Showdown looms: Military strikes on Syria likely days away, warns US officials

August 28, 2013 – SYRIA – The U.S. could hit Syria with three days of missile strikes, perhaps beginning Thursday, in an attack meant more to send a message to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad than to topple him or cripple his military, senior U.S. officials told NBC News on Tuesday. The State Department fed the growing drumbeat around the world for a military response to Syria’s suspected use of chemical weapons against rebels Aug. 21 near Damascus, saying that while the U.S. intelligence community would release a formal assessment within the week, it was already “crystal clear” that Assad’s government was responsible. Vice President Joe Biden went even further, bluntly telling an American Legion audience in Houston: “Chemical weapons have been used.” Vice President Joe Biden addresses the use of chemical weapons in Syria and the president’s response in a speech to the American Legion. “No one doubts that innocent men, women and children have been the victims of chemical weapons attacks in Syria, and there’s no doubt who’s responsible for this heinous use of chemical weapons in Syria: the Syrian regime,” Biden said. White House press secretary Jay Carney repeated Tuesday that the White House isn’t considering the deliberate overthrow of Assad. “The options that we are considering are not about regime change,” said during a daily briefing with reporters.

 “They are about responding to the clear violation of an international standard that prohibits the use of chemical weapons.” But Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., an influential voice on military matters, pressed the administration to go further, calling for the U.S. and its allies to provide weapons to “the resistance on the ground. The important part of this whole situation is, is this just going to be just a retaliatory strike that has no lasting impact or something that changes the momentum on the ground in Syria?” McCain told reporters in Mesa, Ariz., after an event on immigration reform. Senior officials told NBC News that Defense Department planning had advanced to the point that three days of strikes were anticipated, after which strategists could run an assessment and target what was missed in further rounds. Many Americans asked about the slaughter in Syria are torn as to how the U.S. should get involved. NBC’s Kevin Tibbles reports. U.S. missile strikes would almost certainly be launched from Navy destroyers or submarines in the Mediterranean Sea. The U.S. in recent days has moved destroyers closer to Syria, which sits on the sea’s eastern edge, but that was mostly a symbolic move. U.S. Tomahawk missiles are so precise that they can hit not just buildings but also specific windows, and they could hit Syrian targets from far farther west in the Mediterranean. Navy officials said four destroyers are lined up ready to strike: the USS Barry, the USS Mahan, the USS Ramage and the USS Gravely. Tuesday, a fifth guided-missile destroyer, the USS Stout, also entered the Mediterranean, through the Straights of Gibraltar, but officials said it wouldn’t take part in any cruise missile attack. “The four destroyers now in place have more than enough cruise missiles,” one official said. –NBC