SecDef Mattis: Trump' Blunt Warning to Assad Stopped Him From Launching Another Poison Gas Attack

Gotta be tough.

ABOARD A U.S. MILITARY AIRCRAFT — Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Wednesday that the U.S. warning to Syria not to conduct a chemical attack on its own people appears to have been taken seriously by the Bashar Assad regime.

"They didn't do it," Mattis told reporters on his plane as they flew from Germany to Belgium. "It appears they took the warning seriously."

Mattis would not confirm or discuss on-the-record statements by a Pentagon spokesman that the U.S. had observed the movement of chemical munitions at the Shayrat airfield, the same airfield from which a Syrian warplane dropped deadly sarin nerve gas on civilians April 4. Navy warships launched a cruise missile attack on the air base later that week, which destroyed several aircraft.

Maybe they didn't do it now because Trump was accusing them before they even did it. Maybe if that sort of pre-emptive condemnation doesn't come the next time they start loading the poison gas bombs on to the planes, they will go ahead and do it, and then just say The Jews Must Have Done It.

posted by Ace at 08:29 PM

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