US, UK say support is weak for military action against Syria
LONDON — The United States and Britain are acknowledging the Western world’s weak support for any military action against Syria’s government as they seek ways to pressure President Bashar Assad and his chief backer, Russia, to halt a deadly offensive in Aleppo. They are trying to present it as a possibility, nevertheless.
After a meeting of 11 governments opposing Assad’s rule, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson each insisted Sunday that all options were on the table. But their stark explanations about the danger of resorting to military force appeared to rule out such a move.
The result was a somewhat schizophrenic threat that was unlikely to scare Assad’s government or Russia as they move to crush the last rebel-held areas of Aleppo, Syria’s largest city.
“When a great power is involved in a fight like this, as Russia has chosen to be by going there and then putting its missiles in place in order to threaten people against military action, it raises the stakes of confrontation,” Kerry said after the meeting in London.