Something out of numbing

I’m with Charles Krauthammer on this one: “The world is on fire and we’re chasing rabbit holes,” he declared April 4, the same day of a(nother) major chemical weapons attack in Syria and days ahead of a(nother) set of deadly attacks by ISIS on unprotected Christians.

For weeks, major American media have been on a hunt to prove Trump advisers colluded with the Russians to influence the U.S. election. This, with no actual evidence the elections were influenced, but never mind, the FBI is investigating. Then we learned former National Security Adviser Susan Rice requested “unmasking” the names in intelligence briefs tied to the Trump campaign, dozens of times. This could be a crime if it turns out Rice used that information to leak anonymously damaging information about the Trump team to the press, but expect months of potentially fruitless congressional investigation.

Meanwhile, can we spend a moment on chemical weapons? Can we review how the Rice-Obama team colluded with Russians at the cost of Syrian lives?

In August 2013 a UN fact-finding team reported children in Syria were being “killed or publicly executed, crucified, beheaded or stoned to death” by a group calling itself ISIS. President Obama chose that moment to focus instead on the Syrian government’s use of chemical weapons and threatened President Bashar al-Assad’s continued use would constitute a “red line” requiring U.S. intervention.

Assad conclusively crossed that line in August 2013 with a sarin gas attack near Damascus. It killed nearly 1,500 Syrians. Officials briefed the president. The Pentagon took the red line seriously, moving into round-the-clock staffing for a military operation and positioning four U.S. Navy destroyers bearing Tomahawk missiles in the Mediterranean. Fighting forces in Syria took Obama at his word too. Syrian commanders ordered troops back to barracks. ISIS dispersed its fighters to an area around Homs where they took cover in a Crusader-era castle.

‘We were able to get the Syrian government to voluntarily and verifiably give up its chemical weapons stockpile.’ —Susan Rice

Then in a late-night phone call Obama suddenly changed course. He wanted congressional approval, an effort doomed to failure, then asked the UN to set up a committee to account for Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile. Russia would help. And we took the bait. In this way Moscow gained a U.S.-sanctioned new foothold in the Syrian war, Assad made a show of turning over chemical stockpiles to international monitors, and ISIS went on to invade Iraq.

At the time there was little press investigation over the back channels or scruples of the Obama arrangement. A year later the Obama team declared Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile destroyed. When in 2016 intelligence chief James Clapper bucked, telling Congress the Syrian government was in fact continuing to use chemical weapons, the press yawned. The White House apparently did, too.

In a post-election interview three months ago, Rice hailed the Obama administration’s success in removing Syria’s chemical weapons. “We were able to get the Syrian government to voluntarily and verifiably give up its chemical weapons stockpile,” she said ahead of the April chemical attack in Khan Sheikhoun.

We the world have watched as though we can do nothing—while thousands die horrible, suffocating sarin deaths; nearly half a million Syrian lives overall are lost to war; thousands of women and girls are subjected to torture, rape, and sex slavery; refugees overrun the region; and ISIS-brand terrorism spreads. We are numb from ignoring so many unthinkables.

President Trump’s decision to fire upon the air base where the latest gas attack was launched was pivotal simply because it was something. Something out of years of numbing nothing. Trump signaled a willingness to confront Russia for backing Syria. His action suggested he could be moved by human atrocities, and that he can govern in measured, serious ways. These are new developments. Now we will see if he can work with his officials to craft a policy founded on strategic principles (for those see Ambassador Nikki Haley’s UN speeches April 5 and 7). Let’s see a serious press, in turn, willing to investigate Russia’s role in supporting a chemical weapons regime and the Obama team’s collusion in letting that fire burn.