A Quote by Ivo Daalder
Syria is a signature to the Geneva Protocol of 1925, which bans the use of chemical warfare. Syria has violated that international norm. For the United States to act in response is the right thing to do, is a legitimate thing to do, and is necessary in order to uphold this very important international standard.
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Any use of chemical weapons, by anyone, under any circumstances, is a grave violation of the 1925 Protocol and other relevant rules of customary international law.
I do not think Syria can achieve international recognition in the future - even if they work through a successful political process, you know, the international community simply is not going to accept a Syria led by the Assad regime.
So my judgment is that Syria will move; Syria will change, as it embraces a legitimate relationship with the United States and the West and economic opportunity that comes with it and the participation that comes with it.
[Hezbollah, Iran, and Russia] are here because they could offer very essential and important help, because the situation that we are facing now is not only about a few terrorists from within Syria; it's like international war against Syria.
No one doubts that innocent men, women and children have been the victims of chemical weapons attacks in Syria. And there's no doubt who is responsible for this heinous use of chemical weapons in Syria: the Syrian regime.
He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do. He lies and cheats; he snubs the mandate and authority of international weapons inspectors; and he games the system to keep buying time against enforcement of the just and legitimate demands of the United Nations, the Security Council, the United States and our allies. Those are simply the facts.
I think that it's very important to have the United States' engagement in many situations we have around the world, be it in Syria, be it in the African context. The United States represents an important set of values, human rights, values related to freedom, to democracy. And so the foreign policy engagement of the United States is a very important guarantee that those values can be properly pursued.
So, the international community are all the countries that are important: the United States definitely everywhere; the European Union because it is very important, and also, they do show a great deal of international responsibility; and then the local players.
I think Russia must have been very embarrassed by Syria's use of chemical weapons because it really undercut Putin's role back in 2013 in saying he had helped get rid of Syria's weapons.
Why should you use a term [rebels] in the United States and England and maybe other countries and use another term in Syria ? This is a double standard that we don't accept.
I would have I think made a bigger mistake if I had said, "Eh, chemical weapons. That doesn't really change my calculus." I think it was important for me as president of the United States to send a message that in fact there is something different about chemical weapons [in Syria].
If there is anything worse than international warfare, is civil warfare, and the United States was destined to experience it in the extreme of bitterness.
I think we have to knock out ISIS. Right now Syria is fighting ISIS. We have people who want to fight both at the same time. But Syria is no longer Syria; Syria is Russia and Iran, who she made strong, and Kerry and Obama made into a very powerful nation and very rich nation very, very quickly. Very, very quickly. I believe we have to get ISIS.
And, as a consequence of the pressure that we've applied over the last couple of weeks, we have Syria -- for the first time -- acknowledging that it has chemical weapons, agreeing to join the convention that prohibits the use of chemical weapons, and the Russians -- their primary sponsors -- saying that they will push Syria to get all of their chemical weapons out. The distance that we've traveled over these couple of weeks is remarkable.
The United States took the lead in shaping the norms, rules and institutions of what became the liberal international order, including the United Nations, the international financial institutions and the Marshall Plan.
Of course, when Secretary-General is objective, he can play an important role in dealing with different officials in the United Nations in order to bring the policies of the different states - mainly Russia and the United States - toward more cooperation and more stability regarding Syria.
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