17 March 2016

A Lenten Change of Heart in the Kremlin

Does Putin read Shaw Sheet?

by Neil Tidmarsh

Remember the piece in Shaw Sheet four weeks ago called ‘Maskivrovka’? It concluded by saying;

“Perhaps someone ought to tell the Russian leadership that … Lent is now upon us, and Lent is the season for the serious and sincere contemplation of our sins, for repentance and penitence.  But wait … the Russian Orthodox Lent – known as the Great Lent – doesn’t start until 14 March. So perhaps there’s hope yet. Although another three or four weeks is a long time for the suffering people of Syria to wait for a change of heart from the Kremlin.”

And this week, three days ago, bang on March 14, what happens?  Putin announces the end of Russian military involvement in the Syrian civil war, and the withdrawal of Russian forces from Syria! Coincidence?

To be honest, the announcement took me as much by surprise as it did everyone else.  But on reflection it isn’t quite the mystery it appears to be.  The reasons for Russia’s involvement in the Syrian war easily explain the reasons for this week’s announced withdrawal.

Last September, before the Russian intervention, Assad and his regime were on the brink of defeat.  That defeat would have cost Putin two valuable commodities: Russia would have lost face by abandoning an ally it had sworn to protect; and it would have lost its military bases in Syria and hence its influence in the region.  Russia went to war, fighting as Assad’s airforce, to secure those two commodities.

And five months later – five months of intense and ruthless bombardments and airstrikes – the opposition forces have been pushed right back, Assad is safe from military defeat, and those Russian bases are now secure.  Mission accomplished.  As many as 1,000 Russian troops will remain in their naval base of Tartus and their airbase of Hmeimim near Latakia; time for the rest of the troops – estimated to number somewhere between 2000 and 5000 – to go home.

Russian military involvement in Syria is a costly and dangerous game.  Putin must have known all along that he would be wise to get out of it as soon as he could.  He certainly hesitated for some time before committing himself in the first place; the conflict had been raging for four years before Russia’s decisive intervention.  The material cost of the conflict must be a heavy burden for Russia, already suffering from the collapse of oil prices, the cost of supporting the annexed Crimea and the conflict in Ukraine, and the subsequent Western sanctions.  And the dangers must be alarming to say the least: potential war with Turkey which, being a Nato member, would be a war against the West; potential war between Russia’s ally Iran and Saudi Arabia, which again could have escalated into a war between Russia and the West.  The dangers of such wars increase with each day of conflict, with each mile the opposition forces are pushed backwards.  Putin is a practical and pragmatic operator; in spite of what many commentators have said, that kind of war could never have been part of his plan.

Apart from the dangers of escalating the war, any continuation of the vicious bombing campaign would also have risked international pariah status for Russia, further sanctions and even war crimes charges, all of which Putin no doubt would like to avoid.  And there are rumours that the opposition forces have recently got hold of ground-to-air missiles; that would have changed the game completely – Russian aircraft being shot down and Russian casualties rising would not have gone down very well back home in Russia at all.

Having saved face and saved Russian military bases and hence influence and power in the region, Putin has apparently seized upon this week’s renewal of peace-talks (the peace process has been re-booted following the more-or-less successful ceasefire of the last few weeks) as the perfect opportunity to disengage.  If the talks succeed, he will be able to claim a great deal of credit for that success, as he is no longer fighting; if they fail, then he can deny responsibility for that failure, as he is no longer fighting.  Win-win.  Peace now suits him; there is no reason to doubt the sincerity of the partnership which his foreign minister Sergei Lavrov is forging with John Kerry in pursuit of that peace.

Assad remains a problem; he and his regime appear to be as belligerent and defiant as ever.  He does not want peace, now that he is no longer on the verge of defeat.  His refusal to consider standing aside is the biggest obstacle to the peace-process; his political survival is the one thing which the opposition groups will not accept.

But Russia’s disengagement is an indication of Putin’s impatience with Assad’s obstinacy.  It has been reported that it surprised Assad as much as it surprised the rest of the world.  We’ve fulfilled our obligations by saving you from defeat, Russia seems to be saying, but that’s as far as it goes, because the rest of the world wants peace.

If Assad personally can no longer rely on Russian might to keep him in power, then that is very good news indeed for the peace process.  In Geneva, representatives of the Syrian opposition are said to be ‘astonished and jubilant’ . Some are even contemplating direct face-to-face talks with the regime, something which they’ve refused to do while Assad insists on staying in power. “Our morale is sky high. The regime will not be able to survive alone” one of them was quoted as saying by The Times.

It is also very good news for the fight against Isis.  This week, Russian planes were supporting Syrian forces in their advance against Isis-held Palmyra, and Sergei Lavrov has been talking about ‘a division of labour’ between Russia and the USA against Isis in Syria and Iraq.  All parties can now concentrate on this common enemy.

Of course, Russia could still intervene militarily in Syria if renewed conflict ever brought the regime close to defeat again.  Russia will keep a presence in Syria ‘for control of monitoring the cessation of hostilities’, in the words of the Kremlin. It still has that naval base at Tartus and that airbase at Hmeimim, and Syria will always be in range of Russian ships in the Mediterranean and the Caspian Sea.

But I suspect that Putin hopes that won’t be necessary.  Now he has stepped away from Assad and is no longer bombing the Saudi-backed rebels in Syria, he can start exploring the possibility of a rapprochement with Saudi Arabia.  The Saudis have been offering him tempting deals to come on-side for the last two or three years; the two oil-producing countries could work together on oil-production levels to combat the fall in oil prices which is doing them both so much harm.  King Salman has been planning a visit to Moscow for some time; and now that Russia’s bombing campaign in Syria is over, the biggest obstacle to that visit has been removed.

And if the peace-process in Syria does bears fruit, Putin must be hoping that he can pluck some ripe and juicy relaxation of Western sanctions from it.

 

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