James Jeffrey: “We do not turn to Russia to broker an agreement. We turn to the U.N. to do it.”

We think that this regime needs to subject itself to the U.N. process, free and fair elections, a new constitution or at least a reformed constitution, and a nationwide cease-fire.

Whatever it takes--well, whatever political process and diplomatic process is necessary to get that government to behave differently toward its own population and to its neighbors, that is an absolutely essential precondition for a…

If we do not play the kind of very costly and at times very difficult role that we play in the world, then you get a Syria; you get a law of the jungle in a very important area where you do have, as I said, five armies.

It's unpleasant, it's transactional, it's ugly, but we and Turkey have very similar strategic goals.