Obama: Send Syrian rebels anti-chemical weapons gear

President Barack Obama on Monday cleared the way for the United States to send vetted Syrian rebels equipment and training enabling them to resist a chemical weapons attack, the White House said.

Obama issued a memorandum to Secretary of State John Kerry saying that such assistance "is essential to the national security interests of the United States."

The decision came in the aftermath of an Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack in a Damascus suburb. The United States and its allies say Syria President Bashar Assad's forces were behind the attack, and place the death toll at over 1,000, including hundreds of children.

The president's decision seems to indicate that American officials worry Assad might be tempted to use chemical weapons against rebels fighting to oust him even as the United States and Russia work out a plan to place that arsenal under international control to be destroyed.

The new aid may include "defensive chemical weapons-related training and personal protective equipment to select vetted members of the Syrian opposition, including the Supreme Military Council, to protect against the use of chemical weapons," National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said in a statement explaining Obama's decision. The aid is "non-lethal," she noted.

Under Obama's determination, U.S. assistance may also include "chemical weapons-related personal protective equipment to international organizations, including the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, for the conduct of their operations" under the Russia-U.S. plan.

It may also encompass "chemical weapons-related life-saving assistance for organizations implementing Department of State or U.S. Agency for International Development programs to strengthen local Syrian health care providers' ability to prepare for and respond to any use of chemical weapons."

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