March 4 2018 Sergei and Yulia Skripal are attacked with a nerve agent in Salisbury
March 6 2018 Boris Johnson blames Russia and calls Russia “a malign force”
March 7 2018 Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman of Saudi Arabia arrives in London for an official visit
March 13 2018 Valeri Gerasimov, Russian Chief of General Staff, states that Russia has intelligence a fake chemical attack is planned against civilians in Syria as a pretext for US bombing of Damascus, and that Russia will respond militarily.
March 19 2018 Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman of Saudi Arabia arrives in Washington for an official visit
April 8 2018 Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman of Saudi Arabia arrives in Paris for an official visit
April 8 2018 Saudi funded jihadist groups Jaysh al Islam and Tahrir al-Sham and UK funded jihadist “rescue group” The White Helmets claim a chemical weapons attack occurred in their enclave of Douma the previous day – just before its agreed handover to the Syrian army – and blame the Syrian government.
April 11 2018 Saudi Arabia pledges support for attack on Syria
April 14 2018 US/UK/French attack on Syria begins.
I have always denied the UK’s claim that only Russia had a motive to attack the Skripals. To denigrate Russia internationally by a false flag attack pinning the blame on Russia, always seemed to me more likely than for the Russians to do that to themselves. And from the start I pointed to the conflict in Syria as a likely motive. That puts Saudi Arabia (and its client jihadists), Saudi Arabia’s close ally Israel, the UK and the USA all in the frame in having a powerful motive in inculcating anti-Russian sentiment prior to planned conflict with Russia in Syria. Any of them could have attacked the Skripals.
Today, Theresa May is claiming -astonishingly – that the UK attack on Syria is “to deter chemical weapons attacks in Syria and the UK”. I don’t think the motive for a Skripal false flag could be more starkly demonstrated.
We do not yet know how many children and other civilians have died so far in what the media always pretend are magically “pinpoint” attacks on Syria. Denying the “collateral damage” is part of the neo-con playbook. The danger is that they will not stop but continue to push, testing how far they can go in weakening Syrian government forces to promote their jihadist allies on the ground, before they spark a real Russian reaction. That way madness lies.
It is also worth noting that the most ardent supporters of this military action, outside Saudi Arabia and Israel, are the Blairites in the UK and the Clinton Democrats in the USA. The self-described “centrists” are actually the unhinged extremists in today’s politics.
This attack on Syria is, beyond doubt, a huge success for the machinations of Mohammed Bin Salman. Please do read my post of 8 March which sets out the background to his agenda, and I believe is essential to why we find our nations in military action again today. Despite the fact the vast majority of the people do not want this.
Friends, may I recommend these relevant articles:
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/cambridge-analytica-scandal-goes-down-the-paranoia-hole/
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/how-russiagate-produced-the-missile-attack-on-syria/
Meanwhile it’s interesting what they did not strike: Presidential quarters.
That would indicate that the US (and its minions) has given up on regime change.
Or would it?
I presume that would be construed as an overt declaration of war.
Er…he wouldn’t be there!
I see…. lol
Dear Craig,
If you join the dots you can see a conspiracy in the Kennedy Assassination, the fake Moon Landings, Princess Diana’s death please come up with some more suggestions….
I think you’ll find a tin foil hat will help, still available at great prices here: https://rdbl.co/2IRMpG0
Yours sincerely,
Vlad
That the moon landings were faked is a fake: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Side_of_the_Moon_(film)
Iraq WMDs, Kuwait baby incubators, Cuban sonic beams, …
A further, supposedly Independent Report, which indicates, there were relatively serious attempts to cause real damage to Damascus, but all the missiles at crucial locations were shot down, and the Syrians were laughing whilst videoing these attacks. I didn’t think missile defences could work this well.
“Syria Strike Fails: US, Britain, France Bomb Damascus Friday April 13 2018”
https://quemadoinstitute.org/2018/04/14/syria-strike-fails-us-britain-france-bomb-damascus-friday-13-2018/
Extract
“By 02:39 UTC the strikes were reported over, with no further attacks planned. It was confirmed by many locals that Russian Air Force planes had taken off from their base in Latakia. Apparently the Russian planes scrambled in the direction of al Tanf, but at that moment, the USA-led cruise missile attack came to an end. Twitter source AJSB says, “In the beginning, it seemed that they were launching non-stop wave after wave of missiles till they get all their targets destroyed…and suddenly, they stopped and gave up (and as an example, they completely failed to destroy or even hit the SAA Missile base)…this was odd.”
(The Bully ran away, when confronted?)
Tony
Yeh, a country reduced to throwing barrels out of helicopters at people shot down 71 latest technology American missiles, I believe them.
Aye and apparently it took 76 Tomahawks (with 1000lb payloads of the US’s finest HE) to destroy a couple of unreinforced buildings!
Or maybe they launched 76 but they all didn’t make it?
Just catching up ,- the Russians ie Lavrov say the samples from Salisbury were sent by the OPCW to a Swiss lab for analysis. That this Swiss lab found evidence in its analysis that. BZ spray had been used on the Skripals shortly before they were found collapsed on the park bench and this is what caused their symptoms. However OPCW has omitted/ suppressed all mention of BZ3 in its official report. Is that a correct summary?
I would buy into the idea that the Skrioals were sprayed jwith domething incapacitating just before they were found and I don’t understand either why the door handle was not checked earlier for nerve gas, if it was known to Mi6 as a preferred Russian delivery option (see letter from uK National security advisor Mark Sidwell who to NATO.,)
However, how did Russia obtain this information? And are they claiming OPCW is deliberately suppressing information and suppressing facts? I am struggling a bit with that? Also OPCW verified chain of evidence was complete showing that Skripals had been poisoned with a nerve agent which was of the novichok .
The confusing element, omitted from the first accounts, is that the sample provided by UK contained both BZ and “novichok”.
“Just catching up ,- the Russians ie Lavrov say the samples from Salisbury were sent by the OPCW to a Swiss lab for analysis. That this Swiss lab found evidence in its analysis that. BZ spray had been used on the Skripals shortly before they were found collapsed on the park bench and this is what caused their symptoms. However OPCW has omitted/ suppressed all mention of BZ3 in its official report. Is that a correct summary?”
No, that is how the Russian Foreign Minister wants people to interpret it not what was said.
The Swiss lab along with the other labs confirmed the presence of Novichok nerve agent in the samples they received. They also found small traces of BZ. How much and where it came from is pure speculation but I wouldn’t rule out the possibility small doses of it could be used by doctors in the treatment of nerve agent poisoning.
Except that interpretation fits a lot better with the reported events of the ‘poisoning,’ as well as information released by Salisbury hospital in various forms. A lot better.
No it doesn’t.
What it does fit is this public information video released by the Foreign Office on 30th March.
https://twitter.com/foreignoffice/status/979333458131607553
Public disinformation on disinformation, you mean?
Just saying ‘no it doesn’t’ isn’t an adequate reply. You have to explain the slow onset of symptoms, the ‘delivery method’ (door handle) that somehow contaminated both Skirpals, how nobody else was affected, the ridiculous instructions to wash normally or use baby wipes to get rid of novichok (or similar compound) and so on.
I don’t have to explain anything. British scientists identified Norvickok nerve agent as the cause of the Skripal’s illness and OPCW scientists confirmed their findings.
@fred,
did the FCO release a similar video when Tony Blair was of whatever degree of confidence of the Iraqi WMD?
The point is, at least so far as I am concerned, I have a degree in Science and a degree in Law, so give me primary data and I am fully capable of making a conclusion myself. When you tell me to “trust you” when your story doesn’t stack up the BS detectors go off left-right-and-centre. The first BS detector that went off in Skripal case for me was that the witnesses (who were being interviewed by the BBC) described a man having hallucinations and when I looked up symptoms and signs of “Novichock” the symptoms were cardiac and respiratory arrest within a very short time frame.
Then, in my experience, when you are being told “but-but-but-but” the story just becomes more implausible.
@fred
Ambiguity and weasel words.
@IM
That’s strange because when Looked up the symptoms of Novichok poisoning hallucinations was one of them.
In 1987, one physicist at the laboratory was saved despite being exposed to the chemical when a ventilator stopped working. Witnesses described how he staggered out of the room, describing seeing bright hallucinations before collapsing and being rushed to hospital by the KGB. He was left with permanent injuries after being critically ill for ten days and unable to walk for six months.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5492781/Scientist-reveals-horror-lethal-nerve-agent-Novichok.html
@fred
“I don’t have to explain anything. British scientists identified Norvickok nerve agent as the cause of the Skripal’s illness and OPCW scientists confirmed their findings.”
The published OPCW report summary is actually fairly ambiguous, referring always to the ‘toxic chemical’ identified by Porton Down (which was novichok or similar compound).
“The results of analysis of biomedical samples conducted by OPCW designated laboratories demonstrate the exposure of the three hospitalised individuals to this toxic chemical. // The results of analysis of the environmental samples conducted by OPCW designated laboratories demonstrate the presence of this toxic chemical in the samples.”
That does not rule out the presence of other chemical agents, nor does it confirm beyond the imprecision already contained in the Porton Down analysis. The OPCW wording struck me as odd at the time. Like Stephen Davies’s letter to the Times. Both now seem explicable to me if another agent, not a nerve agent, BZ, was identified by the hospital and in the sample analyses by the Swiss lab. It also matches the reported symptoms much better, something I note that you refuse to acknowledge or even refute with counter-arguments. Of course that leaves the mystery of the novichok traces.
“British scientists identified Norvickok nerve agent as the cause of the Skripal’s illness and OPCW scientists confirmed their findings.”
The UK government said that their scientists said it was “Novichok or a closely related agent” to the courts. We don’t know what the actual scientists said nor what they said to the OPCW. The OPCW said that it confirmed the findings of “the UK”, not the UK’s scientists. We do know that the UK government would have liked the OPCW to have stated that the poison was Novichok. This the OPCW didn’t do. They didn’t do this either because they were being awkward or because the poison wasn’t Novichok. Why should they be awkward?
Just missing the detail that the Swiss Lab’s results ‘hinted’ that the samples had unusually persistent traces of Novichok (‘or similar compound’ etc.) – which ‘might’ indicate adulteration.
“However, how did Russia obtain this information?”
I suspect either their intelligence services are doing their job or a conscientious scientist(s) has passed the report on.
“And are they claiming OPCW is deliberately suppressing information and suppressing facts?”
They’re not saying anything yet- they brought up the inconsistency into the public view and asked for OPCW to explain the report in light of the Swiss lab report (unlike the UK they’re not making accusations until they have evidence).
I should feel happier taking this at face value if the Russians were to release the full text of the Swiss lab Report.
I suspect they would release it, but I think they’re giving OPCW time to reply (or another shovel/excavator to dig deeper, whichever you prefer) first. The Russian Ambassador to the UK said in a press conference yesterday that the Russians send a series of questions under CWC Art. 9(2), I suspect they intend to invoke the post-10 day protocol once (c’mon they know nobody here would reply) that time has passed…
Question time. Here goes.
“Sergei Skripal, a former Russian double agent, and his daughter Yulia were poisoned with an incapacitating toxin known as 3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate or BZ, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said, citing the results of the examination conducted by a Swiss chemical lab that worked with the samples that London handed over to the Organisation for the Prohibition of the Chemical Weapons (OPCW).”
1. So these were NOT the samples that the OPCW collected itself (with a certified CoC) but those that ‘London’ handed over
2. If it is true as has been suggested here (I don’t have any URL’s) that A-234 was found ‘inside’ the BZ, what do we make of the phrase ‘pure’ in the OPCW-report
3. Is the Swiss Lab one of the three Labs that the OPCW approached? What results did the other Labs return?
I believe pure doesn’t mean pure in the strict sense, but the lack of impurities that might imply origin. I have posted a longer explanation above as to what I think the difference is.
Interestingly, WaPo say that Lavrov said the sample contained precursor to BZ as well…
It would seem that no less than a Suisse member of the OPCW group that recently visited Salisbury to take sample etc, to try and identify the source of Skripal family poisoning, have now independently claimed that their Salisbury sample(s) was quickly identified as an exclusive UK/USA/NATO toxin BZ. And definitely was not any fictitious Russia ‘non-made product’ called Novichock by Mde May.
BZ for those like Craig Murray who probably know that it is: ( 3-Quinuclidinyl Benzicate ) and is readily available at Porton Down ?
I think Craig is currently discussing this issue with his sources.
Ahem. BZ is 3-Quinuclidinyl Benzilate not 3-Quinuclidinyl Benzicate. It was made by the US Army.
Second, No, the scientists of the highly regarded Swiss Spiez lab, one of 5 in the world approved by the OPCW, did not go to Salisbury to take samples. The samples were given to it by the OPCW, which had received them from the British Govt. The Swiss Spiez lab found a suspiciously high concentration of pure A-234 nerve agent (aka Novichok) and also BZ, a psycotropic nerve agents in the given samples.
Third, the Swiss lab came to the conclusion that the Skripals were poisoned by the BZ made in the US Army and not by the Novichok . How did the Swiss Spiez lab come to this conclusion? IMHO, by logical deductions:
a)The Skripals would have died if they had been poisoned by such a high concentration of pure Novichok. They did not die. BZ does not kill but disorientate the victims, who will recover. Yulia Skripal said she was disoriented at the material time.
b)Since after an intervening period of two weeks in rainy Salisbury, the highly reactive Novichok could not possibly exist in such high concentration and purity . So the logical conclusion was that the A-324 was possibly added (spiked) to the samples before they were given to the Swiss Spiez lab for testing. By who?
Fourth, the OPCW mysteriously neglected to mentions the presence of BZ in its final report. Why?
Here is a link to a PDF which describes the OPCW Lab procedures.
The Role of Designated Laboratories
Professor Paula Vanninen Director Finnish Institute for Verification of the Chemical Weapons Convention, VERIFIN
Department of Chemistry
University of Helsinki
https://www.unog.ch/80256EDD006B8954/(httpAssets)/D15A6BEA6AB55D5BC125808300494E83/$file/opcw3_role_of_designated_labs.pdf
Interesting read, thanks.
On page 9: “Representatives of Inspected State Party or OPCW inspectors take the samples“.
Hmm…!
Also, it remains unclear how many so called Designated Labs there are for each request, and in particular in this (Salisbury) case.
I believe the OPCW said 4 labs would be used. It’s on the OPCW website, or it was.
Open Letter to Sharon White, Chief Executive OFCom
Dear Ms White
As CEO of Ofcom, you are ultimately responsible for the oversight of the British Broadcasting Corporation, having taken over this function from the BBC Trust in the last calendar year.
It is therefore to you that the scandalously incompetent coverage of the Salisbury poisoning event by BBC News should be highlighted, with suggestions as to the levels of censure required to restore some vestiges of respectability to terms such as ‘News’, ‘Journalism’ and ‘Telling the Truth’.
As a career civil servant who has worked almost anywhere but in the media, you may still be somewhat wet behind the ears about longstanding BBC shenanigans. I am sure you did sterling work in the Embassy in Washington, for the Treasury, for Tony Blair’s administration (I hope Alastair Campbell is not your media mentor, however), for the World Bank, DfID, Ministry of Justice and DWP. You are neither a journalist nor a broadcaster……
The first suggestion I have for you is instigating a journalistic Hippocratic Oath that all BBC employees, contractors or third party suppliers are required to operate under. The concept of dedication to the truth might be sentence one of such an oath. The concept of distinguishing between gossip, unconfirmed sources, reasonable conjectures, beyond all reasonable doubt might be sentence two. The concept that the magnitudes of lies told increases exponentially as you reach the pinnacles of power, hence the need to test rigorously assertions which may lead to the deaths of large numbers of innocent people might cover sentence three. The concept that the BBC represent the license payors, not the Government of the Day, might cover sentence four. The concept that verbatim repetition of propaganda is not value-add journalism worthy of £250,000 salary per annum might cover sentence five.
Here are areas which competent journalists should have discovered rapidly and ethical editors should have placed as Item 1 on the main News programmes:
1) You do not need a factory to synthesise enough nerve agents to kill two people, as 1 milligramme is enough to kill a few hundred. So talk about where Novichoks were manufactured was not news, rather journalistic dead ends.
2) Globalisation sees procurement in UK with suppliers in China, so the users of a nerve agent may well have procured that agent overseas.
3) The symptoms of the Skripals were singularly incompatible with novichok action: any semi competent journalist should have worked that out by March 18th. Why did no BBC journalist do that?
4) When a Salisbury A&E consultant writes to the Times saying ‘no one has been poisoned by a nerve agent and only three people have been poisoned’, this is headline news. Why was it censored at the BBC?
5) When Novichoks are shown to be broken down by rain, why will samples taken by OPCW four weeks later still have Novichoks present? Should a BBC hack not have said: ‘ does this tell us that the toxic agent is stable in damp conditions’?
6) When Boris Johnson’s logical deficiencies concerning potentially guilty parties are so crassly ridiculous, why did the senior BBC political correspondent not say: ‘I am sorry Foreign Secretary, that simply will not wash’?
7) When the BBC acts as a mouthpiece for war 5 times in twenty years, relinquishing all journalistic integrity to spout intelligence claptrap, half truths, unattributable gossip and quite frankly made up propaganda to justify illegal wars, does that not suggest to reputable civil servants that an MI6 substation exists on Wood Lane housing a beehive of MI6 drones?
8) What is the point of 24 hour rolling news when it means there is never a minute in the day for critical analysis? How much do 50 million people lose by having news-free propaganda twenty four hours a day rather than cogent, questioning journalism four hours a day?
9) Do you think that script readers on BBC news are worth more than £25,000 a year? If so, why??
10) Do you think that sycophantic, arse-licking star fuckers make good journalists? Or would an abrasive call-a-cocksucker-a-cocksucker type be more likely to speak truth unto power on behalf of the license payors?
I hope you have not reached the heights you have reached being anodyne, lacking intellectual curiosity and turning a blind eye to Tony Blair’s treason concerning Iraq. That would suggest you would happily let Theresa May do the same in Syria.
If you would, then I humbly submit to you that you are ethically unfit to supervise what should be a hard hitting, robust, evidence-led journalistic output of the largest UK-owned news organisation.
Yours Faithfully
A UK voter
LOL, but I have to admire the effort.
I’m nostalgic for Falklands-era BBC news reporting: “The British government, if it can be believed, claims that…”
And the wonderful moment when Robin Day asked a blunt question of John Nott, who took off his mike and stormed out. Day, as ever, just said very drily, ‘Oh, looks like he’s had enough’. Or something quite similar. Why in hell can’t our wimps of BBC reporters do the same?
That is splendid.
Rhys Jaggar, I really liked, the mild, almost silent, gentle start, and the crescendo in the final piece. Do you write music too?
Totally agree! I have said from day one of the Skripal case that the West is testing the possible reaction of Russian and ultimately China too. Behind all this posturing and sabre rattling is a desire by Trump and his allies to take on the other two Super-powers. Why? because America, like all empires can see the writing on the wall, they all collapse eventually but before they do they flex their muscles. America is on the cusp of decline, they have had there day and they know it. They think that by causing situations that undermine Russia and its new standing in the world they will not have to go all out nuclear with the certain result of their own destruction. That is exactly why they talk behind the scenes to avoid a face to face conflict. And yet they still continue to provoke Russia at every opportunity. American and NATO troops right on the Russian border.
If they manage to cow the Russians, then for certain the Chinese are next. I foresee a war of sorts without a doubt. Again why? Because the American establishment sees this latest round of bombings in Syria as a success. Russia has failed to stand up for its ally in a military sense. A bully does not stop until you smack him on the nose. Russia has few options open to it. If they do nothing the we will see more staged Chemical attacks followed by yet heavier bombing and next time their will be Russian casualties, just to test the reaction.
“before they do they flex their muscles”
Such as?
Being a history teacher at one time, I’m cursed with a certain degree of knowledge. I can think of a few examples of empires that went out with a bang but I’d be surprised if you could. I would say Nazi Germany doesn’t count.
All the obvious ones, though, British empire, Rome, Soviet Union, went quietly. So quietly that some say they didn’t go at all, that they merely transmuted.
Hittite. Japanese.
I’ve only heard of the Hittites but confess to knowing zilch about them. Japan though I don’t think is a very good example because it was not a consolidated empire as such.
They didn’t really arrive on the global scene until 1905 when they surprised everybody by beating Russia in a war but I can’t remember that ever being discussed as part of any sort of imperial program… I might be wrong.
They expanded into northern China from Korea and I’d agree these were its most consolidated colonies but their domination even there was very short lived. All of its other imperial conquests were even more short lived and indistinguishable from the short lived success it had in the Second World War.
As for lashing out as its empire was starting to collapse, that seems back to front with Japan; the lashing out was at the start.
Prof Anokhin said he had spoken to doctors treating the hostages who had been supplied by the Russian military with an antidote for general class of substances to which BZ belonged.
“BZ is a muscarnic cholinergic blocker,” said Prof Rose. “It affects a special type of nerve, known as a muscarnic receptor, in the brain. When it is released into the atmosphere, it gets into the lungs. It then passes through the blood stream and through the entire brain.”
Prof Rose said the agent affected the chemical acetylcholine, which carries messages from one nerve cell to another.
“BZ interacts with this and stops the message getting across”, he added. “It’s like turning the volume up on a radio, and stopping any changes in the signal, so the message loses all its meaning.”
The agent works on the brain and paralyses its ability to interpret what is going on. “It turns off the lights, and destroys the body’s headquarters.”
Prof Rose added that the people least likely to be affected by the gas were the terrorists themselves as they are the healthiest and the most prepared for such a situation. “It will affect the young and the old more than the fit,” he said. There were many young women among the casualties carried from the theatre. “Obviously in this case it was used in grossly high concentrations,” he said. “The victims appear to be the very young and old, which you would expect if it was used in a confined space.”
The gas has never been used before, Prof Rose said, except perhaps in secret, or in a US propaganda film in the 1970s, by the US Department of Defence. “It was stockpiled and never used in the west.” Prof Rose said he had experimented with the gas – which originally comes as a white powder mixed with a propellant, in a laboratory, but never on humans. He was not aware if the Soviet Union had obtained the gas.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/oct/28/russia.richardnortontaylor
So what you are saying is that this BZ agent that the Russians have never manufactured or possessed, was used by the Russians on their own people? (obviously not with intent to kill)
That was claimed at the time, “Russian Secret Gas Could be BZ, claim British Experts”
https://www.voanews.com/a/a-13-a-2002-10-28-26-russian-67409072/383324.html
Later it was declared to be a variant of fentanyl.
Who knows? Neither you nor me, right?
and as for so-called “British Experts”, they seem to be prostitutes and fantasists, like the dear Doctor from Kew Gardens with her retracted claim about a rare poisonous plant appearing in the stomach of the Russian who died while jogging.
The claim was very convenient at the time for certain “intelligence sources”, I remember,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolokol-1
BZ Uses
Incapacitating Agent
from The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health – NIOSH
QNB is an incapacitating agent and has been considered historically for use as a chemical warfare agent. A very potent drug, QNB causes confusion and hallucinations; it also affects circulation, digestion, salivation, sweating, and vision. Impairments caused by QNB are generally temporary and unlikely to be fatal; however, they can be severe if exposure is large enough.
Reminds you of somebody?
Here is the reference
https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/3-Quinuclidinyl_benzilate#section=Metabolism-Metabolites
Russian minister Lavrov stated today that Moscow obtained results of the chemecal samples taken by OPCW at Salisbury. These were tested in Swiss laboratory in Spitz (I may transliterate wrong) at showed BZ chemical. Regarding this fact Russian Ministry sent an enquiry to OPCW asking why these results were absent in their final report.
This news in russian
https://ria.ru/world/20180414/1518659174.html?referrer_block=index_main_3
Has it not occurred to Craig that the Russians may have put out the story of impending fake chemical attack as part of their plan?
Sorry, but there is a lot of hysterical bollocks going on here. The US attack won’t change anything, least of all the regime. What is the grand master plan?
@Mark B, You need to update yourself on reading Q Anon coded messages on you tube.
Trust the plan
Trust POTUS
I’ve just wasted 5 minutes of my life looking at that shite.
I took three and it felt awful
That’s a very convoluted explanation, what would their plan be? Ockham’s Razor and cui bono?
What would their plan be? Who knows? Split public opinion in the west over likely western military response?
What would the west gain from taking a chem attack? If the western military response had been meaningful I’d go along with you, but it clearly was just a piece of theatre.
Quite frankly, if you can’t formulate your own argument as to what the plan would be, simply don’t advance a theory that’s not even half-baked!
What would “the West’s” plan be? I don’t know, but one doesn’t launch 103 missiles against multiple targets with no plan, perhaps the Russians were right that 71 of those were intercepted by Soviet-era Syrian air defences. I would speculate that this was a test of the Syrian missile shield and the test didn’t go too well for “the West”…
If “the West” was so sure that Assad did perpetrate the chemical attack he was accused of, why not wait just a few more days until OPCW FFM confirm that?
Remember the last time Trump launched missiles after a chemical attack in Syria?
So how is this attack advancing some sort of vague western scheme?
It’s face saving
@Mark B,
I don’t follow you, are you saying that it’s
(a) a cunning plan by the Russians, or
(b) a face-saving op. for Trump?
You can’t keep moving the goal posts of a conversation when it doesn’t go your way.
Ah, the master plan question.
The master plan may well be quite boring. Something along the lines of keeping Syria weak, so weak that it presents no threat to regional security, can’t build up strength and influence, and is perpetually distracted with defence and reconstruction. I’m sure that would suit Israel and Saudi Arabia.
When you look at Syria’s last 40 years, that’s more or less what they have been doing. The thing that changed in the area recently, of course, is Iraq. They, Israel, the US, Saudi Arabia, and others, are crazy frightened that the power vacuum in Iraq will be filled with a government that is friendly or even cooperative towards Iran.
There’s the Sunni – Shia division too which when you look at the demographics suggest Iraq ought to be more comfortably aligned to Iran. This worries Saudi Arabia a lot and goes a long way towards explaining their unhealthy interest in Yemen.
That’s my stab at what’s going on. The one country I didn’t mention is Russia which for me just exacerbates the potential for strife as far as the west and Saudi Arabia is concerned, by injecting arms and backing, etc.
You do not deny there was an attack by the US and several other countries today, do you?
Who me? No, I definitely think there was an attack. The bullshit is flying on both sides.
Here, how the FSA train children to act-out a “chemical attack”: https://twitter.com/The_Cyrenian/status/983661056366030849
IM
Please don’t tell me that you can’t understand my point and then accuse me of moving goalposts. The conversation isn’t going your way or my way, but only one of us is struggling to keep up.
I’m suggesting that we shouldnt take the report that Russians had heard of a planned fake chemical attack as a given. It could be a lie. It could also be a clever ruse paving the ground for a deniable chem attack by the Russian/Syrian axis.
If the west are capable of lying, so are the Russians.
The nub of this is what the US attack actually means on the ground and the answer is nothing. Absolutely nothing.
The position of the Russians and the Iranians in Syria hasn’t changed one bit.
This attack by the west is about being seen to do something, rather than actually doing something.
Remember, the use of chem weapons is irrelevant in the grand scheme of things on the ground. Nearly all of the 500,000 deaths in Syria have been from conventional weapons.
I didn’t say I can’t understand you, did I?
I said I didn’t follow your line of reasoning because you presented one theory that wasn’t even half-baked, and then faced with that, you said “face saving for Trump”. Now you’re presented evidence with how easy it is to fake a “chemical attack,” you, yet again, are re-framing! So tell me, if you’re so upset about the 500K deaths, as you say, HOW IS LAUNCHING 103 MISSILES going to cause less suffering??? That’s a rhetorical, btw, question designed to expose your perverse logic.
You’re assuming the US led attack is over. If it is you might tell me why they have an armada on its way, due in the area on the 24th.
Operation Delirium (a suitable name for once)
In secret experiments during the Cold War, the U.S. Army tested nerve gas, hallucinogenics and other chemicals on its own soldiers to see if these chemicals could be used during wartime to incapacitate the enemy.
https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=166891159
The chemical is a cousin of atropine, a deliriant commonly used to counter to nerve agents like VX or Sarin.
This property makes BZ especially insidious—a doctor might be tempted to treat exposure with another atropine-based countermeasure, but that will actually amplify symptoms and hasten death. The particularly nasty aspect of this chemical weapon is that use of atropine needles, a common countermeasure against nerve agents, is actually a toxic combination and can lead to exacerbation of symptoms, even death.
Only Physostigmine has shown to be an effective antidote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physostigmine
Dr. James Moore used to be a prof at the U of DE and made compounds for the CIA. He tells some amazing tales. Case in point: He made BZ for the CIA and got some on his hands. He felt very disoriented. “I felt like the whole world turned sideways on me.” This effect lasted for days and so he asked the big boys at the CIA how to get back. They told him to take some THA (tetrahydroacridine) that is now used as an experimental Alzheimers treatment. He claims it straightened him right out. MK-801 is a sigma opiate receptor agonist (I think) not sure about that one. Forward this anon to alt.drugs if you think it is worth it. Thanks.–keith — Lamont Granquist ([email protected])”
http://pages.uoregon.edu/munno/OregonCourses/REL253F12/REL253Notes/BZStory.htm
If the Russians really have the correct information this BZ is not much like the published formula for Novochok. No chlorine or fluorine component.
Not made with 2 component agricultural chemicals.
me thinks this is not Novochok family. Not what they said it was.
Lavrov added: “the Swiss […] lab noted that [A234] presence in the samples appeared strange, given the substance’s high volatility and the relatively long period between the poisoning and the sample-taking.” [emphasis added] [1]
1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/russia-trace-of-western-made-nerve-agent-seen-in-uk-samples/2018/04/14/c76a8b30-3ff7-11e8-955b-7d2e19b79966_story.html?utm_term=.179e8876d10a
We should welcome the stance that Britain, the USA, France and all the NATO countries and their supporters have taken against states that kill innocent civilians.
To that end, when can we can expect air strikes against Israel, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and bizarrely, the USA, the UK and France themselves? Oh sorry, Palestinian, Kurd, African, South American,, Afghan, Iraqi, Iranian, Kurd et al citizens, don’t count.
Thank you, Theresa May, for such hypocrisy and allowing us in the UK to sleep safely in our beds.
I dream of the day you and your ilk face charges for war crimes in the international Criminal Court. Oh damn, I forgot; that’s only for lesser African or Balkan countries.
Not so sure, ingwe, she might end up in front of the ICC. Unlikely but possible since what she did was a clear violation of international law.
Lionel Nation on point – ‘They Dropped the MOAB’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVWlPmR7u5g
What can a poor boy do?
1. I won’t be voting for the May Junta in the upcoming local elections
2. I will further extend the economic sanctions I apply to American goods; hitherto this has been largely due to the fact that they are by and large poorly designed, badly built and not on a par with Japanese, Korean or German alternatives, but from here on Coke, McD and anything else I can think of gets the chop as a matter of principle
3. As an Englishman, it is hard to conceive of ways in which my instinctive contempt for anything French coyld be any more visceral than it already is, but I resolve to at least try
4. If I ever come across a Kuwaiti late at night in a dark alley, I may not be accountable for my actions; the same may be true of the supercilious smug Swedish UN delegate, who I had startec to warm to but now have firmly in the “Git” column
5. I will try – honestly I will, really hard – to figure out what game the Chinese are playing; they’ve got me baffled for sure
6. I will consign The United Nations to the same fond memory hole as The Tooth Fairy, Father Christmas and gold at the end of ths rainbow; a sweet enough idea, but of absolutely zero utility
7. I will stop fantasising about doodling on the Russian representatives bald head – at least while he is speaking
8. I will try to get on with whats left of my lufe, and ignore these cretins (which is whatI’ve been doing today)
The Chinese are playing the long game. If you read what Mao proposed in the late 40s, sailing between the warring factions of the world without getting involved, it’s more or less what they have done since then. If I remember correctly he planned this for about 100 years and then at some point they would play the bastard card and kick everybody in the ass. Something like that anyway.
In international relations they talk about China being a soft power. They don’t mean daft, of course, they mean using economics to influence outcomes rather than force which is what they have done in Africa and so many other places. Fair play to them, I suppose.
Well Ophelia, I’m struggling to imagine you avoiding a burgundy / bordeaux (depending on your taste). There’s no real need to spite yourself re French products. With American ones it’s just healthy & sane to avoid them.
Chemical Weapons: Anticholinergic Incapacitating Agents (BZ)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=665A_9Bth6s
“the central nervous systems effects tend to be delayed, you can have a prodomol period of several hours”
https://youtu.be/665A_9Bth6s?t=598
All the evidence points at this moment to BZ being the only chemical that effected the Skripals, that the government engaged in perjury at the Court of Protection and that the Skripals were deliberately unnecessarily put into a coma ( Offence against the Person?) to avoid them being able to communicate or otherwise interfere with the governments ongoing criminal activity.
The Story of the Drug BZ
“If you’re afraid of dying, and you’re holdin’ on, you’ll see devils tearin’ your life away. But if you’ve made your peace, then the devils are really angels, freein’ you from the world. It all depends on how you look at it.”
-Louie paraphrasing Meister Eckhart at the end of Jacob’s Ladder.
At the end of the movie Jacob’s Ladder, the main character Jacob Singer has a talk with Michael, a chemist who explains to him that the violent deaths of the soldiers in his battalion in Vietnam were caused by a drug-induced psychosis brought about by the hallucinogen BZ, or quinuclidinyl benzilate. This drug was invented under the direction of the U.S. government to maximize the aggression of the soldiers, but it backfired when the unwitting human guinea pigs turned on one another.
A little research on the internet revealed the following:
http://pages.uoregon.edu/munno/OregonCourses/REL253F12/REL253Notes/BZStory.htm
Lavrov just announced that the unknown toxin was BZ https://www.rt.com/news/424149-skripal-poisoning-bz-lavrov/ from data from the non-NATO Swiss lab. See BZ properties here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK201480/ Speaking as a toxicologist, I would say that this fits the stability and and toxicity profile of what happened much better than any of the known “Novichoks”. UK is busted!
On page 6 of the comments there’s a link to a WaPo article where it’s reported that Lavrov also says that the sample contained BZ precursor and that apparently the Swiss lab was surprised by the “Novichok” presence (“appeared strange”) given the time since exposure and the volatility of the compound.
So has the UK government been lying about what was used against the Skripals, or could BZ reasonably be considered as a “Novichok or similar”. or whatever the precise wording was that Porton Down used? Reading a description below about the symptoms that BZ causes, it seems a fair way away from being a lethal nerve agent, although it’s obviously still strong enough to make people very ill.
BZ is not even close to the described Novichok, BZ is an incapacitating agent, the chemical structure is different, BZ is close to atropine, which is used as an organophosphate never agent antidote. See-
Chemical Weapons: Anticholinergic Incapacitating Agents (BZ)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=665A_9Bth6s
“Looked so out of it” and “strange hands movements… looking up to the sky” [1] is consistent with hallucinogenic effects and not with a respiratory nor cardiac arrest, the latter two being symptoms of Novichok, and the former being a symptom of BZ.
1. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-43295193/salisbury-russian-spy-incident-eyewitness-describes-couple
“BZ is not even close to the described Novichok”.
What the government said in the court document is that there was “a Novichok class nerve agent or closely related agent.” and people naturally assume that it is closely related in a chemical sense. But these are lawyers and the the meaning of the words is whatever they want it to be.
Is an elephant closely related to a mouse? Of course they are, if I want them to be; they’re both four-legged mammals. An elephant and a snake. They’re both invertabrates.
So how could a so-called “Novichok” be “closely related” to BZ? Well, one plausible explanation could be that they’re both chemical agents designed to incapcitate. The phrase “closely related to” doesn’t have to be anything to do with the chemical composition. Nobody lied but their “truth” is designed to give a completely misleading impression. That’s lawyers for you.
True enough!
And that’s exactly how the British government, the bbc, and various other British bastards have been manipulating the truth of everything for the last 100 years.
NATO Code: BZ
http://www.cs.amedd.army.mil/FileDownloadpublic.aspx?docid=13d94373-93f3-47a9-9822-c572b3b6aa43
BZ Recognition and Treatment
https://s3.amazonaws.com/PHR_other/PHR_BZ_Fact_Sheet_04-13.pdf
If the Swiss lab BZ toxin story is correct will it be possible to bury it in western media? Any thoughts, anyone?
If it does come out in the media I’d be pretty sure there’ll be some story(ies) discrediting the Swiss facility out soon after.
Closer to the truth by a country mile than the shite we are getting in the Media coverage.
Our government’s position defies all logic and doesn’t even think we are worthy of a credible excuse for this madness.
Independent Swiss Lab Says ‘BZ Toxin’ Used In Skripal Poisoning; US/UK-Produced, Not Russian
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-04-14/independent-swiss-lab-says-bz-toxin-used-skripal-poisoning-usuk-produced-not
I posted the timeline above on The Guardian comments and suprise surprise it was moderated off!
Clinical effects from ingestion or inhalation of BZ appear after an asymptomatic or latent period that may be as little as 30 minutes or as long as 24 hours; the usual range is 30 minutes to 4 hours, with a mean of 2 hours. However, effects may not appear up to 36 hours after skin exposure to BZ. Once effects appear, their duration is typically 72 to 96 hours and dose-dependent.
Following an ICt50 of BZ, severe effects may last 36 hours, but mild effects may persist for an additional day. The clinical course from BZ poisoning can be divided into the following four stages:
1. Onset or induction (0 to 4 hours after exposure), characterized by parasympathetic blockade and mild CNS effects.
2. Second phase (4 to 20 hours after exposure), characterized by stupor with ataxia and hyperthermia.
3. Third phase (20 to 96 hours after exposure), in which fullblowndelirium is seen but often fluctuates from moment to moment.
4. Fourth phase, or resolution, characterized by paranoia, deep sleep, reawakening, crawling or climbing automatisms, and eventual reorientation.
Conclusion:
If BZ was used on the Skripals, and Atropine was used as an antidote at Salisbury Hospital or Tidworth, it would have made them much worse.
The antagonism between physostigmine (derived from the calabar bean) and atropine (tincture of belladonna) was first reported in 1864 by a physician who successfully treated prisoners who had become delirious after drinking tincture of belladonna. Physicians did not notice this report until the 1950s, when atropine coma (in which 50 mg or so of atropine was given to certain psychiatric patients) was successfully treated with physostigmine after the “therapeutic benefit” had been attained. Again, this went unnoticed until a controlled study reported in 1967 indicated that anticholinergic intoxication could be successfully, albeit transiently, reversed by physostigmine.
http://www.cs.amedd.army.mil/FileDownloadpublic.aspx?docid=13d94373-93f3-47a9-9822-c572b3b6aa43
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-04-14/independent-swiss-lab-says-bz-toxin-used-skripal-poisoning-usuk-produced-not
Independent Swiss Lab: ‘BZ Toxin’ Used In Skripal Poisoning US/UK-Produced, Not Russian
Internationally recognized lab concludes nerve agent not produced by Russia
Zero Hedge – April 14, 2018