I usually find Thomas Friedman to be a bit of a pompous bore, but he hit the bullseye today with his column about America and Syria. Trump’s arsonist as fireman routine is, in fact, the precise approach taken by Assad to what was initially moderate and reasonable opposition. We know how that has turned out.
To extend the analogy a bit, Trump clearly doesn’t mind burning down the country any more than Assad did, and both rely on Putin to save their bacon. As to Assad’s Iranian friends, however, they will only come to Trump’s rescue by engineering some sort of stupid provocation. That is unlikely, but not impossible.