Blaming Syria: A Rush to Judgement?

One of the things that makes Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s show must-see television is Carlson’s willingness to push back on narratives that go unquestioned in not just the mainstream media, but even within conservative circles. He took that approach on Monday night when you would have had to search high and low to find anyone seriously questioning the fact that Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad was responsible for a deadly chemical attack on civilians in Douma. The Trump administration is clearly moving forward as though the evidence is forgone. The only dissent comes from Russian-influenced outlets like RT, and, well, that’s about where you would expect to find an alternative view.

But just because everyone believes something to be true, does that make it true?

That was the question Carlson raised as he explored the possibility that, in Syria, not everything is always as it seems.

“Universal bipartisan agreement on anything is usually the first sign that something deeply unwise is about to happen,” Carlson said. “If only because there is nobody left to ask skeptical questions. And we should be skeptical of this. Starting with the poison gas attack itself. All the geniuses tell us that Assad killed those children, but do they really know that? Of course they don’t really know – they are making it up. They have no real idea what happened.

“Actually, both sides in the Syrian civil war possess chemical weapons,” he noted. “How would it benefit Assad using chlorine gas last weekend? Well it, wouldn’t. Assad’s forces have been winning the war in Syria. The administration just announced its plans to pull American troops out of Syria. Having vanquished ISIS. That’s good news for Assad. And about the only thing he could do to reverse it and hurt himself would be to use poison gas against children. Well, did he it anyway, they tell us. Is he that evil?”

That question is answered with an eyeroll by experts in foreign policy. Of course he’s that evil, Tucker! Haven’t you been paying attention?

But that’s part of the problem, see, because Carlson has been paying all too much attention. He knows that there are very powerful foreign policy forces that do NOT want Trump to go through with a withdrawal from Syria. Would it be above those forces to orchestrate an attack like this and then lay the blame on Assad? We don’t know. But Carlson is right that this scenario unfolded similarly last April, with the international community at the time blaming the Assad regime despite repeated denials. However, as he pointed out on the show, “months ago the secretary of defense admitted that actually we still have no proof that Assad used sarin gas.”

You certainly don’t have to believe that the Pentagon or any other U.S.-affiliated entity willfully killed civilians in an effort to “false flag” the president into escalating the war in Syria. All you need to wonder is whether or not we have a full picture of what’s going on in this civil war, and there’s not an intelligence official in Washington who can say yes to that question with a straight face.

We’re not saying Assad did or didn’t preside over this attack. But there’s no question that something about this is suspicious.