Like Obama, Trump Was Against Military Intervention In Syria In 2013

President Donald Trump pauses during a town hall with business leaders in the South Court Auditorium on the White House complex in Washington, Tuesday, April 4, 2017. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
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Despite blaming the Obama administration for Tuesday’s suspected gas attack in Syria, President Donald Trump, like then-President Barack Obama, was against using military force in Syria back in 2013.

On Tuesday – as on Aug. 21, 2013 – a suspected gas attack in a rebel-held area of Syria resulted in scores of casualties. Trump on Tuesday said he believed that Syrian President Bashar Assad was behind the recent attack, as did the Obama administration in 2013.

Trump said in a statement that the attack was “a consequence of the past administration’s weakness and irresolution. President Obama said in 2012 he would establish a ‘red line’ against the use of chemical weapons, and then did nothing.”

Obama’s decision not to pursue military action against Syrian regime targets in 2013 – despite Assad crossing the White House’s “red line” of using poisonous gas against Syrians – was one of the most divisive foreign policy decisions of his two terms, even within the White House.

However, according to his Twitter activity in the days following the 2013 gas attack, Trump was supportive of avoiding a military response (though he was also critical of Obama drawing the red line in the first place):

And so on. Read the full catalogue of Trump’s “Syria” tweets here.

H/t Eli Stokols and TPM Prime member inversion.

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