robert_menendez.jpg

U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez said today that the United States and its allies should launch missile strikes on "high-value" Syrian government targets to send a message that using chemical weapons on civilians will not be tolerated anywhere on the globe.

(Barbara L. Salisbury/For the Star-Ledger)

TRENTON — U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez, the chairman of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee, today called on President Obama and allied nations to begin missile strikes against Syrian government targets, saying he was convinced the Syrian regime has used deadly chemical weapons on civilians and must be stopped.

Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat who took over the foreign affairs panel earlier this year, said the United States and its allies should take the rare step of intervening in Syria's civil war to send a message that chemical warfare on innocent citizens will not be tolerated anywhere on the globe.

"Time is of the essence," Menendez told The Star-Ledger today in a telephone interview. "If a regime uses chemical weapons against its people, in contravention of the international laws, how does one at the end of the day send a clear and unequivocal message that the world will not permit that?"

Although Menendez did not call for ground troops to be deployed, he said the potential responses by the United States and its allies should include "limited stand-off strikes on high-value targets ... such as military bases, transit choke points, airfields, power facilities."

But Newark Mayor Cory Booker, also a Democrat who is vying for the Senate seat left vacant by the death of U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg in June, took a different stance from Menendez today.

Booker told the Huffington Post in a video interview that he was "war-weary" after a decade of U.S. military interventions in the Middle East and that he was not convinced all the facts were out yet on the chemical attacks in Syria.

"My posture on Syria is that we should not be going to war, we should not be unleashing missiles," he said. "I just have a default position that’s going to always lead me first and foremost to peace."

In public remarks this week, Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State John Kerry both condemned the use of chemical weapons in Syria, and today Obama said the United States had "concluded" — based on unspecified evidence — that the Syrian government led by President Bashar al-Assad used poisonous gas on civilians last week.

Menendez said he had spoken with Kerry and Samantha Power, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, in recent days to discuss those reports and the rapidly evolving possibility of a "coordinated response" with such allied nations as France and the United Kingdom.

The possibility of missile strikes has been on the table for months and would allow U.S. armed forces to destroy "hundreds of targets at a tempo of our choosing," according to a June letter to Congress from Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.

Menendez also suggested stronger actions.

"You could also attack the specific regime units that carried out the chemical attacks in Eastern Damascus. ... You could have a larger-scale effort to neutralize the Syrian chemical weapons locations," he said. "Those are all options."

A bipartisan group of more than 100 House members sent a letter to Obama today urging him to seek congressional authorization before any military action, but Menendez said Obama could act without Congress on some "precision strikes."

"There are several elements of international law that the administration could avail themselves of," Menendez said, citing the Geneva Conventions and the Chemical Weapons Convention.

"Personally,” he added, "I would like to see that Congress is involved to show there is unity on that issue, but not if it’s going to take forever."

Menendez also said it may not be worthwhile to wait for a team of UN inspectors in Syria to deliver a report on whether chemical weapons were used, saying it would only confirm what U.S. officials already know.

U.S. Sen. Jeffrey Chiesa (R-N.J.), who is temporarily filling the seat held by Lautenberg, said it may be that a military strike is "something that has to be done."

"We know, hearing from the vice president and the president and the intelligence that we’re gathering, that these attacks were catastrophic and the use of chemical weapons is something that many people have spoken out about, Secretary Kerry especially, as inhumane and immoral," Chiesa said at a news conference in Cape May today.

Any military response by the United States or its allies could well set off a chain reaction in the volatile Middle East. Iran — an ally of the Syrian government — has threatened to attack Israel if Western nations launch missiles into Syria.

Menendez, who described himself as a "strong defender" of Israel, said that it "will have to decide its own national security issues and how it defends itself."

"This is not a hand we wish we were dealt, or a hand that Israel wishes it was dealt," Menendez said. "But we have to make the case that using chemical weapons has serious consequences. Many more lives will be saved."

Booker’s Republican opponent, Steve Lonegan, has already said that the United States should not be involving itself in foreign conflicts, and announced today that he would hold a news conference Thursday to expound on his views about Syria.

In contrast, U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a member of the Foreign Relations Committee and former Republican presidential candidate, agreed with Menendez on launching air strikes as well as the need to arm the forces opposed to Assad.

"The important part of this whole situation is, is this just going to be just a retaliatory strike that has no lasting impact or something that changes the momentum on the ground in Syria?" McCain said Tuesday, according to NBC News.

Star-Ledger staff writer Jenna Portnoy contributed to this report.

RELATED COVERAGE

• U.S. moves forces closer to Syria as chemical weapons inquiry continues

• More Politics







FOLLOW LEDGER POLITICS: TWITTER | FACEBOOK | GOOGLE+