Whatever damage our deal with Assad did to rebel morale, and however longer the fight will go on because that deal harmed the rebel ability to defeat Assad, the deal has not decisively weakened the rebels. They are still fighting and they could fight on for years more while Assad's small base of support may not be able to endure the bloodletting for long enough to grind down the rebellion.
Assad's forces can mount offensives, but they have to have the ability to hold what they take after they clear an area they focus on.
Here's an area the rebels have moved on that had been relatively safe:
Syrian rebels pressed their offensive deeper into the coastal heartland of President Bashar Assad's Alawite sect on Wednesday, battling government troops backed by warplanes for control of at least two villages in the heavily wooded and mountainous terrain, activists said.
Opposition fighters from several conservative and hard-line Islamic groups, including the al-Qaida-affiliated Nusra Front, launched their assault Friday on the northern stretches of Latakia province along the Turkish frontier. So far, they have seized a border crossing, and also gained control of an outlet to the sea for the first time since Syria's uprising began three years ago.
While modest in terms of territory, those gains have buoyed an armed opposition movement that has suffered a series of recent setbacks on the battlefield. Over the past month, Assad's forces, backed by his allies from the Lebanese Hezbollah militant group, have captured towns and villages along Syria's border with Lebanon, squeezing the flow of rebel fighters and materiel across the frontier.
I can wish the rebels weren't jihadi types. But their operations do demonstrate that rebellions can strike where the best government troops aren't, and do damage.
As the rebels hang on despite Assad's free hand since the autumn, but as Assad finds the chemical deal did not allow him the time to decisively defeat the rebellion, somebody will have to try something new to break the basic stalemate that endures. Assad thinks that he can be ruthless enough to crush the spirit of the rebellion.
I have strong doubts that Assad's faction can endure the losses longer than the rebels can--as long as the rebels receive external support sufficient to give them a reason to keep fighting and dying.
