New York Times: What Next for Syria?
“With the apparent collapse of the United Nations-mediated peace talks on Syria, the United States and its allies find themselves in a difficult spot. … Now that peace talks have run aground, [President] Obama has asked his advisers to review old and new options for bolstering opposition forces and easing the desperate humanitarian crisis. These tasks have grown even more complicated as Syria has increasingly become a breeding ground for a new generation of terrorists and as ever-larger refugee flows threaten to destabilize the region. Such threats may at some point require bolder steps. … Mr. Obama has resisted being pushed into a war by critics who seem to believe that force is the ultimate sign of leadership. Leadership sometimes means not going to war. It also means, in this case, persisting in the frustrating search for a peaceful solution and, short of that, some means of lessening the misery of the Syrian people” (2/18).