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Moving closer than ever to launching air strikes on Syria, the Obama administration over the weekend pronounced that it had “very little doubt” that the Bashar Al Assad regime used chemical weapons on the Syrian population.

A White House spokesperson said President Obama is closely monitoring the situation in order to “make an informed decision about how to respond to this indiscriminate use of chemical weapons.”

The Syrian government conceded to allowing UN inspectors who are already in the country, to examine areas where the weapons were allegedly used. But the US dismissed the gesture saying, “the belated decision …is too late to be credible.”

UN inspectors were indeed able to inspect the site of the attack this morning after initially being fired on by snipers.

The moves toward a possible US strike are an apparent response to shocking visual footage and photos of what appear to be victims of a fatal gas attack in Syria last week.

GUEST: Reese Erlich, a freelance foreign correspondent whose stories appear on NPR, GlobalPost and The Progressive. He is currently writing his fifth book: “Syria’s Uprising: Assad, the Rebels and US policy.”