The Obama administration keeps spinning its wheels on Syria. Because the White House sees no clear American interest in toppling Bashar al-Assad, it has tasked out Syria policy to others, first Turkey then the Arab League, and pleads for an international chorus condemning the Syrian regime at the U.N. Security Council. Because the administration cannot register that national interest is the prime mover of nation-states, it does not understand why Russia, along with China, keeps vetoing resolutions against Assad.

After her several tirades directed against the Russians for their obstinacy, U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice’s routine is getting tiresome. Does the White House really not know whom they are dealing with? Either the administration is deeply cynical or unfathomably naïve. Moscow has an interest in seeing Assad survive—and blocking the United States.