The threat of further U.S. military action in Syria looms with the Pentagon reportedly drawing up plans for a response to Tuesday’s deadly chemical attack that Defense Secretary James Mattis will present to President Donald Trump Thursday evening.
According to reporting by the The Intercept, one of the options under consideration would be “saturation” bombings of the war-ravaged country.
Though he offered no evidence, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said at a Thursday press conference there was “no doubt in our minds” that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was behind the attack that killed more than 70 people. No formal investigation has yet been launched.
When asked if Assad has “to go,” Tillerson said that “it would seem that there would be no role for him” in Syria’s future—an apparent call for regime change, which marks a departure from the administration’s previous stance on the crisis.
When probed further about what steps the U.S. would take to remove him from power, Tillerson responded: “The process by which Assad would leave is something that requires an international community effort both to first defeat ISIS within Syria, to stabilize the Syrian country to avoid further civil war, and then to work collectively with our partners around the world through a political process that would lead to Assad leaving.”
When asked if he and Trump would organize such a coalition, he said: “Those steps are underway.”
Meanwhile, official sources told CNN and other outlets that “the Pentagon has long-standing options to strike Syria’s chemical weapons capability,” which Mattis will be presenting to the president in Florida on Thursday evening, though “[t]he sources stressed a decision has not been made.”
Trump is currently hosting Chinese President Xi Jinping at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, which Phyllis Bennis, director of the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies, said could make for a “dangerous moment,” as the U.S. president is eager to present himself as a “strong leader.”
Further, Bennis told Common Dreams that Trump hopes to distinguish himself from his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, who the president called “weak” because Obama did not use military force “at every turn”—though Bennis specified that he did use it.
“Trump may well use this opportunity to pursue a high profile military campaign,” she said. “He has Mattis coming down to make a very public display, to show the world he is a ‘military guy.’ He’s not a president who is likely to step back, he may feel compelled to go ahead with military action.”
What’s more, she notes that “no one in Congress seems prepared to challenge these threats.”
CNN also reported that Trump alerted some members of Congress on Thursday that he is “considering military action in Syria,” a move that will likely appease Republican and Democratic war hawks.
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