A Syrian rebel commander who recently completed a U.S. training program has told the U.S. military that he surrendered six coalition-provided trucks and ammunition to an intermediary linked to the al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria, known as the Nusra Front.
This only reinforces that the Russians and Assad are definitely the lesser of two evils. Under the Assads minority religious rights were protected, women's rights were protected, there was a prosperous middle class, there was modern infrastructure and religious fanatics were few and far between in a very secular society. The Americans are backing the wrong dog yet again.
Americans do it reflexively, mostly because their "reality" consists of meetings in congressmen's offices and what kind of fantasies the think-tanks in the Beltway come up with. That's how a crook like Ahmed Chalabi became their Iraq "expert" and talked them into an invasion that cost $2 trillion and 5000 soldier's lives. No sign that this kind of thinking in DC will ever stop. Even if they mostly avoided the Syrian trap there's still every reason to believe that if the GOP win the White House they're more than willing to take the show back on the road to Iran next time.