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President Trump did more than retaliate for Bashar al-Assads illegal and inhumane use of nerve agents against civilians when he ordered the launch of 59 Tomahawkmissiles to destroy al-Shayrat airbase in Syria. He also detonated a few shibboleths of his predecessors foreign policy.

First isthe idea thatPresident Obamas 2013 deal to remove Assads weapons of mass destruction was a success. Susan Rice and John Kerry have lauded the agreement with Russia to supervise the extraction and destruction of Assads weapons stockpiles as recently as the last year. But Assads brazen attack on civilians in Idlib Province exposed their celebrations as premature. Trumps swift, decisive, and limited response ended more than a half decade of vacillation towards Assads behavior. Obama diplomacy failed, but hard power may yet deter Assad from using weapons banned for almost a century.

The second casualty of the U.S. strike was the absurd Obama line that the only alternatives available to a president are inaction on one hand and a massive ground invasion and occupation on the other. Obama and the architects of his echo chamber would slam any advocate of military measures as a bloodthirsty warmonger ready to repeat the worst mistakes of the U.S. experience in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the reality has always been that there are a range of intermediary steps America can take to pursue her objectives and enforcethe standards of Western civilization. The destruction of al-Shayrat is an example of coercive diplomacy similar to the airstrikes President Reagan deployed against Muammar Qaddafi and President Clinton deployed against Slobodan Milosevic. The immediate aim is punitive, to deterthe further use of nerve gas against civilians. The longer-term goal is to remove Assad from power and reach a settlement that would in all likelihood partition Syria into sectarian zones of influence. Both objectives are impossible through diplomacy alone. Only through the introduction of force might we frighten the Syrians and their supporters into giving up Assad if not the Alawite power structure and winding down his war machine.

EDITORIAL: Syria After the Airstrikes

Which brings us to the final straw man Trump lit on fire. When President Obama punted on Syria in 2013, he claimed there was no international support for limited intervention. True, David Cameron lost a vote in Parliament on the matter. But the actual powers Obama didnt want to offend were Iran and Russia.He worried they would scuttle the Iran nuclear dealas payback. The loss of American credibility, the confidence ofallies, and Syrian civilians were all factored into the cost of an Iranian promise not to test a bomb for 10 years.

Well, the rapprochement with Iran, if it ever existed, is over. In recent weeks President Trump has met with the leaders of our traditional Sunni allies: Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan. He has signed off on aid to Saudi in its war against Iranian proxies in Yemen. He has approved weapons to Bahrain, which is worried about Iranian influence over its Shiite population. America is heavily involved in Iraq and Syria. And now, by striking Assad, President Trump has targetedIrans most prominentservant.

Where things go from here is anyones guess. One of the reasons I urged Congress not to support Obamas airstrikes in 2013 was worry not only over the presidents ambivalence but also possible escalation. Presidential ambivalence is gone, but myworry remains. I do think that this operation was about the best one could hope for: the message and objective was clear, the focus limited, the forceoverwhelming, support broad and deep. Assad may think twice before using these deadly agents again. Russia may be more inclined to replace him with one of his generals. But it is still worth thinking through possible responses if Assad crosses one of President Trumps many lines again. Whatever the future holds, we do know this: President Trumps foreign policy will look nothing like President Obamas.

Matthew Continetti is the editor-in-chief of the Washington Free Beacon, where this column first appeared. 2017All rights reserved

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Trump Blows Up Obama's Foreign Policy Straw Men - National Review

National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster delivered remarks in Florida today to give some background on the strikes against Syria Thursday. He made one curious comment that raises a lot of troubling questions:

And the one thing that I will tell you though, there was an effort to minimizeto minimize risk to third-country nationals at that airportI think you read Russians from thatbut thatand we took great pains to try to avoid that. Of course, in any kind of military operation, there are no guarantees. And then there were also measures put in place to avoid hitting what we believe is a storage of sarin gas, so that that would not be ignited and cause a hazard to civilians or anyone else.

Emphasis added. Now recall that John Kerry bragged on Charlie Rose in 2014 about the Obama administration cutting an historic deal that removed "100 percent of the declared chemical weapons" from Syria. I don't know how much of a caveat the word "declared" constitutes, but as recently as January former Obama National Security Adviser Susan Rice was confidently announcing that the Obama administration had removed chemical weapons from Syria. (Suffice to say, it's been a bad week for Rice's credibility.)

Over at The American Interest, Sean Keeley observes that the Obama administration most certainly knew that the public line they were pushing about removing chemical weapons from Syria was a lie:

In Congressional testimony last February, Obama's Director of National Intelligence James Clapper acknowledged "gaps and inconsistencies in Syria's declaration," validating reports that Syria was still hiding banned chemicals at undisclosed locations. And on its way out the door in January of this year, the Obama Treasury quietly introduced new sanctions against Syrian officials involved in chemical warfare. Buried in the language sanctioning a particular official was a telling admission: "As of 2016, Abbas has continued operating at locations in Syria associated with chemical warfare-related missions."

Whether or not the Obama Administration knew of this particular sarin facility, then, they clearly knew that Syrians were still clinging to their stockpiles at several locations. They knew what Adam Garfinkle has been saying all along: that Obama's deal to remove chemical weapons was not a historic diplomatic triumph but an unenforcable sham that the Syrians and Russians never intended to comply with.

Despite such evidence of dishonesty, the media have been awfully credulous about the Obama administration's self-serving claim of having rid Syria of chemical weapons. Now we know better. In fact, Keeley goes on to note that general revulsion at participating in the Obama administration's dangerous charade has led many former Obama administration officials to support President Trump's actions in Syria.

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Obama Administration Knew Syria Still Had Chemical Weapons, Despite Saying Otherwise - The Weekly Standard

As Ive said before, Trumps foreign policy mostly boils down to anything but Obama:

No matter how Trump ultimately comes out of the foreign-policy ideology test, what he really seems to want to be on the world stage is the not-Obama. And when faced with a choice, the best way to understand what Trump will do is to expect he will opt to differentiate himself as much as possible from his predecessor.

Hes proved hes not Obamaand thats useful to him, one former senior Obama official told me, one of many veterans of the previous administration I spoke with Friday who were supportive of Trumps airstrike on Syria.

It fits the pattern I mentioned earlier this week. Whenever one party takes over the presidency from the other, there is always some of this, but in Trumps case positioning against many of the things Obama was for explains more about his foreign policy because he has so few set views on these issues. Unfortunately, the anti-Obama positioning only seems to run in one direction: more intervention and less diplomatic engagement. Trump isnt cancelling Obamas support for the war on Yemen. On the contrary, he has increased U.S. support for that atrocious war, and may increase it even more in the future. He isnt scaling back the war on ISIS, but instead has escalated it. He wants to undo the few things that Obama got right, and he wants to make Obamas worst policies even worse.

Perhaps the most alarming way that Trumps foreign policy is unlike that of his predecessor is in his decision-making process, or rather his lack of much of a process. Obama was usually slow and deliberative to a fault, and Trump is very hasty and erratic. If Obama sometimes seemed to want to ponder options endlessly, Trump is at the much riskier extreme of acting impulsively without considering the consequences. That has been on display in other ways for a long time, but it is particularly dangerous when it comes to ordering the use of force. As Emma Ashford notes, Trump seems to be prone to making snap judgments on the use of force. Given how poor his judgment seems to be, his willingness to order attacks quickly without thinking through the implications is that much more disturbing.

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A 'Not-Obama' Foreign Policy That Keeps Obama's Worst Policies - The American Conservative

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President Donald Trump blamed Barack Obama for the crisis in Syria in the aftermath of a chemical attack on civilians. USA TODAY

Donald Trump and Barack Obama arrive for Trump's inauguration ceremony at the Capitol on Jan. 20, 2017.(Photo: Scott Applewhite, Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON President Trump seems to have a pretty clear idea who to blame for many of the problems that cross his desk in the Oval Office.

It's President Obama.

From the civil war in Syria and the nuclear showdown with North Korea to the loss of manufacturing jobs in the Rust Belt and problems with health care, the 45th president has blasted the 44th for misguided policies and weak leadership that have left him with a multitude of troubles to fix. He's even accused Obama of wiretapping Trump Tower during the campaign and his team of breaking the law in the Russia investigation.

"I have to just say that the world is a mess," Trump lamented at a Rose Garden news conference Wednesday with Jordan's King Abdullah II, words he repeatedly has used since taking office. "Whether it's the Middle East, whether it's North Korea, whether it's so many other things, whether it's in our country horrible trade deals I inherited a mess."

Just about every president is elected after campaigns that promise a change in direction, and many previouspresidents have criticized their predecessors. That includes Obama, who faulted George W. Bush's administration for what he saw as a misguided invasion of Iraq that undermined U.S. credibility around the globe, and for failing to take adequate steps to avert the financial meltdown that greeted Obama when he took office.

That said, Trump's critique of Obama has been more sweeping and more personal than other presidents in modern times, and he has been less inclined to temper his words after being inaugurated. Some presidents become less critical of their predecessors once they are in the Oval Office themselves and find themselves facing the same tough trade-offs and difficult issues.

It comes amid Trump's frustration about scoring record-low approval ratings and heading toward the end of his first 100 days without a major legislative achievement to tout.

"Trump is unusual in placing frequent blame on his predecessor so early in his term," said Steven Schier, a political scientist at Carleton College and co-author of The Trump Presidency: Initial Assessments,being published this fall. "It's a big contrast to his extravagant promises of quick solutions to major problems."

President Trump boards Air Force One under heavy rain at Andrews Air Force Base on April 6, 2017.(Photo: Jim Watson, AFP/Getty Images)

During the 25-minute news conference, Trump volunteered criticism of Obama and his team on:

A few hours earlier, the president suggested in an interview withThe New York Times thatObamanational security adviserSusan Ricemay have broken the law with actions related to Russian surveillance, although he didn't say how or provide any evidence. "A massive, massive story," Trump said, while calling the controversy over Moscow's meddling in America's election and possible collusion by his associates "a total hoax."

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said Trump isn't blaming Obama for his problems, he's blaming him for America's problems among them Syria, North Korea and overbearing government regulations. The president is "busy and focused on fixing a lot of things," she said, "challenges that are the result of Obama failures."

Several former senior officials in the Obama administration said Trump's litany of criticism, especially his allegations of criminal wrongdoing,has angered and energized them.

"We saw President Obama welcome President Trump into the White House after we were heartbroken about Hillary (Clinton) losing," said Alyssa Mastromonaco, a former deputy White House chief of staff. "For Donald Trump to sort of hit a tough spot and decide he's going to deflect by blaming the former president ... of wiretapping it was laughable but it was also devastating."

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Another former senior administration official said Obama himself has had a more measured reaction to Trump's jibes than many of those close to him. The former president generally has declined to respond publicly to Trump, although he has said he might do so down the road on issues he considers critical.

The two have what might charitably be described as a complicated relationship. Obama famously mocked Trump as he satin the audience, stone-faced,at the White House Correspondents Dinner in 2011. At the time, Trump was a leader in promoting the debunked allegation that Obama wasn't born in the United States. During last year's campaign, Barack and Michelle Obama stumped for Clinton in speeches that questioned Trump's character and qualifications for the White House.

Still, Obama and Trump held a cordial meeting at the White House two days after the election,then spoke by phone several times. Obama attended Trump's inauguration, but Sanders says they haven't spoken since then.

In this Nov. 10, 2016, file photo, President Obama and President-elect Donald Trump shake hands following their meeting in the Oval Office.(Photo: Pablo Martinez Monsivais, AP)

Trump's attacks on Obama, including his denunciation of his signature Affordable Care Act as a catastrophic failure,have helped unite Democratsagainst him. Not a single congressional Democrat endorsed the White House-backedhealth care proposal. And Trump's jibes at Obama may well complicatehis efforts to reach across the aisle on a proposed tax overhaul and an infrastructure bill.

It's also an argument that is likely to work less well as more time passes. In relatively short order, voters tend to hold the current resident of the White House accountable for the state of the nation's economy and security. "The blame game becomes steadily less credible the longer he is in office," Schier says.

Even Trump seems to recognize that.

"I now have responsibility," Trump acknowledged in response to a question about the chemical-weapon attack on Syria. "I will have that responsibility and carry it very proudly. I will tell you that. It is now my responsibility."

Contributing: David Jackson

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Analysis: Trump gets his blame game on, targets Obama for just about everything - USA TODAY