As Russian President Vladimir Putin has starkly warned, military action in Syria absent absolute proof that chemical weapons were used, and that it was the regime who employed them, is a dangerous and foolhardy ratcheting up of tensions between the US and Russia.
This critically important relationship has already been strained lately by two relatively trivial distractions. First, there was the episode surrounding Sergei Magnitsky, the Russian auditor who was killed in prison, prompting US sanctions against those officials deemed responsible, followed by Russia blocking foreign adoptions to the US. Then there was Edward Snowden, the government contractor who leaked information about National Security Agency surveillance and was given temporary asylum in Russia.
