Resumen de United States strikes syrian government airbase in response to chemical weapons attacks by syrian forces; two additional strikes on syrian government forces justified by defense of troops rationale

Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson

• On April 6, 2017, the United States launched air strikes against a Syrian government airfield, marking a new development in Syria's long-running civil war. U.S. involvement in the conflict had previously been limited to the provision of indirect support for some rebels and the use of direct force against certain nonstate actors, particularly Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). This changed in the wake of April 4, however, when a rebel-held town was hit by a nerve gas attack that killed more than eighty people—including at least thirty children—and injured hundreds more. The attack used Sarin or a Sarin-like substance, which causes death by asphyxiation, often accompanied by blue facial skin and foaming at the mouth. The United States concluded, along with many other states and the NGO Human Rights Watch, that the attack was perpetrated by Syria's Assad regime.