What if Assad is telling the truth?

Dictatorship 101 - step down... or massacre your own people long enough so that those you claim caused it come into existence

The whole situation under which the massacre took place makes zero sense. Initially we were told that the people were killed under heavy shelling. A report released today by the UN monitors showed most the people were killed by what they described as executions. So now the rebels are claiming the army had come in and personally executed almost 100 people. Not unheard of as massacres go.

But note what I said above, UN monitors were let into the area to inspect the bodies.

Why in the name of all that makes sense would the army commit this massacre only to let in UN monitors into the area hours later to confirm it? Especially seeing as they had no problem doing so in early cases such as in Homs, amidst cries of massacres (which turned out to be false btw), the army prevented anyone from entering the area for days on the basis it was still unsafe to do so.

I've heard only one possible answer to this, and that is that the government wanted to send a message to the rebels, to scare them into submission. So lets analyse that idea.

The regime thought it would be a good idea to massacre a close to 100 people, with the hope that it would scare the battle hardened opposition, who have already witnessed thousands of deaths in the country, and all the while willing to accept the international backlash that has indeed now occurred, and also risk the only thing that can topple the regime; international military intervention. (which the SNC has called for today in a press conference)

Does that really make sense to anyone here?

And lets not forget this all took place just before Annan was due for talks with the government, perfect welcoming gift for him too.

I don't support the regime, the clock has struck for them, and it's time for Syria to transition to democracy, but there is no proof at all so far the regime carried this massacre out.

gurramok wrote: »

Looks as if the killings were outsourced to the pro-government Shabiha militia rather than the actual army. Nice way of absolving responsibility by Assad.

According to who?

And even if that was the case my point still stands. Your saying the killing was outsourced to these militias who have a known connection to the regime, why would the regime order them to kill these people, then invite UN monitors in to inspect the damage? Knowing such claims would be made against them?

Again, this is not a matter of black or white.

I am Syrian, and I do support a regime change in Syria, it is long over due but it has to be done correctly and not by armed interventions. You cannot clean blood with blood.

There are different groups running havoc in Syria, committing all sorts of atrocities in order to flare up the already blazed emotions of Syrians. Yes, we have issues with the Ba'ath regime and have suffered 40 years of it. But we don't want to see the country fall into a state of civil war due to schemes plotted by foreign players, which are using this notion to achieve their goals in the region.

Remember back in 2006, when the world watched Israel destroy Gaza and southern Lebanon, did we see Israeli officials and diplomats being given 72 hours to exit Western countries?? ...we know why, but when it comes to Syria, it is a different subject apparently.


As for what happened in Houla; we may never know the truth.

Jaafa wrote: »

According to who?

And even if that was the case my point still stands. Your saying the killing was outsourced to these militias who have a known connection to the regime, why would the regime order them to kill these people, then invite UN monitors in to inspect the damage? Knowing such claims would be made against them?

There are a couple of possibilities.

1. The regime may not have ordered the killings, it may have been a purely sectarian act.

2. The regime may have ordered/requested the militia to attack but did not tell the militia exactly what to do.

What the op and others seem to be trying to imply, that some anti-assad faction carried out the massacre in order to implicate the regime is a bit too conspiracy-theory for me, not that I'd completely rule it out but it seems like a pretty unlikely possibility. Until more evidence comes out the most likely possibility is that the militia did it.

Few rumours are circulating in Damascus at the moment...well, again, depends on who you talk to; some people are saying "business as usual" while others are saying "a backroom deal is coming up, bloodless (relatively) resolution in 8 - 30 days"... can we hope?

Also, a general strike over the next three days in Damascus like the one earlier this week, which I think is the only way we can hurt the regime, and some people are saying we're coming to the fiery finale... what and how it will be presented no one knows until it happen.

I'm a little worried about the tone of the current general strike, every time they close the street for the marches, "organizers" go around telling people:
"ya bitsekir, ya minkasir!!" = "Either you close or we'll break!!"

And, I heard that the malls were specifically told that the protesters would burn them down and shoot at the workers inside if they didn't close; this is from the "peaceful" side? Again, I know that most of those marching are sincere but the people making the marches possible aren't as sanctified as people make them out to be. I have lived and witnessed the events for 10 months.

As in terms of the political sense, part of me cares who gets into power, but part of me realise that I never had much of a choice in the matter, what's going to change now? I want to see a change, but as always, considering who's putting themselves forward, I'm not overly excited about it, either.

One of my friends was murdered 2 days ago in Homs...
I grieve for his death, and admire his bravery but at the same time, I don't believe that death would help the situation, I much prefer to be actively building the country rather than being used as a symbol to flare the emotions of others. Particularly, because of the ones who's doing the flaring. I realize this has been the case since time immemorial, but the way some people latch onto the deaths of others to fuel their agenda is very disturbing... and I'm talking individuals, not the cause itself.

They seem to promote themselves, really "I'm so sad these people died, I wrote a book about it" or "My series of concerts are dedicated to those who gave their lives to make sure [I continue to have a career]" you get the point.

There's a number of sincere people among those but you can always tell who's just excited because it's their turn to shine.

We have lost tens of thousands of qualified people during the previous 14 months from doctors, engineers and other highly skilled young people to either; Deaths, gone missing or simply migrated into the West or the Gulf states to look for work.

A great effort will be required to rebuild Syria... and our wealth of minds is dwindling.

on the bases that he wouldn't give in to basic reforms I doubt he is telling the truth

Well the Russians are supplying Assad with arms this whole time.

Has nothing to do with Chechnya. They are supporting Assad with arms because Russian companies have loyal contracts with the Assad government. They have been trading with them for decades. Therefore they would have contacts and storage warehouses over there which they retained after the Soviet Union collapsed. Russia can only sell weapons to countries outside of the West as the western countries primarily buy off the USA or EU countries. If it stopped selling weapons, that would be more or less a weapons embargo. This would be in line with Moscow's neutral stance on the subject.

It doesn't mean that the ebul Russians are going to sell Assad thermobaric weapons to use on Homs a la Grozny.

They went in a second time under Putin in 1999 and are still there now.

The war in Chechnya is over and only a skeleton garrison remains in the Caucasus. The Chechen wars were sparked primarily by both the breakup of the Soviet Union and the belligerence of the Yeltsin regime in trying to pick up the pieces. Putin simply inherited the mess and had to deal with it. (He inherited a lot of crap left over from Yeltsin)

Because they, China and Iran prop up and use the Syrian govt by proxy.

First of all, Iran doesn't prop up Syria. Syria is a predominantly Sunni secular Ba'athist nation. Iran is a Shia theocracy. Russia doesn't prop up Syria. It simply sells weapons to them, as it had for decades, so why should it stop? Is America propping up the UK by selling Javelin missiles to them? China does nothing aside from represent Assad loosely on the UNSC.

Plus, just because these countries are vetoing the (very vaguely worded) potential resolutions doesn't mean that they support Assad, but rather that they reject western meddling in the Syrian conflict.

The state of the Middle East and environs is not all down to big bad western devils and 'da jews' you know. It was and for the most part still is, a cold war theatre.

So you say that "western devils" have nothing to do with the state of the Middle East, but then you turn around and say it was and is a cold war theatre? That's self-contradictory, considering "western devils" were "combatants" in the cold war. And I didn't say it was "da jews".

What the hell does this have to do with what I said? The cold war is over too, although clearly not for you, taking into account your digs at the Russians for things an unelected moron did with their armed forces almost 20 years ago.

I think this is a potential turning point in the paradigm of world politics. I think Russia and China will emerge from this more powerful and more confident.

Few rumours are circulating in Damascus at the moment...well, again, depends on who you talk to; some people are saying "business as usual" while others are saying "a backroom deal is coming up, bloodless (relatively) resolution in 8 - 30 days"... can we hope?

Hi Suff. Who do you believe is primarily to blame for all of this chaos?

The Syrian opposition is a group of 'known' exiles who have, or had benefited from the regime at some stage in the past. They are known, and have no support within Syria.They turned against the regime in an attempt to attract attention that might result in favourable political outcome. This group has full backing from the US and the Arab Gulf States.

Funnily enough, that's a lot like the Russian opposition (Gary Kasparov and Berezovsky)

Russia Today has got zero credibility. Their brief is to drag out every crank and crackpot they can find, call them a "journalist" or a "researcher" and let them spew demented conspiracies.

Putin is very keen to destabilize and weaken western countries, and promoting disinformation and baseless conspiracies is one good method.

Here's an example, this lady is presented as "a physicist". Check this out:

if Assad has nothing to hide, then why not let in Investigators from any country in the world, even a neutral county.

Let in UN human rights experts.

Let in the media.

Let anyone in who wants to investigate.

Have a court case where those accused can defend themselves.

Of course he will let in none of these people and won't have a court case, because Assad is 100% guilty of this crime, everyone knows this, even the Russians, Chinese and Kofi Annan.

It's blatently obvious Assad forces committed this massacre and all the the other massacres.