Sinking in the Syrian mud

In Syria, as in Israel, the winter has been very mild so far. But Russia is already knee deep in the Syrian mud, which it stepped into just two months ago with all its might but with little forethought.

In early September, dozens of Russian jets arrived in Syria and within days began indiscriminately bombing targets across the country, adhering to the traditional Russian approach: What can't be fixed with force can be fixed with even more force. Their accomplishments on the battlefield have been negligible, aside, of course, from killing hundreds of civilians and moderate rebels. The price for their intervention in Syria, however, is rising sharply. Last month, a Russian civilian airliner, with 224 passengers on board, was blown up over the Sinai Peninsula by Islamic State terrorists, and this week the Turks shot down a Sukhoi bomber.

The Russian military intervention in Syria has two objectives: to knock U.S. President Barack Obama down a few pegs and show the world that President Vladimir Putin is boss. The other goal is to save Syrian President Bashar Assad and pummel the moderate rebel groups in western Syria that have inched closer to toppling his regime.

As such, the massive bombing raids have been aimed at moderate groups in the west, while almost completely ignoring the Islamic State group in the east. From Assad's perspective, Islamic State not only poses a smaller threat, but both he and Putin need it to justify their ongoing war of extermination against the moderates.

The terrorist attacks in Paris two weeks ago played into Putin's hands, temporarily painting him as a global hero. Compared to a hesitant Obama, who only wants to return home in one piece without doing too much, and compared to French President Francois Hollande, who is good at delivering speeches but helpless when it comes to taking real action against terrorism, Putin stood up to provide a clear diplomatic approach to resolving the Syrian crisis, thus saving Europe from a wave of terror attacks, but more importantly from the flow of refugees threatening to flood the continent.

Putin's solution is to bolster Assad and vanquish his opposition, in the hope that he will eventually gather enough strength to defeat Islamic State. European and American leaders are more than happy to fall for Putin's charms, because he has proved himself before and is prepared to do what they are not, which is to send troops into the fray. If, to achieve this end, Assad needs to be acquitted, even after massacring his own people, it would be the lesser of two evils. Ultimately, while Assad may have gassed thousands of Syrians, he did so on behalf of some notion of secular enlightenment, and he has no interest in exporting his brand of violence to Europe.

Putin's problem, however, was never Obama or Europe. He hardly takes them into account as is. The problem is the rebels and their supporters on the ground. Putin is discovering that Russian power has its limitations. While he pays almost no regard to Israel and sends his bombers to strike mere hundreds of meters from the Israeli-Syrian border on the Golan Heights, he will need to account for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Moreover, Russia's airstrikes and cruise missiles in Syria look good on television screens, but their effect on the ground is limited, certainly against rebel groups lacking the structure of a real army.

Assad's regime in Damascus, for the time being, is secure, as Iranian and Hezbollah forces, backed by Russian air power, have even regained control of several towns and villages in the north. Indeed, the Syrian army is no longer combat effective; Assad's allies from Tehran, Beirut and Moscow are doing the fighting for him.

None of this, however, spells out any real change in the country. The war in Syria will continue, and with it more Russian blood will be spilled. Russia's involvement in Afghanistan also began on a soft note and was buoyed by widespread public support in the country, but no one forgets how it ended. Perhaps, though, Putin has forgotten.

Israel, for its part, must proceed with extreme caution in the Syrian arena. The Russian bear is wounded, and it will retaliate ferociously and without restraint. In this situation there is greater risk of friction with Israel along the Golan border and in the skies over Syria, and Israel needs to avoid finding itself directly in the path of Russian rage.

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