Russia's airstrikes in Syria are playing well at home

MOSCOW -- Whatever effect Russia's airstrikes are having on the ground in Syria, their impact at
home is clear: They prove to Russians that their country is showing up the United States and
reclaiming its rightful place as a global power.
So far, Russia's intervention in Syria has served President Vladimir Putin's goals. The potential
danger, military analysts say, lies down the road.
To frame and illustrate Putin's success in Syria, state television stations provided a series of
seemingly scripted news broadcasts over the weekend.
Channel One's evening news program on Saturday opened with dramatic cockpit videos of Russian
jets making what were described as direct hits on terrorist training camps and weapons stores. The
bombs were never off by more than five meters, a military spokesman said, because of the jets'
advanced targeting capabilities.
This was followed by a report of the disastrous airstrike in the northern Afghan city of Kunduz that
destroyed a hospital and killed at least 19 people, including international medical staff. U.S.
responsibility for the airstrike had not been proven, but Russian viewers were left with little doubt of
who was to blame or of whose military capabilities were superior.
There was no mention of any civilian casualties in Syria as a result of the Russian air raids, while
activists have reported dozens of deaths.

Screen grab from Syrian TV shows damage from Russian airstrikes on Sept. 30, 2015.
Syrian Television
On the contrary, Russian television stations replayed the section of Putin's address to the United
Nations General Assembly last week in which he criticized U.S. policy in the Middle East and asked:

"Do you realize now what you have done?"

Rossiya state television interviewed Putin's spokesman, who noted that Putin and President Barack
Obama called each other by their first names, suggesting that Obama welcomed the meeting and
treated the Russian leader as his equal.
Russia's military buildup in Syria in the weeks ahead of the annual gathering of world leaders at the
United Nations appeared instrumental in persuading Obama to schedule the meeting with Putin on
the sidelines. While some in Washington had argued against such a meeting, it was played in
Moscow as Obama's initiative and a reflection of U.S. recognition that Russia had become a major
power broker in the Syria conflict.
The focus on Syria has diverted attention from Ukraine, a conflict that Putin appears eager to put
behind him. Television viewers on Saturday saw the Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine
withdrawing columns of tanks from the front line in accordance with an agreement reached last
week. The message as articulated by rebel commanders was that the fighting was over.
The national pride generated by Russia's show of force in Syria also has helped the Kremlin
compensate for Russia's sputtering economy.
More directly, Russia's military intervention has allowed Moscow to defend its strategic interests in
Syria, where it has a naval base on the Mediterranean coast and a longtime ally in President Bashar
Assad.
The Russian airstrikes that began Wednesday have mainly targeted central and northwestern Syria,
strategic regions that are the gateway to Assad's strongholds in the capital, Damascus, and along
the coast.
Russia says it is targeting the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria group and al Qaeda's Syrian affiliate,
but at least some of the strikes appear to have hit Western-backed rebel factions.
Political commentator Yulia Latynina said Russia wants to see the destruction of the Islamic State of
Iraq and Syria (ISIS). "Only this will allow Putin to achieve the desired result, to show Obama how
he, Putin, a real man, succeeded where Obama was disgraced," she said in her program Saturday
night on Ekho Moskvy radio.
Military analysts say that for the airstrikes to be effective they need to be followed up on the ground.
Putin has ruled out sending Russian combat troops and said Russia would be supporting offensive
operations by the Syrian army.
Even with Russia's support, however, Assad's forces likely will be unable to do anything more than
defend the 20 percent of Syria they already control, according to Georgy Mirsky, a widely respected
Middle East scholar.

Writing in his blog on Sunday, Mirsky

warned of the risk of escalation if
Russia gets pulled deeper into the
conflict.
With ISIS apparently lacking any
sophisticated air defense weapons,
Putin can run his air campaign without
risking casualties that could provoke a
negative reaction at home. Any ground
operations, though, could result in
military deaths and invite unwelcome
parallels to the botched Soviet war in
Afghanistan.
Mirsky said the bigger worry was that
the airstrikes would kill not only
militants but Sunni Arab civilians,
motivating Islamic terrorists to turn
their sights on Russia and making it easier for them to recruit volunteers within Russia. Most of
Russia's Muslims are Sunnis, including those in Chechnya, Dagestan and elsewhere in the North
Caucasus, where there is a simmering Islamic insurgency.
It is these radical Islamists, he said, who pose the real threat to Russia: "America will not send
terrorists to carry out bombings in Moscow, but these fanatics easily could."
2015 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast,
rewritten, or redistributed.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/russias-airstrikes-in-syria-are-playing-well-at-home-putin/