Nearly three years ago, the government of Syria agreed to give up or destroy its chemical weapons stockpiles and programs. While the deal was hailed as an important step in disarming an odious regime, the agreement was controversial — not because of its outcome, but because it substituted for military action that U.S. President Barack Obama had threatened against the Damascus government if it used those weapons in the civil war it was fighting. In recent weeks, however, it has become apparent that Syria did not give up all those weapons, and has used them on the battlefield again. What was once derided as indecision on the part of the U.S. president now looks like outright failure and raises serious questions about U.S. credibility as well as the reliability of verification provisions in the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC).
The crisis began in late fall 2012, when there were reports of chemical weapons attacks in Syria. It was not clear who was responsible for using those weapons. While Syria was believed to have the world's third-largest stockpile of chemical weapons, rebel forces had attacked a chemical weapons plant and stolen 200 tons of chlorine gas.
Obama warned the Syrian government in 2012 that "a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized. That would change my calculus. That would change my equation." Implicit in that statement was a threat that such behavior would force armed U.S. intervention in the conflict. Yet despite evidence showing that the Damascus government was responsible for many of the chemical attacks that claimed hundreds of lives and devastated many others, Obama stayed his hand.