Russia’s role in Syria expected to expand in 2016

Beirut: After Russia’s near-surprise military intervention in Syria in September, Moscow’s role in the country is only expected to get deeper in the coming year.

Militarily, the upcoming year will witness more aggressive Russian involvement in the Syria War, assisting the government with the possible take-over of entire towns and cities either through fierce battles or deals with the Syrian rebels.

President Vladimir Putin sent his troops to the Middle East with one objective: winning in Syria. They did not come in order to pack up and leave within the upcoming months and nor are they there to get a share of power with regional players Turkey and Saudi Arabia.

A rumour is making the rounds that Putin will visit his troops at the Hmaymeem Military Airport on the Syrian coast on occasion of the Russian Orthodox Christmas, which falls on January 7. He did it last August when he paid a surprise visit to Russian-annexed Crimea, whipping up grand tension in eastern Ukraine.

Putin’s message to his troops — and the world — is clear: Russia is back in the Middle East and it intends to stay. The massive deployment of arms, planes and military personnel since last September is an indicator that these Russian bases are not temporary and will not be dismantled and shipped back home anytime soon.

Three months after Russian operations started, the year closes with the Syrian army regaining mountains surrounding the coast and entire chunks of rebel-held territory around Aleppo. The year 2016 will likely be one in which a deal is hammered out in Al Ghouta, the agricultural belt surrounding Damascus that has been held by Syrian rebels since 2012. After a Russian air strike killed top rebel commander Zahran Alloush on Christmas Day, the Islamist militias of rural Damascus are in disarray. The rebels are expected either to bicker amongst themselves, collapse and surrender, or reach a deal with the Damascus government, like the one reached recently in the midland city of Homs and the rural town of Zabadani. Both called for the safe exodus of all rebel militias to opposition-controlled cities of Deir Al Zor and Raqqa.

As the year opens, the Syrian army with the Russian Air Force is rumbling south towards Daraa on the Syrian-Jordanian border, in an attempt to finish off the most imminent threat to the Syrian capital. Meanwhile, a deal is underway that will likely see the light in early January calling for the exodus of approximately 4,000 militants, many of them from Daesh, from cities and towns around Damascus. Also on 25 January 2016, UN-sponsored talks between the Syrian government and its opponents will kick off in Geneva, “Syrianising” any international deal reached by major stakeholders on their behalf. The details, at a micro-level, will be handled by the Syrians themselves. The political process, approved last October in Vienna, calls for a Syrian-led negotiating process for six months that leads to a new government and the drafting of a new constitution for Syria.

A 2016 benchmark is next May when the tenure of Syria’s current Baath-dominated parliament expires. There are differences on what the limits of power of the new government should be. The opposition is pointing to Geneva I saying that it ought to be a Transitional Government Body (TGB) that takes over all presidential powers from Bashar Al Assad. Russia and Iran curtly refuse such a formula, calling instead for a “cabinet of national unity” that runs the country with Al Assad in power. The transitional period ends when early presidential elections take place in the summer of 2017.

Nothing has changed in the pro-regime camp; it still firmly holds on to the notion that Al Assad can run for another term 18-months from now. The Saudis and Turks have also not changed their insistence on Al Assad’s departure, but the real change is seemingly in the United States. Regardless of what is said in public, the Obama administration is adjusting to Russian ambitions in the Middle East and shifting priorities because of Daesh.

The year 2016 will be a presidential election year in the United States, with few in Washington DC expected to have time for the Syria war, delaying a US-backed resolution until a new president is sworn-in in January 2017. By then, Putin hopes to have only two players left on the Syrian battlefield: the Syrian army and Daesh. He hopes to put the next US President in front of two difficult choices: Al Assad or Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi.