It's time to recognize that this has always been about coercing political change where change was needed, but where those in power had no inclination to do so, and offered no effective legal means for evolution of governance to the people affected by their governance.

It has been about leveraging the active or latent energy for revolution resident within population groups perceiving themselves oppressed by some blend of formal or informal, foreign or domestic systems of governance.

Syria is not distinct from "Arab Spring"; And Arab Spring is not distinct from the Constitutional Revolutions in Turkey and Iran 100 years ago.

It has never been about religion, that is just what defines the teams of revolution, just as it has defined the teams of the governance and populations leading up to revolution.

Being a shirt or a skin tells you what basketball team you are on - but it isn't why you play basketball. We focus on the wrong factors, draw the wrong conclusions, and expend ourselves supporting the wrong causes and flailing away at the symptoms.