going through the equivalent of europe's 30-year war. you're seeing religious divisions, state divisions, non-state groups all battling. essentially in that kind of a situation, there's going to be a lot of fluidity in terms of what alliances, contemporarytemporary coalitions are going to happen. we're not going to run that any more than you can run french revolution to switch metaphors in the period after 1789. it takes two or three decades for these things to work themselves through. will we be involved in one group and another group and the enemy of my enemy, i think yes. >> what do you make of the death -- murder of boris nemtsov. is there anything to say about it? >> i think we are seeing what a brutal regime this is. a regime that i think is stripped more and more of any shred of legitimacy it faces, that it could have. i think that a lot comes down to whether you're basically an optimist or a pessimist.