Baladi News
The Foreign Policy magazine wrote that Syria is moving toward the so-called frozen conflict and this may have been the goal all along for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has initiated and managed such conflicts elsewhere, including in Georgia and Ukraine.
The magazine also pointed out that Putin's endgame in Syria has arrived, where Putin had backed the Syrian government, but is now making clear that his interests don’t entirely overlap with Assad’s.
The magazine indicated that the biggest losers in the Syrian conflict are Assad and Iran, where Putin said in the press conference following his meeting with Assad:
"Following the Syrian Army’s notable successes in fighting terrorism, and with the activation of the political process, the foreign forces based in Syria will start to withdraw from the country."
This seemed to hint that the Russian president wasn’t interested in assisting the Assad regime’s reconquest of the entirety of Syria, and absent the Russian air support that the Syrian military has relied on in major combat operations (including the siege of Aleppo and the destruction of rebel-controlled Eastern Ghouta), such reconquest would be impossible, according to the magazine.
Russia appears largely to have made the points it wished to make in Syria. Its intervention kept the Assad regime from probable defeat in 2015. The regime’s fortunes have since been reversed.
The foreign Policy sees Moscow as wishing to make itself the key power broker in the Syrian context, the address through which all must pass in pursuit of their goals. But for this, of course, Russia must be able to grant each party part of what it wants, rather than coming down firmly on any side.
Source: The Foreign Policy