A report by the Office of the Director for National Intelligence outlining ... evidence against Syria is thick with caveats. It builds a case that Assad's forces are most likely responsible while outlining gaps in the U.S. intelligence picture....
In addition, an intercept of Syrian military officials discussing the strike was among low-level staff, with no direct evidence tying the attack back to an Assad insider or even a senior Syrian commander, the officials said.
So while Secretary of State John Kerry said Monday that links between the attack and the Assad government are "undeniable," U.S. intelligence officials are not so certain that the suspected chemical attack was carried out on Assad's orders, or even completely sure it was carried out by government forces.
I'm not sure what to say. The Associated Press report is that stunning. The intelligence document is essentially a brief against a U.S. missile strike, yet the White House by all appearances is staying with its "full-steam-ahead approach," as the AP characterizes it. And "State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said it didn't really matter whether the administration knew ... details with total certainty."
We're talking about missile strikes that will themselves invite Syrian or Syria-allied retaliation on quite possibly a global scale, and quite possibly bring the brutal deaths of innocent thousands more, which would certainly compel our re-retaliation, and so on--but the "details" underlying these immense risks aren't really important?
It's been 10 years, almost to the month, since I was this dumbfounded.