The rebels have been taken over by religious freaks. It will be like arming Taliban/Al-Qaeda against the soviets.. USA should stay out of it.
http://www.channel4.com/news/syria-files-interactive-rebels-weapons-money-ideology-assadFor what it's worth here's Channel 4's breakdown of the Syrian rebels' factions. Which of course is by no means conclusive and a few weeks old now.
Assad's position is no longer tenable, whether they would of been better off with Assad or without we will never know. But, the people should not have to live in a state of fear from their government. Maybe now, they will have new fears from extremists. But, it is not for us to decide.
This revolution was founded on democratic principles. While I do not agree with arming the rebels, I understand the argument for arming them. As Cameron says, if we do not arm the more secular non-extremists, then the extremist rebels will become stronger as they are well armed and well funded. While, the secular FSA will stand little hope of getting anything as they are no match for Assad's forces and no match for the extremists.
However, the lines between who are the FSA and who the other groups are blurred, one fighter might fight for one group one day and in a few months might be fighting for another group. We really don't know.
I was reading on Twitter, from some of the reporters I follow, that a small number of arms were transferred to FSA through Jordan. I cannot remember what the weapons were, but I think manpads were mentioned and RPG 29s (I know nothing about weapons, but, just try to follow the conflict). Anyway, these weapons later appeared in youtube videos in the hands of Al-Sham and Jabhat Al-Nursa extremists. I will try and scroll back through Twitter and find this.
Of course, this is not fully verified, but my point is, the weapons seem to change hands fast, whether rebels steal them from government, government steal them from rebels, rebels pass them amongst each other, or rebels steal them from each other. We don't know.
And, should we really be arming people when we do not know where these weapons will end up? I don't think so. A manpad might take a few MiGs out of the sky, but God forbid it hit a civilian aircraft which is much easier to hit.