Hillary Clinton embraced secretary of state John Kerry’s diplomatic overture on Monday, telling a crowd assembled at the White House that Syrian President Bashar Assad could avoid U.S. military intervention if he would “turn over every single bit of his chemical weapons to the international community.”
In doing so, Clinton helped to add legitimacy to the Kerry proposal, which an administration official earlier on Monday called a “major goof.” Both the Russian and Syrian Foreign Ministers responded to Kerry’s proposal, saying they would welcome the initiative. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf added that Assad’s surrender of his chemical weapons stockpile would be “an important step” brought about only as a result of the administration’s credible threats to use force.