Russia

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WASHINGTON—Russia has been carrying out a “disinformation campaign” to try to cover up for the suspected

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, senior White House officials said Tuesday, adding the U.S. has concluded the Syrian military used banned sarin gas in the assault.

As Secretary of State Rex Tillerson arrived in Moscow for high-level talks, White House officials on Tuesday added to pressure against Moscow by questioning Russia’s role in the attack and suggested that it may have known that its ally Syria was preparing to use sarin.

Officials said there is no U.S. intelligence consensus on whether Russia had advance knowledge of the attack. But they also said it seems implausible that Moscow wouldn’t have known given the close military cooperation between the two countries.

 

Russian and Syrian forces work side-by-side at the airfield used to launch the attack, raising suspicions among White House and Pentagon officials that Russia may have known what was coming.

“We do think that it is a question worth asking the Russians about: How is it possible that their forces were co-located with the Syrian forces that planned, prepared and carried out this chemical weapons attack at the same installation and did not have foreknowledge?” said one of the officials.

The chemical attack April 4 killed at least 85 people.

Syria repeatedly has denied using chemical weapons in the attack, and Moscow has suggested that the Syrian airstrike hit a chemical weapons depot used by rebels.

On Tuesday, the White House dismissed the Russian allegation as baseless disinformation meant to obfuscate Syria’s culpability in the attack.

“It’s clear that the Russians are trying to cover up the attack,” said one senior White House official.

U.S. officials say a Syrian SU-22 warplane dropped one bomb filled with sarin gas on the rebel-held village of Khan Sheikhoun. After the attack, Pentagon officials said they saw a Russian drone flying over the area, then a second Russian-made plane carried out an airstrike on a field hospital where many victims were taken for treatment.

It is unclear if a Russian or Syrian pilot carried out the second attack, White House officials said.

After seeing graphic images of children killed in the chemical attack, President Donald Trump ordered a cruise missile attack Friday on the Shayrat airfield, believed to be home to the pilots who carried out the airstrikes.

The U.S. military launched nearly 60 missiles in an attempt to deter President Bashar al-Assad from using chemical weapons again.

The strike didn’t damage the airfield runways or target suspected sarin gas storage sites at the base, making it possible for Syria to keep using the banned chemicals.

White House officials said Syrian personnel associated with the regime’s chemical weapons program were at Shayrat airfield in late March, and on April 4.

 

On the day of the American cruise missile strikes, U.S. officials warned Russians that an attack on Shayrat airfield was coming, giving them an opportunity to get their personnel at the base to safety.

The U.S. didn’t strike parts of the base where Russians work, an intentional move designed to focus attention on Syria.

White House officials said there was no evidence to back up Russia’s contention that a rebel chemical weapons storage site was hit in the strike and called on Moscow to stop obfuscating, work with the U.S. and ensure that Syria follows through on its commitment to get rid of all of its chemical weapons, sometimes known as WMDs, or weapons of mass destruction.

“This is an opportunity for the Russians to choose to stop the disinformation campaign…and eliminate WMDs together,” said one of the White House officials.