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WASHINGTON — The White House said on Thursday that American intelligence agencies now believed, with “varying degrees of confidence,” that the Syrian government had used chemical weapons, but it said it needed conclusive proof before President Obama would take action.
WASHINGTON — The White House said Thursday that it believes the Syrian government has used chemical weapons in its civil war, an assessment that could test President Obama’s repeated warnings that such an attack could precipitate American intervention in Syria.
The disclosure, in letters to Congressional leaders, takes the administration a step closer to acknowledging that President Bashar al-Assad has crossed a red line established by Mr. Obama last summer, when he said the United States would take unspecified action against Syria if there was evidence that chemical weapons had been used in the civil war.
The White House, in a letter to Congressional leaders, said the nation’s intelligence agencies assessed “with varying degrees of confidence” that the government of President Bashar al-Assad had used the chemical agent sarin on a small scale.
The White House emphasized that, “given the stakes involved,” the United States still needed “credible and corroborated facts” before deciding on a course of action. The letter, signed by the president’s director of legislative affairs, Miguel E. Rodriguez, said the United States was pressing for a “comprehensive United Nations investigation that can credibly evaluate the evidence and establish what happened.”
But it said more conclusive evidence was needed before Mr. Obama would take action, referring obliquely to both the Bush administration’s use of faulty intelligence in the march to war in Iraq and the ramifications of any decision to enter another conflict in the Middle East.
Although the White House said it could not confirm the circumstances in which victims were exposed to chemical weapons, it said it believed that the chemical agent sarin had been used. “We do believe,” the letter said, “that any use of chemical weapons in Syria would very likely have originated with the Assad regime.”
Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, who is chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the agencies actually expressed more certainty about the use of these weapons than the White House indicated in its letter. She said Thursday that they voiced medium to high confidence in their assessment, which officials said was based on the testing of soil samples and blood drawn from people who had been wounded.
Britain, in a letter last month requesting a United Nations investigation, cited three episodes in which it suspected that chemical weapons had been used: in a village west of Aleppo and on the outskirts of Damascus, both on March 19, and in Homs on Dec. 24.
American officials said the attacks, which occurred last month in a village near Aleppo and in the outskirts of Damascus, had not been definitively connected to Mr. Assad. The White House said the “chain of custody” of the weapons was not clear, raising questions about whether the attacks were deliberate or accidental.
Secretary of State John Kerry, emerging from a Congressional hearing, said that the United States believed that chemical weapons had been used in two instances, though he did not offer details.
“Given the stakes involved, and what we have learned from our own recent experience, intelligence assessments alone are not sufficient,” the White House said in the letter, which was signed by its legislative director, Miguel E. Rodriguez. “Only credible and corroborated facts that provide us with some degree of certainty will guide our decision-making.”
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, wrapping up weeklong travels in the Middle East that included daily discussions of the Syria crisis, said he was prepared to “give advice on policy decisions” for Pentagon action, but he cautioned that much remained uncertain about the alleged use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime.
That meticulously legal language did not disguise a thorny political and foreign policy problem for Mr. Obama: he has long resisted the calls to arm the Syrian rebels and has expressed deep doubts about the wisdom of intervening in an Arab nation so riven with sectarian strife, although he has also issued pointed warnings to Syria.
Asked if the assessment had proved that Syria had crossed a “red line” drawn by the president, he responded, “We need all the facts, we need all the information.” He noted that uncertainties remained over “what was used, where it was used, who used it.”
In a statement last summer, Mr. Obama did not offer a technical definition of his “red line” for taking action, but said it was when “we start seeing a whole bunch of weapons moving around or being utilized.” In Jerusalem last month, he said proof that Syria had used such weapons would be a “game changer” for American involvement.
The disclosure brought a swift reaction on Capitol Hill, where Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, said, “I think it’s pretty obvious that a red line has been crossed,” and he referred to Mr. Obama’s characterization last summer that Syria’s use of such weapons would be a “game changer.”
The Pentagon, administration officials said, has prepared the president a menu of options that include commando raids that would secure chemical weapons stockpiles and strikes on Syrian planes from American ships in the Mediterranean. Last year, the United States secretly sent a 150-member task force to Jordan to help deal with the possibility that Syria would lose control of its stockpiles. Mr. Obama could also provide more robust aid to the rebels, including weapons.
Mr. McCain called on the president to begin supplying weapons to the rebels, which he has so far refused to do; to enforce a no-fly zone over Syria; and to redouble pressure on Russia to abandon its support for the Assad regime.
White House officials gave no indication of what Mr. Obama might do, except to say that any American action would be taken in concert with its allies.
Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, the ranking Republican member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the intelligence assessment was “deeply troubling,” and, if correct, meant that “President Obama’s red line has certainly been crossed.”
While lawmakers from both parties swiftly declared that the president’s red line had been breached, they differed on what he should do about it.
The administration’s use of the phrase “varying degrees of confidence” suggested that there might be differing levels of certainty among the American intelligence agencies about the reliability of the evidence that chemical weapons were used.
“The political reality is that he put himself in that position that if the ‘red line’ is crossed — he made it very clear — it would change his behavior,” said Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona. The intelligence “is a compelling argument for the president to take the measures that a lot of us have been arguing for all along,” he said.
Faced with mounting pressure to act against Syria — including a new assertion by an Israeli military intelligence official on Tuesday that Syria repeatedly used chemical weapons — the United States has been waiting for the results of an exhaustive analysis by the United Nations of soil, hair and other material to determine whether chemical warfare agents have been used.
The timing of the White House disclosure also suggested the pressures it is facing. It came the same day that the British government said that it had “limited but persuasive” evidence of the use of chemical weapons, and two days after an Israeli military intelligence official asserted that Syria had repeatedly used chemical weapons.
But that investigation has been hobbled because the United Nations inspectors have not been allowed into Syria. Also, the scope of that investigation does not extend to who used the weapons, focusing merely on whether chemical agents were used. The United States is also conducting its own assessment, as are Israel and other countries.
In a letter to the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, several weeks ago calling for a United Nations investigation, Britain laid out evidence of the attacks in Aleppo and near Damascus as well as an earlier one in Homs.
Even if the United Nations investigation proves the use of chemicals, an official said, the White House must determine who used them and whether they were used deliberately or accidentally. He did not offer a timetable for that process.
The letter, a copy of which was obtained by The New York Times, reported that dozens of victims were treated at hospitals for shortness of breath, convulsions and dilation of the pupils, common symptoms of exposure to chemical warfare agents. Doctors reported eye irritation and fatigue after close exposure to the patients.
“It is precisely because this is a red line that we have to establish with airtight certainty that this happened,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity so he could discuss internal deliberations. “The bar on the United States is higher than on anyone else, both because of our capabilities and because of our history in Iraq.”
Citing its links to contacts in the Syrian opposition, Britain said there were reports of 15 deaths in the suburban Damascus attack and up to 10 in Aleppo, where the government and rebels have each accused the other of using chemical weapons.
Mr. Hagel, speaking on Wednesday in Cairo, said, “Suspicions are one thing; evidence is another.”
“Fortunately the deaths have not been high,” Senator Feinstein said, “but there have been deaths.”
Some analysts say they worry that if the United States waits too long, it will embolden Mr. Assad, who has steadily escalated the lethality of the weapons used against the opposition. The government’s use of chemical weapons in isolated episodes, these experts said, would be a way to test international reaction before using them on a wider scale.
The United States has also pushed for a United Nations investigation, but it made clear on Thursday that it has collected enough evidence on its own and with Britain and other countries to make its assessment. An official said the United States was also suspicious about the attack in Homs.
Last August, Mr. Obama threatened the Syrian government with unspecified American action if there was any evidence that chemical weapons were being used or moved on a large scale. On Tuesday, Israel’s top military intelligence analyst, Brig. Gen. Itai Brun, said at a security conference in Tel Aviv that the Syrian government had used chemical weapons, and he criticized the international community for not doing more in response.
While several officials said the intelligence agencies expressed medium to high confidence about its overall assessment, two intelligence officials noted that there were components of the assessment about which the agencies were less certain. He did not offer details.
“The president’s red line appears to have been crossed,” said Martin S. Indyk, a former American ambassador to Israel. “The administration has to take some time to decide what to do about it.”
Administration officials had begun the week casting doubt on the claims made by the Israeli official, Brig. Gen. Itai Brun, about chemical weapons. “Suspicions are one thing; evidence is another,” Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Wednesday on a visit to Egypt.
“But if they end up leaving the impression that the president is not willing to enforce his red line,” said Mr. Indyk, who is now at the Brookings Institution, “that will have consequences in the region, particularly when it comes to Iran’s nuclear program, as well as for our ability to deter Assad’s use of chemical weapons in Syria.”
But by then, a senior administration official said, the intelligence agencies had already become more confident of their assessment, after several weeks of examining the evidence. With Secretary of State John Kerry scheduled to brief senators on Syria on Thursday, the White House decided on Wednesday evening to get ahead of that meeting.
Administration officials said their assessment of chemical weapons in Syria was not much different from that of Britain and France, which sent letters to the United Nations’ secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, last month urging a thorough investigation of the accusations.
The administration’s disclosure came in a response to Mr. McCain, a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and the committee’s chairman, Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, who wrote to the White House asking whether Mr. Assad or his supporters had used chemical weapons during the two-year-long war.
Although Britain and France laid out allegations of chemical weapons attacks in three places in Syria, neither country said it was certain that chemical weapons had been used, according to copies of the letters obtained by The New York Times.
“Given the fact that we have been developing additional information within our intelligence community,” a White House official said to reporters, “we felt it was the right and prudent thing to do to respond in an unclassified form to this letter.”
Even within Israel, the military’s assessment has not been fully embraced by government officials and analysts who follow Syria. Several officials said Wednesday that while they did not doubt the evidence, they worried that the general’s speech would be used to pressure Washington.
Lawmakers generally welcomed the White House’s disclosure, though some suggested that the administration was still inclined to play down the implications of the assessment.
“Every intelligence branch can submit its own assessment,” said an Israeli official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “The issue of chemical weapons is being examined by Israel and the United States at the most senior levels, and is still being discussed.”
“It is important that we read the intelligence as it is laid out, not as we would like it to be,” said Representative Mike Rogers, Republican of Michigan and the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
Another official said that was the reason that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Mr. Kerry on Tuesday that he could not confirm the assessment.
Michael
R. Gordon contributed reporting from Washington; Thom Shanker from Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates; and David E. Sanger from Jerusalem.
“There’s a difference between what the I.D.F. feels is the truth as they see it and what we feel is appropriate for the dialogue between the two governments,” he said, referring to the Israel Defense Forces. “Don’t read into this an effort to force America’s hand.”
Mr. Hagel, in Egypt, declared that Washington would not be rushed into action by foreign intelligence reports, even those from allies. The administration, he said, has to be “very careful” before drawing conclusions and, if necessary, changing its policy, and should await a full review by United States intelligence agencies.
Administration officials said that the Pentagon had prepared a menu of military options for Mr. Obama if he concluded that there was incontrovertible evidence that chemical weapons had been used. Those options, one official said, could include missile strikes on Syrian aircraft from American ships in the Mediterranean or commando raids.
