This is CBS Eye on the World.

Here's John Batchelor.

I welcome Cliff May, the founder and president of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy.

He's traveling.

All eyes on Syria.

His column in the Washington Times underlines the non-transparency, the fog of war in Syria,

at civil war since at least 2011.

Assad has fled.

And now, Cliff, a very good day to you.

Again and again, I read the stories from Damascus and Turkey enters into the

conversation. Erdogan, the very strong president of Turkey, enters into the conversation. HTS, there's

Turkey. Free Syrian Army, there's Turkey. The Idlib province, there's Turkey. Turkey is a member of NATO, not a member of the

EU. It's certainly an important player for the last several hundred years, but since the end of

the Ottoman Empire, there has been this story that there are people who call themselves neo-Odominists to restore the

glory of the Ottoman Empire that once drenched from the Mediterranean to the Hindu Kush.

All the divided states, Iran, Iraq, and Syria and Jordan, all that was Ottoman territory until the end of

the first war.

Where is Erdogan in this present conflict in Syria?

Can you discern his mission?

Good evening to you.

Good evening to you.

Yes.

...