The US Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications, Ben Rhodes: “The President has said that the use of chemical weapons would change his calculus, and it has.  Our decision making has already been guided by the April intelligence assessment and by the regime’s escalation of horrific violence against its citizens… the President has augmented the provision of non-lethal assistance to the civilian opposition, and also authorized the expansion of our assistance to the Supreme Military Council (SMC), and we will be consulting with Congress on these matters in the coming weeks…Put simply, the Assad regime should know that its actions have led us to increase the scope and scale of assistance that we provide to the opposition, including direct support to the SMC. These efforts will increase going forward.”