Assad Vows to Defend Syria as Damascenes Brace for Dreaded Western 'Aggression'

President Bashar Assad vowed Thursday to defend Syria from attack as Washington and London laid out their case for punitive military strikes against Damascus over suspected poisonous gas attacks.

"Syria will defend itself in the face of any aggression," state television quoted Assad as saying.

The United States said it deployed a fifth destroyer to the eastern Mediterranean while Russia was reportedly sending in two warships and Britain dispatched fighter jets to Cyprus.

The mood among Damascus residents was fearful, while security forces prepared for possible air attacks by pulling back troops from potential targets and imposing tougher security controls.

Southeast of the capital, a car bomb killed nine soldiers in the town of Nabak, sparking clashes between troops and rebels, a watchdog reported.

Syria's nervous neighbors stepped up preparations for conflict, with Israel authorizing a partial call-up of army reservists while Turkey put its forces on heightened vigilance.

U.S. President Barack Obama, who a year ago warned the use of chemical arms would cross a "red line," on Wednesday said Washington had definitively concluded Assad's regime was to blame for the August 21 attacks.

Asked how close he was to ordering a U.S. strike, Obama said: "I have not made a decision."

He said U.S. action would be designed to send a "shot across the bow" to convince Syria it had "better not do it again".

The Nobel Peace laureate, who wants to seal a legacy of ending wars after the bloody Iraq and Afghan conflicts, not getting into new ones, argued it was vital to send a clear message around the world.

But some commentators have warned the U.S. could effectively see itself fighting on the side of al-Qaida, whose militants have joined rebels in the battle to oust Assad.

Washington has bluntly signaled a Security Council resolution that could have given a legal basis for an assault was going nowhere owing to Russian opposition.

Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain, facing an uphill battle to win parliamentary support for any intervention, said what was at stake was "one of the most abhorrent uses of chemical weapons in a century".

Cameron admitted there was no 100 percent certainty of who was responsible, but the government insisted military action would be allowed under international law as "humanitarian intervention".

French President Francois Hollande said the world must act to stop the violence. But his government said coordinating an agreed response would be "difficult".

Syrian opposition leader Ahmad al-Jarba said the West must get rid of Assad and his "killing machine" and bring him before the International Criminal Court.

The international community has remained largely impotent over the war despite the huge death toll, as Russia, along with China, have blocked three Security Council resolutions aimed at pressuring Assad.

However, fears intervention could ignite a conflagration were stoked further by Iran, whose army warned a strike on Syria would "drive the Zionists to the edge of fire".

Iran and Syria are main backers of Hizbullah which fought a devastating war with Israel in 2006.

And Israeli President Shimon Peres vowed the Jewish state would "respond with all our might" if attacked.

Global financial markets remained on edge, although stocks rebounded while oil prices slipped back from two-year highs on supply fears.

Diplomats said the five veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security Council were to hold a new meeting on the crisis at 1830 GMT on Thursday to discuss a fiercely disputed British draft resolution that could allow military action.

U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon has appealed for Western powers to await the findings of by his inspectors probing the sites of the attacks that horrified the world.

Hundreds of people including children were reportedly killed when poisonous gas was unleashed on the outskirts of Damascus on August 21.

If confirmed, it would be the deadliest use of chemical weapons since Saddam Hussein gassed Iraqi Kurds in 1988.

The attacks, though not the first in Syria where chemical weapons' use has been alleged, threaten to draw the West into an escalating 29-month conflict in the face of deep divisions in the international community.

Ban said the U.N. experts -- on a third day of inspections of alleged attack sites -- would leave Syria by Saturday and report to him immediately.

He appealed to divided powers to work together to head off military action against Syria, where the U.N. says over 100,000 have been killed and almost three million made homeless since the uprising against Assad erupted in March 2011.

"Diplomacy should be given a chance... peace (should) be given a chance," Ban said.

With any U.S.-led missile strikes unlikely to have U.N. backing, key Damascus allies Russia and Iran again warned against any intervention, saying it could set off a wider conflict.

The Kremlin said Russian President Vladimir Putin -- whose country is Syria's top arms supplier -- and German Chancellor Angela Merkel had agreed the Security Council must study the weapons report and work to find a settlement.

Meanwhile, and as Western powers inch closer to launching military action, Syria is tightening security and juggling its military assets, forcing the people of Damascus to ready for the dreaded inevitable.

Faced with the likely prospect of a barrage of air strikes, Rana says she feels "deeply concerned."

She has decided to leave her house in the northern neighborhood of Qudsaya for the relative safety of her parents' home in Mazraa, in the center of the Syrian capital.

"Staying at home would be dangerous. Together with my husband, I'll go to my parents' place for the time being, until things clear up," she explains.

Rana's house is situated near Mount Qassioun, which features a number of military bases and artillery positions used to shell rebel-controlled suburbs of the city.

Similarly Ayssar, his wife and their two children have packed their bags and departed for Beirut in neighboring Lebanon where his parents have rented a house.

Their apartment is located right next to an air force building in Abu Roummane, another likely target of the expected Western air strikes.

Lana, a 30-year-old humanitarian worker, said many of her colleagues have taken leave and "plan to travel to Europe".

The United States and its allies accuse the Syrian army of unleashing chemical weapons last week against two rebel-controlled parts of the capital, and are threatening to launch punitive strikes in response.

In Damascus, a stronghold of the regime, residents and the security forces are mobilizing amid increasingly palpable tension.

The police are out in force, many streets have been shut off to traffic, and public buildings have been fortified with sandbags.

This morning, Ammar says it took him more than three hours to get to work in Damascus from Qtaife, a 50-kilometer (30-mile) journey that normally takes him two hours.

"The roads were packed with people. Soldiers stepped up their controls and inspected all cars. I feel as though I have come a long way," he says.

The army has been preparing for all eventualities should the West launch missiles against Syria, a security official told Agence France Presse on Thursday.

"We are working, like all the armies of the world, on worst-case scenarios. We are taking measures to protect the country from a strike and preparing the conditions for an adequate response," said the official.

In hospitals, the security forces have become increasingly visible.

At a large public hospital on the outskirts of the capital, workers noticed the presence of eight security agents in battle fatigues on guard outside the building.

With the Western action looming, the army has begun to reposition its assets over the past 48 hours in Damascus, as well as the central cities of Hama and Homs.

Dozens of military commanders and their brigades have been "evacuated" to other locations, says the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.