David Jackson, Jim Michaels, and Tom Vanden Brook

USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — After weeks of resisting calls for a tougher stance against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government, President Trump Wednesday denounced Syria for a chemical weapons attack and implied he would adopt a new policy toward Syria.

Trump did not provide any specifics about what he might do, and his options against Syria remain limited. But two key members of the cabinet said Russia bore the responsibility.

During an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, Ambassador Nikki Haley said Russia was complicit by choosing to "close their eyes to this barbarity."

"How many more children have to die before Russia cares?" Haley asked. "The U.S. sees yesterday's attack as a disgrace at the highest level — an assurance that humanity means nothing to the Syrian government.

Haley implied the United States might act alone against Syria. “When the United Nations consistently fails in its duty to act collectively, there are times in the life of states that we are compelled to take our own action,” Haley said. “For the sake of the victims, I hope the rest of the council is finally willing to do the same.”

Later in the day, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said there's "no doubt in our mind" that the Syrian government is responsible for what he's calling a "horrific attack." Tillerson said the U.S. thinks that it is time for Russia to rethink its support for Assad's government.

The president said the photos of the victims of dead women and children changed his attitude toward the Assad regime "What happened yesterday is unacceptable to me." The latest attack, Trump said, "crossed a lot of lines for me."

If Trump is not committed to ousting Assad, which he has not said he would do, he may be only working at the margins, analysts said. If responsible for the attack, Assad violated the 2013 agreement to destroy his chemical weapons stockpile.

“Assad was saying, 'I can get away with anything now,'” said Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute. “Trump needs to show it’s not true.” Rubin recommends considering airstrikes that would target aircraft or airfields linked to the attack or hitting Assad's palaces.

Chris Kozak, an analyst at the Institute for the Study of War, said airstrikes are a remote option and pose the risk of weakening Assad while strengthening the Islamic State terrorist group that has been fighting the Assad regime for years.

On Wednesday, Trump and Jordanian King Abdullah both pledged to do more to fight the Islamic State, also known as ISIS. Trump could also broaden existing sanctions and attempt to aim them at Russians and Iranians helping the regime, Kozak said.

The Syrian government's role in the attack is clear, according to a senior Defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity because officials were not authorized to speak publicly about intelligence matters. Radar showed that Syrian warplanes were in the vicinity of the suspected chemical-weapons attack, the official said.

But the Defense official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about intelligence matters, said that a military response could imperil U.S. forces on the ground in Syria fighting the Islamic State.

There are several hundred U.S. special operations troops in Syria advising forces arrayed against the Islamic State, also referred to as ISIS or ISIL. A U.S. attack on Assad's regime could prompt him to target American troops, deepening and complicating the civil war there, the official said.

Trump's tougher talk against Syria also followed a change in the White House's National Security Council, as senior strategist Steve Bannon was removed as a member of the council's principals committee.

The president made his new thoughts on Syria public during a news conference Wednesday with Abdullah. Speaking in the White House Rose Garden, Trump denounced Syria and continued to blame predecessor Barack Obama for global troubles ranging from Iran to North Korean nukes.

"The world is a mess," Trump said. "I inherited a mess, whether it's the Middle East, whether it's North Korea, whether it's so many other things ... We're going to fix it. We are going to fix it."

Speaking just hours after another missile test by North Korea, Trump said he would use this week's summit with Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping to pressure him to rein in Kim Jung-un's government over his nuclear threats. "We have a big problem," he said of Korea, and "we have somebody that is not doing the right thing."

Trump has said the United States may act against North Korea on its own, but has not provided specifics or whether that might involved preemptive military action.

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Trump also said Obama should have dealt with Syria, North Korea and other challenges. As he did Tuesday, Trump said Obama should acted after a Syrian chemical attack in 2013, especially after he had declared that such an action would cross a "red line" — even though Trump, as a New York businessman, opposed bombing Syria at that time as well.

"I now have responsibility," he said, "and I will have that responsibility and carry it very proudly." He declined to specify what actions he might take, saying he didn't want to tip off the Syrians and "I don't like to say where I'm going and what I'm doing."

Former Obama aides said their administration stabilized the globe in the wake of de-stabilizing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They said Trump's foreign policy lacks coherence, in part because the administration is under investigation for possible campaign ties to Russians involved in hacking Democratic Party officials during last year's election.

“The real mess Trump inherited is his campaign’s contacts with Russian agents," said Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the National Security Council during the Obama administration. "He seems incapable of focusing on any of the actual foreign policy challenges that every president has to manage.”

Trump's guest, Abdullah, also denounced the chemical weapons attack in Syria, and called for a "political solution" that can end the violence of the country's civil war. He said the attack is another testament to the failure of the international community to adequately address the conflict.

"This is happening on our watch, on our conscience, as well as the global community," he said. “This should not be tolerated, whatsoever.”

The Syrian civil war has a had a major impact on Abdullah's nation, as thousands of refugees have poured into Jordan from neighboring Syria. Trump pledged an unspecified amount of "humanitarian assistance" to Jordan to deal with its refugee problems.

Trump and Abdullah also said that, during an Oval Office meeting earlier in the day, they also discussed plans to somehow re-start peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians.

Contributing: Donovan Slack, The Associated Press

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