"Doesn't Putin realize that Assad is a dictator?" they exclaim. "Why doesn't Putin instead work with the U.S. to oust Assad from power? they ask.

Putin's position is that Assad is a great partner in the global war on terrorism and, therefore, should not be ousted from power. Putin and Assad say that the rebels who are firing on government troops are the terrorists who need to be killed as part of global the war on terrorism. They ask why the U.S. government is supporting terrorists when it purports to be against terrorism.

The Putin-Assad position is, in fact, no different from that of Egyptian military dictator Gen. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who says that the people who are trying to overthrow his dictatorship are terrorists. Interestingly enough, the U.S. government, which partners with el-Sisi by providing him with hundreds of millions of dollars in weaponry, agrees with el-Sisi. That's why U.S. national-security state officials and their national-security state counterparts in Egypt stand together in their war on terrorism against the Egyptian "terrorists" who are trying to overthrow el-Sisi's military dictatorship.