it's been 16 months of internal war fair in syria with the strong dictator in charge using military force against his own people rising up against him. syria has almost no friends in the whole world who are left still supporting the strong man dictatorship there as had uses force against its own people. it has iran, which is an international rogue state and has no friends of its own, no credibility, and no pull on other countries. they have china which refused to take a stand on anyone else's human rights or violence for fear of anyone taking a stands on theirs. and they also have russia. syria has russia, and unlike iran, russia is sort of thought of as being an international grown-up maybe, a country in the international community of nations, so syria is using force against its own people. you don't have to be subtle and read the body language. there's a not subtle thing at all to watch for this particular meeting when president obama and president putin were sitting down yesterday at the g-20