It is not our Policy Position to respond to this through regime change. We will take an appropriate response, and we are evaluating, the president and his team are evaluating the options available to them. And the president will make an assessment and an announcement in due time. Defense secretary chuck hagel made clear that u. S. Military forces are ready. Suffice to say the options are there, the United States department of defense is ready to carry out those options. If that would occur, that would occur also in coordination with our international partners. But youre ready to go like that . Were ready to go like that. Meanwhile, closest allies are lining up in agreement. British Prime Minister David Cameron. Now, of course, any action we take, or others take, would have to be legal, would have to be
that could be used to deliver Chemical Weapons such as airplanes, artillery rockets, and no apparent serious regime targets are included in that risks and they believe the strikes could
coalition, so i think he made the right choice. senator inhoff, before the president made the decision to go to congress, you had been very public and critical of what you saw as the president s limited plan to strike at syria. best guess, sir, as a veteran of capitol hill, will congress approve the authorization for the use of force? first of all, i don t think they will. and chris, you for some reason, nobody wants to talk about the real serious problem here and that is the condition of our military today. a week ago, i said i would oppose going in and having mi military intervention. it may sound easy when people like secretary carey say it s going to be quick. this could be a war in the middle east, it s serious. you ve got to realize what this president has done to our military and our military is is so degraded now.
congressman, as best as you can articulate, as someone who i understand supports increased u.s. intervention and military strike here, can you explain to me and our viewers what the concrete mission here, what the concrete goal is of any kind of military action? well, i assume the concrete goal, of course, it hasn t been decided to do this. if seems imminent. but i think the goal would be to say to assad and other assads of the world that crimes of this violent nature cannot go unpunished. if we stand by and watch the murder of innocent men, women and children, children gasping for breath and foaming at the mouth and don t take action, i think it encourages other bad players to do the same thing. so i think at the very least, it s saying that you ve gone too far, and we re going to make it hard for you to use your air
to the civil war. it s a very complex situation that s witnessed so many abuses. this is not the first abuse human rights watch has documented. been going on and on including the use of missiles and many kinds of arms that cannot distinguish between civilians and competence, anyway. now, what will come out of this particular attack if it happens is just speculation today. okay, but that is exactly the speculation that anyone engaged in this policy has to deal with. what do you say to the congressman, congressman eliot engel who makes the argument those in support of intervention have made, been making a while now, which is the world cannot sit idly by and watch such atrocities? as someone from human rights watch, how do you respond to that? we have not advocating for or against the intervention. if the intervention really is to happen, which is looks like it will, then for us, all must respect the law forward. they should not target civilians, they should not use weapons that are
that could be used to deliver chemical weapons such as airplanes, artillery rockets, and no apparent serious regime targets are included in that risks and they believe the strikes could take maybe two to three days to hit all targets they want. congressional reaction has been cautious and muddled, while senator chris murphy said on our show last night the president should come to congress here for a vote. there s hardly, of course, consensus on that point. of course, congress is out of session. today congressman steve cohen suggested president obama wait until congress returns on september 9th. then congressman cohen all but dismissed that idea. i think we could wait until september the 9th or thereabouts to take action. in many ways, i defer to the president s prerogative and trust the president to do what s right. joining me now, congressman elliot engel, democrat from new york, ranking member of the house foreign affairs committee and has been an advocate of the u.s. intervent