Boris Johnson: Do as I say, not as I do

[Scooter]

So did Boris Johnson pen his spirited defence of the humanitarian necessity of bombing Syria before or after his party voted against accepting 3,000 unaccompanied Syrian child refugees?

Inquiring minds want to know.

[Econoline]

[Gob]

Of course you do know that the bombing was aimed at reducing the elected Syrian government's chemical warfare capability. The chemical warfare which is causing Syrians to have to flee their own country.

[Big RR]

Except it is not just chemical attacks that are causing the refugees to flee; barrel bomb attacks are just as, if not more destructive (and kill just as well as poison gas), yet these are tacitly approved by the international community which just wants to draw a line in the sand --they really don't care where so they can beat their chests and pretend they are doing something. And chemical attacks are a small enough niche of how people can be killed in large numbers, that it is a convenient place to draw that line.

What I see here is an aid to the bombing because of international politics and a refusal of the refugees because of local politics; but neither decision was made with much (if any) of a concern about the plight of the Syrian people.

[Scooter]

Syria Airstrikes Instantly Added Nearly $5 Billion to Missile-Makers' Stock Value

Raytheon stock surged Friday morning, after 59 of the company’s Tomahawk missiles were used to strike Syria in Donald Trump’s first major military operation as President.

Trump ordered the airstrike on the Syrian government Thursday night in retaliation for a deadly chemical weapons attack on civilians earlier this week that killed as many as 100 people. The U.S. blamed the attack on the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The Tomahawk missile used in the strike is made by Raytheon (RTN, +0.49%), whose stock opened 2.5% higher Friday, adding more than $1 billion to the defense contractor’s market capitalization.

The shares of other missile and weapons manufacturers, including Boeing (BA, -1.67%), Lockheed Martin (LMT, +0.21%), Northrop Grumman (NOC, -0.40%) and General Dynamics (GD, +0.08%), each rose as much as 1%, collectively gaining nearly $5 billion in market value as soon as they began trading, even as the broader market fell.

[ex-khobar Andy]

An old boss of mine once said to me: "I can do foolish things. That doesn't make me a fool." Obama's red line against chemical weapons in Syria was foolish and he more wisely abandoned it when the issue arose. Trump (and May and Macron) all saw the possibility of allaying some domestic issues with the barrage of missiles. I am not yet totally convinced that Assad was responsible for the chemical attack last week - he had nothing to gain from it and a lot to lose. But regardless, the real audience for the attack was not Russia and Iran or even the Assad camp: it was the US, UK and France voter. "Look, I'm doing something."

ETA - and yes, what Big RR said.