How can we ask the Russians to join with us in getting gas weapons out? We tried that before and achieved “100% success”. It might even have been true at that moment. But the knowledge of how to make nerve gas is the crucial thing, and there is no way to get rid of that knowledge. They can make their own, and there’s basically nothing we or the Russians can do about it, beyond trying to strictly monitor all the equipment and any precursor chemicals that the Syrians can’t make themselves.
We can condemn it, we can sanction it, but we can’t stop Assad from using it if that’s what he wants to do.
Let’s see how long it is before Assad uses it again. I won’t be surprised if he does a cost benefit analysis and decides it is not worth it. A couple of days before he used it the Secretary of State said his removal was not our focus. Now, he says assad is done. Do you think using more chemical weapons will help him survive? What he should do is take the money and run. Maybe his buddy putin will give him a Dacha, or his palls the mad mullahs will take him in.