The Shayrat Airfield Link

Idlib CW Massacre 4-4-17: The Shayrat Airfield Link
Adam Larson
April 19, 2017
incomplete - last edits August 7

Note: this should already have been up, but it's only partly up - mostly readable, but rough, and likely to be added to before it's done.  It'll be worth a re-check in a few days.
...

a jet sheltered at Shayrat destroyed in the strike (Sputnik)

Shayrat Airfield in Homs province (Wikimapia) is where President Trump's hammer fell when he saw "baeutiful babies" die on rebel video. Some jets used in Syria's demonized struggle against terrorists were totaled, the airfield was damaged, a reported six soldiers were killed, nine civilians killed by errant missiles, plus injuries and damage. It could have been far worse. 

This was widely-praised, but people are widely stupid. Trump launched this strike in response to an episode he - hopefully - doesn't understand. Because much evidence suggests this was another terrorist crime, where they massacre their hostages and blame the Syrian government (see here for some of the better clues).

The April 11 White House explanatory report, "The Assad Regime's Use of Chemical Weapons on April 4, 2017" (New York Times copy), lays out the questionable basis for the strike. The jet connection is explained so:

Our information indicates that the chemical agent was delivered by regime Su-22 fixed-wing aircraft that took off from the regime-controlled Shayrat airfield. These aircraft were in the vicinity of Khan Shaykhun approximately 20 minutes before reports of the chemical attack began and vacated the area shortly after the attack.

So two jets were overhead at the alleged attack time. This may well be. Implicitly, they dropped bombs at this time, but that's not proven. This is the central question: did any CW released actually come from those jets? The public confidence of any U.S. presidential administration definitely shouldn't be taken as convincing. It's the original reason to blame Syria. If instead some terrorist crime was carried out beneath a passing jet, unconnected to anything it was carrying, clearly it wouldn't be fair to target Syrian forces over it. There are various legal aspects to that, etc. ... but let's get to the meat of the question.

Strikes, Times, Claims

The Russian claim, as reported so far, is dubious - the chemical victims seen on video (around 7-9 am) were affected a poison (not sarin) accidentally spread when a Syrian Air Force strike damaged a terrorist chemical weapons storage depot. The White House report addressed this so:

"...a Syrian military source told Russian state media on April 4 that regime forces had not carried out any airstrike in Khan Shaykhun, contradicting Russia's claim." 

They may have said this to Russian media somewhere, but that means little when they also said to global media that they did, just at noon. Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem said there was at least one attack that day; as CNN reported, he "said the government's first strike happened at 11:30 a.m., about five hours after reports of the chemical attack emerged." Syria says it hit a site at 11:30 - video proves hospital was hit around then, and perhaps another target to the southeast of that was hit earlier (plume analysis unclear so far) 

But if this happened early enough to explain that, it's a strike Syria denied. That's a problem, a disagreement between allies, if that's Russia's real story, and not an unfairly promoted theory. It makes the White House correct, if they had said "had not carried out any aistrikes at the relevant time." This, Syria does deny. Everyone agrees on a noon strike, and the US alleges an earlier strike, so we have two distinct times to consider.

There were some additional words from Moscow about these chemicals being transported to Iraq, apparently a politically oriented message that shouldn't have been stated as literal fact (best read as similar...). Combined, it's an unfortunate answer, and gives the White House and others some basis to claim Russia is trying to "confuse" the issue.

(Update: Russia MoD on Facebook - they seem to be shifting to a no-CW-release explanation, and no longer claiming a Syrian-sparked accident at an unspecified time.)

What Happened?

Let's start by considering the crude but perhaps adequate flight path graphic they provided as proof. (not the clearest version, here cropped a bit).

I'm not sure how to read these track and narrate the shown flight, but ... maybe as said, two jets flew north from Shayat (the southern starting point) and later returned. One jet ... disappeared around the Wadi al-Arab district of Homs city? ignoring that and a few stray returns...) Along the way, this says, one jet passed, it seems, just south of Khan Sheykhoun at one point, and perhaps both of them passed further south at least once. The times given are 6:37 and 6:46 am, local time. (Z = UTC, and Syria is +2 time zones, +DST)

This clashing with Syria's claims has 3 main possibilities - the track of the attack is:
* Honest and accurate: this shows Syrian jets dropping sarin on Khan Sheikhoun, and the government lies when they deny it
* Honest but (fooled?): this shows a reconnaissance flight out of Shayrat that rebels launched a false-flag incident to synchronize with (their hyped "obsevatory" system routinely gives them forewarning of such flights, to time the explosions right - the rest would have to be pre-arranged)
* Dishonest - this shows Syria's noon strike, deliberately falsified to say 6:30

I lean to the middle option.

All evidence indicates there were at least three powerful explosions in Khan Sheikhoun at about this time - some minutes after sunrise at 6:16 as the sun was still low and from the east, three large plumes of smoke, consistent with conventional high explosives, rise above the city, as seen from the north. A jet is possibly heard at the video's start, apparently trailing off (departing). But we don't have proof that any passing jet actually caused these plumes.

Note also, a stout white cloud, not a blast plume at all, is also just rising from near an apparent school just northeast of the tel (the big flat hill in the middle of town). Schools are often taken over by Islamist militant to store weapons, synthesize chemical weapons, and store hostages, among other things.

Then, a sort of fog spreads across the town, likely from that red-circled area, from a spot out in the fields well southwest of city center, and perhaps elsewhere. Wind direction: by records, about left-to-right. By visuals, unclear, maybe the opposite, mixed over time, and roughly still at filming time. Suggested: mild alternating winds shifting gasses back and forth a bit - more in one direction that's not clear yet)

It's not clear this fog is sarin, or whatever people described (mostly as seeming yellow, not white... see below).

Then, between 7:30 and 9 am or so, lots of dead people appeared at rebel collection points, never, in hundreds of cases, seen at the homes they mostly are said to die in. That's odd, and leaves open the possibility that they didn't die in their individual homes... Any link between this and the passing jet is at least as unproven as with the attack plumes.

The White House Crater

The White House cites one particular crater, that's hyped as poisonous, shown off in opposition videos as the main site, where people in paper face masks at best mill about the following day. The crater does appear new-ish, though the scene is ambiguous. The White House convincingly showed by satellite views it wasn't there in late February. But proof is lacking that it was hit on 4 April or, at least, during the alleged jet attack between 6:37 and 6:46.

My graphic above is based on Bellingcat's careful line-of-sight work (from the evidence so far). They have minarets and other features lined up with the apparent filming spot north of town, like I've done before.

The work seems sound and self-evident, so I didn't double-check it. It allows for rough placement of the plumes, as I've done above in pink circles (distance along each line isn't certain). Note: above I label crater in blue and "U.S. pinned site" in yellow. Ignore the yellow: I saw a blob of that color right there in the flight path graphic's little inset. But that was the yellow pin's head, I guess, with its invisible tip pointing to the crater they talk about, or meaning to (might point too far south).

Note in Bellingcat's bottom left view (facing south) there's an added red line to the crater the White House speaks of. I can't prove it yet, but I don't think there's a plume there, at this time. Location: if the above placement isn't exact, this drove view will refine it.

The video never pans far enough to the left to look down that red line of sight. I checked to be sure - see the little panorama inset in the lower left view - that's about as much as they show, its left edge stopping maybe half way to seeing what's above the crater area.

One should think they would pan over to it if it had been stricken, with the most important and also the closest expected blast plume, or sarin cloud, a little further to the left. But after showing the big ones and the white cloud further off, he pans to the other plume worth showing, even further out and to the right. Another video shows that plume in more detail. No one shows a plume above the crater. This suggests there wasn't one yet, but it fails to prove it. Maybe everyone just figured someone else was filming that one, or whatever...

What I'm hoping for now is some rare hidden video Petri Krohn has missed in his huge playlist, that does pan over that area to clarify if there is or isn't a sign of that crater being blown out. Becuase if it happened before or after those two alleged jet passes, we have a big problem with the Trump narrative...


The Sarin Bomb in the Crater
Add May 4: Furthermore , the U.S.-provided flight track of the attack jets shows they never passed directly over Khan Sheikhoun. Carefully laid out so their map matches a satellite view (with cities and highway bends all matching), it's clear the track does what it appears, passing only south of the town, once fairly close, and again further out, as well arcing halfway around to north at that greater distance. The nearest pass, fudged a bit north for a best case scenario, is shown beneatt. (it's not clear if this is the first pass at 6:37 or the second one at 6:46, when the attack allegedly happened. It's also not clear to me which direction if's flying here, east or west.)

So a jet would have to use missiles, all fired off to the north, in order to hit targets in the town, like the famous crater in the north (red circle) from which the sarin was allegedly released. That's a bit over 2 km north of the jet path

That's a problem for Human Rights Watch, who find the remnants inside that crater are "consistent with" a soviet-made air-dropped bomb made for dispersing sarin - KhAB-250. A circular cap is conveniently laying in the crater, and they find it's quite similar to the filling cap to the 250 model. And the bent tube has a vertical green stripe down the seam, whereas the KhAB has two horizontal green stripes around it. Close enough? It lets them make a leading claim of Soviet-supported pro-grade chemical warfare...

These remnants, combined with witness observations, the victims’ symptoms, and the identification of sarin as the chemical used in the attack by the French[1] and Turkish[2] governments and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons,[3] suggest that the Syrian warplane dropped a factory-made sarin bomb. According to open source material, the only Soviet-produced bombs designed specifically to deliver sarin are the KhAB-250 bomb, and its bigger version, the KhAB-500.

Anyway, the KhAB-250, as they note, is an air-dropped bomb. It has no propulsion, and falls straight down, landing just  ahead on the flight track from where it was released (from the initial momentum of the jet), and no more than a couple meters in any other direction due to wind. It won't fly a couple kilometers left or right. So either the U.S. flight track is wrong, or this thing cannot have been dropped as alleged.

IF those are genuine parts of that special, and never-before seen weapon ... it seems the sarin used was some nasty impure kind, maybe to implicate the terrorists? If so, not a good vehicle to use.  Bit it's quite likely a terrorist group stole a few of these from on overrun warehouse, or bought one in the black market, maybe they just planted some mangled remains, or even filled one with their own dirty sarin, after rigging it up to be fired in on a rocket, or from a mortar or hell cannon. To me, and to Petri Krohn, the bent tube jammed in the dirt suggests a fired rocket, with no explosive payload, just lots of force. I can see what HRW and others say about a liquid spilled all around. To me, the pattern of that darker patch, the crater details and cracks in and displacement of the pavement, and the bent fragment, all suggest this rocket thing was fired from the north or N-NW (after burrowing in, the back part bends forward on the flight path with its kinetic energy). It probably did disperse something here that killed that goat, at least. The bulk of the debris was removed since, leaving just the part that looks kind of like a regime sarin bomb.  This deserves an explanation, and some double-checking too, so it might take a while...</end 5/4 add>

<Add June 29> Expanding on the flight path, I finally did a full-path correlation to show the radar track's map is apparently all to scale from takeoff to Khan Sheikhoun. In 3 images, here on Twitter. The town is bigger than I took, but my north-shift was more than adequate.

A more correct line is considerably south of that, roughly as shown below, relative to current placements for all alleged or possible bomb spots, conventional or CW. The opposition sources have always claimed all weapons of both kinds were air-dropped bombs that only fall straight down, not missiles that can be fired at a distance and even change course. The 4 clearly claimed bomb drops are shown here in dark blue. But if the US radar track is to be believed, the jets never passed directly above any of them, nor even close to above them. One is about a kilometer north, and the other three about 3 km north. 

Consider if anything was offset, the jet(s) could have passed over city center. But we see nothing off, and this arc around the town makes clearer more sense than a pass right over and an arc way to the north or south. If anything, I'd say it's shifted a bit north, as that south pass is much closer than the rest of the arc. But separately, I located the mysterious source of  the southwest area fog field, and it was close enough I tried setting the path right over it; maybe it was one target of the surveillance flight, because Syria suspected something was happening there. As it happens, this is closer to my new line than my old line was; the radar track runs between these two lines, but closer to the purple one.

This just clarifies the same issue I raised early on. As I summarized in a follow-up tweet, "So the WH graphic shows: the jets from Shayrat NOT bombing KS. But the words disagree, and they attack Shayrat for bombing KS."<end 6/29>

The Sarin
Anyway ... a fatal flaw in the decision to blame Syria for this, is no consideration whatsoever of the possibility of a terrorist false-flag incident,  despite a clear logic of motive, a clear enough (if obscured) capability, and copious (unacknowledged) precedents for murderous and deceptive CW use by various Islamist factions fighting in Syria, and  ... Its vapor is often yellow, irritating, and smells foul, like rotting food, notably eggs and sulfur. That's just what they report in Khan Sheikhoun. (see the Sarin Evidence)

British foreign secretary Boris Johnson said the other day, via Hansard, "We know from shell fragments in the crater that sarin had not only been used, but that it was sarin carrying the specific chemical signature of sarin used by the Assad regime." By this, we think he's admitting it does not match Syria's surrendered stocks. If it did, he'd probably prefer to say that. Instead, he calls it a kind they've used. This includes what are in fact several terrorists uses of impure sarin, since March, 2013, falsely blamed on Syrian forces, even though they're the targets half he time. This was accepted as used by Syrian forces in the Ghouta attack of August 21, 2013, but evidence suggests that never did match with Syria's stocks, and the event has massive indicators of being a false-flag massacre carried out on hundreds of hostages, the ultimate in massacre marketing, that failed in part for being too obvious in that regard.

So, Boris seems to be saying ... this is Ghouta 2.0, as it was already seeming to us.As there was no regime missile base link to prove it wasn't rebels behind Ghouta, we lack proof there was any link bgetween the Khan Sheikhoun attack and any jet, or the Shayrat airfield.

Sarin at Shayrat?

Boris Johnson, same speech and link as above:

We know beyond doubt that two Sukhoi-22 aircraft took off from Shayrat airfield, where we know chemical weapons are stored.

I suggest this isn't independently known - Syria has allegedly given up all CWs, and shouldn't store them anywhere. When did the anti-Assad powers find out he was holding out on some sarin at a specific airfield? And why didn't they say anything about it until now? Really, I propose, they had someone deduce there was sarin there, since a jet from there dropped the stuff, then pretended that was its own intelligence to support that deduction.

<Add 6/29>Seymour Hersh and his anonymous sources tackle this claim in a recent article at welt.de

Within hours of viewing the photos, the adviser said, Trump instructed the national defense apparatus to plan for retaliation against Syria. “He did this before he talked to anybody about it. The planners then asked the CIA and DIA if there was any evidence that Syria had sarin stored at a nearby airport or somewhere in the area. Their military had to have it somewhere in the area in order to bomb with it.” “The answer was, ‘We have no evidence that Syria had sarin or used it,’” the adviser said. “The CIA also told them that there was no residual delivery for sarin at Sheyrat [the airfield from which the Syrian SU-24 bombers had taken off on April 4] and Assad had no motive to commit political suicide.” Everyone involved, except perhaps the president, also understood that a highly skilled United Nations team had spent more than a year in the aftermath of an alleged sarin attack in 2013 by Syria, removing what was said to be all chemical weapons from a dozen Syrian chemical weapons depots.

How the CIA could know if there was or wasn't residue anywhere at the base is unclear. SU-22s are blamed, not SU-24.  Other details of the account are somewhat questionable as well.<end 6/29>

CW Personnel?
A CNN wire report (via KTLA.com) passes on confident assessments:

The US military and intelligence community has intercepted communications featuring Syrian military and chemical experts talking about preparations for the sarin attack in Idlib last week, a senior US official tells CNN

They note this doesn't amount to foreknowledge they should have acted on pre-emptively - and I can buy that. But is it even true?

The April 11 White House report said

Additionally, our information indicates personnel historically associated with Syria's chemical weapons program were at Shayrat airfield in late March making preparations for an upcoming attack in Northern Syria, and they were present at the airfield on the day of the attack.

In fact, perhaps just from this, CNN wire report..

The US now assesses that Syria has re-established a unit of personnel associated with chemical weapons that existed before the 2013 agreement in which the Syrian government pledged to give up its weapons inventory. And there is some indication they are getting outside help.

This should be people who know CW science, discussing wind directions with commanders, helping draw up the plan of attack (and a brilliant alleged plan this was!)- might be people who did work with CWs back when that was thing people worked with, now re-assigned - but might just be the pilot whose flown other missions in which CW were allegedly dropped. Consider: 

• Perpetrator of second largest chemical attack in Syria identified - Orient Net, April 5, 2017, gives specific details where he and his family live, seeming to invoite a terrorist assassination or worse ...
• Al-Arabiya reports US, UK, and France were asking for the names of any pilots involved. "Syrian Pilot Mohammed al-Hasouri, who took off in his jet from the Shayrat military airport on Tuesday morning, may have not thought that his name may be internationally listed and he will be pursued."
• Zaman al-Wasl gives details of "Brig. Gen. Mohammad Yousef Hasouri, Chief of Staff and deputy commander of Shayrat airfield" and heard that he's "one of the biggest war criminals in Syria" who "has so far carried out more than 3,500 raids, mostly in Aleppo."{
• Charles Lister on Twitter: "Reports: The pilot *allegedly* responsible for #KhanSheikhoun CW attack, Gen. Mohammed Yousef Hasouri, has been killed in an IED attack." The reports may be with Orient News, and they seem to be doubted. Some suspect the government killed him to hush up the crime.

Note: These outlets are all sponsored by direct "regime" opponents, be it wealthy Syrian expatriates (Orient News and Zaman al-Wasl), Saudi-Arabia (Al-Arabia) or Qatar (Charles Lister) (copied from ACLOS)


I thought I had seen something about his flying chemical missions before, mainly chlorine. If so, that could be what makes him CW "personnel," and that alone might be their basis for that claim.
... 
Add Aug. 7:  https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2017/04/10/khan-sheikhoun-chemical-attack-bombed/comment-page-2/
comment by Richard P - April 11, 2017
B’cat said, “The earliest reference we have discovered ” was an [Apr 4] 8:21 local tweet referencing a video published at 7:59 a.m.
But, it would seem, the actual “earliest reference” is the “spotter” who (at 6:26am) presupposes that the [SU-22] warplane, he identifies as it takes-off, is the pilot and aircraft implicated in a recent, earlier (March 30) incident.
Based on that evidence, and quiet evening weather, the spotter determines then expressly warns, “Quds 1, guys he has chemicals, he has chemicals.” [I suspect the spotter was exclaiming more than just making a statement.] Maybe it’s semantics, but it seams significant [out of the ordinary, really].
Here is the report from the supposed radio message: [1]
The Times (UK) originated the story, my copy from an AU pub. They both have subscriber limits.
Here is the NY Post’s story copy… http://nypost.com/2017/04/10/pilot-was-no-stranger-to-dropping-a-chemical-bomb-in-syria/
report also says he recieved an award for his attack that day, but was named  as Haitham Hassouri, maybe to conceal his identity in the publicized ceremony. A tweet was deleted!
In the recording of the radio chatter, a monitor, named only as Hussam, detects a Sukhoi 22 fighter jet taking off from the Shayrat air base at 6.26am. The pilot identifies himself as “Quds 1”.
“The air is still, and this warplane doesn’t take off at this time unless it is loaded with something dangerous, poisonous materials,” notes Hussam as he is listening. “Quds 1, guys he has chemicals, he has chemicals. He is the
same pilot who had dropped chemicals on Latamineh.”
Twelve minutes later Quds 1 drops the missile on Khan Sheikhoun.
Latamineh, 15 miles from Khan Sheikhoun, was hit by a missile filled with what appeared to be a chemical agent on March 30. Doctors described victims suffering spasms and foaming at the mouth. About 70 people were injured, although none was killed.
Radar track following this jet and a cohort shows they never passed over the alleged bomb sites. Luckily here
it's "missile," which is at least possible. No one ever takes off at 6:30 in calm weather unless it's to gas people? Really? What other time of day are the first post-dawn recon missions slated for? Or there's no such thing in this war? They scope it during the night and attack at first light?