Obama said that a quick intervention in the war in Syria was problematic, but according to reports US Special Forces and CIA operatives have already entered Syrian soil through Jordan borders, before the videos of the alleged chemical attack near Syrian capital were even posted.
US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel declined to discuss any specific force movements while saying that Obama had asked the Pentagon to prepare military options for Syria.
US defense officials told The Associated Press that the Navy had sent a fourth warship armed with ballistic missiles into the eastern Mediterranean Sea but without immediate orders for any missile launch into Syria.
US Navy ships are capable of a variety of military action, including launching Tomahawk cruise missiles, as they did against Libya in 2011 as part of an international action that led to the overthrow of the Libyan government.
"The Defense Department has a responsibility to provide the president with options for contingencies, and that requires positioning our forces, positioning our assets, to be able to carry out different options - whatever options the president might choose," Hagel told reporters traveling with him to Asia.
Syrian government has been investigating reports of an alleged chemical attack that according to circulated pictures and videos killed several people near Damascus.
The foreign-backed Syrian opposition which has been occupying the targeted area for months, quickly blamed the Syrian army of carrying out the attack.
The prospects of the attack are not clear yet.
Media reports had it that Qatar’s Al Jazeera TV and Reuters news agency published the news of massacre in East Ghouta, Damascus “one day” before the massacre happened.
Qatar’s Al Jazeera TV published the news of the alleged chemical weapons attack by the Syrian army, citing unknown activists as its source.
Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi highlighted certain countries’ hostile stance towards his country telling the world that a media and political campaign of lies is being circulated by certain Arab and foreign media outlets including al-Jazeera, al-Arabiya, Sky News and others which are involved in the shedding of Syrian blood and supporting terrorism, with the objective of distracting the UN committee of inspectors of its mission to investigate which party to the conflict has used chemical weapons.
“The cries of terrorists and their calls for aid accompany the fact that the Armed Forces are advancing on the ground, and also accompany the fabricated campaign waged by some channels in desperate bid to imbue false morale in the armed terrorist groups,” he said.
Omran al-Zoubi described the support by some Arabs and the so-called Arab League for these allegations as ridiculous, naïve and illogical.
SHI/SHI