UK's military chief: Intervention in Syria risks all-out war
Sunday Times reports Sir David Richards urged UK government to consider whether apparent use of chemical weapons by Assad forces should be a tipping point
Britain's most senior military officer has warned Prime Minister David Cameron that intervening in Syria would risk dragging UK forces into an all-out war, The Sunday Times reported.
General Sir David Richards, chief of the defense staff, believes any military response to the use of chemical weapons by Bashar Assad's regime would have to be on a huge scale to succeed.
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According to the British newspaper, Richards urged the government to consider whether what appears to have been a small-scale use of chemicals should be a tipping point. "Even to set up a humanitarian safe area would be a major military operation without the co-operation of the Syrians," he told senior defense figures. "In Syria, we have to be prepared to go to war."
The Sunday Times said top Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) figures also fear that creating safe zones could drag Britain into a full-scale military engagement. They warn that British forces might have to defend the zones against attack by Syrian forces.
Victim of alleged chemical attack in Syria this month
Richards has argued that a limited operation to create a no-fly zone like the one over Bosnia in 1993 would be insufficient because of Syria’s air defenses, according to the report.
On Friday Cameron condemned an apparent nerve gas attack on civilians in Aleppo as a "war crime”, but stressed that he would not rush to send British troops to the Syrian battlefield. The British PM said that the UK should instead work toward strengthening the Syrian opposition in order to oust Assad.
Aftermath of alleged chemical attack in Aleppo earlier this month (Photo: Reuters)
“I don’t want to see (deployment of troops) and I don’t think that is likely to happen,” Cameron said.
Meanwhile, the state-run Syrian newspaper Al-Watan reported Sunday that chemical weapons have been used against Assad's forces. The report could not be confirmed.
The government's mouthpiece quoted sources who are "familiar with the issue" as saying that many soldiers were admitted to a hospital in Damascus following a "chemical attack" launched by the rebels. The paper said the attack resulted in some deaths as well.
Al-Watan quoted a medical official as saying the wounded soldiers were fighting rebels near the Barzeh neighborhood in north Damascus. The same "medical official" told the newspaper a missile was fired from Barzeh at Syrian army forces deployed on the outskirts of the neighborhood.
President Barack Obama has suggested that the use of deadly chemical agents could be the "red line" for the US to intervene in the two-year-old Syrian war, but over the weekend he made clear he was in no rush to intervene in the Syrian civil war on the basis of evidence he said was still preliminary.
Speaking a day after the disclosure of US intelligence that Syria had likely used chemical weapons against its own people, Obama mixed talked tough while calling for patience as he sought to fend off pressure for a swift response against Syrian President Assad.
'That is going to be a game changer.' Obama with King Abdullah (Photo: AFP)
"Horrific as it is when mortars are being fired on civilians and people are being indiscriminately killed, to use potential weapons of mass destruction on civilian populations crosses another line with respect to international norms and international law," Obama told reporters at the White House as he began talks with Jordan's King Abdullah.
"That is going to be a game changer," he said. But Obama stopped short of declaring that Assad had crossed "a red line" and described the US intelligence evaluations as "a preliminary assessment."
While some more hawkish lawmakers have called for a US military response and for the arming of anti-Assad rebels, several leading congressional voices urged a calmer approach after Secretary of State John Kerry briefed them.
"This is not Libya," said Nancy Pelosi, the senior Democrat in the House of Representatives, referring to the relative ease with which a NATO bombing campaign helped overthrow Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. "The Syrians have anti-aircraft capability that makes going in there much more challenging."
US officials said on Thursday the intelligence community believes with varying degrees of confidence that Assad's forces used the nerve agent sarin on a small scale against rebel fighters.
Reuters contributed to the report
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