Three Middle Eastern nations have
offered the United States use of their
military assets for action against Syria,
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said
Monday. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab
Emirates are the first to do so, and
other countries are expected to as
well, Kerry said in a phone call to
Democratic lawmakers, according to
two people who were on the call. The prospect of military strikes has
resulted in about 100 defections from
the Syrian military, he said on the call,
according to the sources. A total of 127 Democrats from the
House of Representatives were on the
call, a Democratic aide told CNN. But the tough sell for action was clear
in the call. When Gen. Martin Dempsey,
chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
said collateral damage from a strike is
expected to be low, some lawmakers
questioned how officials could know that. Two senior Arab diplomats said talks
with Saudi Arabia and the UAE are
preliminary, and no details have been
discussed. But two leading Republican
senators who met with President
Barack Obama on Monday said the administration signaled increased
support for Syria's opposition in a bid
to shift the balance of power in Syria's
2 1/2-year-old civil war. "There seems to be emerging from this
administration a pretty solid plan to
upgrade the opposition," said Sen.
Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, a
member of the Senate Armed Services
Committee. And Sen. John McCain, the ranking
Republican on the Senate Armed
Services Committee, said he was more
supportive of a limited U.S. strike after
the meeting, partly because of the
prospect of that increased support. But both senators said they needed more
detailed assurances that the U.S.
strategy would be sufficiently strong
and sustainable before they could
endorse it to their colleagues. Administration officials will be
conducting classified briefings on Syria
for Congress nearly every day this
week. Obama will meet Tuesday
morning with House Speaker John
Boehner and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, congressional aides said, and
he'd already planned talks with the
leaders of the key national security
committees in the House and Senate. One of those, House Armed Services
Chairman Buck McKeon, told CNN the
administration will have to overcome
"a lot of distrust among the American
people" about the intelligence that
fingers Syria's government in a poison gas attack outside Damascus in late
August. "There will be a real questioning as to
the veracity of the evidence and if this
really happened or not," McKeon, R-
California, said in an interview with
CNN's Barbara Starr. "It will be
necessary to explain and prove to the American people, and I think the only
person who can really do that is the
president of the United States." But McCain said it would be
"catastrophic" for Congress to reject
Obama's call to authorize U.S. military
force, adding it would "undermine the
credibility of the United States and the
president of the United States." Al-Assad: Middle East 'powder keg'
could explode Syrian President Bashar al-Assad,
meanwhile, warned that a regional
war could break out if Syria is attacked. "The Middle East is a powder keg, and
the fire is approaching today," he told
French newspaper Le Figaro in an
interview Monday. "One must not speak only of the Syrian
response, but rather what could be
produced after the first strike. Because
nobody can know what will happen.
Everyone will lose control of the
situation when the powder keg explodes. Chaos and extremism will
spread. The risk of a regional war
exists." Syria has repeatedly denied being
behind an August 21 chemical
weapons attack that killed hundreds
of people. While a U.N. probe is under way, U.S.
Secretary of State John Kerry said
Sunday there's "an overwhelming
case" that Syria was behind the attack. Blood and hair samples obtained from
first responders through an
"appropriate chain of custody" have
"tested positive for signatures of sarin"
gas, Kerry said on CNN's "State of the
Union" on Sunday. It's unclear exactly how the United
States obtained the material
independently of the United Nations. Al-Assad told Le Figaro, "We have
challenged the United States and
France to give a single piece of
evidence." Obama and French
President Francois Hollande, whose
government has also called for action against Syria, "have been incapable" of
providing it, he insisted. He also questioned "the logic" of
carrying out an attack that injured
Syrian soldiers as well. NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh
Rasmussen said Monday that "many
facts in this case point to the regime as
responsible for the chemical attacks." He called for a "firm international
response." "It would send a very, I would say,
dangerous signal to dictators all over
the world if we stand idly by and don't
react," he said. But NATO itself won't take military
action against Syria. NATO is prepared to protect Turkey, a
NATO member, if Syria attacks it,
Rasmussen said. The alliance has
deployed Patriot missiles to the
country, he said. But, he added, "I
don't foresee any further NATO role in Turkey. It is for individual nations to
decide how to react to what has
happened in Syria." Britain, which was just as forceful a
voice for military action as the United
States, also won't take part after the
House of Commons rejected a
resolution that would have opened the
door for British attacks against Syria. In Yemen, meanwhile, that country's
parliament on Monday announced its
opposition to any outside intervention
in Syria. Al-Assad warns of 'repercussions' "The French people are not our enemy,
but the policy of their state is hostile to
the Syrian people," al-Assad told Le
Figaro. "... This hostility will end when
the French state changes its policy.
There will be repercussions, negative as is well understood, against the
French interests. France has said it won't act without the
United States as a partner. So the world is looking to the United
States, waiting to see whether it will
act. And following Obama's last-minute
decision to hold off until Congress
weighs in, no such action is expected
until after lawmakers reconvene from recess on September 9. Lawmakers are split, worried about
whether military strikes could worsen
the situation -- partly because the
opposition in Syria includes al Qaeda-
linked extremists such as the al-Nusra
Front. The August 21 attack killed more than
1,000 people -- perhaps more than
1,400, according to U.S. officials. "We know that the regime ordered this
attack, we know they prepared for it,"
Kerry said Sunday. "We know where the rockets came
from. We know where they landed. We
know the damage that was done
afterwards. We've seen the horrific
scenes all over the social media, and
we have evidence of it in other ways, and we know that the regime tried to
cover up afterwards." Obama: Many want action, 'nobody
wants to do it' "(W)e are looking at the possibility of a
limited, narrow act that would help
make sure that not only Syria, but
others around the world, understand
that the international community cares
about maintaining this chemical weapons ban and norm," Obama said
Saturday. He added that "part of the challenge
that we end up with here is that a lot of
people think something should be
done, but nobody wants to do it." Obama stressed his preference for
multilateral action, but said "it is not in
the national security interest of the
United States to ignore clear violations
of these kinds of international norms,
and the reason is because there are a whole host of international norms that
are very important to us." The United Nations charter generally
doesn't allow countries to attack other
nations unless in self-defense or with
approval from the U.N. Security Council. But United States, Britain, and France
couldn't get support from the United
Nations for a strike on Syria, because
Syria's allies in the U.N. Security Council
-- Russia and China -- are sure to block
any U.N. effort. Russia, which has major trade deals
with Syria, is sending a delegation to
Washington for "dialogue" with
members of Congress, the Kremlin said
Monday. When the two sides share "opinions
and arguments, then we'll better
understand each other," said Valentina
Matviyenko, speaker of the Federation
Council, the upper house of
parliament. "And I hope that the U.S. Congress will take a balanced
position" and reject military
intervention. She insisted there are no "strong
arguments" for war. Russia rejects Kerry's claim that the
United States has all the evidence it
needs. "We absolutely were not convinced by
that (evidence) that our American
partners, as well as the British and the
French, showed us," Russian Foreign
Minister Sergey Lavrov said, according
to the state-run RIA Novosti news agency. "There are no facts, there's only talk
about what we know for certain. When
we ask for more detailed evidence,
they say, 'You know, it's all secret, so
we can't show you.' That means that
there are no such facts." China weighed in Monday as well. "We are gravely concerned that some
country may take unilateral military
actions," said Chinese foreign affairs
spokesman Hong Lei. "We believe that any action taken by
the international community should
abide by the purposes and principles
of the U.N. charter ... so as to avoid
complicating the Syrian issue and
bringing more disasters to the Middle East region." Transcript: Obama's remarks on Syria The United Nations, meanwhile, said
evidence that could show whether
chemical weapons were used in Syria
was being delivered to a lab on
Monday. But a U.N. spokesman would
not estimate how long it may take to get results. Even when results are
released, they won't show who was
responsible. Al-Assad's regime Monday asked U.N.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon "to
shoulder his responsibilities for
preventing any aggression on Syria,"
the state-run Syrian Arab News
Agency reported. Under U.S. law, Obama doesn't have to
get Congress' approval to launch
military action. The 1973 War Powers
Resolution authorizes a president to
initiate an attack as long as he notifies
Congress within 48 hours. But internationally, a U.S. strike against
Syria could be deemed illegal. Obama faces legal challenges on Syria
strike Why China, Russia and Iran are
standing by the Syrian regime Five U.S. Navy ships are being
positioned in the Red Sea, a U.S. official
said Monday. A second official said the aircraft carrier
USS Nimitz is not expected to
participate in combat operations over
Syria, but the ship is there to establish a
greater U.S. military presence in the
region. Syria missile strike: What would
happen next? Reports: Sarin's been used in Syria
before World leaders have said previously
that sarin has been used in the Syrian
civil war. In April, the United States said it had
evidence sarin was used in Syria on a
small scale. In May, a U.N. official said
there were strong suspicions that rebel
forces used the deadly nerve agent.
And in June, France said sarin had been used several times in the war,
including at least once by government
forces. But the August attack was by far the
deadliest. "This is such a blatant example, we
can't pretend not to see it," said
Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon
official now with the American
Enterprise Institute. 'Red line' debate: Are chemical
weapons worse? No end to the bloodshed While world leaders grapple with what
to do about Syria, the reports of
carnage on the ground keep rising. At least 118 people were killed across
Syria on Sunday, including 13 children,
the opposition group Local
Coordination Committees of Syria said. And 63 people were killed across the
country on Monday, including eight
children, according to the opposition
Local Coordination Committees of Syria. State-run news agency SANA said the
army killed "scores of terrorists"
Monday and destroyed their hideouts. The United Nations has said more than
100,000 people -- including many
civilians -- have been killed since a
popular uprising spiraled into a civil
war two years ago. U.S. Marines site appeared hacked The pro-Assad Syrian Electronic Army
appeared to have hacked the U.S.
Marines recruitment website,
marines.com, overnight, and posted a
letter urging Marines not to attack
Syria. "Dear US Marines, This is a message
written by your brothers in the Syrian
Army, who have been fighting Al
Qaeda for the last 3 years," the
message states. "... Obama is a traitor
who wants to put your lives in danger to rescue Al Qaeda insurgents." The message ends by saying, "You're
more than welcome to fight alongside
our army rather than against it. Your
brothers, the Syrian army soldiers. A
message delivered by the SEA." A Marine Corps official said the content
of the site was not compromised;
instead, visitors were redirected to
another site. No confidential or personal
information was put at risk, the official
said. The Marine Corps Recruit Command
cannot immediately confirm who was
responsible for redirecting visitors, the
official said.