Marine General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said no decision had been made by the United States to employ military force in response to a future chemical attack in Syria.
“But we are in a dialogue, a routine dialogue, with the president to make sure he knows where we are with regard to planning in the event that chemical weapons are used,” he told a small group of reporters during a trip to India. Dunford later added: “He expects us to have military options and we have provided updates to him on the development of those military options.”
This week, a top US envoy said there was “lots of evidence” that chemical weapons were being prepared by Assad regime in Idlib.
The White House has warned that the United States and its allies would respond “swiftly and vigorously” if Assad regime used chemical weapons in Idlib.
Dunford did not say, one way or the other, what he expected Trump to do should Assad regime use chemical weapons again.
Dunford declined to comment on US intelligence about the possible Assad regime preparations of chemical agents.
“I wouldn’t comment on intelligence at all, in terms of what we have, what we don’t have,” he said.
Asked whether there was still a chance the assault on Idlib could be averted, Dunford said: “I don’t know if there’s anything that can stop it.”
“It’s certainly disappointing but perhaps not (surprising) that the Russians, the Turks and the Iranians weren’t able to come up with a solution yesterday,” he said.
Dunford has warned about the potential for a humanitarian catastrophe in Idlib and instead has recommended more narrowly tailored operations against militants there. “There’s a more effective way to do counterterrorism operations than major conventional operations in Idlib,” he said.
Bashar al-Assad and his allies have massed their militias on the front lines in the northwest, and Russian planes have joined his bombardment of opposition controlled areas there, in a prelude to a widely expected assault despite objections from Turkey.
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