Clinton on Syria: U.S. has done all it can do

(CBS News) Hillary Clinton has said she plans to step down as secretary of state in January regardless of whether President Obama is reelected. She's on an extended diplomatic farewell tour, and was met with protests Monday in Cairo.

She also sat down with CBS News' Margaret Brenann who asked her if she's confident in the U.S. strategy in Syria, where President Bashar al Assad continues a brutal assault on anti-regime forces.

"I don't know what other strategy anybody is suggesting," Clinton said. "Because unless you have Security Council support for any other action -- I don't think any country believes that it should act unilaterally in such a complex, dangerous situation."

Clinton said that Syria's neighbors, in particular, are worried about any unilateral action inside Syria that could push violence across its borders.

"I know that people share my deep frustration and outrage at what's going on inside Syria, but my job is not just to express outrage. My job is to try to figure out what can be done that would be effective," Clinton said. "And sometimes a situation dons not lend itself to an answer that is immediately satisfying."

"I'm very confident we've done everything that we can do" to bring the situation to an end as quickly as possible, she said.

A day after the Red Cross declared the conflict in Syria a civil war, Clinton said that the U.S. continues to strongly support Kofi Annan, the former U.N. secretary general who is now a joint envoy of the U.N. an Arab League.

She said the U.S. is backing the Syrian rebels with non-lethal assistance and is not planning to alter that course.

"We don't want to further militarize the conflict," she said. "We don't want to support either directly or indirectly the arming of people who could perhaps not use those weapons in a way we would prefer. They seem to be getting their hands on enough weapons. It's not weapons, it's will that we're trying to engender between both the government and the opposition to cease the violence and work toward a transition that leads to a democratic future."

Watch two clips from the interview below:

[kevcl6750]

Assads regime is getting ready to start using chemical weapons against
the people of Syria. When it happens we will hear the same old CS line of garbage from Hill and O that we are shocked and that they condemn the brutality, etc. etc. O will not do anything that he thinks will risk his re election and more people will die a horrible death. O is a feckless , political, and moral coward and history will judge him as such.

[kevcl6750]

Assads regime is getting ready to start using chemical weapons against
the people of Syria. When it happens we will hear the same old CS line of garbage from Hill and O that we are shocked and that they condemn the brutality, etc. etc. O will not do anything that he thinks will risk his re election and more people will die a horrible death. O is a feckless , political, and moral coward and history will judge him as such.

[Yofee2]

Shhiitt, these guys are fighting for NOTHING in that broke country, so they deserve it... The US shouldn't do any thing since it won't make any money there... no oil, no diamond, nothing...not even a "Thank you"... Instead, selling them weapons to make some $$ is a good idea to solve our economy problems now.

[Yofee2]

****, these guys are fighting for NOTHING in that broke country, so they deserve it... The US shouldn't do any thing since it won't make any money there... no oil, no diamond, nothing...not even a "Thank you"... Instead, selling them weapons to make some $$ is a good idea to solve our economy problems now.

[expatriate2]

Why not just pretend that Syria is an independent nation with the right to resolve its own problems. That might be a nice change instead of the U.S. pretending that it is the United Nations with the autonomous right to intervene wherever it chooses.

[ichibandan]

So, in diplomatese, we will start selling arms to the rebels, if we haven't already. If we have been already, we will now sell them the big stuff.

[Yofee2]

good point, that's the way we should make $$