Not all the opposition are Jihadists* , it is not even close tbh so it is a distortion to the point of not true to say the choice is either assad or jihadists
I think for many Syrians the choice is that stark – Assad or Jihadists.
Of course you could sit on the fence and fudge the issue by pointlessly making the point that not all the rebels are Al-Qaeda affiliated, whilst conveniently ignoring the fact that most of the fighting is being carried out by Jabhat al-Nusra, as are most of the causalities being taken on the rebel side, which is of course what David Cameron likes to do.
The battle hardened, most committed, and most effective, front line fighters on the rebel side, are the international Al-Qaeda fighters. It was exactly the same in Afghanistan. The Taliban were always relatively fairly crap fighters, as their name suggests they were young and inexperienced. They gained control of approximately 90% of the country to a large extent by forming alliances, doing deals, bribery, and other shenanigans, with all sorts of people including warlords who’s allegiance could be bought. If some serious fighting was required Al-Qaeda’s foreign arab fighters generally stepped in and provided the experienced front line troops.
Al-Qaeda provided the “crazies”, as the yanks liked to call them, that got the job done in Afghanistan, both during the time of the Soviet backed government, and post-Soviet backed government. Today they are the crazies in Syria. And they certainly won’t meekly stand back in any post-Assad Syria.
imho
