The Syrian Sarin Gas Scam: The Threatened US Missile Attack On Syria Was Based On Evidence Known To Be Flimsy - And Most of the Media Failed Us Again

Seymour Hersh appearing on DemocracyNow, December 9,
2013. (Screen Capture)

This week, famed investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, disseminated an article on the August sarin gas attack in Syria. He was forced to publish the article in a relatively obscure publication, the London Review of Books, because the Washington Post refused to publish it. In the article, Hersh claimed his sources within the military and the Obama Administration had serious doubts about the role of the Syrian government in the Sarin attack, but that the Obama Administration "cherry picked" the "evidence" it presented to the world in order to justify a missile attack on Syria. Hersh was not the first one to raise a questions about the Obama Administration's evidence of the Syrian government's involvement in the gas attack.  During the peak of the crisis journalist Robert Fisk raised questions, citing sources within the United Nations.  Unlike Hersh, however, Fisk didn't wait until everything 'blew over' before he went public with the misgivings of establishment insiders.

By Ronald David Jackson
Hersh is now making the same argument that other, more courageous souls made back in early September: that the "evidence" for a Syrian government role in the attack was so shoddy that the US government took the planned missile attack to Congress for approval (Congress balked) because it got cold feet about attacking a government on such flimsy evidence. The Obama Administration was hoping to make Congress an accessory to the crime just in case their "evidence" was later proven to be fraudulent. They wanted to be able to say that "Congress saw our evidence, accepted it, and approved the attack on Syria. So don't blame us." Hersh also suggested that the Obama Administration was relieved when Russia suggested a US attack on Syria could be avoided if Syria would agree to give up its chemical weapons. Perhaps one of the things that frightened the Obama Administration was the fact that former US intelligence professionals were raising questions about the supposed Syrian government sarin attack and were publicly demanding answers.

Rebel Videos: Top - field testing gas on rabbit;
Middle - rebels shown wearing gas masks; Bottom
- lab testing gas on rabbits. These videos were widely
available but most mainstream and progressive
media outlets did not inform the public about them
during the run-up to the threatened US missile
attack on Syria. (Screen captures from rebel videos)

But the Hersh story revealed something far more profound: American journalism, whether we are talking about the mainstream corporate media and much of the so-called "independent" progressive press, remains absolutely unreliable in times of crisis.  It is thoroughly intimidated by power and is paralyzed by the fear of the label "conspiracy theorist." For the most part, America's vaunted "free press" remained silent, even though there was plenty of evidence suggesting that some of the "rebel" factions fighting against the Syrian government were fully capable of launching the sarin gas attack and had plenty of motive to do so. During an interview on Democracy Now, Hersh mentioned a report that the Turkish government had even caught al-Qaeda elements in Turkey with sarin, but that he couldn't confirm the story because aspects of the Turkish government got cold feet and decided to cover the incident up.

RELATED STORY: Syrian Government Sarin Gas Attack Scenario Impossible - Suggests New Study By MIT Professor & Former UN Weapons Inspector: Rockets Used Couldn't Travel Required Distance

The vast majority of the journalists working in mainstream and progressive media ignored the evidence of possible rebel involvement and refused to publish any of it, preferring instead to stand mum as the Obama Administration geared up for war while selling the world a bullshit narrative about Syria's use of weapons of mass destruction. In other words, America's "free press" repeated the very same mistake it made during the run up to America's war on Iraq, a war we now know was based on evidence that was completely and deliberately fabricated.