The lede in the Reuters story by Matt Spetalnick reads "The Syrian government may be developing new types of chemical weapons, and U.S. President Donald Trump is prepared to consider further military action if necessary to deter chemical attacks, senior U.S. officials said on Thursday." The lede in the A.P. story by Josh Lederman is less bellicose, "The Trump administration on Thursday accused Syrian President Bashar Assad's government of producing and using 'new kinds of weapons' to deliver deadly chemicals despite committing to abolish its program in 2013, and said the world must find a way to stop it."
The government officials quoted on background provide no proof for any of their allegations. The intention here is to make sure that it is part of the public record that Syria persists in the use of chemical weapons and the Trump administration has signaled the use of military force.
Spetalnick continues:
A deadly sarin attack on a rebel-held area in April prompted Trump to order a missile strike last year on the Shayrat air base, from which the Syrian operation is said to have been launched.
“We reserve the right to use military force to prevent or deter the use of chemical weapons,” one official said, while declining to specify how serious a chemical attack would have to be to draw a fresh U.S. military response.
A second official said, however, that the Trump administration hopes that stepped-up international sanctions and diplomatic pressure will help rein in Assad’s chemical weapons program.
If the international community does not act quickly to tighten the screws on Assad, Syria’s chemical weapons could spread beyond its borders and possibly even “to U.S. shores,” the second official said.
“It will spread if we don’t do something,” the official warned.
The officials echoed U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s recent accusation that Russia, Assad’s ally in Syria’s multi-sided civil war, bears some responsibility for failing to enforce the chemical weapons ban.
Russia has denied any complicity, and the Syrian government has said it has not carried out any of the attacks.
The U.S. officials suggested that if left unchecked there would be more smaller chemical attacks as an “instrument of terror” to compensate for Assad’s lack of adequate manpower to retake some opposition-held areas.
“They think they can get away with it if they keep it under a certain level,” an official said.It is truly pathetic almost infantile propaganda. Notice the continued use of the "low manpower" rational. Assad apparently must resort to the use of chemical weapons when they offer no tactical advantage because the Syrian Arab Army is woefully understaffed. There is no evidence that this is case.
At least Lederman of the A.P. broaches the topic of why a government would resort to an almost useless weapon only to expose itself to an attack by the global hegemon:
Use of such widely deplored weapons comes with great risk for Assad, raising questions about why he would take the chance. But the officials said the U.S. believes Assad's government sees chemical attacks as an effective way to terrorize rebels and sympathetic populations into fleeing, therefore altering the demographic balance in the Alawite heartland where Assad is trying to consolidate control. Assad is a member of the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam that forms a minority of Syria's population.This is the same shopworn fantasy recycled: Assad can't stop using chemical weapons because he loves to terrorize his own people.
Champions of American exceptionalism are obsessed by Obama's failure to bomb Damascus after the August 2013 false flag sarin attack in East Ghouta, and they are critical of Trump's almost cosmetic cruise missile attack on Khan Sheikoun last year. They want a massive air strike on Syria. The problem is the Russia S-400 missile defense system.
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