Dem senator suggests bombing Syrian Air Force

President Obama should consider destroying the Syrian Air Force on the ground to prevent future aerial attacks against civilians, a top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said Thursday.

Sen. Robert Casey Jr. (D-Pa.), the chairman of the committee's Middle East subpanel, said the unification of Syrian opposition groups and their recent gains on the ground should encourage the United States to increase its involvement in Syria. 

“The administration should also examine and assess other ways in which the Syrian Air Force can be deterred or degraded, including the use of surface-to-surface Tomahawk missiles, to degrade the Syrian Air Force's ability to take off,” Casey said at a day-long conference of the hawkish Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “Planes on the ground is what we're talking about here.”

The remarks come as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is expected to officially recognize the Syrian National Coalition as the legitimate successor to Assad's government during a meeting of a U.S.-backed Friends of Syria in Morocco next week.

• Better coordinate international support, including weighing on Iraq to stop allowing Iran to fly military supplies to the Assad regime through its air space;

• Consider training and intelligence sharing with “heavily vetted” opposition groups;

• Consider measures that would “hamper” the Syrian Air Force's ability to attack civilians; and 

• Give monetary support for local opposition leaders.

“Time is growing increasingly short for [the] moderate elements among the political and armed opposition,” he said. “The space to positively influence the environment is narrowing and may be closing. The establishment of the new opposition group, combined with better understanding of armed population, provides a renewed opportunity for a more assertive U.S. policy.”