers of Duncan Sandys, Mr Macmillan’s defence secretary, by Matthew Jones, a reader in international history at Royal Holloway, University of London.

Although historians know that intelligence services had sought to topple the Syrian regime in the autumn of 1957, this is the first time any document has been found showing that the assassination of three leading figures was at the heart of the scheme. In the document drawn up by a top secret and high-level working group that met in Washington in September 1957, Mr Macmillan and President Eisenhower were left in no doubt about the need to assassinate the top men in Damascus.

Part of the “preferred plan” reads: “In order to facilitate the action of liberative forces, reduce the capabilities of the Syrian regime to organise and direct its military actions, to hold losses and destruction to a minimum, and to bring about desired results in the shortest possible time, a special effort should be made to eliminate certain key individuals. Their removal should be accomplished early in the course of the uprising and intervention and in the light of circumstances existing at the time.”

The document, approved by London and Washington, named three men: Abd al-Hamid Sarraj, head of Syrian military intelligence; Afif al-Bizri, chief of the Syrian general staff; and Khalid Bakdash, leader of the Syrian Communist party.

For a prime minister who had largely come to power on the back of Anthony Eden’s disastrous antics in Suez just a year before, Mr Macmillan was remarkably bellicose. He described it in his diary as “a most formidable report”. Secrecy was so great, Mr Macmillan ordered the plan withheld even from British chiefs of staff, because of their tendency “to chatter”.

Concern about the increasingly anti-western and pro-Soviet sympathies of Syria had been growing in Downing Street and the White House since the overthrow of the conservative military regime of Colonel Adib Shishakli by an alliance of Ba’ath party and Communist party politicians and their allies in the Syrian army, in 1954.

Driving the call for action was the CIA’s Middle East chief Kermit Roosevelt, grandson of former president Theodore Roosevelt. He identified Colonel Sarraj, General al-Bizri and Mr Bakdash as the real power behind a figurehead president. The triumvirate had moved even closer to Nikita Khrushchev’s orbit after the previous year’s disastrous attempt by Britain and France, in collusion with Israel, to reverse the nationalisation of the Suez canal.

By 1957, despite America’s opposition to the Suez move, President Eisenhower felt he could no longer ignore the danger of Syria becoming a centre for Moscow to spread communism throughout the Middle East. He and Mr Macmillan feared Syria would destabilise pro-western neighbours by exporting terrorism and encouraging internal dissent. More importantly, Syria also had control of one of the main oil arteries of the Middle East, the pipeline which connected pro-western Iraq’s oilfields to Turkey.

The “preferred plan”adds: “Once a political decision is reached to proceed with internal disturbances in Syria, CIA is prepared, and SIS [MI6] will attempt, to mount minor sabotage and coup de main incidents within Syria, working through contacts with individuals.

“The two services should consult, as appropriate, to avoid any overlapping or interference with each other’s activities… Incidents should not be concentrated in Damascus; the operation should not be overdone; and to the extent possible care should be taken to avoid causing key leaders of the Syrian regime to take additional personal protection measures.”

Sabotage

The report said that once the necessary degree of fear had been created, frontier incidents and border clashes would be staged to provide a pretext for Iraqi and Jordanian military intervention. Syria had to be “made to appear as the sponsor of plots, sabotage and violence directed against neighbouring governments,” the report says. “CIA and SIS should use their capabilities in both the psychological and action fields to augment tension.” That meant operations in Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon, taking the form of “sabotage, national conspiracies and various strong-arm activities” to be blamed on Damascus.

The plan called for funding of a “Free Syria Committee”, and the arming of “political factions with paramilitary or other actionist capabilities” within Syria. The CIA and MI6 would instigate internal uprisings, for instance by the Druze in the south, help to free political prisoners held in the Mezze prison, and stir up the Muslim Brotherhood in Damascus.

The planners envisaged replacing the Ba’ath/Communist regime with one that was firmly anti-Soviet, but they conceded that this would not be popular and “would probably need to rely first upon repressive measures and arbitrary exercise of power”.

The plan was never used, chiefly because Syria’s Arab neighbours could not be persuaded to take action and an attack from Turkey alone was thought to be unacceptable. The following year, the Ba’athists moved against their Communist former allies and took Syria into a federation with Gen Nasser’s Egypt, which lasted until 1963."

Syria: Cameron and Obama threaten ´serious response´

..

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23830590

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It looks like if they can prove the latest chemical attack was from Essad, USA and UK  will retailate.

But it is still not proved that it was the government. There are websites and people, they keep telling it is the opposition to trigger a western response..

hey lets stop the killing of people by killing even more people! even if assad burned every single city with napalm he cant kill as much as a western invasion would

Syria chemical attack undeniable, says John Kerry

US Secretary of State John Kerry has condemned what he termed the "moral obscenity" of the Syrian government´s use of chemical weapons against its own people...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-23844643

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-23844652

http://haber.gazetevatan.com/rusyadan-flas-suriye-karari/564554/1/gundem (Turkish..-Russian Minister says that ´Russia has no intention to go war with anybody even there is a military intervention in Syria´

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I think an attack might be on its way..

Can I ask, what would you do? What do you think would be the best move? Sit and wait until all Syrians die? Let´s leave it on to them? Turn a blind eye while thousands of innocent children are being killed and millions forced to leave the country? 

You may remember at the very beginning, when it all has started. Civilians and the rebels were crying out for help from the west/UN. Why from them? Simply because these countries are in a position to provide help. Sadly, Russia and China kept vetoing all resolution. And now the conflict has just become so complicated that a western military intervention may not be sufficient to do any good. (I´m talking about western military intervention, not western invasion. By which I mean a similar military operation that was launched in Libya. No doubt, western military forces are not welcome in the region. We all know about Iraq. And also, how would they sell this idea at home? Thousands of soldiers died in a war that was not justified whatsoever, the wounds are so fresh, who wants more of that? For these reasons I doubt that an invasion would come up as a possible military action.)

I believe, Russia and China should have been disregarded long ago, and a military intervention should have been carried out long ago. And I completely understand the reasons why the western countries were not rushing for such move - see my thoughts above. Though it looks like their hesitation made the situation worse.

In Syria, by now both sides have become so desperate. It looks like Assad´s goal is to eliminate the opponents at any price. No matter what the tool is, no matter that these are their own people, just kill them all. Let me ask you, if they won this battle, what do you think, how would affect that your country? How would affect that the relationship between Turkey and Syria? Or Turkey and Iran perhaps?

Looking at the other side, perhaps a quick military intervention would have prevented that thousands of jihadists, al-qaeda guys and all that sort of extremists joined to the Syrian rebels. Obviously the rebels have taken anyone who were willing to fight on their side, but it looks like they sort of lost the control on these groups. So who could predict now what would be next if Assad was defeated? Perhaps the rebels would come on power with extremists hand in hand? You see, what could have been prevented, seems to be on its way. 

Not to mention that in the surrounding countries, particularly in Lebanon, this whole strife is not only looked at as an internal conflict, but as a sectarian fight as well. Where it all will end?

I believe it is past time that intervention is needed. My fear is that with or without intervention the result (will there be any resolution?) of this conflict will be far from satisfactory to the region. And to west too.

the solution is to stop fueling terrorism in foreign countries. read my previous post

In the spirit of democracy, I think that the last word is for the Syrians to decide. It is no other country´s business to call the shots for Syria, Tunisia, Egypt, etc. If Syrians want Assad, which in polls he has proven to have had a 75% majority, then Assad should stay. If they want him out, then out he should go. However, you cannot decide to "revolutionize" an entire country over a small percentage of opposition (that is if the Assad opposition is a small number). In the united states, the presidential elections are always a hair away usually standing right between that 48%-51% margin yet you do not see them throwing around revolutions. Anyway my point is that LET THE CITIZENS DECIDE AND LISTEN TO BOTH SIDES.

Adana Emniyet Müdürlüğü´nün, Reyhanlı katliamının ardından başlattığı El Kaide ve bu örgütle irtibatlı El Nusra Cephesi´ne yönelik operasyonda gözaltına alınan zanlılara ait adreslerde 2 kilogram da sarin gazı ele geçirildi.

30/05/2013

http://www.radikal.com.tr/turkiye/adanada_el_nusra_operasyonu_2_kilo_sarin_gazi_bulundu-1135579

Of course it should be Syrians to decide. But I would not trust the polls. They can be very fake. Saddam had 101% of votes for example. do you know any real elections in Syria? The answer is there was not and Essad is a pretty much, sheer dictator who does not afraid of killing his own people. His father killed thousands in 1982 in Hama (around 40.00. He will go one way or another.

But there is another side of this coin. What if the ruler is quite ruthless and having serious weapons including chemical ones? (Kaddafi was a great example in this respect as he gabbed the money from oil and hired all those marcenaries from African countries and was able to kill his own people in order to stay in power). What if the ruler is determined to kill all his opposition in order to stay in power? what if the ruler dont hesitate to use chemical weapons? Do you think the entire world should stay and watch? Watch to see all those childeren/civilians getting killed?

I think there should a rapid force give to the UN to use about this type of incidents.

what if thats the story that we are all made to believe? what if worse things are happening in other countries in the world, what if larger countries have larger innocent body counts in their lateest histories, and nothing is being done about it? what if nothing is being done about other horible terrible stiuations all over the world, but only certain targeted countries are being screwed? for some reason all these dictators and horrible terrible people are being oppressed in such a certain way that it will always benefit usa and britian.

http://screechingkettle.blogspot.com/2011/10/putting-todays-wars-in-perspective.html

i mean during the iraq war most of us were like "oo saddam the horrible terrible petty dictator! he fucked everyone up! he has chemical weapons as well!" but what happaned? did saddam get assassinated? in the end 1.5 million people died so that they could be "free of saddam dicatatorship". well they got freed alright. he didnt even have chemical weapons. is it so hard to see that this story is looping over and over in the countries that were list-targeted after 9/11?

UN inspectors leave Syria as US weighs ´limited act´

..

The departure of the UN experts has heightened expectations of a possible international military strike against government forces.

UN officials say it may take weeks to analyse the samples gathered and to present conclusions, and UN spokesperson Martin Nesirky said that the inspectors would return to the country to investigate several other alleged chemical weapons attacks that have taken place during the country´s two-and-a-half year uprising against President Bashar al-Assad.

..

"We cannot accept a world where women and children and innocent civilians are gassed on a terrible scale.
 
"The world has an obligation to make sure that we maintain the norm against the use of chemical weapons."

..

 But it´s been clear all along that American planning has been based on its own independent intelligence.

..

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-23908808

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2013/08/201383022471103335.html

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It looks like USA and France are ready to attack without a decision from the UN. That is somehow always be critical and questionable by the world.

I don t think anybody wants any war anywhere in the world.

But saying that ´I dont war any war´ and being passive, or saying that I am impartial is not the answer. Because that behaviour tends to make ruthless oppressive regimes being more oppressive and freely  killing of their own people(We all saw it with Saddam, Darfur, Rwanda and Srebrenitsa) 

I dont think there is an easy answer unfortunately..

Trust threatened oppressed  innocent civil people to the care of Dutch Army.

R.I.P  !

Syria crisis: UN says more than 2m have fled

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-23937972

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This is the result of a dictator clinging to power

Do you honestly think that  what you do - posting on TC  actually made a difference to the last 10 people who just died in Syria. The UN and USA  are watching TC for all your bright ideas. Tell you what , if you really want to make a difference and be active . I will personally pay for your plane ticket to Syria and you can shout your  ideas from the street. Have a nice day

It is quite an unnecessary comment. Amazingly futile...

hes not posting to stop the war lol. otherwise i would post all day. he is posting to tell us his opinion or news. not to make a difference to that 10 people but to try to explain why 10 people died.

oh I know he is only telling his opinion as he did when abla she  the poster picture, he went into a rant about how that was not active enough as far as he is concerned. So I leave the offer open to him.If he is so passionate about  all these world problems that he seems to be involved with, can be corrected. I give him a one way ticket to syria for him to enjoy.

Kelowna,

I don´t know what has caused you to be so bitter, I wish I could sweeten your world, but I doubt it would be welcomed. 

While I don´t always (in fact most of the time) agree with Mr. H, I do respect his right to have an opinion and to post his ideas. He obviously takes time and effort to put the words together and he does think about things.

sure you can sweeten my world by contributing as much as you can to the syrian refugees. They are living in horrible conditions. The children who have been orphaned or seek medical care/ basic needs and food. Start  something in your neighborhood,facebook or your work find ways to contribute to their ability to start to recover from this terrible act of crime. It would be much better to do this than chant on tc about who knows what , who disagrees with who, considering you will help many... I suggest you be active and do something positive. I have and will continue to try and help them and others in their plight of getting basic needs met.

I just want to mention these kids are not political they just want their mom´s dad´s and a place to live with food in their bellies.......

The children of Syria have been killed, maimed and orphaned. Those still alive are struggling to survive. Clean water is running out. Diarrhoea and disease are on the rise.

We need your help to reach desperate children and their families with critical, life-saving essentials. Give these families the chance to survive.

Syrian Children in Crisis

Children caught in fighting in Syria are being killed, maimed, and denied access to food and medicine as the number of child refugees fleeing the civil war tops one million.

In all fairness, we don´t know what thehandsome is or isn´t doing in his private life.  The fact of the matter is, we don´t know what anyone on this site is like in their real life.

Humanity in general needs committed people to speak for those who have no voice - and not just in Syria.  There is suffering in almost every corner of every country on Earth.  So, I do agree that if you can help in some way, DO IT in a meaningful and productive way.  Words are not helpful but they can and do motivate people to do extraordinary things. 

i see

There is nothing to see in there. I promise  for that

Thank you Alameda.

At least you have an opinion and you are not afraid to put it in writing with straight words.  I respect that.

I piss further than all of you.

Well, it seems you dont have an opinion but that does not stop you from posting. That is something to praise. Lol  

Syria chemical attack: Key UN findings

...

So in summary the UN inspectors conclude that chemical weapons were used on a relatively large scale. There has been a whole series of earlier incidents where their use was alleged but these have not been investigated in this kind of detail.
..........

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-24130181

http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/syria_cw0913_web_1.pdf (caution: disturbing images)

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I think it will take a few more attacks of this kind to change the preception of this war in the west.

 Why do you  want the west to be the one???? To be the one to change their perception. What about Turkey? They are close to this and huge army too.

"A vitally important and thoroughly documented new report on the impact of Obama´s drone campaign has just been released by researchers at NYU School of Law and Stanford University Law School. Entitled "Living Under Drones: Death, Injury and Trauma to Civilians From US Drone Practices in Pakistan", the report details the terrorizing effects of Obama´s drone assaults as well as the numerous, highly misleading public statements from administration officials about that campaign. The study´s purpose was to conduct an "independent investigations into whether, and to what extent, drone strikes in Pakistan conformed to international law and caused harm and/or injury to civilians".

The report is "based on over 130 detailed interviews with victims and witnesses of drone activity, their family members, current and former Pakistani government officials, representatives from five major Pakistani political parties, subject matter experts, lawyers, medical professionals, development and humanitarian workers, members of civil society, academics, and journalists." Witnesses "provided first-hand accounts of drone strikes, and provided testimony about a range of issues, including the missile strikes themselves, the strike sites, the victims´ bodies, or a family member or members killed or injured in the strike"."

"It is a campaign of terror - highly effective terror - regardless of what noble progressive sentiments one wishes to believe reside in the heart of the leader ordering it. And that´s precisely why the report, to its great credit, uses that term to describe the Obama policy: the drone campaign "terrorizes men, women, and children".

Along the same lines, note that the report confirms what had already been previously documented: the Obama campaign´s despicable (and likely criminal) targeting of rescuers who arrive to provide aid to the victims of the original strike. Noting that even funerals of drone victims have been targeted under Obama, the report documents that the US has "made family members afraid to attend funerals"."

"In the hierarchy of war crimes, deliberately targeting rescuers and funerals - so that aid workers are petrified to treat the wounded and family members are intimidated out of mourning their loved ones - ranks rather high, to put that mildly. Indeed, the US itself has long maintained that such "secondary strikes" are a prime hallmark of some of the world´s most despised terrorist groups."

"A one-day attack on US soil eleven years ago unleashed a never-ending campaign of violence around the world from the target and its allies. Is it really a challenge to understand that continuous bombings and civilian-killing assaults over many years, in many Muslim countries, will generate the same desire for aggression and vengeance against the US?"


"There are more than 80 names at the end of a human rights report published online this week. Each one is said to belong to a civilian killed or maimed as a result of U.S. missile strikes in Yemen since 2009. They were mothers, fathers, children and grandparents – and they stand in contrast to claims that the United States does not launch missiles into Yemen unless there is a "near-certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured," as President Obama told the nation in May.

The names are preceded by 25 pages of detailed descriptions of U.S. airstrikes in Yemen and their consequences, offering a rare level of information on specific attacks and their physical, psychological and financial impacts on individual Yemeni civilians.

"For me, its power is in the totality," says Gregory D. Johnsen, a former Fulbright Fellow in Yemen and author of the book The Last Refuge: Yemen, Al Qaeda, and America´s War in Arabia. "We tend to hear about these strikes in drips and drabs over the course of months and years, but the report is the most comprehensive one I´ve seen on U.S. strikes in Yemen."

The report has been turned over to Ben Emmerson, the United Nations´ special rapporteur on human rights and counterterrorism, who is in the midst of an investigation into the civilian impacts of U.S. targeted killings and drone strikes abroad. The interviews contained within – collected by Alkarama, a Swiss-based human rights organization, and HOOD, an organization of lawyers and activists in Yemen – paint a violent picture of life on the receiving end of U.S. counterterrorism policy in the Arabian Peninsula.

Take the story of Salem Ben Ahmed ben Salem Ali Jaber, who died along with four others following a drone strike on the village of Khashamir in August 2012. A father of seven, Jaber was a popular imam and teacher, who had explicitly condemned al Qaeda and urged others to dismiss the organization. According to the report, "he was to meet with suspected members of Al-Qaeda who had criticized him for his stance" on the day he died.

Eyewitness Abu ´Issa Rajab Khamis Ba Rif´at described the scene as missiles ripped the imam´s body to shreds. "Women and children immediately started screaming," he said. "Animals died, and the bodies of all those who died were disintegrated and scattered over a large area."

The report also describes airstrikes in Azzan, a city with 6,000 inhabitants, where militants have battled the Yemeni government for control. According to the report, the U.S. has backed the government´s offensive with "air raids and drone strikes, killing dozens of members of armed groups designated as ´officers,´ as well as many civilians creating an exodus of thousands of inhabitants."

Investigators looked into a March 2012 strike in the city that killed two identified al Qaeda members and an unknown man, injuring six children in the process. "I was sitting with my friends there, and we were going to play football, when suddenly we were shaken by the sound of a violent explosion," said 13-year-old Amin Ali Hassan Al-Wisabi. "I looked in front of me and saw a car burning. A missile had struck it. Shrapnel hit me in my foot, but I didn´t feel any pain, and I ran towards the house with blood flowing from my injury. I saw the car burning beside me and one of my friends lost consciousness."

A number of homes were destroyed in the strike on Azzan, and residents complained that the Yemeni government has done nothing in response to their substantial losses. In the meantime, they live in fear of being hit again. "Several inhabitants have expressed terror at the thought of another strike, expecting that they could be hit at any moment," the report states. "They do not understand why the bombings were carried out in cities when they could just as easily have targeted cars outside of residential areas, or why the suspects were killed rather than arrested."

The report reveals details regarding a May 2012 strike in the town of Ja´ar, where anti-government fighters had taken control at the time. According to investigators, the attack began with a missile strike against a home, killing the 33-year-old man inside. When residents gathered at the scene, they say an aircraft returned, fired several rockets, and killed 13 more men and one woman while injuring dozens of others and destroying a number of homes. The report notes, "Some witnesses are certain that it was an American plane because it was ´gray and eagle shaped,´ while the Yemeni military would not have any such aircraft."

A witness named Abdallah Saleh Hussein told investigators what he saw that day: "After the first strike, I rushed to the scene with my son Muhammed, just like dozens of other people. We were trying to assist the victims when suddenly a second attack took place. I saw many bodies shredded. My son was hit by bomb fragments in the stomach and neck. He died quickly."

"To this day, I do not understand why they would be targeted," Fadhl Al-Dhali´i, a researcher and official at the Ministry of Education of Abyan, says in the report. "The consequences for the residents´ peace of mind, especially the children, have been devastating for those who have experienced trauma. The victims have still not been compensated and our message to the international community and the Yemeni government is to come to the aid of the families of the victims."

While the report focuses heavily on U.S. drone strikes, it opens with an examination of devastation wrought by missiles fired from an American warship nearly four years ago. The now-infamous al-Maajala attack, launched early on the morning of December 17th, 2009, left over 50 people dead. At least 21 of them were children; 14 victims were women, half of whom were pregnant."


"Largely thanks to a complicit corporate-state news media, the story of a U.S. teenager executed without trial by the government has largely gone under the radar."

Said the teen´s grandfather: "I really feel disappointed that this crime is going to be forgotten. I think the American people ought to know what really happened and how the power of their government is being abused by this Administration. Americans should start asking why a boy was targeted for killing. In addition to my grandson´s killing, the missile killed my brother´s grandson, who was a 17-year-old kid, who was not an American citizen but is a human being, killed in cold blood. I cannot comprehend how my teenage grandson was killed by a Hellfire missile, how nothing was left of him except small pieces of flesh. Why? Is America safer now that a boy was killed? ... I urge the American people to bring the killers to justice. I urge them to expose the hypocrisy of the 2009 Nobel Prize laureate. To some, he may be that. To me and my family, he is nothing more than a child killer."



"Last month, military stats revealed that the U.S. had launched some 333 drone strikes in Afghanistan thus far in 2012. That made Afghanistan the epicenter of U.S. drone attacks — not Pakistan, not Yemen, not Somalia. But it turns out those stats were off, according to revised ones released by the Air Force on Thursday morning. There have actually been 447 drone strikes in Afghanistan this year. That means drone strikes represent 11.5 percent of the entire air war — up from about 5 percent last year.

Never before in Afghanistan have there been so many drone strikes. For the past three years, the strikes have never topped 300 annually, even during the height of the surge. Never mind 2014, when U.S. troops are supposed to take a diminished role in the war and focus largely on counterterrorism. Afghanistan’s past year, heavy on insurgent-hunting robots, shows that the war’s future has already been on display."


"President Obama announced Friday that about 100 U.S. troops have been deployed to the West African country of Niger, where defense officials said they are setting up a drone base to spy on al-Qaeda fighters in the Sahara."



"The skies over Libya were clogged with U.S. Predator drones during last year’s war. But just because the war officially ended in October didn’t mean the drones went home.

A Defense Department official tells Danger Room that the U.S. has kept drone flights flying over Libya, despite the conflict that initially brought them to Libyan airspace ending nearly a year ago."



"In December 2011, Iran captured a stealth aircraft fitted with reconnaissance equipment flying over their country which was later shown on Iranian television and identified as a drone missing from America´s arsenal."



"Stepping up its involvement in Mexico’s drug war, the Obama administration has begun sending drones deep into Mexican territory to gather intelligence that helps locate major traffickers and follow their networks, according to American and Mexican officials."



"More secret bases. More and better unmanned warplanes. More frequent and deadly robotic attacks. Some five years after a U.S. Predator Unmanned Aerial Vehicle flew the type’s first mission over lawless Somalia, the shadowy American-led drone campaign in the Horn of Africa is targeting Islamic militants more ruthlessly than ever."


"The US could deploy unmanned drones to launch air strikes against al-Qaeda´s increasingly powerful offshoot in Mali under plans being considered by the White House."


"Early last month, Tausug villagers on the Southern Philippine island of Jolo heard a buzzing sound not heard before. It is a sound familiar to the people of Waziristan who live along Pakistan´s border with Afghanistan, where the United States fights the Taliban. It was the dreaded drone, which arrives from distant and unknown destinations to cause death and destruction. Within minutes, 15 people lay dead and a community plunged into despair, fear and mourning."



"The belief that weaponized drones won´t be used on US soil is patently irrational. Of course they will be. It´s not just likely but inevitable. Police departments are already speaking openly about how their drones "could be equipped to carry nonlethal weapons such as Tasers or a bean-bag gun." The drone industry has already developed and is now aggressively marketing precisely such weaponized drones for domestic law enforcement use. It likely won´t be in the form that has received the most media attention: the type of large Predator or Reaper drones that shoot Hellfire missiles which destroy homes and cars in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan and multiple other countries aimed at Muslims (although US law enforcement agencies already possess Predator drones and have used them over US soil for surveillance).

Instead, as I detailed in a 2012 examination of the drone industry´s own promotional materials and reports to their shareholders, domestic weaponized drones will be much smaller and cheaper, as well as more agile - but just as lethal. The nation´s leading manufacturer of small "unmanned aircraft systems" (UAS), used both for surveillance and attack purposes, is AeroVironment, Inc. (AV). Its 2011 Annual Report filed with the SEC repeatedly emphasizes that its business strategy depends upon expanding its market from foreign wars to domestic usage including law enforcement."

"Like many drone manufacturers, AV is now focused on drone products - such as the "Qube" - that are so small that they can be "transported in the trunk of a police vehicle or carried in a backpack" and assembled and deployed within a matter of minutes. One news report AV touts is headlined "Drone technology could be coming to a Police Department near you", which focuses on the Qube.

But another article prominently touted on AV´s website describes the tiny UAS product dubbed the "Switchblade", which, says the article, is "the leading edge of what is likely to be the broader, even wholesale, weaponization of unmanned systems." The article creepily hails the Switchblade drone as "the ultimate assassin bug". That´s because, as I wrote back in 2011, "it is controlled by the operator at the scene, and it worms its way around buildings and into small areas, sending its surveillance imagery to an i-Pad held by the operator, who can then direct the Switchblade to lunge toward and kill the target (hence the name) by exploding in his face." AV´s website right now proudly touts a February, 2013 Defense News article describing how much the US Army loves the "Switchblade" and how it is preparing to purchase more. Time Magazine heralded this tiny drone weapon as "one of the best inventions of 2012", gushing: "the Switchblade drone can be carried into battle in a backpack. It´s a kamikaze: the person controlling it uses a real-time video feed from the drone to crash it into a precise target - say, a sniper. Its tiny warhead detonates on impact."

What possible reason could someone identify as to why these small, portable weaponized UAS products will not imminently be used by federal, state and local law enforcement agencies in the US? They´re designed to protect their users in dangerous situations and to enable a target to be more easily killed. Police agencies and the increasingly powerful drone industry will tout their utility in capturing and killing dangerous criminals and their ability to keep officers safe, and media reports will do the same. The handful of genuinely positive uses from drones will be endlessly touted to distract attention away from the dangers they pose.

One has to be incredibly naïve to think that these "assassin bugs" and other lethal drone products will not be widely used on US soil by an already para-militarized domestic police force. As Radley Balko´s forthcoming book "Rise of the Warrior Cop" details, the primary trend in US law enforcement is what its title describes as "The Militarization of America´s Police Forces". The history of domestic law enforcement particularly after 9/11 has been the importation of military techniques and weapons into domestic policing. It would be shocking if these weapons were not imminently used by domestic law enforcement agencies.

In contrast to weaponized drones, even the most naïve among us do not doubt the imminent proliferation of domestic surveillance drones. With little debate, they have already arrived. As the ACLU put it in their recent report: "US law enforcement is greatly expanding its use of domestic drones for surveillance." An LA Times article from last month reported that "federal authorities have stepped up efforts to license surveillance drones for law enforcement and other uses in US airspace" and that "the Federal Aviation Administration said Friday it had issued 1,428 permits to domestic drone operators since 2007, far more than were previously known." Moreover, the agency "has estimated 10,000 drones could be aloft five years later" and "local and state law enforcement agencies are expected to be among the largest customers."

Concerns about the proliferation of domestic surveillance drones are typically dismissed with the claim that they do nothing more than police helicopters and satellites already do. Such claims are completely misinformed. As the ACLU´s 2011 comprehensive report on domestic drones explained: "Unmanned aircraft carrying cameras raise the prospect of a significant new avenue for the surveillance of American life."

Multiple attributes of surveillance drones make them uniquely threatening. Because they are so cheap and getting cheaper, huge numbers of them can be deployed to create ubiquitous surveillance in a way that helicopters or satellites never could. How this works can already be seen in Afghanistan, where the US military has dubbed its drone surveillance system "the Gorgon Stare", named after the "mythical Greek creature whose unblinking eyes turned to stone those who beheld them". That drone surveillance system is "able to scan an area the size of a small town" and "the most sophisticated robotics use artificial intelligence that [can] seek out and record certain kinds of suspicious activity". Boasted one US General: "Gorgon Stare will be looking at a whole city, so there will be no way for the adversary to know what we´re looking at, and we can see everything."

The NSA already maintains ubiquitous surveillance of electronic communications, but the Surveillance State faces serious limits on its ability to replicate that for physical surveillance. Drones easily overcome those barriers."

The reply to your question lies in another question: "WHO SOLD THE GAS TO THE SYRIANS IN FIRST PLACE? ".