WASHINGTON: The United States is considering imposing a no-fly zone in Syria, in what would be its first direct military intervention of the two-year-old civil war, Western diplomats said on Friday, after the White House said Syria had crossed a "red line" by using nerve gas.
After months of equivocating, President Barack Obama's administration said on Thursday it would now arm rebels, having obtained proof the Syrian government used chemical weapons against fighters trying to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.
Two senior Western diplomats said Washington is mulling a no-fly zone close to Syria's southern border with Jordan.
"Washington is considering a no-fly zone to help Assad's opponents," one diplomat said. He said it would be limited "time-wise and area-wise, possibly near the Jordanian border", without giving details.
Imposing a no-fly zone would require the United States to destroy Syria's air defences, entering the two-year-old civil war with the sort of action that NATO used to help topple Muammar Gaddafi in Libya two years ago.
The area near the Jordanian border contains some of the most densely-populated parts of Syria, including the outskirts of the capital Damascus.
Washington has moved Patriot surface-to-air missiles, war planes and more than 4,000 troops into Jordan in the past week, officially as part of an annual exercise but making clear that the forces deployed could stay on when the war games are over.
Syria's civil war grew out of protests that swept across the Arab world in 2011, becoming by far the deadliest of those uprisings and the most difficult to resolve, with powers across the Middle East squaring off on sectarian lines.
Western countries have spent the past two years demanding Assad leave power but declining to take direct action like that taken in Libya, because of the far greater risk of engaging with a much stronger country that straddles sectarian divides at the heart of the Middle East and is backed by Iran and Russia.
Just months ago, Western countries believed Assad's days were numbered. But momentum on the battlefield has turned in his favour, making the prospect of his swift removal or end to the bloodshed appear remote without outside intervention.
Thousands of seasoned fighters from Lebanon's pro-Iranian Hezbollah militia joined the war on Assad's behalf in recent weeks and last week helped the Syrian government recapture Qusair, a strategic town. Assad's government says its troops are now preparing for an assault on Aleppo, Syria's biggest city, mainly in rebel hands since last year.
Activists reported an intensified assault on parts of Aleppo and its countryside near the Turkish border overnight, sparking some of the most violent clashes in months.
The use of chemical weapons provides a straightforward reason for Washington to intervene. Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes said Washington now believed 100-150 people had been killed by poison gas.
"Our intelligence community assesses that the Assad regime has used chemical weapons, including the nerve agent sarin, on a small scale against the opposition multiple times in the last year," he told reporters.
"The president has made it clear that the use of chemical weapons or transfer of chemical weapons to terrorist groups is a red line," he said. "He has said that the use of chemical weapons would change his calculus, and it has."
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