davep wrote:That and the fact the US/UK had been actively supporting them due to their fixation with overthrowing Assad (which is why nothing happened during 18 months of coalition bombardment).
I don't understand the Assad thing, precisely why everyone in that whole region is so set on it that "Assad must go." From Trukey to Israel to KSA and Jordan and all the countries over there, they all say "Assad must go."
The only part of it I get is the geopolitical thing, with shia Iran on one side and then the sunni world on the other. Shia is opposed to sunni. And then, Israel is opposed to shia Iran because it's Iran that's been screwing with them for so many years (funding hezbollah, etc.).
So that's how it is, all the sunni nations are against Iran and then Israel is big time against Iran.
Iran is allied with Assad. Iran is also doing proxy wars and pushing out, in the region. So naturally, the sunni states wouldn't be thrilled about a Russia-Iran-Assad bloc and here comes the Iranian and Russian armies marching through the ME together.
Putin tries to navigate some spot in the middle, he doesn't want just tied to Iran, for a while there he was thinking about becoming hegemon over the entire region -- Iran, and the sunni states, sort of replacing the USA.
But then he just had a lot of problems with that. They invited a saudi delegation to Moscow and Lavrov was overheard saying "fucking morons" on an open mic.
So.. I don't think the whole ME will ever go over to Russia, it just can't work out with how much Russia is linked with Iran.
But KSA and others have been spending more on Russian military gear and a bit less on American. So there's some rising influence there, for Russia.
IN CONCLUSION -- I don't know all the complexities of why everyone is so much against Assad, but they just are.
Russia is primarily hooked up with Iran and Assad, so it's easy for Russia to say "assad stays." But the US is allied to all the countries that say "assad must go," and there's really no way the US can force them to accept assad, depending on how deep these issues run.
edit: and having said all the above, I'll just point out..
That Iran has done a lot to Israel over the years, with their support of Hezbollah and the rocket attacks. And Iran has always been, and continues to be, the most bellicose and anti-Israel and greatest threat to Israel.
Iran has also done a lot of bad things to the US, over many years.
Yet as bad as Iran is, the sunni ISIS are worse. So. Okay, if Obama won't handle it then then I don't care if Iran wants to handle it and if Russia wants to handle it and I don't care if Russia winds up with the middle east. That ISIS stuff is worse than Iran, they've got to be defeated.
If our leadership in the US thought the geopolitical ramifications of Russia getting control of the ME were serious, then Obama should have taken Assad out back when he was about to, and we also needed to send troops in and handle things.
If you want to hang on to a region, you have to keep troops there, that's just how it goes.
So I just wanted to add all that nuance, the whole region is "enemies of my enemy" and bad people and some are worse than others, etc., and then in the big picture it is a concern about Russia if it's anti-western and got control of all the oil and then becomes a problem and cold war concerns.
My HOPE would be that Russia really will not be an enemey of the West in the future, that they won't ever actually hybrid war in the Baltics and that Crimea was it and they won't do that again. And then okay, fine, Russia can have all the middle east and if they can handle that mess then Russia deserves to be hegemon.
Long story short, I'm glad Russia's fighting ISIS. Should have been the USA but Obama didn't do it, but if O won't, then at lest Putin is.