Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel: US military was ready to take action against the Syrian regime if ordered; Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: Chemical weapons use by Syrian President Bashar Assad requires "a decisive response";
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    • According to reports, US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said on August 24 that the US military was ready to take action against the Syrian regime if ordered, but stressed that Washington was still evaluating claims of a chemical weapons attack. "President Obama has asked the Defense Department to prepare options for all contingencies. We have done that…Again, we are prepared to exercise whatever option, if he decides to employ one of those options." Hagel told reporters in the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur. He noted that the US and its allies were assessing intelligence on allegations that President Bashar al-Assad's forces unleashed chemical weapons in an attack near Damascus last week as he battles an uprising that began in March 2011. "I wouldn't go further than that, until we have more intelligence based on facts," Hagel aded. Hagel later delivered a speech in which he underlined Washington's bid to rebalance America's strategic focus towards the Asia-Pacific.1

    According to reports, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee US Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) has said that chemical weapons use by Syrian President Bashar Assad requires "a decisive response." Following a national security call on Syria, Menendez released a statement saying, "This is not a moment to look the other way, to blind ourselves to the horrifying images in Syria." He added that he also did not want to "send the dangerous message to the global community that we [the US] would allow the use of a chemical weapons attack to take place with impunity. "A decisive and consequential US response is justified and warranted to protect Syrians, as well as to send a global message that chemical weapons attacks in violation of international law will not stand.” He added that vulnerable populations throughout the world could become potential targets if the US did not act.2

    Meanwhile, according to reports, President Obama has not yet decided on U.S. action in Syria, where according to him, his administration has "concluded" President Bashar al Assad used chemical weapons in an attack against civilians last week near Damascus. "I have gotten options with our military, had extensive conversations with my national security team," the president said on August 28 in an interview with "PBS NewsHour." "If the Assad regime used chemical weapons on his own people, then that would change some of our calculations - and the reason has to do with not only international norms but America's own self-interest." Employing his sharpest language to date, Obama defined Vice President Joe Biden's assessment on August 27 that there is "no doubt" the Syrian government was at fault. Obama noted that United States has concluded that Assad's regime "carried these out”. And if that's so, there needs to be international consequences.3

    In another development, according to reports, US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel on August 30 asked the Philippines for more access to the country’s military bases for another twenty years as the two sides discuss a wider American military footprint in Asia. The request for increased military presence is part of President Barack Obama‘s strategic “pivot” to Asia, a policy that calls for a stronger US military alliances and more troop presence in the Asia-Pacific region. United States and Philippine officials are negotiating a framework agreement that would increase the rotational presence of US troops and allow more of its ships and aircraft to pass through the Southeast Asian country.4

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