McCain on Syria: Any resolution must include authority to attack air defenses

McCain on Syria: Authorization from Congress must change the balance of power and give the rebels a fighting chance.

|
J. Scott Applewhite/AP
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., discusses the the crisis in Syria during a TV news interview before participating in a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing today with Secretary of State John Kerry, and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Sept. 3. President Obama won conditional support Monday from two of his Republican foreign policy critics, Sen. McCain, and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.

Sen. John McCain says he will support President Barack Obama's request to intervene inSyria if the move would "reverse the situation on the battlefield."

McCain tells NBC it isn't sufficient to merely send a strong message to President Bashar Assad with a limited-range response. McCain says a resolution of intervention must include authority to degrade Syria's air defenses. The Republican says "it's an unfair fight" on the ground and that Assad has the upper hand.

McCain says if authorization from Congress doesn't change the balance of power and give the rebels a fighting chance, then it "will not have the desired effect."

Obama's former rival for the White House says he "cannot support something that might be doomed in the long run."

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to McCain on Syria: Any resolution must include authority to attack air defenses
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2013/0903/McCain-on-Syria-Any-resolution-must-include-authority-to-attack-air-defenses
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe