NP - The NATION (magazine), SYRIA, AND THE TRUTH ABOUT CHEMICAL WEAPONS

[David Morris]

On April 11th 2017, the US National Security Council released a 4-page
reportwhich stated, “The United States is confident that the Syrian regime
conducted a chemical weapons attack, using the nerve agent sarin, against
its own people in the town of Khan Shaykhun in southern Idlib Proince on
April 4, 2017.”  The same day, Secretary of Defense James Mattis declared,
“Last Tuesday on the 4th of April, the Syrian regime attacked its own
people using chemical weapons. I have personally reviewed the intelligence,
and there is no doubt the Syrian regime is responsible for the decision to
attack and for the attack itself.”

Imagine if, after all that, Secretary Mattis stated that “we do not have
evidence” that the Assad regime was responsible for the Khan Shaykhun
attack.  It would be a shocking admission, staggering in its implications.
But Mattis never made such an admission.

Nevertheless, *The Nation* published an article on April 16th 2018 claiming
that he did.  Its claim is indisputably false.  [...]   *The Nation* is
deceiving the public on a matter of the utmost gravity.

The transcript of the February press conference is available for all to
read.

It matters what happened in Khan Shaykhun.  We have abundant evidence,
certified by the UN, that the Assad regime launched a gas attack causing
dozens of men, women, and children to suffer agonizing deaths. The Nation’s
claim encourages readers to think otherwise, but the claim is a
fabrication.  Stephen Shalom (the author of a superb Jacobin article on the
Khan Shaykhun attack) has made the following observation about those who
propagate the James Mattis "no evidence" assertion: “Sometimes, a claim is
so clearly without merit, so obviously ludicrous, that those who promote it
mark themselves, at best, as individuals wholly uninterested in examining
evidence when a dubious claim conforms to their preconceived notions, or,
at worst, as scoundrels.”  The journalistic malpractice of The Nation
insults victims and harms the truth.