August 24, 2013

Syria warns U.S. not to intervene militarily, USA Today

Bassem Mroue and Albert Aji

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/08/24/syria-rebels-chemical-weapons/2695243/

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U.N. chemical weapons experts are now in Syria to investigate three purported chemical attacks that took place months ago. Allowing the investigators into the country took months of negotiations between the U.N. and the Assad government. And even then, their mandate "is limited to those three sites...and it is only charged with determining whether chemical weapons were used, not who used them." So after the most recent alleged chemical weapons attack, will President Obama wait for UN inspectors to gain access to one more site? Will he depend on the UN to find whether chemical weapons were used, but not who used them? And where would the rudderless White House go from there? After all, the UN is Obama's go-to authority - as he pounded should have been the case on Iraq. So if the UN gang can't get in, or won't say whodunnit, the man just might have to make a decision for himself.