Syrian Ultimatum

Here's a great post by Omri at Mere Rhetoric:

Syria Gives Israel Ultimatum. Isn't That Cute?

For a man who's air force would last about 10 seconds against the IAF, jerkoff over here is awful bold:

Syrian President Bashar Assad continued to give clashing messages to the international community with an announcement that he was ready to negotiate with Israel. In an interview with Spanish newspaper El-Pais on Saturday, the president said it would take six months to reach an agreement with Israel. If a peace agreement would not be reached, he added, war would break out.

Bashar Assad has the same ability to unilaterally launch an international conflict that we have to launch an international conflict. If Tehran wants a war in six months, they will activate Hezbollah and there will be a war in six months. What's that you say? The UN will make sure that Hezbollah is unable to launch a war in six months (actually, obviously you didn't say that since you read this blog - but let's pretend that you did). Actually, not so much with the Hezbollah not being able to start a war thing:

Only two days after Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon, Hizbullah leaders announce that their weapons threatening Israel will remain along the border. Muhammad Fanish, a minister representing Hizbullah in the Lebanese government, announced that the organization "will never give up its arms nor its role of fighting the occupation." According to him, Hizbullah won't abandon its role "as long as there is occupation of even one foot of our land." Fanish, energy and water minister in the Lebanese government, spoke Monday at a festive meal breaking the Ramadan fast.

How very festive. "OK, good day of repentance and making peace everybody. Now let's celebrate murdering some Israeli civilians, huh? How about a rousing chorus!" And here's one last block quote from this morning's news - this time that Syria and Iran helped Hezbollah during the war:

During the fighting in Lebanon Hezbollah received direct intelligence support from Syria, using data collected by listening posts jointly manned by Russian and Syrian crews. Hezbollah was also fed intelligence from new listening posts built on the Syrian side of the Golan Heights, which are operated jointly with Iran. This information was confirmed in recent reports by the defense journal Jane's. Syria's centrality to the collection and transfer of intelligence to Hezbollah is based on separate agreements Damascus signed with Moscow and Tehran on intelligence cooperation.

What bothers be more than the Syrian/Iranian participation is the active assistance to Hezbollah by Russia. Additionally, what bothers me tactically about the Syrian puffed chest is not their puny air force, but their chemically tipped rockets.