They - and ISIS (IS or ISIL) - are why the US never really had any good options once the violence started. Before the violence, Obama did allow efforts to reestablish diplomatic relations with Assad, that Bush had ended. This led to having an ambassador there and Kerry trying to convince Assad to end support of Hezbollah. Obama was attacked by the right for doing this.
Once the Arab Spring led to turmoil in other countries, Obama called on Assad to make reforms that would allow the majority Sunnis some greater inclusion in his mostly Alawite government. Obama, Clinton and Kerry have since been attacked for quotes where they said there was some hope that Assad could be a reformer -- where "could be" has been conflated to "is".
However, all this was before what were reported as peaceful protests were met with bullets. One open question here that does disturb me is to what degree - if any- the US encouraged the protesters then. On one hand, it is dismissive of the Syrian (or similarly, Egyptian) culture and people to assume that they could not act on their own and that they were simply puppets. On the other hand, what was the whole Bush "democracy" initiative, that did not lose funding, all about? Looking at the fact that the administration was publicly supporting Assad changing by allowing reforms ( POTUS and SOS)and Mubarak staying (SOS), if the US was encouraging anything it was done by career people without approval -- which is a pretty scary thought! (I am not naive enough to assume that anyone always speaks the absolute truth, but the comments are not politically helpful.)
When the Assad response became more violent, I think we entered the period where Clinton's and Obama's preferred options diverged, with Obama far more reluctant to give any arms to any rebels. (Totally based on HRC's recent, long after the fact comments)
From then into the present, the ferocity of the civil war has increased and it seems every group is fighting every other group. I suspect that is why the US has been reluctant to arm anyone here. In addition, it is why everyone from Obama, to Kerry and Hagel - even when limited US airstrikes over the use of chemical weapons were proposed - were adamant about no troops on the ground and not becoming a part of their civil war.
Now, of course, things are even more confusing.
Given how tragic Syria is now, it is not hard to wish something different had been done. However, it is impossible to know what would have happened had Hillary's (or McCain's, for that matter) preferred actions been taken. Given that the reality is so bad, claiming you wanted to do something different is tempting because at least because of the American "we can fix it" attitude there is an implicit assumption that in the set of choices a decent one always exists and things get bad only when a good choice is not taken. So oddly, on complex problems, it is easier to be seen as "right" if your option was not the one followed. In this case, both the right and Clinton have implied this on Syria. Implicitly, it may be that some wanting LESS done than Obama did are doing this too.
It might be any American involvement ever would not have been for the good and the middle eastern forces there were a powder keg where the fuse was already lit and too far along for outside forces to stop?
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