WorldTribune.com - Report: Syrians, 'equipment' were in N. Korea train blast. Interesting article. Apparently, according to the article, 10 or so Syrians died in the recent train explosion in North Korea. The explosion damage was heaviest apparently around them, and the N. Koreans used protective suits to get the Syrian bodies.
Something is going on there, and it isn't good. The article mentioned that there were rumors that the two countries were working together on upgraded Scud missiles, and possibly biological and chemical WMD weapons. Add to that that the N. Koreans are apparently still trying to get nuclear weapons.
I see three issues. First, what exactly were the Syrians doing there in the first place?
Secondly, what happened? Was whatever the Syrians were with the cause of the explosion? Possibly something so unstable that the N. Korean railroad caused it to blow up? Or was it someone preempting them? US? Israel? S. Korea? It is something that the Israelis might do, if they thought that the Syrians were preparing WMDs+Scuds for them. Both the U.S. and S. Korea are probably not bloody enough for it.
Thirdly, we pretty much know that Saddam Hussein had WMDs up until the early 2000's. Where did they go? Sure, he might have destroyed them. But that would have taken a lot of work, and if he had done so, he had some incentive to let us know. If he had, we might not have invaded. Far, far, more likely that he either hid them or he shipped them out of the country. And the most logical place to have shipped them would have been to Syria. Both were Baathist regimes. Iran didn't give back the planes that fled there in the first Gulf War, and in any case, wouldn't give back WMDs, given that they had been used by Iraq on them in the Iran/Iraq war. There is a strong suspicion that the stuff found in Jordan recently came from Syria, and thus, probably initially from Iraq.
Obviously, we don't want WMDs on Scuds in Syria, and even more obviously, the Israelis don't. A gas or biological attack on Israel, given its small size, is likely to cause massive casualties. Israel's only real response would be nuclear. We all are pretty sure that they have a nuclear capability. But they have never really admitted such. Imagine the effect though of Syria using gas on Israel, and Israel responding with nuclear weapons. All hell would break out in the Middle East.
