It was a mistake to draw a red line in Syria, says Obama's NSA

Jones said he 'does not blame' Obama for the degree of the current refugee crisis from Syria

It was a mistake on the part of former US President Barack Obama to draw a red line in Syria and then failing to follow up on it, his former National Security Advisor, Gen (rtd) James Jones, said today.

"I think it was a mistake to draw a red line on a certain issue and then fail to follow up on it in any meaningful way and I think that caused a lot of loss of confidence in the will of the US in this very important part of the world," Jones told CNN in an interview.

He is currently in Munich to attend the Munich Security Conference.
 

At the same time, Jones asserted that he "does not blame" Obama for the degree of the current refugee crisis from Syria.

"I know of no part of the world that's more important from a security standpoint to us and to our friends in Europe and indirectly to the NATO alliance," he said.

"But I do believe that since the failure to enforce the red line back in the previous administration, that was a colossal mistake from a strategic standpoint," Jones said.

"I think at the very least the penalty for Bashar al-Assad for having used chemical weapons on his own people should have been the forfeit of a piece of his territory for -- where refugees could have been handled and might have prevented the flow of refugees into Europe," he said.

Jones was responding to a question on news reports that Pentagon may recommend to US President Donald Trump deployment of conventional ground forces in Northern Syria.

He denied reports that he is being considered for the position of National Security Advisor in the Trump Administration.

Trump is meeting three-four potential candidates for the post at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida.

Jones is not among them.

The national security adviser, Jones said, sits as the chairman of one of the four principles committee that keys up the issues just before the full NSE where the President is present.

"So the national security adviser has to have direct access to the president, obviously you keep appropriate people informed, the vice president, the chief of staff and so on and so forth, but that relationship has got to be a very strong and very direct," he noted.

The White House Chief of Staff, Reince Priebus told Fox News that two of the names in circulation -- Bob Harward and David Petraeus - are not being considered for the position.

"The president has said very clearly that the new NSA director will have total and complete say over the makeup of the NSC and all of the components of the NSC, and there is no demand made by President Trump on any candidate for NSA director at all," Priebus said.