petraeus, who was then the head of the cia. the extremists in syria were getting stronger, he said. while the moderate rebels fighting assad were getting weaker. >> do nothing, extremists will continue to gain ground. that's what our syrian contacts were telling us. this isn't rocket science. >> petraeus urged the white house to arm the moderates. >> recommendations were made to assist some of the opposition elements and that decision was obviously not forthcoming to do that for quite a very long time. >> the president was skeptical. he saw the syrian civil war as a quagmire in which the moderates were too disorganized to prevail. >> i think this notion that somehow there was this ready-made moderate syrian force that was able to defeat assad is