When the White House first publicly announced in late April its belief that the Assad regime in Syria had used chemical weapons on its own people, it stressed that this was only a strong suspicion -- not a certainty. Yes, they had blood samples that indicated exposure to deadly sarin gas. But they couldn't say for sure who handled those samples in the two weeks it took to get the blood into Western hands. "The physiological examples are compelling but without being able to determine the chain of custody, that's the key to confirming the use," one unnamed U.S. official told the New York Times earlier this week.
That chain of custody still hasn't been nailed down, an American intelligence source tells The Cable.
[source : Source: U.S. Couldn't Nail Down Chemical Weapons Chain of Custody, The Cable, http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/06/14/us_can_t_nail_down_chemical_weapon_chain_of_custody_but_declared_war_on_assad_anywa, 14th June 2013 (registration required)]
What is being claimed is that, even though the chain of custody cannot be proven, because there are just so many claims of use of sarin and blood samples then there must be some truth to the allegations.
But just how many samples does the USA have? It could be as little as six! From The Cable article I count as little as six samples.
After an alleged chemical attack on the city of Aleppo in March, the U.S. and United States came into possession of at least three physiological samples that tested positive for indicators of sarin gas. Now, Western intelligence services have at least twice that number of blood, urine, and hair samples coming from a variety of battle zones around the country.
"The big thing that changed is an increase in the number of incidents," the source says. "It's impossible that the opposition is faking the stuff in so many instances in so many locations."
And that is the high level of intelligence that the USA has!
No smoke without fire, they are saying.
So just how easy could it be to pull a hoax? Dead easy. Simply provide a few samples, get the rebs to claim they were attacked, and...BINGO! Congratulations! You have just been hoaxed. And your prize is a free delivery of MANPADs an al Qaeda affiliate in Syria of your choice.
Can we be surprised at this low level of proof?
No. Some of the evidence produced to convince us to go to war on Iraq was comical. Never mind Colin Powell at the UN. Much more comical was the taxi driver who claimed he overheard two Iraqi Generals in the back of his taxi discussing Iraq' WMDs! This sarin allegation against Assad is in the same league as that.
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