the case for war here to suggest that only the hawks have international law on their side? >> well, ari, i just refused to use the word war here. this is not war. we can parcel this out any which way and i'll throw something else out at you. this administration and almost anybody involved who knows the syrian conflict would tell you the dirty little secret is we don't want assad to fall right now. my biggest concern with this potential attack is not that it's going to lead to a deeper war, but no matter how we target this, what happens if we destroy the command and control operations that have some control over the huge cache of chemical weapons that exist? i'm more concerned about that and much less concerned about whether there's going to be boots on the ground or this is iraq or afghanistan. in the end, the key here is to send assad a signal that is unequivocal, don't use chemical weapons anymore and get a diplomatic initiative underway that's going to, in effect, try