The United States has ambiguously opened the door to the issue of the use of chemical weapons in Syria. Indeed, neither has it confirmed that they had been used beyond possible doubt, nor has it denied it beyond possible interpretation. This makes the recent uproar over this issue merely a new way to kill time, as well as an unoriginal exploitation of events that are of exceptional importance. Weeks could go by while discussions take place over the ways that would allow the UN investigation commission to visit Syria and the places in which chemical weapons are suspected to have been used. And on the basis of the experience of past commissions in Syria, one can expect for the regime, after having hesitated, refused and then laid conditions, to announce that it would allow commission members to come to Damascus. After that would start a phase of obstructing and complicating the task of the inspectors, similar to what took place with the investigation commission sent by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to investigate the activity of the reactor bombed by Israel or of other sites under suspicion in Syria. Meanwhile, regime forces continue to make use of all kinds of deadly and destructive weapons, through air raids or through long-range missiles – which could lead to a number of human casualties equivalent to that which could have been the result of chemical weapons being used. And until the use of chemical weapons is ascertained, supported by irrefutable evidence which obtaining would require the approval of the regime, the latter would gain additional time to continue killing, destroying and further prolonging the war in Syria. Let us assume that such evidence could not be obtained. Let us even assume that the regime really did not make use of chemical weapons. Would this mean that the world, and in particular the United States and the West, can continue to stand idly by and watch what is happening in Syria, and that there is nothing that would call for moving quickly to put a stop to the course the country has taken? President Barack Obama's administration bears the burden of the shock caused by the deception which its predecessor resorted to concerning Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) in Iraq. The current Democratic President has established his electoral credentials on the basis of rejecting and renouncing the conservative Republican methods of his predecessor, George W. Bush. Those apprehensions may well represent part of the background for the reservations being voiced by the administration at every level in its current action towards the region, so as for the mistake of direct intervention in Iraq not to be repeated. Such a pretext, which prominent figures of the administration ceaselessly reiterate, ignores a basic fact, which is that Iraq, when Bush decided to invade it, was not in a state of internal civil war in which the regime was making use of its entire arsenal against its own people, that the Iraqi victims who had fallen prior to the invasion had succumbed to the pressure of international sanctions, and that the WMD deception had been meant to justify the invasion, under the pretext of preventing crimes from being committed with the use of Weapons of Mass Destruction. In Syria, on the other hand, actual massacres and crimes against humanity are being committed on a daily basis, and victims are falling in numbers equivalent or exceeding what might result from the use of WMDs against unarmed civilians. In other words, Obama is witnessing with his own eyes in Syria what Bush claimed he wanted to avoid by invading Iraq. It may be nearly impossible to expect direct US military intervention in Syria, even if irrefutable evidence were to prove the use by the regime in Damascus of chemical weapons – this at a time when Obama has withdrawn US troops from Iraq and seeks to complete their withdrawal from Afghanistan. Similarly, it is difficult to imagine the recurrence of the Libyan scenario, in view of the Russian-Chinese veto that would be repeated at the Security Council. And as long as it is so, all threats of red lines and of options on the table, in discussing the issue of chemical weapons, become mere devices to manage the crisis, rather than means to bring it to an end. And if the use of chemical weapons cannot be proved, one can only imagine the length of time during which the killing and destruction will continue in Syria without the United States considering that the time has come to put an end to the catastrophe unfolding there.
