Seymour Hersh on Syria/Trump

There’s still only conflicting accounts.

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Will Get Fooled Again – Seymour Hersh, Welt, and the Khan Sheikhoun Chemical Attack

June 25, 2017
Eliot Higgins

https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2017/06/25/will-get-fooled-seymour-hersh-welt-khan-sheikhoun-chemical-attack/

On June 25th 2017 the German newspaper, Welt, published the latest piece by Seymour Hersh, countering the “mainstream” narrative around the April 4th 2017 Khan Sheikhoun chemical attack in Syria. The attack, where Sarin was allegedly used against the local population, dropped in a bomb by the Syrian Air Force, resulted in President Trump taking the decision to launch cruise missiles at a Syrian airbase.

As with his other recent articles, Hersh presented another version of events, claiming the established narrative was wrong. And, as with those other recent articles, Hersh based his case on a tiny number of anonymous sources, presented no other evidence to support his case, and ignored or dismissed evidence that countered the alternative narrative he was trying to build.

This isn’t the first chemical attack in Syria which Hersh has presented a counter-narrative for, based on a handful of anonymous sources. In his lengthy articles for the London Review of Books, “Whose sarin?” and “The Red Line and the Rat Line”, Hersh made the case that the August 21st 2013 Sarin attack in Damascus was in fact a false flag attack intended to draw the US into the conflict with Syria. This claim fell apart under real scrutiny, and relied heavily on ignoring much of the evidence around the attacks, an ignorance of the complexities of producing and transporting Sarin, and a lack of understanding about facts firmly established about the attacks.

With Hersh’s latest article, this pattern of behaviour is repeated. The vast majority of the article appears to be based on an anonymous source, described as “a senior adviser to the American intelligence community, who has served in senior positions in the Defense Department and Central Intelligence Agency”. As with his earlier articles, details of the attack as described by his source flies in the face of all other evidence presented by a range of other sources.

So what scenario does Hersh’s source describe, and how does this contradict other claims? Hersh claims that “Syrians had targeted a jihadist meeting site on April 4 using a Russian-supplied guided bomb equipped with conventional explosives”, and this attack resulted in the release of chemicals, including chlorine, but not Sarin, that produced the mass casualty event seen on April 4th. Hersh’s source is able to provide a great deal of information about the target, claiming intel on the location was shared with the Americans ahead of the attack.

Hersh’s source describes the building as a “two-story cinder-block building in the northern part of town”, with a basement containing “rockets, weapons and ammunition, as well as products that could be distributed for free to the community, among them medicines and chlorine-based decontaminants for cleansing the bodies of the dead before burial”. According to Hersh’s source, the floor above was “an established meeting place” and “a long-time facility that would have had security, weapons, communications, files and a map center.”

The source goes on to claim that Russia had been watching the location carefully, establishing its use as a Jihadi meeting place, and watching the location with a “drone for days”, confirming its use and the activity around the building. According to the source the target was then hit at 6:55am on April 4th, and a Bomb Damage Assessment by the US military determined that a Syrian 500lb bomb “triggered a series of secondary explosions that could have generated a huge toxic cloud that began to spread over the town, formed by the release of the fertilizers, disinfectants and other goods stored in the basement, its effect magnified by the dense morning air, which trapped the fumes close to the ground.”

At this point it’s worth taking a look at the claims the Syrian and Russian governments made in response to accusations that Syria had dropped Sarin on Khan Sheikhoun. Walid Muallem, Syria’s Foreign Minister, stated in a press conference two days after the attack that the first air raid was conducted at 8:30am local time, attacking “an arms depot belonging to al-Nusra Front chemical weapons”. It was noted by observers at the time the time of the claimed attack was hours after the first reports of casualties came in, and both contradicts the 6:55am stated by Hersh’s source, and the slightly earlier time provided by the Pentagon, approximately between 6:37am and 6:46am local time. Not only that, but the Syrian Foreign Minister also described the target as a chemical weapons arm depot, not a meeting place that stored other items in the basement.

Russia also published their own claims about the attack. Sputnik reported the following:

“According to Konashenkov, on Tuesday “from 11.30 to 12.30, local time, [8.30 to 9.30 GMT] Syrian aircraft conducted an airstrike in the eastern outskirts of Khan Shaykhun on a large warehouse of ammunition of terrorists and the mass of military equipment”.

Konashenkov said that from this warehouse, chemical weapons’ ammunition was delivered to Iraq by militants.

Konashenkov added that there were workshops for manufacturing bombs, stuffed with poisonous substances, on the territory of this warehouse. He noted that these munitions with toxic substances were also used by militants in Syria’s Aleppo.”

These claims are consistent with the claims of their Syrian ally, but not the claims made by Hersh and his source. In the face of allegations of chemical weapon use neither Russia nor Syria mention targeting “a jihadist meeting site”, and described the location as a “large warehouse” on the “eastern outskirts of Khan Shaykhun”, not a “two-story cinder-block building in the northern part of town” with “security, weapons, communications, files and a map center.” In fact, the only thing Hersh’s account and the Russian and Syria account agrees on is it was a Syrian aircraft which conducted the attack.

In addition to this, neither Syria nor Russia presented any evidence to support their claim. If, as Hersh claims, Russia had been observing the site with a “drone for days” then they would not only have the precise location of the site, but footage of the site. However, both Syria and Russia have failed to make any imagery of the site public, nor have they provided any specific details about the location of the site. If they had, it would be possible to easily check if the location had been bombed on Terraserver, which has satellite imagery of Khan Sheikhoun before and after the date of attack. In common with Russia and Syria, Hersh’s source seems unable to provide the exact location of the attack, despite his apparent in depth knowledge of the attack.

Ignoring the fact that the version of events presented by Hersh runs counter to narratives produced by all sides, the claims around the chemical exposure are also worth examining. Hersh refers to “a Bomb Damage Assessment (BDA) by the U.S. military” of the strike, which he provides no source for, which supposedly states “a series of secondary explosions that could have generated a huge toxic cloud that began to spread over the town, formed by the release of the fertilizers, disinfectants and other goods stored in the basement”. He describes the symptoms seen in victims as “consistent with the release of a mixture of chemicals, including chlorine and the organophosphates used in many fertilizers, which can cause neurotoxic effects similar to those of sarin.” Here it is worth pointing out that organophosphates are used as pesticides, not fertilizers, and it’s unclear if this error is from Hersh himself or his anonymous source. This is not the only factual error in the report, with Hersh stating an SU-24 was used in the attack, not an SU-22 as claimed by every other source, including the US government.

Despite Hersh’s apparent belief Sarin was not used in the attack, other sources disagree, not least the OPCW (Organisation For The Prohibition Of Chemical Weapons), tasked to investigate the attack. On April 19th 2017 the OPCW published a statement by Director-General, Ambassador Ahmet Üzümcü describing the results of the analysis of samples taken from victims of the attack, both living and dead, stating:

“The results of these analyses from four OPCW designated laboratories indicate exposure to Sarin or a Sarin-like substance. While further details of the laboratory analyses will follow, the analytical results already obtained are incontrovertible.”

A later report from the OPCW, dated May 19th, provided further analysis of samples from the site, including dead animals recovered from the site, and environmental samples. Signs of Sarin or Sarin-like substances were detected in many samples, as well as Sarin degradation products, and at least two samples which state Sarin itself was detected.

Annex 3 of the May 19th OPCW report

These results are also consistent with intelligence published by the French government, which describes the following:

“The analyses carried out by French experts on the environmental samples collected at one of the impact points of the chemical attack at Khan Sheikhoun on 4 April 2017 reveal the presence of sarin, of a specific secondary product (diisopropyl methylphosphonate – DIMP) formed during synthesis of sarin from isopropanol and DF (methylphosphonyl difluoride), and hexamine. Analysis of biomedical samples also shows that a victim of the Khan Sheikhoun attack, a sample of whose blood was taken in Syria on the very day of the attack, was exposed to sarin.”

Based on this and other reports, multiple sources state Sarin was used in the attack, despite Hersh’s narrative of an accidental chemical release. The fact Hersh does not refer to any of these reports seems to, at best, overlook key information about the nature of the attack, and at worst, purposely ignores information that contradicts the narrative he’s attempting to build.

Going back to the attack site, this ignoring or ignorance of contradictory information is also apparent. Open source material from the day of the attack, as well as satellite imagery analysis by various sources (including this excellent piece by the New York Times) consistently point to the same impact sites, one of which is the specific crater claimed to be the source of Sarin released on the day of the attack. None of these point to the structure described by Hersh, nor is there any evidence of a site as described by Hersh being attacked. Journalists visited the town soon after the attack, and made no mention of the site as described by Hersh.

One might argue that all the individuals and groups on the ground, all the doctors treating the victims, and every single person spoken to by the journalists visiting the site failed to mention the site described by Hersh, but there’s a very simple way to clear up this matter. Anyone can access satellite imagery of the town before and after the date of the attack thanks to the imagery available on Terraserver, all Hersh’s source has to do is provide the coordinates of the building attacked and anyone with an internet connection will be able to look at that exact location, and see the destroyed building. A simple way for both Hersh and Welt to preserve their reputations.

Postol is controversial too and has come up before.

As far as I am concerned, he went after the writer and didn’t address the argument. He also doesn’t address the fact that Hirsch also denied in 2013 that Syria was using sarin, yet those incidents led to the Syrians publicly agreeing to destroy their nerve gas weapons.

This looks like it;s devolving into one of those left v. left things that happens. For example the Counter-Punch people declaring Juan Cole consulted for the CIA.

Well, you said you liked the fact Cole had connections with the CIA. Do you give Hersh the same deference? 🙂

Lot to clear up here. What I liked when I fell for the (misreported) idea that he was a consultant for the CIA was that THEY were getting info from HIM. That is, knowledge, info, insight, expertize. I would rather have that then political appointees makin up stuff that suits an agenda.

In this case, with Hirsh, it’s the other way around. Normally, right, you say you don’t trust the CIA. I normally say they are not a unitary thing. So it did not surprise me that one clique in the CIA is aghast at Trump’s ignorance.

But there are threads to this story that are not being addressed. So for example at one point the Russian story was that there was sarin present because the Syrians had bombed a jihadi facility that had sarin in it. So the Russians were basically saying, yeah there was sarin, but it didn’t come from the Syrians. Now the story is, well no there was no sarin. That’s just one example of all the inconsistencies that are out there.

There are several accounts of this that say no we tested and YES there was sarin.

Meanwhile Hirsch famously denied the Syrians were using sarin in 2013, when we know they were–they even publicly stated they would dismantle that weapons program, with external oversight. (All very similar to Hussein.)

In terms of your other points.

1. I don’t buy the narrative that in doing this Asad would be desperate etc. I am not sure where that narrative comes from, but it never struck me as real. He uses chemical weapons already and would just add sarin to the list for the same reasons…that he is showing his enemies are simply not safe. It’s the same logic the Saudis use in Yemen—they make war on the population to (presumably) undermine confidence that they can be opposed. (Or that’s the intent. It’s not working in Yemen either.) Asad doesn’t do this not out of desperation, but with a strong Russian presence essentially making him immune, out of impunity. He has the impunity, is ruthless, and shielded from any effects. He does not worry about consequences. There won’t be any.

2. Putin is deranged, but not in the ways you imply. But that’s not relevant. There are no consequences for either Asad or Putin for doing this. So if Putin was even involved, it just looks like cold calculation on his part.

3. Hirsch has been wrong before and on the same issue—he denied the Syrians used sarin in 2013. In terms of his investigatory skills, he didn’t use those. This is not a full blooded real wide investigation—he reports on the views of a couple of sources. For example he never even addresses the fact that the French and Turks and OPCW (Organisation For The Prohibition Of Chemical Weapons) did find evidence of sarin. Can someone like Hirsch be wrong? Well sure they CAN. Is he right or wrong this time? Well there are conflicting accounts and he is just one person in that mix.

4. First, we don’t know the number…who knows if it’s significant. Second, we get one account among many (from people you say you normally don’t trust) and that looks to me like it could mean there’s actually division within the particular agencies involved (which again doesn’t surprise me, they are never one homogenous thing). Did we get an inside report on what the consensus is among the intel professionals? No, so far it looks like a dissenting position. One which apparently only Hirsch has heard.

None of those points hold up enough for me to dismiss the idea that there are conflicting stories so far.

What am I accusing YOU of? Buying into one of the narratives. Which isn’t an “accusation.” This happens all the time with complex and shadowy issues like this. I see on your part a sincere and honest claim that one set of accounts is more valid. Well it’s the same for me, just from a different side of this. I just have all sorts of hesitations about that narrative, for what seem to me anyway to be good reasons.

Trump accuses Syria of Planning Gas attack as Haley attacks Russia, Iran

Juan Cole

https://www.juancole.com/2017/06/accuses-planning-attacks.html

The Trump administration is making noise about striking Syria, on the grounds that Damascus is planning to use poison gas again.
Trump’s Neoconservative ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, tweeted:

Nikki Haley ✔ @nikkihaley
Any further attacks done to the people of Syria will be blamed on Assad, but also on Russia & Iran who support him killing his own people.

The statement is said to be from “the White House” but is otherwise not characterized. Why does the White House think this? Why did Trump himself not tweet about it if it is coming from him?
The last time Syria stood accused of using poison gas on a rebel population, killing some 70 civilians, Trump fired 59 Tomahawk missiles at the air base from which the poison-bearing aircraft took off, on April 6. It was a largely symbolic action, having no real impact on the regime or even the operation of the Shu`ayrat air base.
The odd thing about the breathless announcement late Monday was that earlier that day Secretary of State Rex Tillerson phoned his Russian opposite number, Sergei Lavrov to discuss tamping down the violence in Syria. They want to extend the current ceasefire in some areas, which did in fact lead to less violence in the “deconfliction zones.
As for the substance, it is true that the Syrian Arab Army sometimes uses chemical weapons on the battlefield. As I understand it, many units of the army have chem auxiliaries for those instances where they might be overrun by the enemy. The army at one point was down to 35,000 troops, from a peak of 300,000 before the civil war. It is evil and against international law, but some of their officers think the only way to level the playing field is to release some gas. The Syrian Conquest Front, formerly the Nusra Front, which held the territory where the early April incident took place, is not known (unlike ISIL) have a chem capacity. The Syrian government is.
But so far the chem use by the Syrian Army appears to be occasional and ad hoc and it isn’t the sort of thing the White House could have gained intelligence about beforehand.
It is almost as if there were a faction of hawks around Trump who wanted to derail any Tillerson-Lavrov cooperation and maintain a condition of undeclared war with Russia and Iran. We haven’t heard a lot from CIA director Mike Pompeo, unlike most others in the Trump cabinet. But if I had to guess who is behind Monday’s “statement” . . .

wv wrote:

my reading is that some sources suggested sarin OR a ‘sarin-like substance’.

Just some stuff on that. It has to do with the chemical decomposition of nerve agents after exposure. They decay to the same kinds of chemicals, but the original could be harder to name. Regardless, it’s still nerve gas–nothing else has the same chemical decomposition signature. In a way it’s like asking which version of plastic explosive was used in a bomb. Well if all plastic explosives have the same decomposition signature and nothing else in existence does, then it’s a matter of which variation, not whether or not it WAS a plastic explosive. Sarin has cousins, and they;’re all banned. Saying “sarin like” is just a way of stating that the chemical signatures most likely point to sarin. This is strengthened by the fact that some actual, direct sarin was found, and not just its decomposed residues left over from environmental and bio-chemical interaction.

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https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2017/04/20/anatomy-sarin-bomb-explosion-part-ii/

Dan Kaszeta (Dan is the managing director of Strongpoint Security Ltd, and lives and works in London, UK. He has 26 years experience in CBRN response, security, and antiterrorism.)

The statement “sarin or sarin-like substance” did not raise flags in my head. Let me take a step back: the molecules sarin, soman, cyclosarin, thiosarin, thiosoman, and chlorosarin are different nerve agents that all possess a common molecular fragment. They decompose to the same molecule, methylphosphonic acid, from environmental exposure or in the body. They have different physical properties and somewhat different potencies, but in many regards they “look” the same to an analytical chemist.

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Juan Cole 2017.06.27 09:41
https://www.juancole.com/2017/06/accuses-planning-attacks.html

Am a huge fan of Sy Hersh; on this we disagree.

Assad would not be insane to launch chem attacks. He has been doing small ones here an there all along when his troops got in trouble. It is strategic and makes perfect sense (however morally vile and illegal it is) for a small army trying to level the playing field. Saddam did it at the Iranian front. Also in that war, there were regime apologists who tried to blame Iran itself, which is ridiculous. I’m not saying you are an apologist; but there are Baath apologists being paid to muddy the waters and you are falling for fake news. All of the chem attacks in Syria have occurred in rebel-held territory. Are they gassing themselves? The people giving them shelter? It is ridiculous. Plus they don’t have the technical expertise to do it, whereas the regime is known to retain stockpiles.

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https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2017/06/25/will-get-fooled-seymour-hersh-welt-khan-sheikhoun-chemical-attack/

On April 19th 2017 the OPCW published a statement by Director-General, Ambassador Ahmet Üzümcü describing the results of the analysis of samples taken from victims of the attack, both living and dead, stating:

“The results of these analyses from four OPCW designated laboratories indicate exposure to Sarin or a Sarin-like substance. While further details of the laboratory analyses will follow, the analytical results already obtained are incontrovertible.”

A later report from the OPCW, dated May 19th, provided further analysis of samples from the site, including dead animals recovered from the site, and environmental samples. Signs of Sarin or Sarin-like substances were detected in many samples, as well as Sarin degradation products, and at least two samples which state Sarin itself was detected.

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