Yesterday Syrian president Bashar al-Assad commemorated Syria’s independence day with a television interview where he described the Syrian civil war as a colonial plot. Western powers, said Assad, “never accepted the idea of other nations having their independence. They want those nations to submit to them.”

Assad is surely aware that 67 years after Damascus won its independence from France, the Western powers, and the United States above all, are wary of direct involvement in a Middle East conflict that may drag on for many years to come. Some may still hold out hope for a diplomatic or political solution, but yesterday Assad dispelled those dreams of a bloodless exit strategy. “The truth is there is a war,” said Assad, “And I repeat: no to surrender, no to submission.”