think this is an absolute mess that the u.s. cannot possibly make better? >> well, you can accuse the obama administration of overthinking the engagement in syria and the problem now we have with donald trump is there seems to be no thinking about what the goal is in syria. if you bomb assad any further, who are you doing it for? there is no negotiation process in which different parties are coming to the table. there is no discussion about what happens if assad goes. really all we have is iran and russia engaged every single day in support of the iran regime -- assad regime. we have israel also targeting strikes there in syria. and you have the united states as of last week saying that the fight against isis is over. that is the technical reason the united states has been engaged there, is to defeat isis. when donald trump said that was over, he gave a full signal to assad that he could unleash chemical weapons on whoever he wanted with impunity in his own country. so now we have a problem.