Realpolitik in Syria And The Appeal To Incompetence

We know that Sarin was used (by whoever) to murder a high number (1400) of civilians. What we did not know until today is: who was the idiot who provided Assad with the chemicals needed to produce the nerve agent. Today we learned that last decade we - ze Germans - did not care as much about the lives endangered by the gas. So we exported 90,000 kg HF to the dictator. Hydrogen fluoride (HF) is essential in the production of Sarin. But fear not Merkel has stated that she has no evidence that it was our HF which was used to produce the gas.

This seems to be our newest general-purpose-government-self-defense. They say they don't know a thing therefore they are also not responsible for anything. It was used to great effect during the NSA scandal. It is a completely new propaganda technique. We shall call it appeal to incompetence. We have no knowledge that [enter random argument]:

• Assad used a chemical needed for the production of Sarin in the production of Sarin.
• The NSA spied on German citizens

Excellent. Merkel will get more than 40 % of the vote on Sunday, which shows just how well the appeal to incompetence works as a tactic.

The chemicals were exported during the time of both the first Merkel government and Schröder's red-green coalition (2002-2006). When it comes to exports in Germany it has always been: Erst kommt das Fressen; dann kommt die Moral (First comes the eating then come morals). Today it is Erst kommt das Fressen, then comes a claim that they don't know anything. No more morals. Realpolitik über alles.