The downing of a Russian helicopter earlier this week in northern Syria by rebels, which left five crewmen dead, was a tough pill for Russian President Vladimir Putin to swallow. After all, until that helicopter was shot down the Russian president could have taken pride in the positive balance, in terms of the minimal number of casualties, which his military intervention in Syria has produced. The Russians were able to save Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime from certain collapse and deal the rebels who oppose him a heavy blow. Despite the fact that thousands of Syrian civilians lost their lives on the way toward achieving this objective, not to mention the mass migration of hundreds of thousands more, no one in the international community has dared voice objection to Russia's actions in Syria. Additionally, Russia has also been able to deter Turkey and Israel from stepping into the Syrian arena, while simultaneously forging a strategic alliance with Iran -- and in a roundabout manner with Hezbollah as well. This alliance is one of the cornerstones of Russia's resurgence in the region. It appears, however, that Russia's most significant achievement in the international arena has been against Barack Obama's United States. In this contest, Washington has been exposed in all its pernicious ineptitude, lacking the will and determination to achieve its own goals, and worse, lacking a vision and objectives that its allies and enemies alike in the region can understand. The immense damage caused by American conduct in Syria, as it pertains to the Russians, is not due to one specific mistake or another but to the amateurish approach that has conveyed a fundamental misunderstanding of what is happening in the region, a lack of experience, naivety and weakness of the type that a superpower like the U.S. must never project. For many months now, Putin has been taking the Americans for a ride. He is steering spurious bilateral talks aimed at reaching a diplomatic arrangement to end the war in Syria. Within this framework, he has endorsed futile diplomatic summits, discussed matters with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, while paying lip service about a cease-fire and withdrawing his forces from Syria, measures that were never truly in play and never materialized, and so on and so forth. In the meantime, simultaneous to this bogus and hopeless diplomatic game, Putin's fighter jets are pummeling targets across Syria, while his allies -- Iran's Revolutionary Guard and Hezbollah guerillas -- are advancing and conquering additional territory held by the rebels. The Americans, however, have remained resolute, not allowing the facts to get in the way and continuing to grant diplomatic cover for Putin's actions in Syria. In step with every military escalation carried out by Putin, such as the assault on Aleppo, the second largest city in Syria, the Americans have offered increasingly delusional proposals, like their proposed joint American-Russian offensive against Islamic State, which would grant legitimacy to Russian intervention in Syria and allow the Russians and Assad to intensify the pressure on the rebels in the country. Salvation, therefore, will not come from the Americans, something that every child in Syria already knows. Putin, though, does have his own set of problems. To be sure, Russia knows how to project strength, but it is still a country struggling with serious economic issues. Putin's popularity in Russia stems from the aura of invincibility he projects. But he, too, remembers Russia's failed intervention in Afghanistan 30 years ago, which ended in thousands of Russian deaths and was one of main catalysts for the collapse of the Soviet Union. For this reason, the downing of the Russian helicopter and the deaths of the crewmen on board is unpleasant news. Regardless, what looks like victory today, could look like sinking deeper in the Syrian quagmire tomorrow. Such is the nature of the battle for Aleppo, in which the Syrians, along with the Russians and Iranians, rushed to declare victory. The Syrian army, however, is exhausted and worn out and doesn't have the ability to capitalize on the advantage provided by Russian air strikes. The rebels have been able to spill the army's blood and halt its progress. In the fight between Putin and Obama what we have is a knockout; but in Syria the war will continue for a long time to come.
