necessarily going to help russia. they're going to create huge walls between themselves and the sunni arab states for years to come. but at the same time, i think it marginalizes or appears to marginalize the u.s., we have no friends in the ground and we have no sort of diplomatic strategy going forward. i think it leaves the united states in a weakened position and i think we'll have to regroup. there were two myths of the last few years. one was that saddam hussein had nuclear weapons. and the other was that bashar al assad, the president of syria, was going to leave in a couple of weeks. that was back in 2011 and he's still there. i think the u.s. needs to really think through what it is we want to see going forward. otherwise we create a situation where russia, i think, is becoming a dominant force in the middle east, potentially with a long-standing interest finally realized of gaining access to warm water ports in the mediterranean. >> haven't we already shown our cards? president obama said, well,