The image of a child — his thick head of hair filled with dust, face blackened and bloodied, his expression blank as his tiny scarred legs barely reach the end of the ambulance seat in which he has been placed — may finally be getting the attention of world in a way numbers have not.

Omran Daqneesh, 5, was pulled from an apartment building in Aleppo, Syria, after yet another Syrian or Russian airstrike. Omran is luckier than many. He survived, as did his parents and siblings, according to news reports. But his stunned look and battered body seemed to express the suffering of a nation.

The civil war that began in an attempt to topple the tyrannical leadership of Bashar al-Assad has become an epic tragedy now bleeding well outside the borders of Syria. Last February, the Syrian Center for Policy Research estimated 470,000 Syrians have died and 11.5 percent of the population has been killed or injured. To place that in perspective, a similarly scaled calamity in the United States would result in 3.7 million casualties.

The United Nations estimates the war has displaced 7 million people, as refugees have fled to neighboring states, destabilizing those countries. Over the past year refugees began to spread into Europe, upending its politics and raising security concerns.

Into the void in war-torn areas of Syria arose the Islamic State, moving into Iraq and persuading its adherents to attack civilians in the West.

The boy’s blank stare and the human carnage cry out for the world to do something, but there are no good options.

Syria is by far the Obama administration’s greatest foreign policy failing. In the summer of 2011, when there were still hopes that an “Arab Spring” could bring self-rule and civil rights to the Middle East, Obama declared, “the time has come for President Assad to step aside.” But rebel leaders, who concluded that the United States would support their efforts to remove Assad, were sadly disappointed.

Then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was among a group of advisors in the White House urging the president to arm and support moderate factions in the fight against Assad, but Obama opted to keep the U.S. out. Instead, the Islamic State and like-minded extremists came to dominate much of the fight.

When Assad crossed Obama’s red line, using chemical weapons on his people, the president chose not to retaliate and instead struck a deal with Assad ally Russia to remove the chemical weapons.

Also rejected were options to use missile attacks to destroy Syrian airfields and its planes on the ground, stopping the bombing of civilians in rebel-held areas.

Things are now even more complicated. Russian President Vladimir Putin has turned the power of his air force in support of Assad. Iran, which has long seen the conflict as a proxy war in defense of its Shitte brothers-in-arms in the Assad regime, has opened an air base to the Russian bombers. For the first time Friday, Russian warships fired cruise missiles at targets near Aleppo.

The U.S. strategy of late has involved limited air support, targeting Islamic State fighters and using U.S. special forces to support, but not fight aside, Kurdish and other friendly rebel groups attacking the Islamic State fighters. A more aggressive air campaign, aimed at stopping the bombing carnage, could well bring Russian and U.S. forces into conflict, with an unpredictable outcome.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump would seemingly abandon the rebel opposition. He sees Putin as an ally in the fight against the Islamic State, declaring our nation has “bigger problems than Assad.”

On the campaign trail, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton has called for establishing, with U.S. allies, no-fly zones to protect Syrian civilians, which could give Putin pause if he does not want to see Russian aircraft taken out.

Clinton has the higher moral ground. The U.S. cannot condone Putin’s conduct. The West must respond.

The presidential candidates need to more clearly describe their approach to Syria if elected. There is no bigger issue on the world stage.