Friday, April 13, 2018

why haven't we heard about this?

This morning's London Times leads with a story about a joint British/US task force headed to Syria. Lede: 'The largest US air and naval strike force since the 2003 Iraq war was heading towards Syria last night as Theresa May won the backing of the cabinet to join in military action. US-led strikes after the suspected chemical weapon attack in Douma which left as many as 40 people dead are expected within the next three days."

Later in the story: "The US is amassing ten warships and two submarines in the Mediterranean and Gulf region. The mobilisation will give Mr. Trump the option for a significant military campaign against Assad. The USS Donald Cook, a guided missile destroyer with up to 60 Tomahawk missiles, is already within range. Three other destroyers are also close by. In addition, the USS Harry S. Truman, a nuclear-powered carrier with 90 aircraft and five escort ships, which set sail from Norfolk, Virginia on Wednesday, could be included in any action by the end of the week. ... The fallout from the Douma attack has the most dangerous standoff between Russia and the West of modern times."

I'm a news junkie. NOT ONE OF MY US NEWS FEEDS HAS ANYTHING ABOUT THIS. Why do I have to be in London to find out we may be heading into war with Russian and Iran in Syria? Is the American press focused so myopically on Trump's twitter feed that they can't see a major military operation underway? If it were one of the British tabloids, I'd figure it was just typical hype, but The Times of London?

If my head weren't so stopped up with this cold, I would be seriously freaking out right now.

3 comments:

  1. That is truly amazing that we have not heard a word about this! How can that be? And it's pretty terrifying.

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  2. I suspect that we didn't hear about it because it was supposed to be a military secret. The US didn't want to broadcast its plans to attack an enemy. We have quite a few enemies to worry about, come to think of it.

    I looked for some news of this earlier today and found none but this just came along:

    https://www.opb.org/news/article/npr-us-launches-attacks-on-syria/

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  3. Sadly, the Times of London ain't what it used to be, having been purchased by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp in 1981. It's become a sensationalist rag.

    David K.

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