With diplomatic efforts all but exhausted, strategic planning has moved into high gear for Assad's possible fall or worst-case scenarios if the civil war deepens, including use of his suspected chemical arsenal.
In Istanbul, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Turkey's foreign minister said their countries were creating a special joint task force to respond to potential crises such as victims of chemical attacks or a dramatic spike in the more than 200,000 refugees that have already fled Syria.
"We have been closely coordinating over the course of this conflict, but now we need to get into the real details of such operational planning. It needs to be across both of our governments," Clinton said after talks with Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.
