Secretary of State John Kerry told Syrian citizens he “lost the argument” on using American force in the Middle Eastern country’s civil war.
Kerry told the Syrians that he had argued for using force in the country when Syrian President Bashar Assad crossed the Obama administration’s “red line” on using chemical weapons against rebel groups. The audio was leaked to CNN and published Saturday.
“I think you’re looking at three people, four people in the administration. I lost the argument. I’ve argued for the use of force. I’m the guy who stood up and announced that we’re going to attack Assad for the use of weapons,” Kerry said on the tape.
The Syrian civil war is now in its fifth year and is widely seen as the biggest foreign policy failure of the Obama administration.
Obama drew a so-called “red line” in 2013 that stated the U.S. would get involved militarily if Assad used chemical weapons on his own citizens. When reports came out of the country that chemical weapons had, in fact, been used against rebel forces, Obama backed down from his “red line” declaration.
The audio was recorded during a meeting between Kerry and Syrian civilians at a meeting at the Dutch Mission during the meeting of the United Nations General Assembly earlier this month.
He blamed Congress for not supporting a strike on Syrian forces following the chemical weapons attack, accused the Russians of not following international law in their involvement in the country and drew a line between fighting the regime and fighting terrorists.
“The problem is the Russians don’t care about international law and we do. And we don’t have a basis, our lawyers tell us, unless we have a Security Council resolution,” Kerry said during the meeting. He added, “They were invited in, we were not.”
He added that the only reason Americans can do airstrikes is because U.S. forces are targeting the Islamic State.
“The only reason they are letting us fly is because we are going after ISIL,” Kerry said. “If we were going after Assad, we would have to take out all the air defenses and we don’t have a legal justification for doing that.”
Kerry also blamed the American public for not supporting greater intervention in Syria. There’s no appetite for American soldiers going into the country, he said.
“A lot of Americans don’t believe that we should be fighting and sending young Americans over to die in another country,” he said.
