![\"syria](\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/syria_rubble-e1523818385966.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Bloomberg<\/a><\/p>\n President Trump\u2019s outrage over another WMD attack by Syria\u2019s President al-Assad was clear. For the second time in his presidency, the U.S. commander-in-chief commanded a reprisal.<\/p>\n While images of sick and dying civilians inundated global media all week, USS Winston Churchill sped toward the Mediterranean to join a flotilla of allied warships, including another U.S. warship, USS Donald Cook; both very capable Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers.<\/p>\n It was all a con.<\/p>\n Both vessels carry as many as 90 BGM-109 Tomahawk Land Attack Cruise Missiles (TLAM)– the majority of weapons used in the Friday evening strike on Syria — neither ship actually fired a shot. Instead, they were stalking horses, a distraction from an assault Assad\u2019s government could do little to defend itself against.<\/p>\n It worked. Pentagon officials on Saturday said they faced little resistance to their targeted attack on what they said were three Syrian chemical weapons facilities. Most of the Syrian countermeasures, including defensive ballistic missiles, were fired after U.S. and allied weapons hit their targets, Lieutenant General Kenneth McKenzie told reporters on Saturday.<\/p>\n \u201cNo Syrian weapon had any effect on anything we did,\u201d McKenzie said. He described the joint U.S., French and U.K. strike as \u201cprecise, overwhelming and effective.\u201d<\/p>\n As the strategy of how to respond developed, Trump appeared to telegraph his intentions with a tweet on April 11: \u201cRussia vows to shoot down any and all missiles fired at Syria. Get ready Russia, because they will be coming, nice and new and \u2018smart!\u201d\u2019 The Russians reacted by sortieing 11 warships from the Syrian port of Tartus. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n