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Exclusive: The New York Times and other major media take ruled out whatever farther skepticism toward the U.Due south. government's claim that Syrian President Assad dropped a sarin bomb on a boondocks in Idlib province, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry

In the former days of journalism, we were taught that there were nearly always two sides to a story, if non more sides than that. Indeed, part of the professional challenge of journalism was to sort out conflicting facts on a complicated topic. Often we establish that the initial impression of a story was wrong once we understood the more nuanced reality.

New York Times building in New York Metropolis. (Photograph from Wikipedia)

Today, however, particularly on foreign policy problems, the major U.S. news outlets, such equally The New York Times and The Washington Post, apparently believe there is only i side to a story, the i espoused by the U.South. government or more generically the Establishment.

Any other interpretation of a set up of facts gets dismissed as "fringe" or "fake news" even if there are obvious holes in the official story and a lack of verifiable proof to support the mainstream groupthink. Very quickly, culling explanations are cast bated while ridicule is heaped on those who disagree.

So, for instance, The New York Times will no longer permit any doubt to creep in about its certainty that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad intentionally dropped a sarin bomb on the remote rebel-held town of Khan Sheikhoun in Idlib province in northern Syria on Apr 4.

A mocking article by the Times' Jim Rutenberg on Mon displayed the Times' rejection of any intellectual marvel regarding the U.S. government'south claims that were cited by President Trump as justification for his April 6 missile strike against a Syrian military airbase. The attack killed several soldiers and 9 civilians including 4 children, according to Syrian press reports.

Rutenberg traveled to Moscow with the clear intention of mocking the Russian news media for its "fake news" in contrast to The New York Times, which holds itself out every bit the world's premier guardian of "the truth." Rather than deal with the difficulty of assessing what happened in Khan Sheikhoun, which is controlled by Al Qaeda'southward Syrian affiliate and where information therefore should exist regarded equally highly doubtable, Rutenberg simply assessed that the conventional wisdom in the West must be correct.

To discredit any doubters, Rutenberg associated them with one of the wackier conspiracy theories of radio personality Alex Jones, another version of the Times' recent troubling reliance on McCarthyistic logical fallacies, not just applying guilt past association but refuting reasonable skepticism by tying it to someone who in an entirely different context expressed unreasonable skepticism.

Rutenberg wrote: "As soon every bit I turned on a goggle box hither I wondered if I had arrived through an alt-correct wormhole. Back in the States, the prevailing notion in the news was that Mr. Assad had indeed been responsible for the chemical strike. There was some 'reportage' from sources like the conspiracy theorist and radio host Alex Jones — best known for suggesting that the Sandy Claw school massacre was staged — that the chemical set on was a 'false flag' functioning by terrorist rebel groups to goad the United states into attacking Mr. Assad. But that was a view from the [U.S.] fringe. Here in Russia, it was the ascendant theme throughout the overwhelmingly country-controlled mainstream media."

Ergo, in Rutenberg'southward sophistry, the "prevailing notion in the [U.S.] news" must exist accepted every bit true, regardless of the checky history of such confidence in the past, i.e., the "prevailing notion" that Saddam Hussein was hiding WMD in Iraq in 2003. Today, to close downwards any serious evaluation of the latest WMD claims well-nigh Syria just say: "Alex Jones."

Thus, any testify that the April 4 incident might have been staged or might have resulted from an accidental release of Al Qaeda-controlled chemicals must be dismissed every bit something on par with believing the wildest of silly conspiracy theories. (Indeed, ane of the reasons that I hate conspiracy theories is that they often reject hard evidence in favor of fanciful speculation, which then can be used, in exactly the way that Rutenberg did, to undermine serious efforts to sort through conflicting accounts and questionable show in other cases.)

Culling Explanations

In the case of the April 4 incident, there were several culling explanations that deserved serious attention, including the possibility that Al Qaeda had staged the result, possibly sacrificing innocent civilians in an effort to fob President Trump into reversing his administration's recent renunciation of the U.S. goal of "authorities alter" in Syria.

A center-rending propaganda image designed to justify a major U.South. armed forces operation inside Syria against the Syrian war machine.

This notion is not equally nutty as Rutenberg pretends. For example, United Nations investigators received testimonies from Syrian eyewitnesses regarding another attempt past Al Qaeda-affiliated jihadists and their "rescue" teams to stage a chlorine assault in the town of Al-Tamanah on the dark of April 29-thirty, 2014, and then spread word of the artificial attack through social media.

"7 witnesses stated that frequent alerts [most an imminent chlorine weapons attack past the government] had been issued, merely in fact no incidents with chemicals took place," the U.Due north. study stated. "While people sought rubber later on the warnings, their homes were looted and rumours spread that the events were existence staged. … [T]hey [these witnesses] had come forward to competition the wide-spread false media reports."

The rebels and their allies also made preposterous claims well-nigh how they knew canisters of chlorine were independent in "butt bombs," by citing the supposedly distinctive sound such chlorine-infused bombs made.

The U.N. report said, "The [rebel-connected] eyewitness, who stated to have been on the roof, said to have heard a helicopter and the 'very loud' audio of a falling barrel. Some interviewees had referred to a singled-out whistling audio of barrels that contain chlorine as they fall. The witness argument could not be corroborated with whatever further information."

Of course, the statement could not be corroborated because it was crazy to believe that people could discern the presence of a chlorine canister inside a "barrel flop" by its "distinct whistling audio."

Still, the U.N. team demanded that the Syrian government provide flying records to support its denial that any of its aircraft were in the air in that vicinity at the time of the set on. The failure of the Syrian government to provide those records of flights that it said did not happen was and so cited by the U.N. investigators as somehow evidence of Syrian guilt, another challenge to rationality, since it would be impossible to produce flight records for flights that didn't happen.

Despite this evidence of a rebel fabrication – and the lack of a Syrian military purpose from using chlorine since information technology almost never kills anyone – the U.N. investigators succumbed to intense career pressure from the Western powers and accepted as true two other unverified rebel claims of chlorine attacks, leading the Western media to written report every bit flat-fact that the Syrian government used chlorine bombs on civilians.

The Dubious Sarin Instance

Besides the dubious chlorine cases – and the evidence of at least ane attempted fabrication – in that location was the infamous sarin assail outside Damascus on Aug. 21, 2013, when there was a similar rush to judgment blaming the Syrian government although later on evidence, including the maximum range of the sarin-carrying missile, pointed to the more than likely guilt of Al Qaeda-connected extremists sacrificing the lives of civilians to accelerate their jihadist cause.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Aug. 30, 2013, claims to have proof that the Syrian government was responsible for a chemic weapons assail on Aug. 21, 2013, but that evidence failed to materialize or was afterward discredited. [State Department photo]

In all these cases, the Times and other Western news outlets behaved as if at that place was simply one acceptable side to the story, the ane that the U.S. government was pushing, i.e., blaming the Syrian government. It didn't matter how implausible the claims were or how unreliable the sources.

In both the Aug. 21, 2013 sarin case and the current Apr 4, 2017 instance, Western officials and media ignored the obvious motives for Al Qaeda to carry out a provocation, foist blame on the government and induce the U.S. to intervene on Al Qaeda'south side.

In August 2013, the Syrian authorities had just welcomed U.Due north. investigators who came to Damascus to investigate government allegations of rebels using chemical weapons confronting regime troops. That the Syrian government would then bear a poison-gas assail inside miles of the hotel where the U.N. investigators were staying and thus divert their attention made no logical sense.

Similarly, in April 2017, the Syrian government was not only prevailing on the battleground simply had just received discussion that the Trump administration had reversed the U.S. policy demanding "regime change" in Damascus. So, the obvious motive to release chemical weapons was with Al Qaeda and its allies, not with the Syrian authorities.

Manufacturing a Motive

The West has struggled to explicate why President Assad would pick that time – and a boondocks of little military value – to drop a sarin bomb. The Times and other mainstream media have suggested that the answer lies in the barbarism and irrationality of Arabs. In that vaguely racist thinking, Assad was flaunting his impunity past dropping sarin in a victory commemoration of sorts, fifty-fifty though the predicable consequence was a U.South. missile attack and Trump reversing once more the U.South. policy to demand Assad's ouster.

Photograph of men in Khan Sheikdoun in Syria, allegedly inside a crater where a sarin-gas flop landed.

On Apr 11, five days after Trump's decision to assault the Syrian airbase, Trump'south White House released a iv-page "intelligence cess" that offered another declared motivation, Khan Sheikhoun's supposed value every bit a staging area for a rebel offensive threatening government infrastructure. Just that offensive had already been beaten back and the boondocks was far from the frontlines.

In other words, there was no coherent motive for Assad to take dropped sarin on this remote town. At that place was, however, a very logical reason for Al Qaeda'southward jihadists to stage a chemical attack and thus bring pressure level on Assad'south government. (There'due south also the possibility of an adventitious release via a conventional authorities bombing of a rebel warehouse or from the rebels mishandling a chemical weapon – although some of the photographic evidence points more toward a staged effect.)

But we're not supposed to enquire these questions – or dubiousness the "evidence" provided by Al Qaeda and its allies – because Alex Jones raised similar questions and Russian news outlets are reporting on this scenario, too.

There's the additional trouble with Rutenberg'due south sophistry: Many of the Apr 4 sarin claims have been debunked by MIT national security and technology expert Theodore Postol, who has issued a series of reports shredding the claims from the White House'southward "intelligence assessment."

Another photograph of the crater containing the alleged canister that supposedly disbursed sarin in Khan Sheikdoun, Syria, on April 4, 2017.

For instance, Postol cited the key photographs showing a supposed sarin canister crumpled inside a crater in a roadway. Postol noted that the canister appeared to be crushed, not exploded, and that the men in the photos inspecting the pigsty were non wearing protective gear that would have been required if in that location actually were sarin in the crater.

All of these anomalies and the problems with "evidence" generated by Al Qaeda and its allies should put the entire meme of the Syrian government using chemical weapons in dubiousness. But Rutenberg is not alone in treating this official groupthink equally apartment-fact.

Iv Pinocchios

Washington Post "fact-checker" Glenn Kessler awarded "four Pinocchios" – reserved for the most egregious lies – to former National Security Adviser Susan Rice for asserting last Jan that the Syrian regime had surrendered all its chemic weapons as part of a 2013 understanding.

Kessler declared: "The reality is that at that place were confirmed chemical weapons attacks past Syria – and that U.S. and international officials had good evidence that Syria had non been completely forthcoming in its declaration [regarding its surrendered chemicals], and peradventure retained sarin and VX nerve amanuensis …. and that the Syrian government still attacked citizens with chemical weapons not covered past the 2013 agreement," i.east., the chlorine cases.

Washington Post'southward "fact-checker" Glenn Kessler. (Photo credit: Singerhmk)

But Kessler has no way of actually knowing what the truth is regarding Syria'south declared chemical weapons employ. He is simply repeating the propagandistic groupthink that has overwhelmed the Syrian crisis. Presumably he would accept given four Pinocchios to anyone who had doubted the 2003 claims about Iraq hiding WMD because all the Of import People "knew" that to be true at the time.

What neither Rutenberg nor Kessler seems willing or capable of addressing is the larger trouble created by the U.S. regime and its NATO allies investing heavily in information warfare or what is sometimes called "strategic communications," claiming that they are defending themselves from Russian "active measures." However, the impact of all these competing psychological operations is to bruise reality.

The function of an honest press corps should be to apply skepticism to all official stories, non acquit h2o for "our side" and decline anything coming from the "other side," which is what The New York Times, The Washington Post and the residuum of the Western mainstream media take washed, peculiarly regarding Heart East policies and now the New Cold War with Russia.

The American people and other news consumers have a right to expect that the Western media volition remember the former adage that there are most always 2 sides to a story. There's likewise the truism that truth often resides not at the surface but is hidden beneath.

Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Printing and Newsweek in the 1980s. You tin can buy his latest book, America'southward Stolen Narrative, either in print here or every bit an eastward-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com).

martinezfonesto.blogspot.com

Source: https://consortiumnews.com/2017/04/18/nyt-mocks-skepticism-on-syria-sarin-claims/

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