You are against president Obama on Syria.
You state it every day, so you should reply to this text from him today in Stockholm...
"JAY CARNEY (White House press secretary): The first question from the American press goes to Steve Holland of Reuters.
Q: Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, sir. Have you made up your mind whether to take action against Syria, whether or not you have a congressional resolution approved? Is a strike needed in order to preserve your credibility for when you set these sort of red lines? And were you able to enlist the support of the prime minister here for support in Syria?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Let me unpack the question. First of all, I didn’t set a red line. The world set a red line. The world set a red line when governments representing 98 percent of the world’s population said the use of chemical weapons are abhorrent and passed a treaty forbidding their use even when countries are engaged in war.
Congress set a red line when it ratified that treaty. Congress set a red line when it indicated that -- in a piece of legislation titled the Syria Accountability Act that some of the horrendous things that are happening on the ground there need to be answered for.
And so when I said in a press conference that my calculus about what’s happening in Syria would be altered by the use of chemical weapons, which the overwhelming consensus of humanity says is wrong, that wasn’t something I just kind of made up. I didn’t pluck it out of thin air. There’s a reason for it. That’s point number one.
Point number two, my credibility’s not on the line. The international community’s credibility is on the line, and America and Congress’ credibility is on the line because we give lip service to the notion that these international norms are important. And when those videos first broke and you saw images of over 400 children subjected to gas, everybody expressed outrage. How can this happen in this modern world? Well, it happened because a government chose to deploy these deadly weapons on civilian populations.
And so the question is how credible is the international community when it says this is an international norm that has to be observed? The question is how credible is Congress when it passes a treaty saying we have to forbid the use of chemical weapons? And I do think that we have to act because if we don’t, we are effectively saying that even though we may condemn it and issue resolutions and so forth and so on, somebody who is not shamed by resolutions can continue to act with impunity.
And those international norms begin to erode and other despots and authoritarian regimes can start looking and saying that’s something we can get away with, and that then calls into question other international norms and laws of war and whether those are going to be enforced.
So as I told the prime minister, I’m very respectful of the U.N. investigators who went in at great danger to try to gather evidence about what happened. We want more information, not less. But when I said that I have high confidence that chemical weapons were used and that the Assad government, through their chain of command, ordered their use, that was based on both public sourcing, intercepts, evidence that we feel very confident about, including samples that have been tested showing sarin from individuals who were there.
And I’m very mindful of the fact that around the world and here in Europe in particular, there are still memories of Iraq and weapons of mass destruction accusations and people being concerned about how accurate this information is.
Keep in mind, I’m somebody who opposed the war in Iraq and am not interested in repeating mistakes of us basing decisions on faulty intelligence. But having done a thoroughgoing evaluation of the information that is currently available, I can say with high confidence: chemical weapons were used.
And by the way, Iran doesn’t deny it. Even Syria doesn’t actually deny that they were used. And that is what the U.N. investigators are supposed to be determining. And frankly, nobody’s really disputing that chemical weapons were used. The only remaining dispute is who used them -- which is outside the parameters of the U.N. investigation. So the U.N. investigation will not be able to answer that preliminarily. They’re not supposed to.
But what we know is, is that the opposition doesn’t have the capability to deliver weapons on this scale. These weapons are in Assad’s possession. We have intercepts indicating people in the chain of command, both before and after the attacks, with knowledge of these attacks. We can show that the rockets that delivered these chemical weapons went from areas controlled by Assad into these areas where the opposition was lodged and that accumulation of evidence gives us high confidence that Assad carried this out.
And so the question is: After we’ve gone through all this, are we going to try to find a reason not to act? And if that’s the case, then I think the world community should admit it because you can always find a reason not to act.
This is a complicated, difficult situation. And an initial response will not solve the underlying tragedy of the civil war in Syria. As Fredrik mentioned, that will be solved through, eventually, a political transition. But we can send a very clear, strong message against the prohibition -- or in favor of the prohibition against using chemical weapons. We can change Assad’s calculus about using them again. We can degrade his capabilities so that he does not use them again.
And so what I’m talking about is an action that is limited in time and in scope, targeted at the specific task of degrading his capabilities and deterring the use of those weapons again. And in the meantime, we will continue to engage the entire international community in trying to find a solution to the underlying problems, which brings me to the last question.
And that is, what happens if Congress doesn’t approve it? I believe that Congress will approve it. I believe Congress will approve it because I think America recognizes that, as difficult as it is to take any military action -- even one as limited as we’re talking about -- even one without boots on the ground -- that’s a sober decision. But I think America also recognizes that if the international community fails to maintain certain norms, standards and laws governing how countries interact and how people are treated, that over time, this world becomes less safe.
It becomes more dangerous, not only for those people who are subjected to these horrible crimes, but to all of humanity. And we’ve seen that happen again and again in our history. And the people of Europe are certainly familiar with what happens when the international community finds excuses not to act.
And I would not have taken this before Congress just as a symbolic gesture. I think it’s very important that Congress say that we mean what we say. And I think we will be stronger as a country in our response if the president and Congress does it together. As commander in chief, I always preserve the right and the responsibility to act on behalf of America’s national security. I do not believe that I was required to take this to Congress, but I did not take this to Congress just because it’s an empty exercise. I think it’s important to have Congress’ support on it." |
