Obama Made Last-Minute Decision On Syria Congressional Approval/Operation Confidence
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama was ready to order a military strike against Syria, with or without Congress' blessing. But on Friday night, he suddenly changed his mind.
Senior administration officials describing Obama's about-face Saturday offered a portrait of a president who began to wrestle with his own decision – at first internally, then confiding his views to his chief of staff, and finally summoning his aides for an evening session in the Oval Office to say he'd had a change of heart.
The ensuing flurry of activity culminated Saturday afternoon in the White House Rose Garden when Obama stood under a sweltering sun, his vice president at his side, and told the American public the U.S. should launch a military strike to punish Syrian President Bashar Assad for a chemical weapons attack the U.S. says killed more than 1,400 people last week.
But first, he said, he'll ask permission from Congress.
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By the time Obama's National Security Council met a week ago Saturday, a few days after the attack, it was clear the intelligence the U.S. had gathered corroborated the notion that a chemical attack had resulted in dramatic mass casualties, officials said. All the officials in this report demanded anonymity because they weren't authorized to discuss the president's decision-making by name.
As the meeting opened, Obama told his advisers the attack outside Damascus was precisely the type of scenario he had been concerned about last year, when he said Assad's large-scale use of chemical weapons would cross a red line for the U.S. and necessitate a response. Obama hadn't made a final decision, officials said, but he told aides his strong inclination was the U.S. must act.
By the end of the meeting, aides were no longer discussing whether to respond, but how and when.
Operation Confidence says, Please Mr. President wait until all the facts are in. America does not need another war.
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