Retired Gen. Jack Keane, the former Vice Chief of Staff for the U.S. Army, said he would have ordered military strikes in Syria 10 days ago on Fox News Wednesday, adding he would never have allowed the forces of Bashar al-Assad so much time to protect their resources while the U.S. publicly debated a course of action:
JENNA LEE: Would you green light this today, if you were in the position to do so?
KEANE: I would have done this 10 days ago. President Obama did not seek political cover when he went to Libya. Other presidents have not done it. These kinds of operations that are very limited and you're not committing the country to a campaign of war, I would never have given Assad's forces this kind of opportunity to hide and protect its resources.
LEE: Would you have even talked about it? Because we've talked a lot about it. Would you have just gone and done it?
KEANE: i would have done it and kept it as quietly as possible and then, of course, during execution, made an announcement to the american people and explained why we're doing it, what the consequences are, what kind of risk there is for us, and certainly explained to them very clearly that it's of limited duration.