It would appear, based on constructs from alternate governmental releases, that thankfully the prior AP report is not a surprise to Secretary Rex Tillerson.  A readout from a call between British Prime Minister Theresa May and U.S. President Donald Trump provides additional context to absorb the larger, and overarching, ally objectives.

As such it appears the international effort is focused on holding Russian President Vladimir Putin responsible for the actions of Syria’s Bashir Assad.   Toward that objective the international leadership is putting an absolute ton of responsibility on U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to be the tip of the spear.

To say all eyes are on T-Rex today would be the understatement of the year.  And ahead of his meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Vladimir Putin is attempting to avoid the snare by refusing to grant T-Rex an audience.  Apparently, based on the action of Putin, Secretary T-Rex is considered a more formidable adversary than former Secretary of State John Kerry.

(Via Reuters) The Kremlin said on Monday that U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will not meet President Vladimir Putin when he visits Moscow on Wednesday, a move that could point to tensions over a U.S. missile attack on a Syrian air base last week.

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The Commander-in-Chief personally calls both commanders of the two missile destroyers who carried out the mission in Syria to thank them for their exceptional performance on mission.  How cool is that?

MEDITERRANEAN SEA (NNS) — April 9, 2017, the commanding officers of Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers USS Ross (DDG 71) and USS Porter (DDG 78) received phone calls from President Donald J. Trump.

The president called to thank the commanding officers, Cmdr. Russell Caldwell and Cmdr. Andria Slough, and their crews for their professionalism and quick response to the tasking to conduct a cruise missile strike against Shayrat airfield in western Syria, April 7, 2017. This strike was in response to the use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime.

USS Ross, commanded by Cmdr. Russell Caldwell, forward-deployed to Rota, Spain, departed on its fifth forward-deployed patrol April 3, 2017, and is conducting routine patrols in the U.S. 6th Fleet area of operations in support of U.S. national security interests in Europe. (more…)

Before getting to the interviews by current U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mrs. Rubio vis-à-vis Syria, it is important to reassert reference points that are being intentionally overlooked by media; reference points the MSM pundits intentionally hide.

Point One – Russia, Iran and Syria’s President Bashir Assad care primarily about one thing: keeping Bashir Assad in power.  All other influential objectives are secondary to this primary intention.  All of the actions taken by Russia, Iran and the Syrian Government are specifically focused on keeping Bashir Assad in power.

Point Two – All historic action taken by the Russian, Iranian and Syrian participants are to eliminate the opposition to Assad.  Goal #1 keep Assad in power, necessitates goal #2 eliminate Assad’s opposition.

Point Three – So long as Russia, Iran and the Syrian Regime can use the terrorism of ISIS as a foil they will continue to do so.   As long as the appearance of Assad fighting ISIS remains the cognitive reference point of the international community – it is easier to keep Assad in power.

Point Four – Therefore the continued ground action of ISIS becomes a tool, a foil, to keep pressure away from the international community focusing on Assad’s removal.

Point Five – It is currently more beneficial for the objectives of Russia and Iran for the ISIS terrorism narrative to remain in place.  The Syrian regime can survive with Assad, and accomplish the agenda of Russia and Iran,  so long as the appearance of fighting ISIS remains the international optic.

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Secretary of State Rex Tillerson appeared on two Sunday news programs today ABC (Stephanopoulos), and CBS (Dickerson) to describe the seismic foreign policy events of the past week.

The first interview, T-Rex explains the U.S. policy directly to John Dickerson:

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T-Rex outlines the appropriate distribution of responsibility for the chemical weapons attack in Syria.

Metaphor – A dangerously moldy red book keeps reappearing on the boardroom desk (the mid-east).  No-one in the room will take responsibility for its origination. U.S. President Trump walks into the room, picks up the book and angrily, publicly, throws it in the trash.

Trump then looks sternly at the most influential task management in the room (Putin/Assad) and tells them deliberately: ‘if the book reappears they will be held to account’. 

The entire organization (world) watched, and saw, the event.  President Trump has assigned responsibility for the future, and accountability for the consequence.

The second interview delivered the same message. T-Rex appears on ABC with George Stephanopoulos.

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There is a predictable disconnect amid political followers who have not paid close attention to the direct Mid-East visitors to the Donald Trump White House regarding the origin of the chemical weapons use in Syria.

Focusing on who used chemical weapons is a moot point in the larger issue of the Syrian conflict. It doesn’t matter whether ISIS “rebels” deployed them or whether Bashir Assad used them against the “rebels” when contemplating President Trump’s response to stop using them. The victims are Syrians. The regional alliance members don’t care who used them. The message is to stop.

We could make a solid argument that either interested party: Bashir Assad or “the rebels” (al-Qaeda, ISIS, al-Nusra et al) had motive and opportunity to use chemical weapons.

We’ve written for several years about the manipulative intentions of both sides, all sides, in the Syrian conflict. We’ve written about President Obama’s policies toward Syria and how his administration armed and equipped all elements; gaining nothing except a horrific death toll and chaotic civil war as an outcome.

We’ve provided lengthy and cited research on arms into Syria from Obama, Clinton and Kerry. The Benghazi Brief outlined Man-Pads and chemical weapons delivered to Syria as an outcome of the collapse within Libya.  We’ve outlined the Libyan weapons caches that became the Jihadist market/yard-sale. We’ve also documented weapons deliveries directly from the State Department using actual recorded audio admissions of Secretary Kerry to his Syrian benefactors.

Additionally, no-one questions whether Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, Assad’s BFF, delivered stock piles of his own chemical weapons to Syria, because it was well documented.  Both Bashir Assad and Saddam Hussein previously used chemical weapons.   Historically Hussein used Chemical Weapons to kill up to 300,000 Kurds in Northern Iraq.

None of this is in doubt.

To argue if Assad used chemical weapons again last week is really an irrelevant issue when you stop and think about Bashir Assad’s political position in 2017. (more…)

A funny thing happened today en route to CNN pundit Brooke Baldwin assembling an anti-Trump narrative.

To understand the epic level of today’s fail by Ms. Baldwin, it’s important to note her earlier interview of a 2013 Syrian chemical attack survivor, Kassem Eid, three days ago.  He was brought on CNN to express his anxiety about ongoing attacks against the Syrian innocents and frame the liberal R2P humanitarian perspective.

Today, in the aftermath of last night’s airstrike, Ms. Baldwin brought Kassem Eid back to frame a narrative about President Trump launching an airstrike in Syria, but being unwilling to accept Syrian refugees.  The objective was to frame Trump’s hypocrisy.

To drive the point home the CNN producers assembled a Hillary Clinton carefully scripted speech soundbite as the lead-up to the question:  “we cannot speak of protecting Syria’s babies, and in the next breath close America’s doors to them“.

However, what happened next wasn’t expected by Baldwin.  She couldn’t shut down the segment fast enough.  This is funny.  Stay with it.

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Political commentator and extraordinarily brilliant satirist Mark Steyn was on Fox and Friends this morning to provide his perspective on President Trump’s decision to take action in Syria.

Steyn brilliantly frames the issues. [Hat Tip Stella]

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Additionally, a point that apparently needs to be made. Idiot MSM pundits like Jake Tapper, though it’s not exclusive to Tapper, keep pointing out the 2013 tweet by President Trump warning Obama about action in Syria and framing their narrative about “what changed?” etc.

Just for clarity. Between the 2013 tweet by non candidate Trump and the 2017 action by President Trump, there was a 2014 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) voted and approved by Senate committee  permitting military action in Syria against the backdrop of chemical weapon use and terrorism.

I swear sometimes the MSM are flippin’ idiots, then I remind myself of the David Mamet principle: “In order for left-wing ideologues to keep espousing their cognitively disconnected talking points they need to pretend they don’t know things.”

Yes, indeed.  Pretending not to know things is a useful pretense.

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As the international community takes stock of the ramifications of President Donald Trump’s narrowly focused and strategic military strike against a Syrian air base, Syria’s Bashir Assad vows to fight ISIS even harder; sans chemical weapons.

“This aggression has increased Syria’s resolve to hit those terrorist agents, to continue to crush them, and to raise the pace of action to that end wherever they are.” ~ Bashir Assad

Good.

It is prudent for all interested observers to think sequentially and logically about the deliberative action taken by U.S. President Trump; and not expand or infer a larger motive than is currently evidenced within the scope of the engagement.

There are a myriad of outlying issues and exponential micro-ramifications.  However, there is every indication the current administration fully accepts the larger understanding that only two central elements are present in the Syrian conflict:  Bashir Assad -vs- Extremist Jihadists’ (al-Qaeda, al-Nusra, ISIS, et al.)

It is also prudent to remind ourselves the key principle behind the direct regional talks previously outlined (non-discussed in MSM) has been a clear understanding -between President Trump and the regional coalition they have formed- that ALL EXTREMISM must be confronted in order to achieve the desired regional result.

That said, last night, in the immediate aftermath of the strikes, Secretary of State T-Rex and National Security Advisor McMasters, outlined the reasoning, objectives and substantive considerations behind the U.S. decision.

The media is not adequately reporting on this briefing (all emphasis mine): (more…)

The Pentagon clearly outlines the reason for President Trump’s strategic and selected military response.  The U.S. is stating evidence that Bashir Assad did launch chemical weapons from this exact airbase, and Russia was willfully blind in their complicity.

U.S. Pentagon – At the direction of the president, U.S. forces conducted a cruise missile strike against a Syrian Air Force airfield today at about 8:40 p.m. EDT (4:40 a.m., April 7, in Syria).  The strike targeted Shayrat Airfield in Homs governorate, and was in response to the Syrian government’s chemical weapons attack April 4 in Khan Sheikhoun, which killed or injured hundreds of innocent Syrian people, including women and children.

The strike was conducted using Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles (TLAMs) launched from the destroyers USS Porter and USS Ross in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea.  A total of 59 TLAMs targeted aircraft, hardened aircraft shelters, petroleum and logistical storage, ammunition supply bunkers, air defense systems, and radars.   As always, the U.S. took extraordinary measures to avoid civilian casualties and to comply with the Law of Armed Conflict. Every precaution was taken to execute this strike with minimal risk to personnel at the airfield.

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President Trump is anticipated to deliver remarks to the nation tonight:

– The targeted single airfield is Sharyat airbase in NW Syria, near Homs – The alleged source of chemical attack – Approximately 60 missiles fired – Russian military was informed in advance – Congressional Gang-of-Eight was notified in advance –

UPDATE: Video of President Trump remarks added:

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WASHINGTON – The United States has fired a barrage of cruise missiles into Syria Thursday night in retaliation for this week’s gruesome chemical weapons attack against civilians, U.S. officials said.

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