Syria's Assad in a 'good mood,' scorns U.S. weaponry after airstrikes

[DonViejo]

Source: The Washington Post



By Liz Sly April 15 at 12:01 PM

BEIRUT — Syrian President Bashar al-Assad praised Russian weaponry on Sunday as his government celebrated victory over rebels in the town where an alleged chemical attack took place, triggering U.S. airstrikes over the weekend.

Assad made the comments during a meeting in Damascus with Russian lawmakers, who later told reporters that he was in a “good mood,” according to Russian news reports. Footage of the meeting broadcast by state television showed an animated Assad smiling and laughing as he met with the Russians.

“President Assad was in absolutely positive spirits. He is in a good mood,” the Interfax news agency quoted Natalya Komarova, governor of Russia’s autonomous Khanty-Mansiysk district, as saying.

The meeting came a day after U.S.-led strikes, launched together with Britain and France, hit three Syrian chemical weapons facilities. The airstrikes were in response to the suspected April 7 chemical attack in Douma, a Damascus suburb.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/syrias-assad-said-to-be-in-good-mood-scorns-us-weaponry-after-airstrikes/2018/04/15/a5e313cb-727a-4dda-98da-d582d86f0add_story.html

[CatMor]

1. These statements will only encourage trump...

to want many billions more for the military. He'll want new, bigger bombs and more "invisible" planes.

[NickB79]

2. Of course he is

He had a few days warning of a strike and had plenty of time to move equipment out. He knows the Russians aren't going anywhere, and the US just blew hundreds of millions of dollars bombing empty buildings. And the Russians got to try out their air defense systems in real world situations.

[bitterross]

3. Yep. Pretty much a Win-Win for him.

I think you got the highlights correct.

[7962]

6. If they tried out their air defense, they need to go back to the drawing board.

It was a dismal failure

[NickB79]

10. It gave the Russians a glimpse of NATO missile capabilities

And now that they saw how their missiles performed (assuming they were telling the truth that 13 missiles were shot down) they can improve them with that data. It's guaranteed that the next generation of Russian SAM's will be better because if this encounter.

Missile tech is a science, and in science there are no failures, only opportunities to learn and improve for the next experiment.

[7962]

14. Well, they'll be "learning" for some years then.

SO far the DoD hasn't confirmed that ANY were shot down. The only reports ive seen are that the defense systems didnt even fire until after the attack was already over. I believe them, because we'd be seeing video of the shoot down just like we see when the Iron Dome shoots down Palestinian rockets.

[William Seger]

4. This insult will not sit well with Little Donnie Big Button

[7962]

5. "Praised Russian weaponry"? The weaponry that fired AFTER the attack was over? HA!

of course he'd praise it. Its all he's got

[Crowman2009]

7. Of course it helps when Pres. Dumbass gives away plans for a missile strike more than a week...

...in advance. Wouldn't be surprised if he gave the GPS coordinates as well.

[LiberalLovinLug]

8. I'll ask a stupid question:

Why don't they just try and bomb his personal residence? Or if there are various ones, bomb them all. I'm not for any kind of bombing as it tends to kill lots of others that are not targets. but if you are going to do that anyways, why not target the top dog? Surely they must have some intelligence as to where he sleeps.

[Jedi Guy]

9. It's a pretty good question, actually.

I seem to recall reading or hearing somewhere that there's a sort of unspoken international agreement not to assassinate heads of state, at least in peacetime. I also seem to recall Churchill putting the kibosh on a plan to assassinate Hitler during WWII, so it seems the agreement holds even in wartime, to an extent.

I have no source to back this up, mind you. It's just something I think I remember. I could be way wrong.

[LiberalLovinLug]

11. Ironic though isn't it?

That the use of chemical weapons is also an international agreement, although not unspoken, between leaders of the world. (Meanwhile the US uses napalm and white phosphorus.)

And Assad will still use unspeakable torture, and conventional bombing raids over civilians and hospitals.

About that unspoken agreement though, didn't they bomb Libya's Gadaffi's home and in the process kill his son? I suppose it could be that they cannot be sure they will get him. Also, he maybe sleeps in a bunker a few levels below ground every night. But don't we have bunker busters? At least try I'd say.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

12. That agreement didn't help Quaddafi (sp?) or Saddam Hussein.

And not doing much for Noriega.

Quaddafi and Hussein weren't killed by U.S. forces, not directly, so maybe we can still appear "clean".

[BigmanPigman]

13. He needs to be tried in the Hague by the UN for war crimes

against his own people.

[Igel]

15. 1. Brand Russia.

He's earning his keep by being an ad-man for the Putin and keeping to the script. Russia has three real money makers: Oil. Weapons. Nuclear power. It helps explain why it's sort of got weird relations with Iran in Syria: Iran buys two out of three of its products, competes on the third, and is a rival for Assad's little black heart.

On the other hand, Ass-ad probably did manage to move a lot of equipment from likely sites. Which sites were likely? In some cases, that's probably predictable. It would overgenerate sites to be cleared, and might miss some. But in the long run, heck, in any but the very immediate run, who cares?

2. Ass-ad's happy because he cleared out Eastern Ghouta, a large rebel-held territory adjacent to Damascus and the source of missiles that would fall on Damascus from time to time. Imagine if N. Virginia were confederate-held territory. Hard for Lincoln to say, "All's great!" when from time to time missiles landed north of the Potomac. And when anything headed south had to detour 25 miles east or west to get around the territory. "Just ignore the bombs falling around you, we're winning in Kansas!"

3. Whether he's in the dark as to the extent of damage or right, it doesn't matter. The Syrian media will report what they're told to report. If the strike happened and leveled the western half of Damascus and he said, "All's fine," the media would film stories claiming that that not so much as a shingle was so much as moved at at a coffee shop in "western Damascus" enjoying the sunshine, even if the rest of Syria had torrential rains. I know these things from Pravda and Izvestiya, from Literaturka, from translating I don't know how many pages of Czech and Slovak newspaper articles from '68 (the difference pre- and post-Soviet occupation was stark).

It's why hearsay and media distrust are so rampant in countries with a totalitarian bent.