WarSclerotic

‘Obama changed his mind on Syria’ | The Times of Israel.

President had been poised to strike at Assad regime without seeking okay from Congress, but had an eleventh-hour change of heart Friday night, officials say

President Barack Obama delivers remarks about the crisis in Syria in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington Saturday, Aug. 31, 2013. (photo credit: AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama had an eleventh-hour change of heart on striking at Syria, officials close to him were quoted saying late Saturday.

Speaking soon after Obama had delivered a White House speech saying he would seek approval from Congress to act against the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons, senior administration officials said Obama had planned to take military action against Syria without congressional authorization, but told aides Friday night that he changed his mind.

The administration officials, quoted by AP, described a president overriding all his top national security advisers, who believed Obama had the authority to act on his own.

But these officials said the president spent much of the week wrestling with Congress’s role in authorizing force and made the decision Friday night after a lengthy discussion with his chief of staff, Denis McDonough.

The administration officials requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss Obama’s decision-making by name.

Earlier, delaying what had appeared to be an imminent strike, Obama abruptly announced he would seek congressional approval before launching any military action meant to punish Syria for its alleged use of chemical weapons in an attack that the US says killed 1,429 Syrians on August 21.

With Navy ships in the Mediterranean Sea ready to strike, Obama said he had decided the United States should take military action, but also determined “our country will be better off” if Congress renders its own opinion.

At the same time, he challenged lawmakers to consider “what message will we send to a dictator” if he is allowed to killed hundreds of children with chemical weapons without suffering any retaliation.

Lawmakers will return to session on Sept. 9.

In Israel, where the Syria crisis is seen by many as an indicator of how the US might act against Iran’s nuclear weapons drive, one right-wing minister said that the Iranian regime would be “opening champagne” in the light of Obama’s hesitation, and a commentator said Tehran might consider that there is a “paper tiger” in Washington, DC.

▶ NBC’s Richard Engle on the Syrian people’s reaction to Obama’s passing the buck. – YouTube.

I’m sure I speak for John Kerry as well.  This marks the end to any claim the US has clung to of “exceptionalism.”  No ethical standards, much less leadership.

God save the United States of America and the world, which till tonight depended on it…

Obama delays Syria strike indefinitely by turning decision over to Congress.

Confounding tense expectations worldwide, US President Barack Obama again dodged a decision for a US strike on Syria by referring it to Congress.

In a speech to the American people, Saturday, Aug. 31, he said the use of chemical weapons by Bashar Assad must be “confronted not just investigated.” But then went on to say, “We are ready to strike whenever we choose. This operation is not time-sensitive. It could take place tomorrow, next week, or next month.
The US House Speaker meanwhile set Sept. 9 as the date for the debate to start.

By these words, the US president chipped away once again at US military plans for Syria – only this time, they looked like vanishing into the blue yonder, leaving Assad and his partners all the time in the world to line up their counter moves, and putting Israel in a tight spot on three counts:

1.  The hostile Iran-Syrian-Hizballah bloc comes out strengthened;
2.  Tehran can feel free to develop a nuclear bomb without fear of resolute US interference;
3.  Hizballah can celebrate its backing for the winning horse in Damascus.

4.  Binyamin Netanyahu’s six-year old policy, which was oriented on engendering understanding with Barack Obama, is in ruins, although it was endorsed by Israel’s defense ministers on the assumption that it was in the interests of national security.

As we reported earlier, President Obama confirmed Friday night that the forthcoming US military attack on Syria would be “limited” and “narrow” and not open-ended, in a  bid to avoid the risk of America being mired in the Syrian civil war.

DEBKA Weekly’s analysts calculated Thursday that by forgoing an air assault and relegating his projected military operation against Syria solely to seaborne Tomahawk cruise missiles – limited to 15 launches – the US president relinquished America’s “penetration and destruction” capabilities – depending of course on his sticking to this plan and not expanding its scope at the last minute.

The Tomahawk cruise missile has a range of 2,500 kms, weighs 450 kilos and can be fired from the five US destroyers and the four US nuclear submarines waiting in the eastern Mediterranean for orders to go.
However powerful, the exclusive use of this type of missile means that Washington has a priori sacrificed the following military objectives:
1. Syria’s chemical weapons stockpiles will remain intact. The Tomahawks can damage surface structures at the bases hosting them, but not penetrate their underground storage sites.

Assad will be left in full possession of his CW arsenal.

2. Neither can Tomahawks alone cripple the Syrian Air Force or shut down its bases. They could damage runways, but only for the hours or days it would take to repair them.
DEBKA Weekly’s military sources say that the Syria air force is left with six air bases still operational, out of a total of thirty. A heavier and larger missile onslaught than the limited assault planned could have destroyed them all, given the Syrian rebels a huge advantage and opened the way for a plan to impose no-fly zones over Syrian air space.

But Obama clearly chose to discard those options.

By delaying his go-ahead on military action against Syria, he gave the Assad regime time to tuck most of its air force bombers and attack helicopters away in fortified hangars early this week, safe from attack. As the hours slipped by with US action, the Syrian ruler’s self-confidence mounted.
3. Syrian missiles have likewise been hidden in underground bunkers. They include the Scud C and D missiles capable of carrying chemical warheads.

4. The big Syrian field command centers will also escape unscathed, although DEBKA Weekly’s military sources report that many of them figure as large as strategic assets on the list of targets which the Pentagon and US military chiefs originally put before the president.

Among them were the command and control centers of the Syrian army’s 4th Division and Republican Guard Division, which protect Bashar Assad and bolster his regime’s hold on power.

It is not clear if the military command centers of Homs, Hama, Tartus, Latakia, the Aleppo area and Idlib remain on the final list.

Striking those targets would have shut down the Syrian military command system and seriously disrupted its operational capabilities.

A second list of 35 strategic targets was handed to President Obama by Syrian rebel commander Brig. Gen. Salim Idris, according to our sources. Their destruction was described as vital. However, not a single item on the list was approved by the president, the Pentagon on the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gen. Martin Dempsey, reflecting the distrust and disconnect prevailing between the US administration and military, and the Syrian rebel leadership.

5. Our sources say that the US military to-do list for Syria covers army artillery units, some of which participated in the chemical weapons launch of August 21 against eastern Damascus; local command and communications centers; and research institutes involved in the development and upgrade of Syrian chemical weapons.

This heavily pruned US operation, if it goes through, will leave Syrian President Bashar Assad sitting pretty with most of his military resources intact, and his hands free to continue his barbaric war on the Syrian opposition, including the use of chemical weapons, unhindered and undeterred.
It is still possible for President Obama to have second thoughts about his low-key operational plan and decide after all to land a strategic blow on Syria.

Obama Delivering Special Announcement on Syria – News from America – News – Israel National News.

President Barack Obama

Flash 90

U.S. President Barack Obama is about to deliver an address to the American people regarding the situation in Syria Saturday at 1:15 p.m. Washington time, 8:15 p.m., Israel time.

Obama is expected to provide an update to Americans on his decisions on how to proceed in Syria, but reportedly will not be announcing a strike in Syria. He has completed a two-hour-long meeting with the National Security Council.

Israeli analysts said over the weekend that the U.S. is expected to attack sometime during the weekend.

Israel’s Channel 2 reported Saturday evening that Hezbollah has told Lebanese President Michel Ayoun that it has no intention of opening fire on Israel in case of an attack on Syria.

Obama’s address is apparently meant to convince the American people that the attack on Syria is indeed necessary. This will not be easy: a new Reuters’ poll shows support for intervention has increased over the past week to 20 percent, up from just 9 percent. More than half of Americans oppose intervention.

Secretary of State John Kerry said Friday that the administration will try to convince the American public and Congress that America has an “obligation” to act.

“The president asked all of us on his national security team to consult with the leaders of Congress as well,” Kerry said. “I will tell you that as someone who spent nearly three decades in the United States Congress, I know that consultation is the right way for a president to approach a decision of when and how and if to use military force. … And I believe, as President Obama does, that it is also important to discuss this directly with the American people. That’s our responsibility.”

Iran: Attack on Syria will set US, Israel ablaze | The Times of Israel.

Top general warns that countries backing Washington will suffer serious losses, as militia chief calls for Israel’s elimination

By Yifa Yaakov August 31, 2013, 7:23 pm

Hassan Firouzabadi, left, with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2011. (Screenshot: Youtube)

Any military attack against Syria will set both Israel and the US ablaze,  Iranian Chief of Staff General Hassan Firouzabadi warned Saturday.

“Regional countries backing this cruel war will suffer serious losses,” Firouzabadi was quoted by Iran’s Fars news agency as saying, referring to the “massive problems” America’s Middle Eastern allies were to suffer as a result of Washington’s warmongering rhetoric and a possible attack.

The top general referred in particular to retaliatory attacks that would hit Israel in the event of an American assault on Syria.

Also Saturday, Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) commander Mohammad Ali Jafari said the US would face reactions from beyond Syria’s borders if it went ahead with its plans to attack the Assad regime.

“The US imagination about limited military intervention in Syria is merely an illusion, as reactions will be coming from beyond Syria’s borders,” Fars quoted Jafari as saying.

He added that Washington’s plans to launch a “limited, narrow” offensive against Syria pointed to its failure to garner the international support needed to form a coalition against Assad, and warned that Obama’s allies in the region were jeopardizing their national security by siding with America.

Jafari’s comments were echoed by Basij militia chief Mohammad Reza Naqdi, who said Saturday that the reactions to American military involvement were likely to go beyond Syria’s borders.

The smallest American assault on Syria would trigger a strong reaction and make the path toward the liberation of Palestine smoother, Naqdi said, hinting that Israel would bear the brunt of this reaction.

Iran and the other nations of the region will respond to America’s illegal involvement in the Syrian conflict and act against it, Naqdi said at a press conference commemorating Iranian victims of terrorist attacks.

“America’s day of reckoning has come today,” Naqdi said. “If international groups do not take steps against these crimes, the people of the world certainly will, teaching that cruel regime a lesson.”

He added that Washington used false pretexts to attack, occupy and loot various countries, and claimed that America’s chemical weapons charges against Syria masked its real intent — world domination.

The solution, he said, was to awaken the American people to the fact that their resources and reputation were being sacrificed for the well-being of the “criminal” Zionist regime — the elimination of which, Naqdi said, would render all the region’s problems a thing of the past.

‘Bashar Assad in a bunker ahead of likely US attack’ | The Times of Israel.

Israeli TV report says Syrian president has sent his family to safe places, is bracing for strike, expects to emerge and claim victory

Syrian President Bashar Assad casts his ballot next to his wife Asma at a polling station during a referendum last year on a new constitution, in Damascus. (photo credit: AP Photo/SANA, File)

Syria’s President Bashar Assad has moved to an underground bunker, and sent his family to “secure places,” ahead of an anticipated US attack, Israeli television reported Saturday night.

“Assad is in a bunker,” the Channel 2 news report said, adding that the president in the past few days has been overseeing the evacuations of military command centers, ordering the relocation of sensitive equipment, and doing his utmost to minimize the damage of the looming US attack. Some forces and equipment have been moved to school and university campuses, including the campus of Homs University, the report said.

The movement of personnel away from likely targets was actually good for the US, a former Israeli army intelligence chief said, since it would likely reduce the casualty toll, and it would also reduce Assad’s incentive to retaliate.

If the US attack is not too devastating, Assad will emerge from the bunker “and say ‘I’ve won,’” said Gen. (ret.) Aharon Zeevi Farkash. “He’ll say ‘I stood up to [the US]. Now I can continue fighting the rebels.’”

One target Assad cannot move, and that is very likely to be attacked, Farkash said, is the SSRC, the Scientific Studies and Research Center in Damascus, at the heart of Assad’s chemical weapons industry.

Key airports would likely be among the US targets, Farkash added.

Farkash predicted a US strike involving about 100 Tomahawk missiles.

Another former head of Israeli military intelligence, Amos Yadlin, noted on Friday that only a threat to fire 250 or 300 Tomahawks, and leave Assad without an air force, and with no chemical weapons industry — reducing his advantages in the civil war and drastically weakening his prospects of survival — might just prompt the Syrian president to agree to send his chemical weapons stocks to Russia and avert an attack. But this scenario was most unlikely, Yadlin said.

Syria expects a US attack “at any moment,” a senior Syrian security official said Saturday, hours after UN inspectors probing a suspected chemical weapons attack outside Damascus on August 21, left the country. And “we are ready to retaliate at any moment,” said the official.

A Kuwaiti paper cited by Israel Radio Saturday quoted Gulf sources as saying that the US planned to strike on Saturday, or Sunday at the latest. The paper quoted diplomatic sources as saying that America will launch strikes in Syria from various bases, including those in Turkey and Cyprus.

( “Arab affairs analyst Ehud Yaari says he’s basically asking Congress to help him down from the tree — that he’s shown he has no desire to strike.”  Is this not the most cowardly shirking of Presidential responsibility in our memories? – JW )

After days of deliberations, US president updates public on his thinking ahead of widely anticipated strike at the Assad regime for its use of chemical weapons

By Times of Israel staff August 31, 2013, 8:27 pm

US President Barack Obama at Henninger High School in Syracuse, New York, August 22, 2013. (photo credit: AP /Jacquelyn Martin)

US President Barack Obama has spoken in the White House Rose Garden to update the public about his decisions on how to proceed regarding Syria. The key message: He’s made up his mind to strike at the Assad regime, but will seek authorization from Congress.

Update:

Boehner: US House to consider Syria military action week of Sept. 9

Instant analysis: Obama has shown he doesn’t want to act

Israeli pundits’ immediate response is that Obama is taking a political chance, and could find himself defeated — David Cameron-style — in a Congressional vote.

Britain’s Sky news says “this wouldn’t have happened” were it not for Cameron’s defeat on a pro-strike vote in the House of Commons on Thursday. “He felt very isolated” and he’s been told by his military chiefs that so much could go wrong.

Certainly, now, there is no prospect of an attack in the next few days.

Arab affairs analyst Ehud Yaari says he’s basically asking Congress to help him down from the tree — that he’s shown he has no desire to strike.

21:01

‘We must not turn a blind eye to what happened in Damascus’

I don’t expect every nation to agree with the decision we have made, Obama says.

He says to the American people that he knows they are weary of war after Iraq and Afghanistan. He adds that the US can’t resolve the Syrian civil war. That’s why US troops won’t go there.

“But we are the United States of America. We cannot and must not turn a blind eye to what happened in Damascus.”

So he asks all members of Congress “to take this vote for our national security.” So put aside partisan politics. “It’s about who we are as a country.”

“Now is the time to show the world” that we uphold our commitments… that right makes might, not the other way around… We cannot turn away” from this massacre.

“I am ready to act in the face of this outrage,” he says, and urges Congress to show it is ready to do the same.

20:57

I don’t need US approval

The president says he is “comfortable” proceeding without UN approval.

He says he believes he has the authority to act without Congress’s okay, but believes in the strength of winning Congressional approval.

“I respect the views of those who call for caution,” he says. But “we must acknowledge the costs of doing nothing… What message will we send if a dictator can gas hundreds of children to death in plain sight, and pay no price.”

How will we stop others — governments that would build nuclear arms — he asks, if we do not follow through “on the values that define us.”

20:54

Obama: I will seek authorization from Congress

We have the necessary assets in the region, says Obama, and can strike whenever we choose.

“But having made my decision… based on what I am convinced are our national security interests,” Obama says he has made “a second decision” — to seek authorization from Congress.

In other words, the strike is several days off, at least.

20:52

Obama speaks of terrible images of the dead

He begins by restating the conviction that the Assad regime was behind the August 21 chemical weapons attack. “Well over 1,000 people were murdered.”

He calls attack an assault on human dignity, and a danger to national security.

“It endangers our friends… including Israel.”

“This menace must be confronted… The US should take military action against regime targets.”

20:50

Israeli TV speculation: Attack between tonight and Tuesday

Israel’s Channel 2 news speculates that the US will indeed attack, and that the strike will come between tonight and Tuesday night. It notes that, after that, President Obama is set to head to Sweden. (Incidentally, he’s scheduled to visit a synagogue in Stockholm for Rosh Hashana.)

Reports from Washington say that Vice President Biden, Secretary of State Kerry, Defense Secretary Hagel, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey are at the White House.

20:46

Security briefing for Israeli cabinet tomorrow

The chief of the IDF General Staff, Benny Gantz, and other security chiefs are to brief the Israeli cabinet at its weekly meeting tomorrow on the Syria situation.

Israeli officials remain convinced that Assad would not strike at Israel in the wake of a US-led attack, despite lots of threats to Israel from both Syria and Iran.

Israel is said to have completed its deployment of Iron Dome, Patriot and other missile defense systems ahead of any attack. Crowds are anticipated at gas mask distribution centers tomorrow, but there are no plans to open more centers, despite the large numbers of Israelis converging on the centers in the past few days.

20:41

Assad said to be in a bunker

Earlier tonight, Israel’s Channel 2 reported that Assad is already in a bunker, awaiting the US strike, expecting to emerge relatively unscathed, and claim victory.

The TV report also said Assad has sent his family to safe places.

Syrian President Bashar Assad and his wife Asma (photo credit: AP Photo/Michel Spingler/File)

In the past few days, he has been overseeing the evacuations of military command centers, ordering the relocation of sensitive equipment, and doing his utmost to minimize the damage of the looming US attack. Some forces and equipment have been moved to school and university campuses, including the campus of Homs University, the report said.

The movement of personnel away from likely targets was actually good for the US, a former Israeli army intelligence chief said, since it would likely reduce the casualty toll, and it would also reduce Assad’s incentive to retaliate.

If the US attack is not too devastating, Assad will emerge from the bunker “and say ‘I’ve won,’” said Gen. (ret.) Aharon Zeevi Farkash. “He’ll say ‘I stood up to [the US]. Now I can continue fighting the rebels.’”

One target Assad cannot move, and that is very likely to be attacked, Farkash said, is the SSRC, the Scientific Studies and Research Center in Damascus, at the heart of Assad’s chemical weapons industry.

Key airports would likely be among the US targets, Farkash added.

Farkash predicted a US strike involving about 100 Tomahawk missiles.

20:37

President behind schedule; UN inspectors in Amsterdam

Obama’s briefing is half-an-hour behind schedule.

Earlier today, AP reported, Obama’s top national security advisers gathered at the White House, and Syrian television broadcast scenes of fighter jets, tanks and troops in training, flip sides of a countdown to a likely US military strike meant to punish Assad’s government for the alleged use of chemical weapons.

A White House official said Obama’s remarks would not be about an imminent military operation in Syria, but rather would update the public about his decisions on how to proceed.

Earlier Saturday, UN inspectors arrived in Amsterdam after spending several days in Syria collecting soil samples and interviewing victims of an attack last week in the Damascus suburbs. Officials said it could be more than a week before their final report is complete.

It seemed unlikely Obama would wait that long to order any strike, given the flotilla of US warships equipped with cruise missiles and massed in the Mediterranean; Friday’s release of a declassified US intelligence assessment saying Assad’s chemical weapons killed 1,429 civilians; and an intensifying round of briefings for lawmakers clamoring for information.

The president said Friday that he was considering “limited and narrow” steps to punish Assad for the attack, adding that U.S. national security interests were at stake. He pledged no US combat troops on the ground in Syria, where a civil war has claimed more than 100,000 civilian lives.

With Obama struggling to gain international backing for a strike, Russian President Vladimir Putin urged him to reconsider his plans, saying he was speaking to him not as a president but as the recipient of a Nobel Peace Prize.

“We have to remember what has happened in the last decades, how many times the United States has been the initiator of armed conflict in different regions of the world, said Putin, a strong ally of Assad. “Did this resolve even one problem?”

20:30

President set to address the public day after Kerry’s speech

A day after his Secretary of State, John Kerry, insisted that the US knew that Syria’s President Bashar Assad was behind last Wednesday’s chemical weapons attack in the suburbs of Damascus, and that 1,429 Syrians were killed, President Barack Obama is about to address the American public.

Kerry set out passionate reasons why the US administration had to hold Assad to account. But Obama insisted later Friday that he had yet to make a decision on how to respond.

Israel faces retaliation if U.S. attacks Syria: Iran military | News , Middle East | THE DAILY STAR.

( Where’s the international community’s condemnation of this threat against a country not involved in any hostilities?  Where’s anyone in the press asking this question?  Whoops, sorry… I almost forgot.  NOBODY in world governments or media gives a shit about Jews.  As long as us Jews remember that disgusting fact, we might survive.  – JW )

August 31, 2013 04:48 PM (Last updated: August 31, 2013 05:32 PM)

The Daily Star

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei stands with Army commander General Salehi, Armed Forces Chief of Staff General Firouzabadi and Revolutionary Guards commander Jafari while attending graduating ceremony for Iran’s army landforce academy in Tehran

BEIRUT: Israel will face retaliation if the United States launches a military strike against Syria, a senior Iranian military official warned, Iran’s semi-official Fars News Agency reported Saturday. “Israel will be hit by retaliatory attacks if the United States launches an offensive on Syria since it [the Jewish state] is the first instigator in attacking [Syria],” Iranian Army Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Hassan Firouzabadi said. Iran staunchly backs the regime in Damascus and is Hezbollah’s leading supporter in the region. Firouzabadi accused Israel of spearheading efforts to drag Washington into a war with the government in Damascus. The U.S. has stepped up its war rhetoric against Damascus after accusing President Bashar Assad’s regime of using chemical weapons earlier this month against opposition strongholds outside Damascus. The Syrian government has strongly denied the accusations but vowed to counter any act of aggression against the country. The Iranian military’s top brass also accused Washington of siding with Al-Qaeda affiliates in Syria, warning of consequences in case of a U.S. strike against the war-torn country. “The U.S., which has invaded countries in the region under the big lie of battling Al-Qaeda following the September 11 [2001 attacks], is now fighting in favor of Al-Qaeda in Syria,” the Iranian general said. Firouzabadi also warned the U.S. war rhetoric could bring about massive problems for other powers. “Regional countries backing this cruel war will suffer serious losses,” he said.

Obama’s Syria crisis: He and John Kerry need a better plan for dealing with Assad’s chemical weapons crimes. – Slate Magazine.

He has feeble international support, and he doesn’t know what he’s trying to accomplish.

By Fred Kaplan|Posted Friday, Aug. 30, 2013, at 4:42 PM

–

A “shot across the bow” is not a fleshed-out plan.

President Obama is in a huge jam on Syria, and it’s not clear how he gets out of it. The problem is twofold. First, he is preparing to take military action against Syria for the sole purpose of enforcing international law. Yet he has very little support from the organizations—or many members of those organizations—that are charged with enforcing international law. If the point of the intervention is to uphold the civilized world’s long-held norms (in this case, norms against the use of chemical weapons), and if he can’t persuade more than a couple other countries to go along, then he doesn’t have a very potent case.

This is not a technical-legal question. It’s central to the strategy and effectiveness of whatever sort of military action he might decide to launch. In his Aug. 28 PBS interview, Obama said that an attack, if he launched one, needed to send “a pretty strong signal that” Bashar al-Assad’s regime “had better not do it again”—i.e., had better not launch any more chemical weapons. And yet if Assad doesn’t see the world closing in on him, if he sees the attack as purely an American (or Western) campaign, against which he can mobilize the usual anti-American (or anti-Western) actors, then the “signal” is going to be pretty weak.

It must have come as a shock when the British Parliament voted down a motion to authorize military action, especially after Prime Minister David Cameron promised Obama that he would join an international coalition to punish Assad for his monstrous acts. Cameron may have thought the motion was a slam dunk. Not since 1782 has a British leader lost a war resolution (the last time was when Parliament decided, against the King’s urgings, to withdraw from the American Colonies). It’s unclear whether this defeat reflects Cameron’s weakness or Britain’s abdication of a role in global politics. But it’s clear in retrospect that Obama should have lined up his ducks before letting his top aides all but announce that the cruise missiles were on their way.

French President François Hollande, who doesn’t need his Parliament’s approval for such things, has said he will join Obama in the war (the first time the two countries have allied in battle without Britain since they jointly fought against Britain in the American Revolution). The Germans are reluctant. The Arab League is wavering, as usual. (Silent support is about all one can expect, though the Saudis have lately been shipping lots of weapons to the rebels in southern Syria). The Turks? Unclear, though their support is crucial, since Turkey is one of the few countries that could claim “self-defense,” as it sits on Syria’s northern border and would potentially face the fallout from a future chemical attack. And since it’s a member of NATO, Turkey could also invoke Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty (an attack on one member is an attack on all) to rally the other allies.

But the second problem Obama faces is at least as serious. He has to figure out how to launch an attack that accomplishes his objectives—and that means first figuring out what those objectives are. He outlined what they weren’t in his PBS interview.

For instance, he said, “I’ve … concluded that direct military engagement, involvement in the civil war in Syria, would not help the situation on the ground.” So, one can surmise (in fact, it has long been clear) that one of his objectives is not to help the rebels win the war or to help topple Assad’s regime.

On a related point, he said, “I have no interest in any kind of open-ended conflict in Syria,” adding, “We can take limited, tailored approaches, not getting drawn into a long conflict, not a repetition of, you know, Iraq, which I know a lot of people are worried about.” So, he does not intend to get involved in the messy business of the aftermath of whatever he decides to do—no nation-building, no siding with any side or faction in the fight. (And, by the way, I believe him on this: Obama is extremely resistant to the chutes and ladders of escalation.)

His objective, he stressed, is limited to restoring the “red line” he drew over chemical weapons, preserving the international norms. “[W]e do have to make sure,” he said, “that when countries breach international norms on weapons like chemical weapons … they are held accountable.”

OK, but what kind of attack accomplishes that objective—and no more? Here, Obama’s remarks on PBS are a bit disturbing: “If we are saying in a clear and decisive but very limited way, we send a shot across the bow, saying, ‘Stop doing this,’ that can have a positive impact on our national security over the long term … and may have a positive impact in the sense that chemical weapons are not used again on innocent civilians.” (Emphasis added.)

A “shot across the bow,” in military parlance, means a single shot, or a single volley of shots, to signal the opponent that you mean business and to test his response, to see if he backs down, before going on to the next step. If this really is what Obama plans to do, it isn’t enough. In fact, it’s worse than doing nothing. Shots across the bow generally don’t work. (I’m tempted to say they never work, but there’s bound to be an obscure exception or two in the annals of history.) It would be especially feckless in this case, given that Assad, looking out on the horizon, would see only a scattered few countries attacking him, a lot of those countries’ putative allies staying away, his own protectors (chiefly Iran and Russia) sticking by him, and his power base at home fairly stable.

To hold them truly accountable, to make sure they don’t use chemical weapons again, Obama has to do serious damage to the things Assad and his regime (chiefly his generals) hold dear. He needs to destroy as much of the military’s infrastructure as possible—air bases, weapons depots, command-and-control facilities (which, let’s face it, is often a euphemism for the leaders in the command-and-control facilities): everything. This will be harder than it might have been a few days ago, since U.S. officials have told the New York Times that they plan to attack such targets, as a result of which the Syrian officers have probably dispersed their weapons and emptied their headquarters so that the cruise missiles striking an air base will wreck fewer planes and those striking headquarters will kill many fewer commanders. As a result, the attack may have to be more extensive.

Obama says he doesn’t want to tilt the playing field in Syria’s civil war, but one thing any attack has to do is weaken Assad’s grasp on his country—or at least on his military. Secretary of State John Kerry said in his speech today that one effect of an attack should be to spur a negotiated solution to the civil war. The only way that will happen is if Assad or his henchmen realize that they are isolated. Supplies from Russia or Iran have to be severed. (Repeated attacks on airfields can help do that). More important, Assad needs to pick up a signal from Vladimir Putin that Moscow is not coming to his rescue. (This is how, eventually, Slobodan Milošević was dethroned in Serbia.)

It’s a thin line that Obama has to walk: launching a strike that’s sufficiently devastating to make Assad or his supporters (at home or abroad) tremble, but not so destructive that it kills lots of civilians or leaves behind a socio-economic catastrophe, which no one is likely to clean up and which therefore is bound to intensify the civil war.

Given the fragility and uncertainties, it would be good if this didn’t look like a purely American (or Western) assault, if more nations—especially Syria’s neighbors—came in on this, even with merely vocal support. One virtue of allies is that they can put a check on military excesses. This can prolong an operation, but it can also give it more international legitimacy.

The U.S. military in particular is a conservative organization. Most generals do not want to intervene in foreign wars, especially foreign civil wars, mainly because they know that they wind up holding the bag if things go south. If they do get pushed into drawing up a war plan, they tend to go overboard. They present a variety of options, placing a low probability of success on those that strike only a few targets (“a shot across the bow”) and a moderate-to-high probability of success only on those that strike practically everything. The president needs to question those options and the assumptions behind the probabilities so he doesn’t go too light or too heavy.

One thing worth noting: This is not Iraq. Some believed that Saddam Hussein was developing weapons of mass destruction. It is long known that Assad possesses them, and the evidence seems clear that he has used them with very deadly effect.

The first question is whether the rest of the world should do something about it. Obama’s case—that action is necessary to preserve the taboo against the use of chemical weapons—is the only case worth making, and I think the case is strong.

The second question, though, is whether the United States and maybe one or two other countries have the legitimacy to enforce international law on their own. That’s a tougher case to make.

The third question is whether President Obama and the allies he rallies have a plan that really accomplishes the strategic goal. At the moment that’s unclear. If other countries had signed on to the mission, they would be discussing that now. Maybe the very act of a dozen or so world leaders discussing a real war plan would have given Assad or Putin pause before the bombs dropped and the missiles flew.

As is, what happens next is a nail-biter. If the use of chemical weapons is still to be considered an international crime, and if members of the international community are to remain relevant actors in the prevention and punishment of those crimes, the answer cannot be that we do nothing—nor can it be that we fire a shot across the bow.

IDF bolsters troops; IAF circles Lebanon sky – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Gearing for possible US attack on Syria, IDF is bolstering troops in north, deploying defense systems in center. ‘If Syria is attacked, Zionists will be attacked,’ Iran army chief says

Roi Kais

The IDF is bolstering forces in the north, in preparation for a possible attack by the US, Lebanese media reported Saturday, referring more specifically to areas in front of the blue line in east south Lebanon and upper Galilee and the Golan Heights.

According to reports, IAF planes are continually circling above the same areas in south Lebanon.

In addition, the IDF deployed all missile defense systems.

On Friday, the IDF deployed an Iron Dome battery in the Tel Aviv Metropolitan area. For the first time the battery is facing north.

The system was deployed as a precaution ahead of possible Syrian retaliation to a potential US strike.

Iron Dome, Hetz and Patriot missile defense were also deployed in the north.

A security official told AFP Saturday that Syria expected a military attack “at any moment,” just hours after UN experts probing a suspected gas attack blamed on the regime left the country.

Iranian army’s Chief of Staff Hassan Firuzabadi said that “If Syria is attacked, the Zionists will be attacked,” the Fars news agency reported.

President Barack Obama said on Friday the chemical weapons attack in Syria threatened US allies Israel, Turkey and Jordan and that while “nobody ends up being more war weary than me” he is considering a narrow, limited US response.