Bush aides debate attacking Syria

[snippy]

By Warren P. Strobel and John Walcott
Knight Ridder News Service

WASHINGTON - Senior aides to President Bush are vigorously debating what to do about Syria as evidence mounts that Damascus is stepping up support for the terror group Hezbollah and allowing anti-American insurgents to reach Iraq, U.S. officials said.

Civilians in Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's office are pushing for military action against Syria and have drawn up plans for punitive airstrikes and cross-border incursions by U.S. forces, three officials said. They are not considering an invasion, they said.

But Bush's White House advisers, backed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the State Department, are arguing against the military venture with much of the U.S. military tied down in Iraq and Afghanistan and a presidential election year under way.

That view appears to have prevailed for now.

http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/7678820.htm

Just laying the early groundwork for the Next Bush War.

[Mistress Quickly]

1. He'll wait until

after he takes the next election.

The onward Christian soldiers. I wonder if they'll flip a coin between Syria and Iran?

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

6. It's next on the PNAC list...

And I wouldn't doubt the * administration would start this one up in late August.
Can't switch presidents during wartime, can we? :eyes:

[snippy]

13. The timing of this leak reminds me of the timing of discussions of Iraq

during the spring and summer of 2002. I think Turd Blossom Rove probably thinks that "debate" ended up helping republicans in the 2002 elections and is hoping to reuse the strategy for November.

Another, longer version of this article concludes with this paragraph:

Some of Bush's hard-line advisers have argued for two years that Syria's regime should be the next U.S. target after Iraq. A defense official Friday night disputed that Rumsfeld and his aides are pushing for military action against Syria or that there is a split between civilians and the uniformed military on the issue. "That is absolutely groundless. It has no basis in fact," said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php?ts=1&display=rednews/2004/01/10/build/world/30-syria.inc (emphasis added)

It really bothers me that the administartion refers over and over again to the Next Bush War, and the majority of the media treats it as barely being newsworthy.

[rumguy]

2. woah if this happens there will be a furor!

fuckin' warmongers, bring it on!

[eileen from OH]

4. I think they'll have to jump the shark

to get to Syria.

eileen from OH

[ComerPerro]

3. Yeah. Debating. Im sure...

By "debating" the Syria issue, I am sure they mean that the only heated arguments are over whether to attack on a Monday or a Wednesday.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

5. Isn't this what the Project for the New American Century

talked about doing back before the neocons took power?

[Malva Zebrina]

7. Yup,absolutely

and if he can he will . He has been given the blank check by the congress, err that is those who now claim they were "lied to" and he can fabricate any excuse he wants in order to fulfill the PNAC handlers, or whoever it is that drives this ignoramus , wannabe, president.

But, I do not think we have the manpower now to do so, without a draft being initiated,and if he getws elected I do think he will force that draft--and then--lookout--only a "what if" I admit, at this point.

[salinen]

10. Iraq was also occupied

as a staging ground for the wars with Syria and Iran. Obvious chess move.

[snippy]

14. True.

[leesa]

19. We have no soldiers and Syria has a real military

Of course, Americans will not have jobs so they will be forced to go fight yet more people who have done nothing to us.

[patricia92243]

8. I'll pray for you folks that are of draft age.

[mlawson]

9. This could be a lose-lose trap for our nominee.

Say, this becomes a public issue by late Spring or earl Summer. Our nominee will HAVE to take a side. If he goes along, he loses a lot of his base. If he opposes the venture, KKKRove labels him 'soft on terrorism' or far worse. Those voters against this would likely vote Dem anyway.

In the end, he HAS to oppose this in some way. Sounds like a Willie Horton deal to me.

[snippy]

15. I think that may be Turd Blossom Rove's plan.

[IADEMO2004]

11. Let's take out China

That is what would make the rest of the world fear US. Why piss around with all these little guys? China has huge coal deposits and they made baby Bush pay storage fees for our spy plane to be parked on their runway. I am scaring myself.

[Marian]

12. Could this be our September/October

'red alert' "surprise"? :puke:

[Lefty48197]

16. I hear that they have WMD's

and that they're trying to buy nukes from Africa.

[snippy]

17. Better send in the Danes.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

18. The PNAC's foot is in the door..

with Iraq -- there is no way in hell they are going to let it stop there. This is the first step in what thay have been planning for since Reagan.

That's why I am afraid of what lengths they will go to to retain their power.

[Stephanie]

20. David Brooks says you're nuts

The Era of Distortion
By DAVID BROOKS

Do you ever get the sense the whole world is becoming unhinged from reality? I started feeling that way awhile ago, when I was still working for The Weekly Standard and all these articles began appearing about how Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Doug Feith, Bill Kristol and a bunch of "neoconservatives" at the magazine had taken over U.S. foreign policy.

Theories about the tightly knit neocon cabal came in waves. One day you read that neocons were pushing plans to finish off Iraq and move into Syria....

[Hell Hath No Fury]

22. I would tell David Brooks...

"Likewise, I'm sure." ;)

[BeFree]

21. What if??

There will soon be over 200,000 troops in Iraq, "on rotation", right?

And:

Given the fact that the reselection of * is looking worse and worse, what have they got to lose by going into Syria now?

Enough troops are now in Iraq for a 50,000 man invasion.

What have they got to lose?

[truth2power]

23. I'm sorry...my brain must be turning to mush.

But "punitive airstrikes and cross-border incursions" do not constitute an invasion??

These people should be confined in an institution for the criminally insane. :crazy:

[DrBB]

24. Yup, Clark is a loony

David Brooks has told us--and many reichpundits agree--that only a whacko loony would think the Bush administration has any intentions of carrying the war to Iraq, Syria, wherever. Where does Clark get these conspiracy theories? God only knows. He's just some kind of whacko. According to pamphlets being circulated now in New Hampshire. The loony General can't be trusted.

Sound familiar? I bet it does to McCain....