In my humble opinion, the ISIS conundrum is a bit more complicated than that. The US -- directly or indirectly -- exercised an "Afghanistan effect" on the situation in Syria (1980s- fundamentalist Muslims [Taliban] are fine as long as they screw the Russians) ... which was pretty unthinking but who reads history in DC? On the other hand, the Padishah, blinded by his fury against Assad and entertaining dreams of pushing the Turkish frontier to a line that was denied to Kemal et al in 1923, he waded in with guns and money and imams and open borders to support the "good" and "devout" Islamics against the Alawite in Damascus. But, lo and behold, his efforts to shatter the Zulfiqar backfired. Now he wants the Russians to take the chestnuts off the fire. Too late, if I may say so.
In my humble opinion, the ISIS conundrum is a bit more complicated than that. The US -- directly or indirectly -- exercised an "Afghanistan effect" on the situation in Syria (1980s- fundamentalist Muslims [Taliban] are fine as long as they screw the Russians) ... which was pretty unthinking but who reads history in DC? On the other hand, the Padishah, blinded by his fury against Assad and entertaining dreams of pushing the Turkish frontier to a line that was denied to Kemal et al in 1923, he waded in with guns and money and imams and open borders to support the "good" and "devout" Islamics against the Alawite in Damascus. But, lo and behold, his efforts to shatter the Zulfiqar backfired. Now he wants the Russians to take the chestnuts off the fire. Too late, if I may say so.