Trump supporters shocked as President launches strike on Syrian airfield after horrific chemical attack
THE air strikes have forced many of Trump’s harshest critics and biggest supporters to reverse positions.
SOME of President Trump’s most hardened supporters and critics appear to have switched places following the decision to order US air strikes on a Syrian air base.
Far-right political commentators criticised Trump for launching the strike without seeking Congressional approval — something he warned against in September 2013 as being a “big mistake”.
Paul Joseph Watson, an editor at the conspiracy theorist site Infowars, said on Twitter that Mr Trump “was just another deep state/neo-con puppet.” He added, “I’m officially OFF the Trump train.”
Meanwhile Democrats and media outlets previously highly critical of the President have praised the move as being bold in the face of international inaction. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer offered praise for the military action, claiming it was the “right thing to do.”
“Making sure Assad knows that when he commits such despicable atrocities he will pay a price is the right thing to do,” Schumer said in a statement. “It is incumbent on the Trump Administration to come up with a strategy and consult with Congress to implement it.”
House Minority leader Nancy Pelosi also gave mild approval for the attack, issuing a statement that called it “a proportional response to the regime’s use of chemical weapons.”
Trump's base of support is gone if he goes to war with Syria, the same people who betrayed before election will betray him again.
— Mike Cernovich 🇺🇸 (@Cernovich) April 7, 2017
I guess Trump wasn't "Putin's puppet" after all, he was just another deep state/Neo-Con puppet.
— Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) April 7, 2017
I'm officially OFF the Trump train.
People praising the Syria attack:
— Baked Alaska™ (@bakedalaska) April 7, 2017
-Hillary
-McCain
-Lindsay Graham
-Paul Ryan
-Leftists
People against the attack:
-Real Trump Supporters
Missiles flying. Rubio's happy. McCain ecstatic. Hillary's on board. A complete policy change in 48 hrs.
— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) April 7, 2017
Today over 500,000 people have watched my videos and streams. 90% are @realDonaldTrump supporters, none want war with Syria. #NoMoreWars
— Mike Cernovich 🇺🇸 (@Cernovich) April 7, 2017
Mr Trump’s former fiercest detractors took the extraordinary step of praising the US President.
An editorial in the New York Times, habitually engaged in a war of words with the unpredictable commander-in-chief,said Mr Trump was “right to strike” and “should be commended”.
The Wall Street Journal said the President had “demonstrated a comfort with military action and a flexibility in approach that saw him change course” on Syria just 48 hours after horrific images of the 80 civilians killed in chemical attacks emerged.
US pundits hazarded that President Bashar al-Assad “must be stunned” at the huge missile strike.
The Syrian regimen has been “carrying out mass atrocities against Syrian civilians at will” for years, wrote Dexter Filkins in the New Yorker, and only now has a punishment been meted out.
PUTIN BLASTS US ‘AGGRESSION’
Russian President Vladimir Putin convened a security council meeting after the strikes and vowed Syrian air defences will be “strengthened”.
The Kremlin called the US air strikes on a Syrian air base an act of “aggression against a sovereign state in violation of international law”.
The Russian military said only 23 of the 59 US cruise missiles reached the Syrian air base.
Syrian state media said four children were among the nine civilians killed from the US strike, however it’s unclear why children would have been on the air base.
Earlier, the Russian President said Donald Trump launched the attack under a “far-fetched pretext”, according to a statement from his spokesman Dmitry Peskov.
“This move by Washington has dealt a serious blow to Russian-US relations, which are already in a poor state,” the Kremlin said.
“This move will not bring us closer to the ultimate goal of combating international terrorism but will instead create a major obstacle to the establishment of an international counterterrorist coalition and to effective struggle against this global evil.”
SUSPENDS AIRSPACE AGREEMENT
The strongly worded statement came as Moscow suspended a bilateral agreement with the US that prevents midair collisions over Syria.
The memorandum, signed by Russia and the US in 2015, allowed both countries to exchange information about their flights to avoid incidents in the crowded skies over Syria.
The suspension of the deal comes after the US launched 59 missiles at the Syrian base where this week’s gruesome chemical attack is thought to have originated.
The Syrian military is reporting at least six people have been killed and several more injured, according to the Associated Press.
Mr Trump’s swift and unexpected air strikes have put him on a direct collision course with Putin, ending the two world leaders’ relatively cordial relationship.
Mr Putin has repeatedly backed Syrian President Bashar al Assad and Russia has vetoed UN Security Council resolutions on Syria eight times.
Russia has argued that the death of civilians in the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun on Tuesday resulted from Syrian forces hitting a rebel chemical arsenal there. Peskov said the US has previously ignored the use of chemical weapons by Syrian rebels and that the Syrian government has destroyed its chemical weapons stockpiles under international control.
Konstantin Kosachev, head of the foreign affairs committee in the Kremlin-controlled upper house, said the prospective US-Russian anti-terror coalition has been “put to rest without even being born”.
BREAKING: Syrian military says 6 people killed, several wounded in US strike on a Syrian air base.
— The Associated Press (@AP) April 7, 2017
He called the attack that almost destroyed Shayrat military base near Homs, in the country’s west, “a pity”, suggesting the US President had been pressured into the act by the Pentagon.
“Russian cruise missiles strike the terrorists, US missiles strike Syrian government forces who are spearheading the fight against the terrorists,” he added.
A US defence official said Russians were present at the base, and the US military contacted its Russian counterparts about the attack ahead of time. But this does not appear to have been enough to prevent the icing over of relations.
‘A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY’
At 8.45pm Thursday eastern time (3.45am Friday in Syria and 10.45am in Australian eastern standard time), the US President ordered 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles to be launched at the Syrian air base.
The airfield was “nearly destroyed”, according to the Syrian Observatory, after the massive attack by two warships in the Mediterranean Sea. Personnel were evacuated as a fire raged for more than an hour, according to the Homs province governor.
Malcolm Turnbull spoke out in support of the US in the strongest terms this afternoon, calling the chemical attack a “crime against humanity”. He said Australia was not involved in the strike but was a committed Coalition partner.
“The Australian Government strongly supports the swift and just response of the United States,” said the Prime Minister. “This was a calibrated, proportionate and targeted response.
“Australia was not involved in the strike but we remain fully committed as a Coalition partner to our ongoing military operations in Iraq and Syria. We have been consistent in our condemnation of the use of chemical weapons in Syria and elsewhere. The use of these weapons, under any circumstance, is illegal and abhorrent. It is a violation of international law. It is a war crime. It is a blatant contravention of basic principles of humanity.
“These crimes against humanity, shocking and horrific even in the context of the Syrian conflict zone, cannot be committed with impunity.”
He went on to condemn Russia’s backing of the Syrian regimen. “Regrettably, as we have seen, the security council is once again at an impasse due to the position of the Assad regimen supporter, Russia,” he said.
‘NO CHILD OF GOD SHOULD EVER SUFFER SUCH HORROR’
His words came after Mr Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate on Thursday night (Eastern Time) that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad “choked out the lives of helpless men, women and children”.
The Pentagon said the missiles fired by the warships targeted “aircraft, hardened aircraft shelters, petroleum and logistic storage, ammunition supply bunkers, air defence systems, and radars” but insisted every effort was made to ensure “minimal risk” to personnel.
The strikes represent the first direct military action the US has taken against the Syrian leadership in the country’s six-year civil conflict. Barack Obama had threatened Assad’s forces over previous chemical attacks but the only US air strikes in the region under his administration targeted terrorists rather than the regimen.
The US President said the punitive strike came after years of failed diplomacy. “On Tuesday, Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad launched a horrible chemical weapons attack on innocent civilians,” he said. “It was a slow and brutal death for so many, even beautiful babies were cruelly murdered in this very barbaric attack. “No child of God should ever suffer such horror.
“Tonight, I ordered a targeted military attack on an airfield in Syria from where the chemical attack was launched.
“It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons.
People praising the Syria attack:
— Baked Alaska™ (@bakedalaska) April 7, 2017
-Hillary
-McCain
-Lindsay Graham
-Paul Ryan
-Leftists
People against the attack:
-Real Trump Supporters
I guess Trump wasn't "Putin's puppet" after all, he was just another deep state/Neo-Con puppet.
— Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) April 7, 2017
I'm officially OFF the Trump train.
It's been fun lads, but the fun is over. I'll be focusing my efforts on Le Pen, who tried to warn Trump against this disaster.
— Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) April 7, 2017
“There can be no dispute that Syria used banned chemical weapons, violated its obligations under the chemical weapons convention and ignored the urging of the UN Security Council.”
But Mr Trump’s most dedicated supporters were not convinced by his about-face on action in Syria. “I’m officially OFF the Trump train,” tweeted Infowars’ Paul Joseph Watson.
“Trump’s base of support is gone if he goes to war with Syria,” added right-wing blogger Mike Cernovich.
‘ASSAD’S HEINOUS ACT’
Pentagon Spokesman Captain Jeff Davis said in a statement: “The strike was conducted using Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles (TLAMs) launched from the destroyers USS Porter and USS Ross in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea.
“Every precaution was taken to execute this strike with minimal risk to personnel at the airfield.
“The strike was a proportional response to Assad’s heinous act. Shayrat Airfield was used to store chemical weapons and Syrian air forces. The US intelligence community assesses that aircraft from Shayrat conducted the chemical weapons attack on April 4. The strike was intended to deter the regimen from using chemical weapons again.”
‘AN ACT OF WAR’
Syrian state TV reported a US missile attack on a number of military targets and called the attack an “aggression”.
Governor Talal Barazi said the strikes appeared to target Homs province in central Syria and said the strikes were intended to “support the terrorists on the ground.”
A Syrian opposition rebel commander, whose district in the country’s centre was among those hit by chemical weapons, said he hoped the US attack would be a “turning point” in the six-year war. Major Jamil al-Saleh, who heads a US-backed rebel group in central Hama, said the continuation of US strikes against government military facilities would protect the Syrian people.
Turkey-based opposition group Syrian Coalition also welcomed the attack, saying Mr Trump had “closed the page on impunity” encouraged by his predecessor. Senior official Ahmad Ramadan urged the US President to “hit the snake’s head” and anyone who ordered and implemented the chemical weapons attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun in rebel-held northern Syria.
My statement on tonight's U.S. missile strikes in Syria pic.twitter.com/nLcHq6jS01
— Senator Dick Durbin (@SenatorDurbin) April 7, 2017
This is an act of war. Congress needs to come back into session & hold a debate. Anything less is an abdication of our responsibility. https://t.co/GvHML3ByeI
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) April 7, 2017
The President needs Congressional authorization for military action as required by the Constitution.
— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) April 7, 2017
Members of Congress debated whether the President had made the right move without gaining a UN Security Council resolution or congressional authorisation first. The issue may explain why he emphasised the attack was in the “vital national security interest of the United States.”
Senator John McCain said the President did not need approval as many actions in the Middle East have relied on an authorisation passed in 2001 for use of force against anyone involved in the 9/11 attacks.
Democratic member of Congress Rep. Barbara Lee tweeted: “This is an act of war. Congress needs to come back into session & hold a debate. Anything less is an abdication of our responsibility.”
Republican Senator Rand Paul said the President requires Congressional authorisation for military action.
Democratic Senator Dick Durbin called the move “a measured response to the Syrian nerve gas atrocity”, adding that “any further action will require close scrutiny by Congress, and any escalation beyond air strikes or missile strikes will require engaging the American people in that decision.”
Senator Bill Nelson said: “I hope this teaches President Assad not to use chemical weapons again.”
COULD THIS STRENGTHEN ISLAMIC STATE?
Dr Sarah Graham, a lecturer at the University of Sydney’s US Studies Centre, said the US action conveyed a very important message and was designed to punish the Assad regimen.
Dr Graham told news.com.au the action was a “180-degree turn for the president”, who had said there were no viable options to remove Assad from power, noting Mr Trump needed to be careful given the US public is wary of “military adventurism in the Middle East”.
She said Russia was unlikely to regard the air strike as an act of war given the US administration had warned Moscow it was happening and there were no Russian aircraft or personnel at the airstrip the US hit.
“I doubt very much that Russia will see this as an act of war although it will be watching closely to see whether the Trump administration takes further action against the Assad regimen,” she said. “This is, after all, the first intentional US strike against the Assad government.”
However Dr Graham said the Assad government wouldn’t see it the same way.
“The question moving forward will be whether it decides to use its own air defences and air forces to strike back at US air capabilities that are acting against Islamic State in the north,” he said. “So far, the Assad regimen has not tried to stop the US in its air strikes against IS, but this might change, and if we see air defences turned against US aircraft, Trump will be faced with pressures to respond.”
Dr Graham said it was too early to tell whether these air strikes would develop into a broader effort to remove Assad but warned this strengthens groups like IS and has implications for Iraq.
“The fact that the administration used force decisively and unilaterally to punish the Assad regimen sends a signal to the US’s adversaries in the Middle East, notably Iran, and around the world that the Trump administration is more willing to use force than many expected from the tone of his America First campaign,” she said.
TRUMP’S STRIKING CHANGE OF ATTITUDE
The surprise US assault marked a striking reversal for Mr Trump, who warned as a candidate against America getting pulled into the Syrian civil war, now in its seventh year.
After previously advocating against a US military attack on the Assad regimen, he earlier in the week appeared deeply moved by the photos of children killed in the chemical attack, calling it a “disgrace to humanity”.
He tweeted on the subject many times in 2013, urging then-US President Barack Obama not to intervene in Syria because there was “no upside and tremendous downside”.
But Mr Trump told a press conference yesterday that he was “very flexible person”, implying his views on Syria had changed and the crisis was now his “responsibility” as calls mounted for a display of force in response to the atrocity.
Mr Trump said yesterday the chemical attack in Idlib province earlier this week had changed his thinking on Assad. “What Assad did is terrible,” Mr Trump told reporters travelling with him on Thursday to Florida on air force One. “What happened in Syria is truly one of the egregious crimes and it shouldn’t have happened.”
Asked if Assad should step down, Mr Trump said: “He’s there, and I guess he’s running things, so something should happen.”
Hillary Clinton also called on the US to take out Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad’s air force on Thursday, days after images from the chemical attack in the war-torn country made headlines across the globe.
White House transcript: President Trump’s full statement on strikes in #Syria. pic.twitter.com/LmEtXlar88
— Dan Linden (@DanLinden) April 7, 2017
TRUMP’S CALL TO ‘CIVILISED NATIONS’
Mr Trump today warned action needs to be taken in what is expected to be a coalition of allies working to stop the bitter conflict in Syria. “Previous attempts to change Assad’s behaviour have failed and failed dramatically,” he said. “The region continues to destabilise, threatening the US and its allies.”
He called on “civilised nations” to join the US “in seeking to end the slaughter and bloodshed in Syria and also to end terrorism of all kinds and all types.”
Malcolm Turnbull would not say this afternoon whether the United States had asked Australia to join a coalition to act on Syria or whether Australia would be willing to increase its military contribution. Australia already flies air strikes in Syria.
The United Kingdom said there will be no vote on a UN Security Council resolution Thursday night to condemn the reported use of chemical weapons in a northern Syria town.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he hopes Mr Trump will take military action in Syria after this week’s chemical attack.
America claims it was Syrian government aircraft that killed dozens of civilians using chlorine mixed with a nerve agent, possibly sarin, earlier this week.
Pentagon statement on US strike in Syria: “Every precaution was taken to execute this strike with minimal risk to personnel at the airfield†pic.twitter.com/kPEtHCeamF
— ABC News (@ABC) April 7, 2017
MORE: "Strike conducted using Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles (TLAMs) launched from destroyers USS Porter, USS Ross," Pentagon spokesman says. pic.twitter.com/BooseTvXAj
— CBS News (@CBSNews) April 7, 2017
‘THERE’S NOT MUCH RUSSIA CAN DO ABOUT IT’
Middle East expert Rodger Shanahan from the Lowy Institute told news.com.au the missile strike was an escalation of the current conflict in Syria and it was too early to speculate on what the outcome of this will be.
“It’s not a bad response,” he said. “We will see how far it goes but really it’s too early to tell just yet.”
While an independent investigation has yet to confirm whether the chemical attack was deliberately conducted by Assad government forces, Dr Shanahan said the US would not have acted this quickly without concrete intelligence indicating otherwise.
“The US has done this based on nothing less than rock solid intelligence,” he said.
He said while there were conspiracy theories emerging about rebels being responsible for the attack, the speed and targeted nature of the US action indicates it was certain who carried it out.
“There’s not much Russia can do about it,” he said. “But this is telling Russia to pull its head in because there’s a new sheriff in town.”
Dr Shanahan said while Russia was publicly backing its ally over claims the rebels carried out the attack, privately that probably wasn’t the case at all.
Russia’s deputy UN ambassador said the US decision to cancel a vote on a UN resolution that would condemn the reported chemical weapons attack on a Syrian town “opens a window of opportunity” to find a compromise. Russia strongly objected to provisions in the original draft circulated by Britain, France and the United States that it said blamed Assad’s forces for the attack before an investigation.
‘AN AFFRONT TO HUMANITY’
Just yesterday, the US called for the UN to do something about the crisis after the horrifying footage shocked the world.
Speaking at a White House press conference following the attack, the US President said it was an “affront to humanity” that “cannot be tolerated”.
His words echoed those of US ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, who stared down the Russian ambassador and warned that the Trump administration would take action against the chemical attacks in Syria if the Security Council failed to act.
RELATED: Syria in 10 simple points
“There are times at the United Nations when we are compelled to take collective action,” she said.
“When the United Nations consistently fails in its duty to act collectively, there are times in the life of states that we are compelled to take our own action.”
ASSAD’S HISTORY WITH CHEMICAL WEAPONS
It’s not the first time that Assad has been accused of using chemical weapons on his own citizens. In 2011 he was condemned for an attack on his own people as he tried to crush a rebel uprising that developed after the Arab Spring.
Then-US president Mr Obama was a vocal opponent to Assad’s use of chemical weapons and sent a specially equipped US naval ship to destroy them after the UN Security Council backed a US-Russia deal in 2013 to remove and destroy the arsenal.
The agreement was brokered as a way to avert US missile strikes that Washington threatened after a chemical attack near Damascus, which Washington and other Western governments blamed on the regimen.
At the time, Mr Trump tweeted: “President Obama, do not attack Syria. There is no upside and tremendous downside. Save your “powder” for another (and more important) day!”
President Obama, do not attack Syria. There is no upside and tremendous downside. Save your "powder" for another (and more important) day!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 7, 2013
The civil war in Syria has become a broader international conflict as Russia and US position themselves on either side of the conflict. Russia has been supporting the Assad government with weapons and other equipment, complicating the war against Islamic State.
In contrast, the US has provided nonlethal military aid such as food, trucks, communications equipment and medical supplies to rebels fighting Assad. It has also supported moderate rebels with air strikes.
The US and Russia signed an agreement in 2016 for a ceasefire to stop Assad and the rebels fighting each other, so they could concentrate their efforts on defeating Islamic State and another al-Qaeda-linked group.
But this fell apart a month later, with the US accusing Moscow of not living up to its commitments after Assad stepped up his offensive against rebel-held areas of Aleppo, Syria’s biggest city.
The war in Syria has claimed around 400,000 lives and left 6.5 million people displaced in what has been billed as the worst conflict of the 21st Century.
Syria descended into full-scale civil war in 2012, causing about half the country’s pre-war population to be displaced as forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad and those opposed to his rule battle each other and jihadists.
— With wires
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