Lawmakers urge Obama to get tough on Syria -- The Washington Times

[bsteadman]

Lawmakers urge Obama to get tough on Syria

The Washington Times
Sean Lengell
4/28/2013

Excerpt:

Capitol Hill lawmakers said Sunday that the U.S. must take a tough stance against Syria for reportedly using chemical weapons against its own people but stopped short of calling for troops to intervene inside the country.

President Obama, they said, must not back down from his warning that Syria’s likely action — or any transfer of chemical weapons to terrorists — would cross a “red line” that would cause the U.S. to act. Doing so, they said, would embolden Syrian President Bashar Assad and rogue nations such as Iran and North Korea.

“The president has laid down the line, and it can’t be a dotted line. It can’t be anything other than a red line,” Rep. Mike Rogers, Michigan Republican and chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, told ABC’s “This Week.” “And more than just Syria, Iran is paying attention to this. North Korea is paying attention to this.”

The White House said last week that military forces loyal to Mr. Assad probably used chemical weapons in their battle with opposition groups intent on toppling his regime — a civil war that has left more than 70,000 people dead in the past two years and displaced hundreds of thousands more. The announcement confirmed intelligence reports from Israel, Britain, France and Qatar.

The White House added that it didn’t have enough information to order an aggressive response.

Sen. Saxby Chambliss, Georgia Republican, said it would be a “huge mistake” for the U.S. to do nothing. But, he added, U.S. intervention should be limited to such measures as a “no-fly” zone over Syria enforced with U.S. anti-aircraft missiles — not troops on the ground.

“If we did that, then it’s still not up to the United States to engage in this from a military conflict standpoint,” Mr. Chambliss said on CBS‘ “Face the Nation.” “We don’t need to put boots on the ground, but we need to enable their neighbors — the neighbors of Syria, to bring some sort of peaceful resolution to this.”

The senator said the U.S. is close to establishing a no-fly zone.

Sen. Claire McCaskill, Missouri Democrat, refused to rule out sending U.S. troops to Syria. She said on “Face the Nation” that the situation has “really deteriorated,” though it has not reached a “tipping point.”

“Obviously, we don’t want to do that unless it’s absolutely necessary,” she said.
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View the complete article at:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...ough-on-syria/

[bsteadman]

US lacks evidence in accusing Syria of using chemical weapons

RT
4/25/2013

Excerpt:

The United States Department of Defense says they suspect Syrian President Bashar al-Assad used chemical weapons on a "small scale" in the country’s civil war, despite lacking solid evidence and having "varying degrees of confidence" in the allegations.

US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel made the claim Thursday while speaking in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, adding that the American intelligence community has determined “with varying degrees of confidence that the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale in Syria, specifically the chemical agent sarin."

US intelligence allegedly indicated that Syria had "twice" used chemical weapons, thereby crossing Obama's much quoted 'red line' for intervention. However, White House officials said on Thursday that the evidence isn't concrete enough to warrant such intervention, meaning it doesn't necessarily preempt an immediate change in the US level of involvement in the country.

Sarin is a colorless, odorless liquid which is used as a chemical weapon. The gas is an extremely potent nerve agent and has a lethal dose of 0.5 milligrams for an adult.


Even at very low concentrations, sarin can be fatal. Death may follow just one minute after direct ingestion of a lethal dose. Atropine and pralidoxime may be used as antidotes, but must be administered immediately.


Sarin, which is estimated to be over 500 times more toxic than cyanide, is classified as a weapon of mass destruction under UN Resolution 687. Production and stockpiling of sarin was outlawed by the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993.

However, Hagel insisted that the use of chemical weapons by any army would violate international guidelines for armed conflicts, and said confirmation of these reports would be a “game changer ” in terms of America’s role in the Syrian civil war.

"It violates every convention of warfare,” said Hagel, the Associated Press reports.

The White House informed Congress about the use of chemical weapons during a Thursday briefing, continues the AP. White House legislative director Miguel Rodriguez sent a letter to Senators John McCain (R-Arizona) and Carl Levin (D-Michigan) explaining that "because the president takes this issue so seriously, we have an obligation to fully investigate any and all evidence of chemical weapons use within Syria."

"Thus far, we believe that the Assad regime maintains custody of these weapons, and has demonstrated a willingness to escalate its horrific use of violence against the Syrian people," Foreign Policy quotes from the letter.

Moments after news of the letter were first reported, Sen. McCain walked out of a briefing in Washington with Secretary of State John Kerry and told reporters, "We just received a letter from the president in response to our question about whether Assad had used chemical weapons.”

Kerry, reports the AP, said the Syrian regime launched two chemical weapons attacks during that Thursday morning meeting, which Foreign Policy says was attended by reportedly all US senators, as well as representatives for the office of the director of national intelligence and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Speaking to CNN shortly later, Sen. McCain said he’s not surprised by the latest intelligence report and has long assumed that Assad’s regime was engaged in chemical warfare. Of specific concern to him, however, was what could happen if the alleged warheads end up in the arsenals of others.

“I think they have control over them at the moment,” he said of the weapons, “but some of them are in heavily contested areas and could easily fall into the hands of jihadist extremists.”

“We need to have operational capability to secure these weapons,” added McCain.

The United Nations and the Secretary General have been notified about alleged chemical weapons use in Syria by American politicians. In response, a spokesman for the UN chief warned that “the United Nations is not in a position to comment on assessments based on national intelligence information.”

But a team of UN advisers “have been in contact with the US authorities on the latest developments,” the spokesperson for the Secretary-General said in a statement.

The statement added that a “technical expert team to conduct a fact-finding mission” has been put together and is on standby, ready to begin work in “24-48 hours.”

So far the expert team is still awaiting its marching orders, after UN chief Ban Ki-moon promised the probe in late March, following an official request by the Syrian authorities to appoint an independent mission to investigate the alleged chemical attack that claimed lives of at least 25 people on March 19.

Although following the Syrian plea, the United Nations said the team would not include experts from Russia and China to ensure it wasn’t biased. Russian EU envoy Vitaly Churkin criticized “this kind of logic” saying in that case he “would recommend excluding all NATO countries too.”

Following this development, in early April, Syria refused to let the UN proposed team enter Syria as it - contrary to the Syrian request - was planning to deploy “throughout Syrian territory” and not at particular locations of alleged attacks. “Syria cannot accept such manoeuvres on the part of the UN secretariat general, bearing in mind the negative role that it played in Iraq and which cleared the way for the American invasion,” a Syrian foreign ministry official explained at the time.

The official stressed that Syria had specifically asked for “a neutral and honest technical team to visit the village of Khan al-Assal” in the province of Aleppo.
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View the complete article at:

http://rt.com/usa/defense-used-chemical-weapons-401/

[bsteadman]

Free Republic is running a thread titled, 'Analysis - No good military options for U.S. in Syria', which was started 4/272013 by 'haffast'

The thread references a 4/27/2013 Reuters article written by Phil Stewart and Peter Apps - http://uk.news.yahoo.com/analysis-no...8.html#Gfe08J0

View the complete Free Republic thread at:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3013225/posts

[bsteadman]

Grim Alternatives in Syria

FrontPage Magazine
Joseph Klein
4/30/2013

Excerpt:

The crisis in Syria is going from bad to worse. Civilians continue to be killed, injured, detained and abducted every day, including most recently the kidnapping of two prominent clerics in northern Syria. Both sides in the conflict are to blame for the unspeakable carnage. As terrible as the bloodshed is, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the resolution to this scenario rests with two grim alternatives. Although Assad, a reliable Iranian ally, has proven his monstrous capabilities, it is becoming indisputable that al-Qaeda-linked rebel forces stand to usher in an equally unworthy regime. Another erratic Islamist theocracy is certainly something the West can ill afford in the rapidly deteriorating region.

The Assad regime continues its brutal crackdown with heavy weaponry, while the opposition is increasingly operating under the control of Islamist jihadists and regularly launching terrorist attacks. The latest involved an assault on the convoy of Syrian Prime Minister Wael Al-Halki in Damascus on April 29th, which resulted in at least six deaths as well as injuries. Also, two missiles were reportedly fired at a Russian plane flying over Syrian territory with at least 159 passengers on board. The crew was able to avoid a hit and nobody was injured.

The Obama administration is trying to figure out what to do about the suspected use of chemical weapons in Syria and just how thick President Obama’s “red line” is going to have to be before he is backed into taking stronger action, including the possibility of military force.

Our intelligence agencies have assessed “with varying degrees of confidence,” the White House said last Thursday, that chemical weapons had been used on a small scale. British Prime Minister David Cameron went a bit further a day later, claiming “there is growing evidence that we’ve seen too of the use of chemical weapons, probably by the regime. It’s extremely serious — this is a war crime and we should take it very seriously.”

Brig. Gen. Itai Brun, the head of research for Israel’s military intelligence, has gone further still and accused the Assad regime of using nerve gas against the rebel forces. “There’s a huge arsenal of chemical weapons in Syria,” he said at a national security conference in Tel Aviv. “Our assessment is that the [Assad] regime has used and is using chemical weapons.”

Israel is especially concerned that Assad’s large stockpile of chemical weapons could end up in the hands of terrorists – Hezbollah and/or al Qaeda affiliated groups – as well as come under Iran’s control. This should be our biggest concern as well.
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View the complete article at:

http://frontpagemag.com/2013/joseph-...ives-in-syria/

[bsteadman]

Obama moving toward sending lethal arms to Syrian rebels, officials say

Obama moving toward sending lethal arms to Syrian rebels, officials say

The Washington Post
Karen DeYoung
4/30/2013

Excerpt:

President Obama is preparing to send lethal weaponry to the Syrian opposition and has taken steps to assert more aggressive U.S. leadership among allies and partners seeking the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad, according to senior administration officials.

The officials emphasized that supplying arms is one of several options under consideration and that political negotiation remains the preferred option. To that end, the administration has launched an effort to convince Russian President Vladimir Putin that the probable use of chemical weapons by the Syrian government — and the more direct outside intervention that could provoke — should lead him to reconsider his support of Assad.

But Obama, who spoke by telephone with Putin on Monday and is sending Secretary of State John F. Kerry to Moscow in the coming days, is likely to make a final decision on the supply of arms to the opposition within weeks, before a scheduled meeting with Putin in June, officials said.

Confirmation of the use of chemical weapons by the Assad government, Obama said Tuesday, would mean that “there are some options that we might not otherwise exercise that we would strongly consider.”

At a news conference, he emphasized the need to “make sure I’ve got the facts. . . . If we end up rushing to judgment without hard, effective evidence, we can find ourselves in a position where we can’t mobilize the international community to support” additional action. Administration officials have made repeated reference to the George W. Bush administration’s inaccurate claims of weapons of mass destruction to justify its 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Yet even as Obama voiced caution in responding to what he has called the “red line” on chemical weapons use, officials described him as ready to move on what one described as the “left-hand side” of a broad spectrum that ranged from “arming the opposition to boots on the ground.”

“We’re clearly on an upward trajectory,” the senior official said. “We’ve moved over to assistance that has a direct military purpose.”
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View the complete article at:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...e19_story.html