pattern seen in alleged chemical arms use in syria
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_SYRIA_CHEMICAL_WEAPONS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-04-28-15-13-14BEIRUT
(AP) -- The instances in which chemical weapons are alleged to have been used in Syria were purportedly small in scale: nothing along the lines of Saddam Hussein's 1988 attack in Kurdish Iraq that killed thousands.
That raises the question of who would stand to gain as President Bashar Assad's regime and the opposition trade blame for the alleged attacks, and proof remains elusive.
Analysts say the answer could lie in the past - the regime has a pattern of gradually introducing a weapon to the conflict to test the international community's response.
The U.S. said last week that intelligence indicates the Syrian military has likely used sarin, a deadly nerve agent, on at least two occasions in the civil war, echoing similar assessments from Israel, France and Britain. Syria's rebels accuse the regime of firing chemical weapons on at least four occasions, while the government denies the charges and says opposition fighters have used chemical agents in a bid to frame it.