Russia and Syria dismiss as a hoax the claims that the regime of Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad used chemical weapons in the rebel-held enclave of Douma on April 7.
So just how did the U.S. conclude Assad was to blame?
It was largely Assad's intent and capabilities and video recorded at the time of the attack, said Sue Gordon, principal deputy director of the Office of National Intelligence.
Gordon, second in command of the umbrella organization for the nation's 17 intelligence organizations, was in Tampa on Tuesday as a keynote speaker for the GEOINT 18 Symposium at the Tampa Convention Center. We spoke backstage after her speech.
Gordon prefaced her answer by saying she can't "talk all the way about it, but there are things that we know."
For instance?
Assad, who's winning his seven-year battle to hold onto what's left of his country with help from Russia and Iran, "had the capability" to use chemical and nerve gas agents and has used them before, Gordon said.
Videos taken in Douma on April 7 at the time of the attack "would be very difficult to manufacture," she said. "It happens so at-the-moment from so many sources. So those who would suggest it was a manufactured event don't work for us. What we saw was in evidence was very consistent with the use of (chemical weapons) and in some cases nerve gas."
Was there any other evidence?
"That was one of the early pieces of evidence we had and I'm not going to talk about the other evidence."
Gordon also dismissed any contention that Jaish al-Islam, the Sunni jihadi group that controlled Douma, was responsible for the attack. One Kurdish news organization said the group had done it before.
Noting again there "are things I can't talk about," Gordon said the "wherewithal of the rebels to create something like that ... seems unlikely."
Then she pulled out Occam's Razor.
"The most likely answer is the simplest answer," she said. "It just doesn't seem consistent with what the rebels would do."
I explained the importance of pushing the intelligence community on the issue because of how news organizations failed to do so during the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. That action was predicated on the false assertion that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.
Gordon said the intelligence community's capacity to track the presence of such materials has improved dramatically since Colin Powell stood before the United Nations to argue for invasion based on a weapons program later proved to be non-existent.
Here's how Gordon explains it today:
"I would just say the improvement in analytic tradecraft, post the run-up to the Iraq War, in terms of how we communicate our confidence in both the data we have and the assessment we made is so far advanced."
Gordon and I also talked about the Russian influence operation that took place during the 2016 presidential election. She fully expects to see the Russians try to do it again.
Russia's efforts to sow confusion about the integrity of the electoral process was "grounded in their doctrine of undermining democracies," Gordon said. "So you are going to see them continue to press any advantage they might have."
But the intelligence community is "doing an excellent job" to counter that, starting with the unclassified assessment of the elections "that alerted the nation and the world to this activity," she said.
"What's great about an open society is that if you know you are being duped, there are things you can do to protect yourself. Do I believe that Russia will continue to pursue its intent? Yes I do. Do I believe we are better postured every day to understand what that looks like and how we might (deal with it)? Yes."
As for working for an unpredictable leader like President Donald Trump, a frequent critic of the intelligence community, Gordon said, "There is more swirl than fundamental vexing.
"It probably hurts a bit when our integrity is challenged but I think actually the combination of Mike Pompeo as (CIA director) and Dan Coats as director of national intelligence has become a really important part of the national security team and the president listens to their voice."
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The Pentagon announced no new casualties in ongoing operations last week.
There have been 2,347 U.S. troop deaths in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan; 49 U.S. troop deaths and one civilian Department of Defense employee death in support of the follow-up, Operation Freedom's Sentinel in Afghanistan; 54 troop deaths and two civilian deaths in support of Operation Inherent Resolve; one troop death in support of Operation Odyssey Lightning, the fight against Islamic State in Libya; one death classified as other contingency operations in the global war on terrorism; and four deaths in ongoing operations in Africa where, if they have a title, officials will not divulge it.
Contact Howard Altman at haltman@tampabay.com or (813) 225-3112. Follow @haltman