It's not a "civil war" just because you have units of opposing factions operating in the same country. The problem with the "rebels" is that they are not consid

It's not a "civil war" just because you have units of opposing factions operating in the same country. The problem with the "rebels" is that they are not considered better, I assume because of their secondary motives (fundamentalism, Sharia law, ...) [1] Also, some of the factions seem to be heavily influenced / supported by foreign powers [2] Taken together, every war is somewhere on a scale between "civil war" and "ordinary war" and just calling it a "civil war" doesn't mean it's necessarily one. Of course, since war is unpopular, all interventionist democracies would like you to believe that it's a civil war and they're not meddling at all. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Aleppo_(2012%E2%80%9316)#Rebels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Aleppo_(2012%E2%80%9... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Syria#War.2C_2011.E2.80.9316 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Syria#War.2C...