But Russia Doesn't Kill Humanely, Like We Do

The U.S. Air Force's senior intelligence officer said Thursday that Russia lacked precision-guided weapons for its bombing campaign in Syria and would likely inflict substantial civilian casualties as a result.

  Stripes

Something that NEVER happens when we bomb people.

Lt. Gen. Robert P. Otto, the Air Force's deputy chief of staff for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, told reporters in Washington that it appeared the Russian forces were using "dumb bombs" instead of weapons guided by lasers or satellites.

[...]

"To me, it was representative of what you'd expect from dumb bombs, being dropped from airplanes at medium altitudes, which is not that impressive," Otto told journalists from the Defense Writers Group.

[...]

"I think precision matters," he said. "If they approach this with indiscriminate bombing, then I think it's going to create second or third effects for them." In contrast, Otto said the U.S. military and its allies have been exceptionally cautious in selecting targets in Syria and Iraq, to the point of slowing down their campaign of airstrikes until they can be sure that no civilians are present.

[...]"Our approach has been to be very cautious with the application of force," he said.

Oh, don't even go there. Need a pictorial reminder of "smart" "precision" bombs?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Hold the Presses

UPDATE: From the State Department

Russia Cannot Be Allowed

The U.S. and six other nations backing rebels fighting to oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad called on Russia to cease attacks against the country’s opposition, saying air strikes that have killed civilians risk fueling extremism.

  Bloomberg

Is this The Onion? No...Bloomberg.

A little warning aside:  about all we have left is hope the US government policy-makers don't actually believe their own propaganda.

The air campaign, Russia’s first military foray outside of the former Soviet Union in more than three decades, surprised and angered the U.S. and its allies. [...] The operation also raise the risk of accidents between Russian and U.S. jets, which are sharing airspace as they pursue separate bombing campaigns.

The public opinion in Iraq is that the U.S. has (again) nefarious aims and is neither committed to a united and sovereign Iraq nor to eradicating the Islamic State.

But now Russia offers an alternative. An intelligence operations room was opened in Baghdad in which Iraq, Iran, Syria, Russia and Hizbullah (the 4+1) develop and exchange intelligence about the Islamic State and possible targets for coming attacks. It looks pretty bad for the U.S. to not be trusted enough to take part in it.

But that is not enough yet. After Russia started its anti-terrorist air campaign in Syria yesterday despite U.S. protests it is now setting the mark even higher. Against a onslaught of dumb U.S. propaganda it is expertly trolling the U.S. over its lack of legitimacy.

Sky News Newsdesk @SkyNewsBreak Reuters: Russian foreign ministry says it would consider any request from #Iraq to conduct airstrikes against Islamic State in Iraq

[...]

It is always good to have an alternative when negotiating with a superior partner. Abadi now has one.

[...]

Why rely on the U.S. when all it does, preferring the Kurds and Sunni militia while holding back effective Shia militia, seems to be against a unified Iraq and when the U.S. fight against IS is at maximum halfhearted. But even if [Iraq PM] Abadi will not kick out the U.S. and invite the Russians he can at least use the Russian offer to pressure the U.S. into a different behavior.

[...]

It now seems that every U.S. "ally" on the ground, except the now finally acknowledged CIA trained friends-of-Nusra-and-IS, would prefer to work with Russia instead of working under hapless U.S. policies.

  Moon of Alabama

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:  http://youwillanyway2.blogspot.com/2015/10/hold-presses.html

Even the Geeks Sometimes Have Issues with Social Media

Not as bad as this guy's mistake, perhaps...

Spandex & Molded Rubber Makes Everything Better

Yep

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

And Speaking of David Cameron...

And Britain "proud" to have abolished slavery. Do you get to be proud because you stopped doing something awful you should never have done? And wants to strengthen bonds with Jamaica. The Guardian didn't directly quote this part, but please tell me he didn't use the word "bonds."

He did! How hilariously tone-deaf is that?

  WIIIAI

..but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Barack Obama: Nobel Peace Prize Recipient & Ender of Two Wars

“We’ve ended two wars.” — Barack Obama, July 21, 2015, at a DSCC fundraiser held at a “private residence”

[...]

“His presidency makes a potentially great story: the first African-American in the White House, who helped the country recover from recession and ended two wars.” — Dominic Tierney, The Atlantic, January 15, 2015, “America Will Miss Obama When He’s Gone”

[...]

How do you know when you’re an out-of-control empire? When you keep bombing and deploying soldiers in places where you boast that you’ve ended wars. How do you know you have a hackish propagandist for a president? When you celebrate him for “ending two wars” in the very same places that he keeps bombing.

[...]

Russia today announced that its upper Parliament approved its own imperialistic intervention and bombing campaign inside Syria, and that legislative body was widely (and not inaccurately) derided by U.S. commentators for being what the New York Times called a “rubber stamp.” The Obama administration, by contrast, does not even bother with the empty ritual of Congressional approval for its bombing campaigns; the president proved he is even willing to bomb a country after Congress rejected his authorization to do so, as happened in Libya.

[...]

Whatever else one wants to say about Iraq and Afghanistan, one cannot honestly say that Obama ended the wars in those countries. The U.S. continues to drop bombs on both, deploys soldiers in both, kills civilians in both, and engages in a wide range of overt and covert force, all without a shred of Congressional approval.

  Glen Greenwald

Dare I say Congress wants it that way?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Ball's in Lord Ashcroft's Court

David Cameron has for the first time publicly denied allegations made in a biography written by the former Tory donor Lord Ashcroft that he was involved in a bizarre university club ritual with a dead pig’s head.

  The Guardian

To be fair, it seems the book says the report could be one of "mistaken identity" but it also says there is photographic evidence.  Cameron has raised.  It will take the photos to call.  But I'm guessing we won't see any photos - Cameron waited a long time to deny the allegation, so I'm guessing in that time, he's found the source of those alleged photos, and either they don't exist, or they (or their owner) have been "neutralized" in some fashion.

On the other hand, I'd guess they do - or at least did - exist.  Otherwise, why bring the subject back to the public's attention by denying it now?

The hunt is now on for the Tory MP – an Oxford University contemporary of Cameron – who claimed to the authors of the biography that he had seen photographic evidence of the pig incident.

I think he's already been found.

Aiding and Abetting

In a U-turn at the United Nations Human Rights Council, Western governments dropped plans Wednesday for an international inquiry into human rights violations by all parties in the war in Yemen that has killed thousands of civilians in the last six months.

[...]

That proposal was a follow-up to recommendations by the commissioner, Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein, who detailed in a report this month the heavy civilian loss of life.

[...]

The Dutch resolution also called for the warring parties to allow access to humanitarian groups seeking to deliver aid and to the commercial import of goods like fuel that are needed to keep hospitals running. Deliveries of aid and other goods have been slowed by the coalition’s naval blockade of Yemeni ports.

But in the face of stiff resistance from Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners, and to the dismay of human rights groups, Western governments have accepted a resolution based on a Saudi text that lacks any reference to an independent, international inquiry.

[...]

“The result is a lost opportunity for the council and a huge victory for Saudi Arabia, protecting it from scrutiny over laws of war violations which will probably continue to be committed in Yemen,” said Philippe Dam, deputy director of Human Rights Watch in Geneva.

  

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.