April 07, 2017
Ilan Goldenberg and Nicholas Heras discuss Syria in The Washington Post
In The Washington Post, CNAS Middle East Security Program experts Ilan Goldenberg and Nicholas Heras discuss President Donald Trump's decision to launch missile strikes against Syria. Please find an excerpt of the article below:
President Trump’s decision to launch missile strikes against Syria’s Al Shayrat airfield after a chemical weapons attack on civilians was an appropriate response to an act of unspeakable horror. Yet as analysts who have argued for greater U.S. military engagement to end the Syrian civil war, we find ourselves conflicted about the president’s decision: We fear there is simply no plan for what comes next.
To succeed beyond Thursday’s limited strikes, American leaders must decide on a clear set of objectives, a realistic desired final outcome, a theory of the case for how to get there and a solid understanding of the risks. We see three potential options for how the president could move forward.
The United States could pursue a limited strategy focused on one-off strikes in response to the Syrian regime’s use of chemical weapons. In that case, the strike on the air base from which last week’s sarin gas attacks were launched will probably be enough. President Bashar al-Assad and his generals will get the message and stop using those types of weapons.
Read the full article at The Washington Post.
More from CNAS
-
Trump Needs to Reestablish Deterrence with Iran
Commentary
The attack attributed to Iran on Saudi Aramco oil facilities is the latest in a series of Iranian escalations—the May 14 and June 13 tanker attacks, the June 20 downing of a U...
By Kaleigh Thomas & Elisa Catalano Ewers
-
Nicholas Heras on Killing of ISIS Leader in U.S. Military Raid
Video
The Center for a New American Security’s Nicholas Heras talked about the killing of ISIS founder and leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in a U.S. military raid in Syria. Listen to th...
By Nicholas Heras
-
Discussing Turkey’s Offensive Against the Kurds in Syria with Nick Heras
Podcast
The United States’ withdrawal and the Turkish military’s incursion into the Kurdish-controlled northeast have completely changed the balance of power in Syria. Without America...
By Andrea Kendall-Taylor, Jim Townsend & Nicholas Heras
-
The Nonintervention Delusion
Commentary
Richard Fontaine addresses the most frequently expressed concerns about U.S. military interventions and concludes that the use of military force will remain a key component of...
By Richard Fontaine
