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Five questions on Syria for the Obama administration
Posted February 07, 2012 11:13 AM
From the Editors
From the Editors
Vice President, Foreign and Defense Policy Studies, American Enterprise Institute
Syria is going to hell in a handbasket, and the world is watching.
This morning, the State Department announced that the U.S. ambassador to Syria and his few remaining staff were gone, the embassy shuttered. That step and this weekend’s Russian and Chinese veto of an almost toothless U.N. Security Council resolution will dominate the news this morning, but the real question is: What next?
Here are five questions for the Obama administration, which professed itself “disgusted” by the Russian and Chinese veto:
- Will the United States support the arming of the Free Syrian Army?
- Will the United States join a “coalition of the willing” with the Arab League and others to support the Syrian opposition?
- Will the United States convene or join in the convening of a conference of the Syrian opposition to build unity and plan for the post-Assad transition?
- Will the United States release and urge others to release information about the foreign bank accounts of top Syrian officials, rather than waiting as everyone did post-Qadhafi?
- If it’s not doing the above, what exactly is the Obama administration doing for the people of Syria, except talking?
