Syria Rejects U.S. Call for Lebanon Pullout

[chlamor]

The Sunday Times - World


February 20, 2005

Syria rejects US call for Lebanon pullout
Hala Jaber, Damascus


SYRIA has defied American demands to withdraw its forces from Lebanon and to disarm Hezbollah militants, insisting that Israel must first pull out of the Golan Heights.

The government in Damascus has been under growing pressure from Washington since last week’s assassination of Rafik Hariri, the former Lebanese prime minister and forthright critic of Syria’s military presence in his country. President George W Bush recalled the US ambassador to Syria and demanded an international investigation of the killing.

Ayman Abdel Nour, a leading Syrian analyst, said yesterday that Damascus had now told senior American officials that a unilateral withdrawal of its 15,000 troops was out of the question until Israel ended its occupation of the Golan Heights, which it seized from Syria in 1967 and annexed 14 years later.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1491716,00.html

[lovuian]

1. Syria is saying come and get me!!!

It will be Syria first then Iran!!!

[chlamor]

2. Pipeline shortcut

Part of the pipeline strategy for the Iraqi oil is to send through Lebanon, a shorter route than present-more direct. Syria is in the way in Lebanon. This 2004 article from Chris Floyd, a superb journalist with the Moscow Times sheds light on the importance of Lebanon. A clip:


"A few months before PNAC's prophetic 2000 report, an allied group with an overlapping membership published a similar document outlining steps to be taken against Syria --first "tightening the screws" with denunciations and economic sanctions, then escalating to military action, as Jim Lobe of Inter-Press Agency reports. The architects of this document included Elliot Abrams, the convicted perjurer now running Bush's Middle East policy; Douglas Feith, one of Rumsfeld.s top aides; Paula Dobriansky, undersecretary to Colin Powell, and influential Pentagon advisors such as David Wurmser, Michael Leeden and everyone's sweetheart, Richard "Influence-Peddler" Perle."

www.globalresearch.ca/articles/FLO502A.html

[cliss]

3. Aha. Thanks for the insight, Chl.

There's no smoke without a fire. In the case of the US, no bombs without oil.

I KNEW there was a ulterior motive.

But it still begs the question: how in the hell do they think they will pull it off? The US has its hands full in Iraq. We are stuck in the mud, with our wheels spinning, not going anywhere.

Where are the troops going to come from? They have none to spare; there is a thread about an 84-year old getting his re-enlistment bonus (see: LBN).

They can always do air raids; you don't need that many people to drop some bunker busters and Daisy Cutters on Damascus and throw in Iran while you're at it. But what happens after they do that? They still have to march in and "take" the place.

Otherwise it's meaningless. They've just bombed the shit out of 2 countries. So? That doesn't mean anything. The ONLY way that they can claim victory is if we march in. I don't see that happening, unless they pull US troops out of Germany, S. Korea, Afghanistan, and every nook & cranny. Then they might be able to do something.

[oasis]

4. Syria, Iran, Russia and North Korea all defying Bush policy. Can't this

leader of the free world get an "amen" from someone on the planet?