Russian and Syria – Analytical View

There are several reasons why Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has chosen to enter the four-year-old Syrian civil war, first using warplanes, and more recently, firing cruise missiles at terrorist targets in Syria.

Reasons For Intervention:

To ensure his position in eventual peace talks on the future of the country and assert his power in the face of western economic sanctions and political isolation after Moscow’s absorption of Crimea and intervention in eastern Ukraine. Thanks to the new crisis, Ukraine has receded to the background, with Syria taking centre stage. 

To wrong-foot the United States and other western powers in their episodic reaction to a crisis that will not go away.

Risks Involved:

• Danger of accidental mishaps between Russian and western warplanes underlining a basic conflict of interest in the objectives of the two sides. 

Ideological Conflict:

Moscow sees Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as part of the solution while for the West he is the main problem.

President Putin has made it plain that any political resolution of the crisis must be based on working with and Strengthening President Bashar Al-Assad’s Regime While The Western Objective Is To Remove Him, holding him responsible for the estimated 3,00,000 deaths his regime has caused, the dislocation of half his country’s population and millions of people living as refugees in neighbouring countries, with millions seeking safety in Europe.

Russia Does Not Make A Distinction Between Terrorists Of The Islamic State Or The So-Called Isis Or Isil Militants And Others Fighting The Assad Regime as components of the Qaeda-aligned Nusra or many of the other factions. The West and its Sunni Arab allies on the other hand distinguish between friendly and unfriendly opponents of the Assad regime. In fact, the American complaint is that Russian warplanes are hitting the West-supported militants, rather than the Islamic State.

By: Dr. Vivek Rana