On Thurs., April 6 around 8:30 p.m., President Trump ordered a targeted military missile strike on an air base in Syria.
This strike was in “response to the Syrian government’s chemical weapons attack this week that killed more than 80 civilians,” writes nytimes.com.
100 or more were injured. The civilians included innocent men, women and children as well as babies. An official said this was intended to send a message to Mr. Assad (Bashar al-Assad) about the American intention to use military force if he continues to use chemical weapons.
There were 59 tomahawk cruise missiles sent to hit the Shayrat airfield in Syria, which is where the chemical attacks took place.
There is a known relationship between Syria and Russia and no Russian planes were at the airfield at the time that the missiles were launched. The Pentagon did inform Russian military officials of the missile to avoid hitting their planes and making more of a conflict.
“It was Mr. Trump’s first order to the military for the use of force – other operations in Syria, Yemen and Iraq had been carried out under authorization delegated to his commanders – and appeared intended to send a message to North Korea, I ran and other potential adversaries that the new commander in chief was prepared to act, and sometime on short notice,” writes nytime.com.
The strike came as quite a shock for some as earlier in the day the Trump administration said options were still being considered. With that being said, Trump moved quickly to send his message and unlike Obama, who rejected the use of strikes when the same chemical attacks happened in 2013, Trump ordered the military strike 72 hours after the awful chemical attacks.
When Trump issued his statement to the people he said, “It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons.”
