Obama Seeks to Maintain Syria Threat as Russia Plan Gains
By Terry Atlas and David Lerman - Sep 10, 2013
President Barack Obama’s top national security advisers recalibrated their campaign for congressional authorization of military strikes, as Russia’s initiative to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons gained traction amid doubts about whether it would work.
The Russian bid to get Syria to surrender its chemical weapons shifted the debate as Obama prepared to make his case for U.S. military action in a nationally televised address tonight. Obama agreed to have the U.S. discuss the Russian moves at the United Nations Security Council, while a bipartisan group of senators began drafting an alternative to the proposal authorizing a military strike.
After having pressed Congress to back military action against a defiant Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Secretary of State John Kerry said the threat of U.S. military action now is needed for a potential diplomatic outcome that averts air strikes. There has been no response to the Russian proposal from Assad, although Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem in Moscow yesterday welcomed the development.
The Russian proposal stands a chance only in the environment of a “credible use of force,” Kerry told the House Armed Services Committee today, pressing for support in a legislative chamber where a majority of members have been against or leaning against against the president’s request for a use-of-force authorization.
‘Credible Threat’
“A lot of people say that nothing focuses the mind like the prospect of a hanging,” Kerry said. “Well, it’s the credible threat of force that has been on the table for these last weeks that has, for the first time, brought this regime to even acknowledge that they have a chemical weapons arsenal. And it is the threat of this force, and our determination to hold Assad accountable, that has motivated others to even talk about a real and credible international action that might have an impact.”
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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-10/france-to-submit-syria-chemical-weapons-proposal-to-un.html