Analysis - Is Syria now a direct threat to the U.S.? [View all]

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(Reuters) - Over the last two weeks, Obama administration officials have signalled - sometimes intentionally, sometimes not - that a worst-case scenario is emerging in Syria.

Peace talks are at a virtual standstill. An emboldened President Bashar al-Assad has missed two deadlines to turn over his deadliest chemical weapons. And radical extremists who have fought in Syria are carrying out attacks in Egypt and allegedly aspire to strike the United States as well.

Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper told members of Congress last week that Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda aligned group in Syria, "does have aspirations for attacks on the homeland." American and Egyptian officials expressed alarm this week at signs that Egyptians who fought in Syria have returned home to mount an insurgency.

Critics of Obama administration policy in Syria argue that none of this should come as a surprise. For years, they have predicted that Assad and his Iranian and Russian backers would fight tenaciously; militants would flock to Syria; and the region would be destabilized by refugee flows, rising sectarianism and radicalized fighters returning home.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/02/08/uk-syria-us-analysis-idUKBREA161NI20140208