RESET: How the Syrian Conflict Could Lead to a Clash Between Russia and NATO.

The humanitarian crisis in Syria has gone on so long and is so devastating in its social impact — with a huge migration, some direct and some coming from people in the existing camps in the countries surrounding Syria — that we can lose sight of the military dangers that are now threatening the Middle East.

It has long been feared in NATO that the Syrian crisis would spill over into a wider war, but that moment is closer now than it has ever been before. Any serious analysis of the start of the First and Second World Wars reveals that a lack of clarity of intention is extremely dangerous.

Our last attempt at “clarity” in Syria resulted in an disastrously indistinct red line.