U.S. officials seek to limit fallout from internal dissent on Syria

Reuters

The Obama administration sought on Friday to control fallout from a leaked internal memo critical of its Syria policy, but showed no sign it was ready to consider the military strikes against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces called for in a letter signed by dozens of U.S. diplomats.Several U.S. officials said that while the administration is willing to hear the diplomats’ dissenting views, it is not expected to make any changes in President Barack Obama’s Syria policy in his final seven months in office.One senior official said that the test for whether these proposals are given high-level consideration will be whether they “fall in line with our contention that there is no military solution to the conflict in Syria.”  

The document — sent through the State Department’s “dissent channel,” a conduit for voicing contrary opinions meant to be classified — underscored long-standing divisions and frustrations among Obama’s aides over his approach to Syria’s civil war. Obama’s Syria policy has been predicated on the goal of avoiding deeper military entanglements in the chaotic Middle East, and has widely been criticized as hesitant and risk-averse.

The cable, signed by 51 State Department officers, calls for “targeted military strikes” against Assad’s government — something Obama has long avoided — to stop its persistent violations of a ceasefire with U.S.-backed anti-government rebels that is largely ignored by Syria and its Russian supporters.

Obama’s critics quickly seized upon the letter, which also calls for a political transition that would usher out Assad.

“This just confirms what House Republicans have been saying for years: we do not have a strategy for victory over ISIS,” said Doug Andres, a spokesman for Republican House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan, using an acronym for the Syria-based Islamic State group.

“The president has been unwilling to listen to the people’s elected representatives, maybe he’ll be willing to listen to his own professional diplomats.”

In what other officials called an attempt to control any damage to the president’s policies, one senior U.S. official stressed that it is only natural that “on a subject as complex and complicated as Syria that we have a diversity of views, and this letter reflects that.”

OBAMA’S “RED LINE”

Other U.S. officials pointed out that the cable does not carry the signatures of any senior State Department officials, such as assistant or deputy secretaries or ambassadors.

Secretary of State John Kerry, visiting Copenhagen, told Reuters on Friday: “It’s an important statement and I respect the process, very, very much. I will … have a chance to meet with people when I get back (to Washington).” He said he had not seen the memo.

The senior official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that since the letter was directed to Kerry, he would deal with it for now, and it would be up to him whether “elevate it” to the attention of Obama and other top advisers.

One U.S. official, who did not sign the cable but has read it, told Reuters the White House remains opposed to deeper American military involvement in Syria.

The official said the cable was unlikely to alter that, or shift Obama’s focus from the battle against the threat posed by the Islamic State militant group.

Obama’s aides also have acknowledged privately that even if the president did decide to take a more aggressive stance against Assad, that would be a much riskier operation now that Russian forces, especially warplanes, are now directly supporting Moscow’s ally Assad. Such strikes could put the United States on a collision course with Russia.

In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he had only seen media reports about the memo, but said: “Calls for the violent overthrow of authorities in another country are unlikely to be accepted in Moscow.

“The liquidation of this or some other regime is hardly what is needed to aid the successful continuation of the battle against terrorism. Such a move is capable of plunging the region into complete chaos.”

The internal dissent has been brewing at least since August 2013, when Obama stunned Kerry, then-Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and other senior aides by abruptly calling off air strikes he had vowed to order if Assad’s forces crossed a “red line” against the use of chemical weapons. Nine days earlier, a Sarin gas attack killed as many as 1,400 Syrians.

“That decision destroyed any credibility the administration had with Russia, Iran or Assad himself,” said a former Defense Department official involved in Syria policy. “Talking softly with no stick is not an effective way of dealing with people like that.”

At least 250,000 people have died in Syria’s five-year civil war in Syria, while more than 6.6 million have been internally displaced and another 4.8 million people have fled the country.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-usa-cable-idUSKCN0Z3087

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