Syria's Assad may cling on, Britain will not arm rebels: sources

[laserguided]

[QUOTE](Reuters) - Britain has abandoned plans to arm Syrian rebels fighting to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad and believes he might survive in office for years, sources familiar with government thinking say.

The sources also told Reuters that a peace conference to try to end the conflict - now in its third year - might not happen until next year if at all.

"Britain is clearly not going to arm the rebels in any way, shape or form," said one source, pointing to a parliamentary motion passed last week urging prior consultation of lawmakers.

The reasons for the shift were that British public opinion was largely opposed, and there were fears that any weapons Britain supplied could fall into the hands of Islamist militants.

"It will train them, give them tactical advice and intelligence, teach them command and control. But public opinion, like it or not, is against intervention."

The British position amounted to one of the gloomiest assessments of the rebels' prospects yet.

It was Prime Minister David Cameron who led the charge earlier this year for the European Union to drop an arms embargo on Syria, which London and Paris had argued was one-sidedly penalizing the anti-Assad opposition.

The involvement of Iran and Hezbollah had shifted the balance of power on the battlefield in Assad's favor, the sources said, giving him less incentive to negotiate, and the West had no strategy to end the conflict soon.

"The Western assessment has changed," said one source. "We thought Assad could only hold on for a few months. We now think he can last a few years."

Hobbled by debt and defense budget cuts at a time when the United States, Britain and NATO allies are withdrawing forces from Afghanistan, the West says it wants to help the rebels topple Assad.

But it finds its options limited.

Forces loyal to Assad have made gains in recent months, while rebel groups have been plagued by infighting between Islamist militants linked to Al Qaeda and the more moderate Free Syrian Army. The longer the conflict drags on, the greater the influence the West thinks the Islamists will have, the sources said.

U.S. efforts to arm the rebels have stalled in Congress. Britain publicly says it is not ruling out arming the opposition but has privately done so, the sources said.

Only a dramatic shift in the situation such as "widespread use of chemical weapons" might force a rethink, another source said, refusing to be drawn on whether a collapse in attempts to broker a political solution might also be a tipping point.

Britain has said it believes there has so far been only small-scale use of chemical weapons.

Political realities mean any British decision to arm the rebels would need to be endorsed by a vote in parliament anyway.[/QUOTE]
[url]http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/07/19/us-syria-crisis-britain-idUSBRE96H16K20130719[/url]

[Nigademus]

The whole situation is fucked up anyway. Adding more weapons to the mix definitely wouldn't help in the long run.

[Genericenemy]

Good, they shouldn't be arming people who have allegedly committed atrocities.