With some progress apparently being made in the peace talks, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad says he believes a new constitution could be ready in a matter of weeks and a new unity government, including both the existing government and rebel factions, could be formed with little difficulty.
Convincing the rebels, such as they are, may not be the tough part, however, as the White House was quick to condemn Assad’s comments, and to warn that the US will never recognize any Syrian government that includes Assad.
The US has made regime change their stated goal in Syria for years, and has been bankrolling a series of not particularly successful rebel outfits to try to see that happen. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest insisted a government including Assad is an “obvious” non-starter.
Exactly what the US can do about it is unclear, however, as they already backed the peace process that seems to be leading to that government, and grousing about the Syrian decision to unify after advocating unification talks probably won’t win them a lot of fans.
Assad suggested the new government would include a cabinet primarily of technocrats, and gave the impression that the draft constitution would give way to free elections, something Russia has advocated as a route to ending the civil war, and which the US has insisted they would condition on banning Assad and certain of his allies from participation.
Well, if they support the UK’s expulsion of Cameron, then the rest of the world can give a damn who the USg prefers not to be in someone elses gov’t…or it’d at least be a start.
Americans watch too many of those action movies. There’s always some arch villian, and when the knights in shining camouflage vanquish him, a full fledged, secular, pro-US democracy will automatically spring into place as the brown skinned natives thank their liberators with sweets and garlands.
What a cheek. But it has been the key War Aim of Washington since March 2011. They are however NOT “rebels” but well paid salaried CIA agents – that’s the seculars – and an equally salaried leadership of Washington’s Jihadists. I’m sorry, but I have always said anti-war.com should have taken a stronger line.
Notice how the USA’s installed hacks in Iraq Afghanistan and Libya, have work out– A big disaster called American installed demockracy.
How about real regime change in Israel or USA or England or Turkey or how about France???.
America’s goal for Russia and China ?– WWIII pending
You got it brother.
What happens is a matter of what the Syrian government can negotiate. If the ex-rebels think they can get a better deal by agreeing to keep Assad in power, they will leave the USA out in the cold, and Obama will be humiliated as his former allies do a deal with his enemy. Then maybe the west will finally realise what rubbish the propaganda is that their media has been printing these past 5 years.
US gov’t: Mr. Assad, you just need to step down so we can put in a puppet government. We got rid of Saddam in Iraq and put in a puppet government and look at how well it is doing today! You can have the same for your own country! We promise, it is for the good of your people!
The cessation of the civil war in Syria, except for Daesh, is far more important for its residents than whether Mr. Assad will or will not be allowed to participate in Syria’s future. Allowing the current killing and people flight to go on by nixing any diplomatic solution proposed by President Assad, even a partial one, is outright immoral.
Americans, don’t look to Obama to prevent war again. The hawks were snookered once already when Obama and Putin engineered a deal with Assad which satisfied Obama’s red line speech and made a US led war impossible. They won’t be fooled again. And there is just no way that the next president, whether Clinton or Trump, is going to have any interest in preventing the US planned war with Syria. And also don’t expect the new administration to have any interest in the least on stopping the planned war with Iran.
luv from Canada
“the US will never recognize any Syrian government that includes Assad.”
Who the fvck cares what those a$$holes think. Time for the States to get their nose out of international politics and start looking after their own country as it is falling apart and Americans are starting to wake up and realize it’s not all sunshine and roses.
Notice how when Crimea held a democratic referendum to leave Ukraine the US rejected that outcome. Ditto for when Assad won the last Syrian election. Next time the US government says ANYTHING about ‘upholding freedom and democracy’ I will seriously projectile vomit…
Previous electoral results for Assad and his father:
https://redpill.me/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/CWj5WT_VAAAxZwC.png-large-300×239.png
The results claim that 100% to 99% supported Assad but this was contradicted by a survey from Syrian refugees in Germany. A majority of them does not like Assad and blamed Assad for the Syrian Civil War. This is more than the people who blamed the Islamic State. However, this does not mean that they accept the Islamic State either.
Assad lied about denying if the torture and murder of detainees. Assad lied about the use of Barrel bombs even though there is video footage of helicopters dropping it. Putin lied of not using cluster bombs even though there is video footage and pictures of unexploded bomblets from cluster bombs. If he lies about this then he might also lie about the election results.
Assad’s government shot peaceful protesters. Assad’s government shot peaceful Kurdish protests; Kurds are denied some rights like having their language banned. It attacked two prominent members of the Kurdish Future Movement Party; assassinating one and beating up one. The Assad government also detains allegedly those who oppose the regime or people are insufficiently loyal to it and some of them are tortured, raped and killed. Relatives of the dead detainees have identified them as everything from civilian activists, to journalists, to bloggers who blog against Assad to a teenager whose crime was listening to anti-Assad music. As woman was tortured and beaten up for having a voice recorder. There are 50,000 detainees at any one time and thousands have been killed. The Assad army executed captured soldiers and civilians. The Assad army, with the help of foreign pro-Assad militias, have committed sectarian massacres against civilians, for example, the Bayda and Baniyas massacres where they killed up to hundreds of people, including entire families.
Sources are here: https://redpill.me/articles/assad-is-a-brutal-puppet-state/
Right on cue, US state department war apologists trying to justify their arming and funding of cannibal jihadis in Syria. Too bad Pentagon documents already reveal how the US government created ISIS:
“The newly declassified DIA document from 2012 confirms that the main component of the anti-Assad rebel forces by this time comprised Islamist insurgents affiliated to groups that would lead to the emergence of ISIS. Despite this, these groups were to continue receiving support from Western militaries and their regional allies.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-05-23/secret-pentagon-report-reveals-us-created-isis-tool-overthrow-syrias-president-assad
I’m against overthrowing Assad. My sources of women begin raped and tortured for having a voice recorder and not being loyal enough to the Syrian government are from actual news articles. This information is not from human rights organizations which may be biased.
“…human rights organizations which may be biased.” You mean biased in favor of human rights?
Many of the people here on antiwar.com accuse human rights organizations to be biased in favor of the rebels. I was just saying that a lot of my sources were from actual news articles rather than human rights organizations.
Ok then, fair enough. But I do believe a lot of those so-called “human rights organizations” are funded by the US (and other anti-Assad) governments. If the U.S. has been covertly providing lethal weaponry for several years now to rebels in Syria, I think they have most certainly been creating their own “human rights organizations” to spout pro-US propaganda.
In the last election, most western countries didn’t even allow Syrian refugees to vote at the Syrian embassy in their respective countries.
Can anyone point out for the world, where, within the body of the US CONstitution where it grants the authority for the US Government to interfere with any foreign government. I can’t locate that part!
Right to huff ‘n puff. Give America the right to warn. Give obummer the privilege to save his face.
What if the US just minded it’s own business for a change ? If they would spend as much time fixing their own messed up country as they do in meddling in others’ things would be dramatically different at home.