In a sane world the U.S. would be training Syrian Christians to form their own militia to protect themselves from the Al Nusra-led Islamist onslaught, but we all know that’s never going to happen.

Via Reuters:

The Syrian government is sending members of its irregular militias for guerrilla combat training at a secret base in Iran, in a move to bolster its armed forces drained by two years of fighting and defections, fighters and activists said.

The discreet program has been described as an open secret in some areas loyal to President Bashar Assad, who is trying to crush a revolt against his family’s four-decade hold on power.

Reuters interviewed four fighters who said they were taken on the combat course in Iran, as well as opposition sources who said they had also been documenting such cases.

Israel’s intelligence chief and a Western diplomat have said Iran, Assad’s main backer, is helping to train at least 50,000 militiamen and aims to increase the force to 100,000 – though they did not say where the training occurred.

A Syrian government security source, who declined to be named, denied that Syria was sending fighters to Iran. “We train our own special forces for this type of combat,” he said. “Since 2006 we have had units trained in guerrilla warfare, why would we need to send people to Iran?”

Syrian residents living in areas controlled by the army or militias say irregular forces have been increasingly “regularised” in recent months. These groups now brand themselves as the “National Defense Army” and seem to operate as a parallel force to the official armed forces – more lightly armed but without any of the oversight or responsibilities.

Since 2011, security forces organized groups called “popular committees” for neighborhood watches. These later became militias nicknamed “shabbiha”, from the Arabic word for ghost.