Meanwhile, more details are emerging about the timeline leading up to the attacks and when the president learned the missiles had struck.
The United States missile strikes against Syria on Thursday were "fully justified" because of the Syrian government's use of chemical weapons, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley told the Security Council Friday.
"The United States took a measured response last night," she said. "We are prepared to do more."
The United States launched 59 Tomahawk missiles, the first direct U.S. military attack on the government of President Bashar al-Assad since the country's civil war began six years ago.
The action was in response to the Syrian government's chemical weapons attack Tuesday that killed at least 80 people, many of them babies and young children.
Meanwhile, more details are emerging about the timeline leading up to the attacks, when President Trump was informed that the missiles had struck their target, and how he informed the Chinese president, with whom he had been dining.
"The president informed President Xi as dinner concluded," White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Friday afternoon. "He was on his way back to his temporary quarters.
"Spicer said that Trump was first informed of the chemical attack on Tuesday during the Presidential Daily Briefing. At that time, the president posed several questions.
There was another meeting that night at 8 p.m. among several of the nation's security "principals."
That was followed by a meeting Wednesday afternoon where the president was briefed and he informed his team to come up with options.
At 1:30 Thursday afternoon, as he flew on Air Force One to Florida, the president spoke with his national security team through a secure video conference. Then, around 4 p.m., Spicer said that the president met with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and others in a secure room at Mar-a-Lago and "gave the go-ahead."
Missiles were launched at 7:40 p.m. during the dinner with President Xi.
Foreign leaders and congressional leaders were notified starting at 8:30 p.m., just as first impacts were hitting the ground. Some of those calls were made Tillerson, Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis and National Security Adviser Henry McMaster.
After dinner, the president went to a secure room with his advisers and had a secure conference call with the joint chiefs. Trump asked about effectiveness and was told it would take few hours but initial results positive.
Six people were killed in the airstrike, the Syrian's Armed Forces General Command said in a televised statement.
After the U.S. missiles landed on the Syria's Shayrat Airfield, a military base, President Trump appeared at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida to announce the U.S. response to the chemical attack, delivering a brief statement that was recorded and quickly broadcast around the world.
“Tonight, I ordered a targeted military strike on the air base in Syria
from where the chemical attack was launched,” the president said. “It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons." (For more information on this and other political stories, for daily newsletters and breaking news alerts.)
The Pentagon said 59 Tomahawk missiles struck the Syrian airfield beginning at about 8:40 p.m. Eastern Time. They were launched from from two Navy destroyers — the USS Ross and USS Porter — positioned in the eastern Mediterranean. The missiles were aimed at jet fighters, aircraft hangars, radars, ammunition bunkers, fuel storage facilities and air defense systems.
The missile strike dramatically expanded U.S. involvement in Syria and increases the prospect of direct confrontation between pro-Assad countries, including Russia and Iran, which have been supporting his government with troops and arms, and anti-Assad countries, including the United States, whose backing of rebels had been limited largely to supplying them with weapons. Several hundred U.S. troops are stationed in Syria to advise local forces planning a major assault to drive ISIS out of the city of Raqqa.
Russia and Iran predictably condemned the missile attack, calling it a breach of international law that will weaken their relationships with the United States..
Both countries maintain that Assad has never bombed his own people with chemical weapons, dismissing evidence of several such attacks during the six-year war.
U.S. officials say that Trump did not ask Russian President Vladimir Putin for permission to wage the attack and that the two have not spoken about Assad's chemical strike. Despite Russia's support for Assad, U.S. military officials warned the Russian military the attack was coming, providing adequate time to move any personnel stationed at the targeted airfield.
"Russian forces were notified in advance of the strike using the established deconfliction line," said Pentagon Spokesman Captain Jeff Davis. "U.S. military planners took precautions to minimize risk to Russian or Syrian personnel located at the airfield."
No Russian aircraft were at the base when it was attacked, he said.
"We are assessing the results of the strike," Davis added. "Initial indications are that this strike has severely damaged or destroyed Syrian aircraft and support infrastructure and equipment at Shayrat Airfield, reducing the Syrian government's ability to deliver chemical weapons.
"The use of chemical weapons against innocent people will not be tolerated."
In the hours following Tuesday's chemical attack, Trump condemned Assad in a statement that also contended that President Obama shared in the blame because the deaths were a "consequence" of his failure to unleash the U.S. military on Assad's government following a 2013 chemical weapons attack.
Trump's military response Thursday carries political risk because it reverses his long-held stance against U.S. military involvement in the Middle East, which he repeatedly affirmed during his presidential campaign. He assured voters that as president he would not waste his time or taxpayers' dollars to solve the problems of other countries, and he supported Russia's backing of Assad.
Despite Trump's insistence that Assad's chemical attacks are a result of President Obama's failure to enforce the much-criticized "red line," Trump's rhetoric prior to his political ascendancy was more in line with his predecessor's policy. Trump had clearly opposed any military response following Syria's 2013 chemical attack and anytime after then. In at least a dozen tweets compiled by The New York Times, Trump was firm in his view. "Syria is NOT our problem" he said in one Tweet. In others, he appealed directly to Obama to “not attack Syria” as “there is no upside and tremendous downside” and to “stay out of Syria.”
Trump had showed no signs of changing his views on U.S. military involvement in Syria until Wednesday, a day after the chemical attack, when chilling videos showing the brutal effects on Syrian victims were shared around the world. Although Assad had bombed his own people with chemical weapons before, the images and news accounts from Tuesday's attack, Trump said, swayed his view of the situation in Syria.
"Assad choked out the lives of countless men women and children," Trump said of the Syrian chemical attack when he announced that the U.S. military had carried out the missile strikes. "It was slow and brutal death. Even beautiful babies were brutally murdered. No child of god should ever suffer such horrors."
He called on "civilized nations" to work with the United States to "end the slaughter and bloodshed in Syria."
Talal Barazi, the governor of Homs province, where the targeted airbase is located, told Reuters early Friday that ambulances and fire trucks were scrambling following the attack to respond to fires there.
U.S. officials said various military plans for intervening in Syria were developed years ago and have been constantly updated, which contributed to the swiftness of settling on the missile attacks. Trump convened a meeting Wednesday of the National Security Council, where military aides presented three options to respond to Assad's use of chemical weapons. Trump wanted more details on two of them.
After traveling to Florida on Thursday, the president met with Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, National Security Adviser Henry McMaster, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and other top national security advisers for the final time before making a decision on the U.S. response.
Before dinner, Trump decided to go with the Tomahawk missile attack, which McMaster later described to reporters as the least powerful option on the table
Tillerson said that communications alerting Russia to the attack were between Russian and U.S. military personnel and did not involve politicians.
Tillerson is scheduled to meet next week in Moscow with Putin. Officials said they're hopeful the missile attack will lead Russia to act on renewed U.S. insistence that it honor a 2013 agreement to destroy Syria's stockpile of chemical weapons. Obama agreed to a Russian-brokered deal not to attack Assad's forces in exchange for ridding Syria of the weapons.
“Clearly, Russia has failed in its responsibility to deliver on that commitment,” Tillerson told reporters Thursday night. “Either Russia has been complicit or Russia has been simply incompetent in its ability to deliver on its end of that agreement."
Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, two of Trump's most consistent Republican critics, praised the president for ordering the missile attack.
"We salute the skill and professionalism of the U.S. Armed Forces who carried out tonight's strikes," they said in a joint statement issued Thursday. "They have sent an important message the United States will no longer stand idly by as Assad, aided and abetted by Putin's Russia, slaughters innocent Syrians with chemical weapons and barrel bombs.
"President Trump confronted a pivotal moment in Syria and took action. For that, he deserves the support of the American people."
House Speaker Paul Ryan said the attack was justified, but he encouraged Trump to involve Congress more as strategy on Syria evolves. Many other Republicans also asked that the White House communicate with Congress.
“It is critical that Assad knows he will no longer enjoy impunity for his horrific crimes against his own citizens, and this proportional step was appropriate," said Sen. Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican who serves as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. "As we move forward, it will be important for the administration to engage with Congress and clearly communicate its full strategy to the American people.”
Senior Democrats in Congress were generally supportive of the attack.
“Making sure Assad knows that when he commits such despicable atrocities he will pay a price is the right thing to do,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement.
Other Democrats had a different view.
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who visited Syria in January, said in a statement that the airstrikes were “reckless and short-sighted.”
Sen. Jeff Merkley, who represents Oregon, offered qualified praise for the president's actions.
"It is essential," he said, "that before the U.S. undertakes any ongoing military campaign in Syria, the President consult with Congress and seek congressional authorization, in accordance with Article I of the Constitution and the War Powers Resolution."
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