The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee wants the Obama administration to encourage Arab allies to provide the Free Syrian Army with weapons to counter Syrian government artillery, but says the United States does not need to patrol a no-fly zone or provide arms on its own.

Rep. Ed Royce, a Republican from southern California who took over the chairmanship of the committee this year, also told Al-Monitor in an extensive interview late Monday (May 6) that the regional expansion and escalation of the Syrian conflict were in part a function of inadequate American leadership.

“This is a consequence of not working in tandem early on with our allies who made repeated requests for the United States to exercise more leadership, and so yes, you do have a situation where there is Balkanization,” Royce said. He blamed the Obama administration for failing to quickly put into place a process to vet officers of the Free Syrian Army and said the US should also have been more proactive in discouraging Qatar from funneling arms to foreign fighters affiliated with Islamic extremists.

Royce, who is serving his 11th term in congress, is best known for defending the rights of domestic victims of crime — expanding laws against stalking and alerting authorities nationwide to the abduction of children. But he has been a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee since entering the House in 1993 and in the interview, exhibited fluency on a wide range of issues.