Vladimir Putin's showmanship in Syria has left him without a strategy: Yet short-term success and long-term failure are the hallmark of Mr Putin’s rule. He scores stunning coups – against the oligarchs, against the opposition, against neighbours such as Georgia and Ukraine, in energy deals with China and Germany – yet at the end Russia languishes. Its economy remains unmodernised and dangerously dependent on natural resources, its institutions are weak, public services dire, the population shrinking, infrastructure crumbling, the economy shrinking, corruption rampant: no wonder Russians (notably the families of the people who run the country) are so keen to live abroad.
Russian news, all the latest and breaking Russia news Vladimir Putin's showmanship in Syria has left him without a strategy Today, November 7th 11:33 · Edward Lucas · metrojet russia assad islamism sharm el-sheikh syria vladimir putin bomb Shared by 1 person But the reckoning may be a bloody one. Russia is now firmly (and probably irrevocably) positioned as an enemy of conservative and radical Sunni Muslims. It is an ardent supporter of the Sisi regime in Egypt, which jails, tortures and executes members of the Muslim Brotherhood. And it is using air-strikes and ground troops to support the Assad regime, nominally against Isil, but in fact mostly against an array of other rebel forces. This represents a radical and dangerous shift from the Kremlin’s past policy. The Soviet Union pursued a policy of intimidating non-entanglement in the Middle East. In 1985, gunmen from the Lebanese Hezbollah militia kidnapped four Sovi