Dude's been mostly a sci-fi author since, what, '73?
In any case, aside from the already-covered sarin issues, I still have a few problems with his deductions:
First, those are slow missiles. Top speed, about 500 miles per hour. They are very accurate, but they are slow. They were in the air for at least half an hour. They went past areas defended by Russian missiles of SA-6 and newer, any of them capable of shooting down a slow cruise missile like a Tomahawk. It is unlikely that the fleet of 50 Tomahawks, fired in a time on target pattern, were not observed; but so far as I know, not one was intercepted.
The Tomahawk isn't just slow, it is also hard to detect. There's a difference between Russia's SA-6 coverage and its ability to see terrain-following targets. Given the Tomahawk's nap-of-the-Earth flying and the lack of a net of look-down, shoot-down radars over Syria, it's far from implausible that a Tomahawk could penetrate such a net undetected. And even if it was detected, it is also far from implausible that the Russians would shrug and decide it's not worth bothering with.
Second, the attack was limited to a single military installation which was presumed to be the base from which the chemical attack on the Syrian civilians including children.
why do you have to talk like a space alien
While limited to that base area, the attack was massive: over fifty Tomahawk missiles, each carrying 1,000 pounds of high explosives, in a time on target attack by highly accurate missiles fired from ships who we may assume took a carefully controlled course during launch. We may assume the base was entirely destroyed. The missiles arrived at 0430, meaning there were few casualties; most base personnel would be in quarters, which we may assume were not targeted. We may assume the skippers and missile officers of the US destroyers had excellent satellite photographs of the base and knew all its buildings and their purposes. And we may conclude the base was destroyed.
The entire world has had intel assets pointed at this conflict for years now. Our military is networked. What are you even driving at, besides the fact that
we're fucking awesome?
The message is clear: You had six air bases, Now you have five. Do you care to try for four? Or fewer?
As Blackeagle pointed out: Nnnnnnnnno. Not so much. I believe Randy has also covered at length how you don't simply bomb an airbase a little bit.
I would say that the message is: if you use your toys to deploy WMDs, we will break them. Because ~25 tons of HE is not gonna render an entire airbase inop. But it can break the assets you use to deploy said WMDs, thus inconveniencing you, and delivering a firm peepee smack.
I think I would not have ordered that attack, affected as I was by the photographs of the effects of the chemical attack.
My, what a hard choice from your desk.
Yes, it could only have been ordered by a monster deserving slaying. But there are many monsters. We could slay a dragon a month for a year, two years, but we would run out of resources before we would run out of dragons.
Here's the thing about dragons: they fly where they please, and they eat where they fly.
I agree with John Quincy Adams. We do not go abroad seeking dragons to slay. We are the friends of liberty everywhere, but we are the guardians of our own.
We are the friends of liberty right up until that we are asked what that friendship means, and then the answer is "fuck you, got mine."
President Trump ordered this strike in the name of national security. It took place while he was at dinner with the President of China the evening before the first formal negotiations with China. It was only after they parted after dinner that President received the strike report and announced the strike, but the President of China must know that the attack was consummated during their otherwise uneventful dinner.
Are we North Korea? Do we need China's permission to act? Seriously though, why do people keep bringing up China in this matter? Why would China care?
But if I were to order such an attack, it would have been as President Trump did it: massive, decisive, but limited in scope, destroying its target but with minimal collateral damage.
Congratulations doctor, you're saying the same thing as one Hillary Rodham Clinton.
I've already been over the nerve gas shit. Sarin is confirmed by reliable sources. It is what it is, and here we are.