Pentagon: 2000 Percent Increase in Russian Trolls Past 24 hours

The Pentagon says a Russian "disinformation campaign" has already begun over the U.S.-led airstrikes in Syria.

Chief Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White said Saturday that "there has been a 2,000 percent increase in Russian trolls in the past 24 hours."

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The U.S., Britain and France said they launched Saturday's strike to punish Syrian President Bashar Assad for a suspected chemical attack against civilians in the town of Douma outside Damascus. Opposition leaders and rescuers say more than 40 people, including many women and children, died in the suspected chemical attack.

Russia's Foreign Ministry says the attack was an attempt to derail an investigation into a purported chemical attack. The Foreign Ministry says facts presented by Russian investigators indicated that the purported attack was a "premeditated and cynical sham."

The Pentagon is backing President Donald Trump's assertion that the missile strikes on Syria were "Mission Accomplished!"

Trump used the haunting political phrase "Mission Accomplished!" in a tweet Saturday morning to praise the "perfectly executed strike" against Syria. President George W. Bush famously spoke under a "Mission Accomplished" banner in 2003 when he declared that major combat operations in Iraq were over, but the war dragged on for years.

Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White says, "It was mission accomplished."

However, one of the stated goals of the strikes was to deter Syrian President Bashar Assad's government from using chemical weapons again. It is too soon to know if that will be the case.

White says the strikes "were very successful. We met our objectives. We hit the sites."