Chuck Hagel: I don't trust Syrian opposition

By JOEL GEHRKE at the Washington examiner

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel acknowledged that he doesn't trust the Syrian opposition, though the top U.S. general argued that a strike on Syrian dictator Bashar Assad ought not be regarded as support for the opposition.
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"That's not my business to trust anybody," Hagel said during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing when Rep. Tom Marino, R-Penn., asked if he trusts the Syrian opposition. "Every nation, every individual, every group, responds in their own self-interest ... [T]he focus is not on good guys [versus] bad guys."
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General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, tried to distinguish between serving as "the military arm" of the opposition and a limited strike on Syria as a response to Assad's decision to use chemical weapons "to clear a neighborhood," as he would any other conventional weapon.
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"That runs great risk for Syria, it runs great risk in the region, and the globe," Dempsey said.
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"We should do something in our national interest based on the use of chemical weapons without committing to supporting the opposition to overthrow the regime."