Kerry Makes Yet Another Dangerous Rush to Judgment

Here we go again with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry leveraging a tragedy to make another "strong case" based on limited evidence. We have already seen this in the case of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and chemical weapons. Now it's Russian President Vladimir Putin's turn for the global smear treatment.

Presumably we're supposed to rush to adopt the notion that Russia's fingerprints are all over last week's downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 over Ukraine -- just as we were supposed to buy into Kerry's story last year about the Assad regime's use of chemical weapons against his own people. That rhetoric almost ended up serving as a pretext for U.S. military action, and it would have if Putin hadn't stepped in and offered to babysit Assad and oversee the removal of potential chemical threats.

The parallels in Kerry's rhetoric on Ukraine and Syria are remarkable. In the wake of last August's chemical weapons attack in Syria, Kerry said Assad's responsibility was "undeniable" and warned of an "informed response" by the U.S. that teetered on the brink of military action. Meanwhile, Putin noted that there was no actual evidence to back up Kerry's claim.

A subsequent United Nations report failed to pin any blame on Assad, but the narrative had already been entrenched.

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