【明報文章】Russia’s position in Syria hangs in the balance amid the negotiations over Russian military presence in the country. Irrespective of final decision Moscow will have to build a new type of relations completely different from what it used to have with Assad.
Arguably most important event, the fall of Assad’s rule, in propping of which Russia has long been deeply involved, remains without meaningful Russian political reaction. While Iran has given its own interpretation of what happened, Russia’s timid pause gives the impression of surprise and uncertainty in Kremlin over Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham’s (HTS) swift takeover of Syria.
This lack of reaction however also betrays far deeper discomfort in Moscow. The fall of Russia’s closest ally shows how ill-prepared Russia must have been to foresee the scale of the coming rebel offensive. Or if Russians knew about it they seemed to be unable and unwilling to help Assad. Either way the root cause of this thinking is Russia’s extreme preoccupation with its war in Ukraine after February 2022. The breakdown of Russian influence in Syria should in a way be seen as a continuation of a domino process which started with Russia’s military withdrawal from Nagorno-Karabakh, a former Armenian enclave within Azerbaijan, in 2023.
But for Russia the rebel victory in Syria is also about an ideological defeat. Moscow has always portrayed itself as a crusader against popular revolutions and guarantor of political stability whether in its immediate neighborhood or even, as in the case of Russian intervention in Syria, in relatively distant places. This matters because Russia will now find it difficult to portray itself as a reliable power in the Middle East. The sentiment is unmistakable – almost into the fourth year of the war with Ukraine its power has been overextended.
This was especially well sensed by Russia’s regional competitor, Turkey. Though two have often been seen as close enough from trade to security arrangements from the Black Sea to the South Caucasus to Syria itself, this has not dissipated Ankara’s inherent discomfort of being somewhat fenced in by Russians: in the Black Sea with the Crimean annexation in 2014 and the war in 2022; in Syria from 2015; to which also could be added Russian troops on Armenia-Turkey border. There were other differences that have accumulated in relations between Russia and Turkey: from problems with bank payments due to US sanctions pressure on Turkey to the Kremlin’s dissatisfaction with the supply of Turkish Bayraktars to Kyiv. Therefore, a clash of interests in Syria was only a matter of time.
The fall of Assad House also means that Russia’s engagement within the broader Middle East could rather diminish. This is especially so when it comes to Moscow’s expanded relationship with Iran’s “Axis of Resistance” – a network of militia groups spread across the Middle East. Indeed, Moscow’s ties with Houthis or Hezbollah have witnessed major uptick over the past year or so and Russia’s widening alignment with Iran has been instrumental in this. It allowed Moscow to divert the West’s attention away from Ukraine. Now however this will be extremely difficult to do because Iran will have to reconstitute its power by transforming the Axis of Resistance into a more modest network more focused on Iraq.
Yet, so far Assad’s defeat does not seem as catastrophic for Russia as it is for Iran. Russian bases in Syria seem to continue to operate as usual. Various unconfirmed reports indicated that Russia has already been in touch with new rulers in Damascus and that they green lit the idea of Moscow keeping its major assets. Moreover, Russian troops are being pulled out of the rest of Syria (primarily bases in Ain Issa and Tel Al-Samn in the Al-Raqqah countryside) and especially the nothern part and moved to the seashore where the Hmemeim air and the Tartus naval bases are located. However, other reports have emerged indicating that Russia could be leaving its bases completely within a month.
Russia’s approach toward the new leadership in Syria will be pragmatic. In fact, Moscow cannot opt for a different approach. Explicit animosity would only further complicate Russia’s already fragile position in Syria and perhaps even seal it for the foreseeable future in the form of the closure of military bases on Syrian coastline. Instead Moscow has to be realistic through establishing close contacts with new leadership and presenting the case for future benign relations irrespective of the fate of its military contingent.
Moscow’s approach could be likened to how it appraised ther situation in Afghanistan following the US abrupt and rather chaotic withdrawal in 2021. Timid contacts with the Taliban have eventually transformed into more active commercial contacts eventually leading to the suspension of the group’s designation as a terrorist entity. Similar wait-and-see then active engagement mode could replicated in Syria’s case.
Refusing to communicate with the new power in Syria today could encourage the political forces in Damascus to move toward closer contacts with Israel or the United States, which could be disastrous for Russian interests. There is now an opportunity to build an effective dialogue with many of these political forces, which will lead to the establishment of mutually beneficial relations. Moscow believes that the initiative should be taken now given that other big and regional actors have already made clear statements on the need to engage the HTS.
One of the first steps by Moscow could be to convene the first conference of all Syrian opposition factions, including representatives of military, political, Islamic and civil circles. It has had an experience with the warring Palestinian factions. Another can involve sending humanitarian aid and taking part in the reconstruction of the Syrian infrastructure. Less tangible but nevertheless important could be Moscow’s pledges of support in the UN and other organizations. Moreover, HTS also needs Russia which could provide the new rulers in Damascus with much-sought international legitimacy. Moreover, given the fact that HTS is not an American geopolitical project, it might look at Russia as a potential balancer against US and its allies the Kurds’ influence in Syria.
After Assad’s fall Russia is facing a mixture of uncertainty and outright dangers around its position in the country and the wider Middle East. There are pathways to salvage the situation, but even in the best scenario Moscow’s position will pale with what it used to be at its height before the invasion of 2022.
Emil Avdaliani is a professor of international relations at the European University in Tbilisi, Georgia, and a scholar of Silk Roads. He can be reached on Twitter/X at @emilavdaliani.
