'For many Syrians, the revolution started a very long time ago'

The Syrian General opened an envelope and emptied its contents on his desk. Out spilled his army's messages to the people of Damascus and Hama and Aleppo and Homs and Deraa. "We have a special department with analysts who write these," he told us. "We give every chance to the people."

And so the generals do, if you trust these flyers – some illustrated with smiling children, others with grim-faced gunmen – dropped by helicopter over the streets of Syria. The General smiled at us. "Do you see how much trouble we take?"

I had heard of these strips of paper but never seen them. Each was signed "the administration of the security forces". They ranged from the banal – "Brother citizen, help us get rid of the criminal gangs by co-operating with the security forces" – to the sophisticated. This, for example, is the Syrian army's message to all armed men: "The security forces have the will to restore stability to all regions of our precious homeland and will not permit the wasting of innocent citizens' blood. Drop your weapons and remember the government is as merciful as a mother is to her children."

If this evocation of maternal care does not appeal to President Bashar al-Assad's opponents, Islam might. "Religion is love – religion is tolerance. Religion does not call for killing." And if you are approaching Syrian troops, here's a note you might like to have to hand, a "safe passage" paper that can save your life. "When approaching a checkpoint, make sure you are not holding any kind of weapon. While doing so, approach slowly and make sure your chest is not obscured by anything suspicious. Hold this bulletin in one hand while putting the other on top of your head." Other papers suggest that armed opponents of the regime "take advantage of the special treatment granted to you by the authorities".

The problem is that the violence of the present was planted long ago. The day after meeting the General, I sat down to tea in Damascus with a middle-aged Syrian who wanted to tell me why he hated the regime. "My brother was part of the [Muslim Brotherhood] revolution of 1980 and even my family didn't know this," he said. "Then one day the Mukhabarat intelligence men came to arrest him. Nobody knows where they took him – not even till now, 32 years later.... For me, the revolution started a long time ago, when my brother was arrested."

This man's revolution, he told me, would be non-violent. "There is nobody in Syria who likes violence. If you have a balloon and keep putting air in it, it will explode. When the people started to protest last year, the government used force to stop them – and drip, drip, drip – there was an explosion."

The people "got outside of silence" and "started to use a little bit of violence against the government". Now these people would never return to their homes, he said, "because if they go home, they will die at home... they have taken the decision never to return". But would he accept a democratic parliament with real elections even if Bashar stayed, I asked? "We have known this government for 40 years. You cannot trust them to give you the correct temperature. Democracy and violence don't meet together. My reply to you is this: No. No. No. No. No. No. No."

Even the army leaflets don't repeat themselves this much. But his words were as adamant as any leaflet.