This is getting pretty Syrias

"Still not a world war". Right.

I thought I'd weigh in on the situation in Syria regarding how it impacts Ukraine, and I think go ahead and tackle the whole "Is this a world war (yet) or not" question to a degree while we are at it, but I will be returning to that theme more fully in later posts as well.

The collapse of the incredibly repressive Assad regime is going to have repercussions in many directions, most obviously right there in Syria and how it affects its direct neighbors, but I am going to avoid discussion of all of that at this time and focus on how this impacts the Russia-Ukraine war.

It is my earnest hope that the Syrian people blossom under their newfound freedom and establish a free democracy. Their odds are better than Libya's were, but only time will tell. It would behoove the west to provide rebuilding assistance, if for no other reason than to selfishly limit the number of refugees fleeing from Syria, but unfortunately, we are entering a time of increased right-wing control of our governments and America's suicidally stupid pick for its next president is going to crash everyone's economy, limiting the amount of assistance available. Still, one can hope that Europe will step up with some much-needed assistance.

Russia and Putin had very publicly promised the Assad regime that it would continue to prop it up, just as it had in its intervention in 2015, along with Iran and Hezbollah, saving the Assad regime from being toppled at that time. Russia not having saved Assad this time, despite having several military bases, troops, and aircraft in the country, is a huge loss of face for Putin, which is not only important for a strongman to remain in power, but it sends a strong message to other nations that rely on Russian support that Putin and Russia cannot be relied upon to save them when they are in trouble.

This is a critical fracture in the axis of evil we are facing. I realize that phrase is fraught at this point, having been co-opted by American right wingers in the recent past, but it should be nearly impossible to deny that western democracies are facing an alignment of authoritarian states at war with it. Russia, Iran, Syria, China, and North Korea, are aligned, co-operating, and actively conducting various levels of hybrid warfare against the west. A Chinese flagged cargo ship just cut two data cables in the Baltic. China supplies Russia with all manner of materials to aid its war efforts against the west, and of course, not only has North Korea supplied Russia with half of the artillery ammunition it has used against Ukraine in the past year, as well as missiles, it has committed ground troops in combat against Ukraine. Iran has been supplying medium ranged missiles and long range drones as well as coordinating with Russian efforts in the Middle East, such as in Syria.

As we enter an age where nations are going to begin coveting their neighbors arable land or water resources due to global warming, other authoritarian nations are looking to this Axis of Evil and avidly watching to see if their efforts to seize territory are successful. This alignment of authoritarian nations is backing Russia's war not only because, unlike much of the west, they clearly see that their survival is dependent on direct opposition to democracy, but also because if Russia is successful in seizing more land from Ukraine or Georgia it is a green light for these other nations to begin wars of conquest against their neighbors, because clearly the west is too weak, disorganized, and distracted to prevent the world slipping into a new age of war.

Since Putin came to power 25 years ago, he has been waging war on the west. Electronic warfare against neighboring nations, hammering their government institutions and taking them offline, cutting data cables and energy pipelines at sea, jamming radar making air travel impossible for a huge swathe of the Baltic region, conducting assassinations and poisonings on other countries soil, and of course, subverting elections all across the world as well as ongoing bombings and fires at war factories in western nations. Although most of these things are a Bonafide casus belli, no western country has acknowledged that Russia is constantly waging war against it and also taken proper measures to counter it. In fact, we have seen Russian influence operations take over government after government in the west and the response to this overt act of war has been effectively nothing. This has been so successful, since capitalism and democracy make buying governments fairly easy, that Russia is actually poised to win the epic battle taking place for the future of the world right now between democracies and this axis of evil authoritarian states. Thankfully, we have the example of Romania at least in how to stop Russian interference in elections. Other nations need to take note and follow suit, or they might as well give up.

Seen in this light, the fact that Ukraine has degraded Russian military capabilities to the point that Russia feels it can neither spare the troops, airlift capability, or other resources to continue to prop up Assad is so HUGE that it cannot be understated.

Russia hasn't just been at war with the west, Russia has been running a very successful campaign of destabilization across Africa, combining psyops efforts to turn those nations away from democracy alongside propping up strongmen where they are in power, and providing troops to destabilize other nations. The loss of Russia's port and airbase in Syria is going to massively affect Russia's ability to continue to project power into Africa. The airbase was a critical stepping stone in Russia's ability to airlift troops and military equipment into Africa. It is conceivable that Russia may be able to negotiate staying in those bases, as the rebel forces haven't quite reached that last corner of Syria yet, but they have already given the Russians 48-hour notice to vacate the country. Everyone is Syria is acutely aware that Russian troops have been bombing their hospitals, killing their civilians, and propping up the incredibly brutal Assad regime, so I am doubtful Putin will be able to successfully negotiate retaining the Russian military bases in the country. Especially with the value of the ruble continuing to plummet, and with no end in sight of that, and Russia increasingly having little to nothing to export, and Russia's word clearly being worth nothing, it seems very unlikely that the rebels will change their minds about wanting the Russian's gone from Syria.

Before we get to the juicy delve into the Russian navy's dire predicament in the Mediterranean, we should also point out that over the course of Russia propping up Assad in power for many years, 100,000 Russian civilians have come to reside in Syria. Russia completely lacks the capability to even pull-out what military personnel it has in country in a timely manner, it can't begin to address the exodus on one hundred thousand civilians on top of this. So far, the rebel leadership is making the right noises about respecting civilians from other nations, and the property of their embassies as well (with the notable exception of Iran, whose embassy got ransacked), but at the very least many of the jobs that were the reason for those Russian civilians being in Syria are likely to evaporate. I would imagine that all of those pasty motherfuckers are pretty nervous about hanging around a country where a group of militias of various stripes are consolidating power as well. Russia is about to very publicly lose more face as one hundred thousand of its civilians desperately try and get evacuated out of the Russian military bases. At the same time, it seems a fair bet that there will be some incidents of Syrians taking revenge on Russian civilians living in the country, especially since some of those "civilians" are likely KGB FSB agents, and most of them are in the country to keep the much-hated Assad in power in one capacity or another. Televised scenes of Russian citizens helplessly being publicly assaulted or executed are going to further damage Putin's face.

Regarding those Russian troops left in Syria, one of the most obvious impacts of the Russian loss of their bases in that country is that those troops will come home and be available to fight in Ukraine. Russia would have you believe that at one point they had over sixty thousand troops in Syria. At one point during the full-scale war in Ukraine I remember reading that Russia was pulling back over twenty thousand troops from Syria to commit to the fighting in Ukraine. In addition, Russia's claims of having 60K troops in country have been disproved as Russian propaganda as well. It is possible western intelligence agencies have a good idea of about how many Russian troops are in country, but that doesn't seem to be public knowledge at this time, but I have seen reports of as few as three or four thousand troops are all that is left guarding and manning the Russian airbase, and even less at and around their seaport in Syria.

Bearing in mind that for the past six months or so, Russia has been very steadily losing over one thousand troops a day either killed or so badly wounded they are unlikely to ever return to combat and that recently that has spiked to between 1,300 and 2,000 troops lost each and every day fighting against Ukraine, the dividends of Russia pulling its remaining troops out of Syria likely amount to less than a week’s "wastage", particularly when you consider that a fair number of these troops are going to be port personnel, aircraft mechanics and other rear area personnel.

Not that that means that Russia won't convert those valuable troops into meat wave infantry. The crew of Russia's only aircraft carrier (a hulk that will never take to sea again), have been formed into a scratch brigade reminiscent of the last days of Hitler's Germany. The "Frigate" ‘brigade’ is actually not too far from where my unit is in the front line. Likewise, troops of Russia's nuclear missile deterrent forces have shown up as more untrained infantry thrown against Ukrainian machineguns recently as well. So, it is quite possible, if not likely, that most, if not all of the troops eventually evacuated from Syria may well be thrown into the Ukrainian meat grinder, despite whatever specialty and experience they have, and despite Russia's shortage of aircraft mechanics. It isn't like there aren't regular complaints from the Russian side about troops like trained artillerymen being pressed into service as infantry cannon fodder and expended for perhaps another few yards of Ukrainian soil while the Russian army is desperately short of trained artillerymen.

Whatever the total numbers of Russian troops still present in Syria, I don't expect their return to have any impact on the war in Ukraine. Even if some of them are combat experienced infantry, the bulk of that 'experience' in Syria has been executing civilians. The war in Ukraine is the polar opposite of their supposed battle experience so far, and even at the most optimistic (for Russia) estimations or claims of how many troops are present, at best add up to less than a months’ worth of Russian combat casualties in Ukraine, while less than a fortnight is probably far more realistic.

If they can manage to get them home, Russia has a few remaining air defense systems in Syria, which might provide a week or three of target practice for Ukrainian forces, but other than that, what Russian equipment that remains in country and can be realistically evacuated in a timely manner is negligible. How much Russia is eventually able to pull out is hugely dependent upon the goodwill of the rebel forces that have liberated Syria, and whether or not they stick to their present deadline of now well less than 48 hours for the Russians to leave. If they give them more time, Russia should be able to get some cargo ships there to pull out more weapons systems and ammunition, but I don't see why the rebels would be inclined to do that for them. They would like to capture what they can, and aren't interested in having the Russians stick around, the sooner they are gone the better, so I will be surprised if the rebels are lenient and allow the Russians more time to pull more of their equipment out of Syria. Even if they do, it will just be another drop in the bucket of their ongoing staggering losses in Ukraine and not have a significant impact on the war.

Which brings us to the fun part of this piece, the Russian navy, and it losing Russias centuries long dream of a "warm water port". Sure, technically, they have Sevastopol in the Crimea at the moment, but not only is the war with Ukraine not over and not going well for Russia, but continued Ukrainian attacks have forced the Russian navy to completely abandon any part of Crimea as a base, including the storied homeport of the Black Sea Fleet, Sevastopol. Ukrainian attacks have been so successful that there isn't even a surviving sea-going vehicular ferry between Russia and Crimea, all traffic is now across the damaged Kerch Strait bridge, or all the way around through the new railroad that Russia has laid through the occupied territories. Technically, Russia has a couple of other "warm water ports" in the Black Sea, but these are tiny and incapable of servicing even the reduced number of surviving Black Sea Fleet ships, and one of these ports is actually in Georgian territory that Russia is occupying. If there is any justice in the world, Russia will be losing that in the not-too-distant future. My heart goes out to the Georgian people in their ongoing struggle against Russian control of most of their government and Russia's incursions into their territory. May freedom prevail.

Frankly, the Russian navy is a fucking joke, and little more than targets at best in the Mediterranean, so they aren't much of a threat there, other than the fact that a number of the vessels based there do carry medium ranged missiles they could potentially launch deep into many countries. I'd almost be inclined to say that the presence of the port as a place for Russian divers and ships cutting cables and pipelines in international waters is more of a threat, but unfortunately, as we have seen, they can put those aboard commercial vessels and hardly need a naval base in Syria to accomplish this.

No, the loss of the Russian naval base is largely one of prestige, again affecting Putin's face, and stature as a strongman, but importantly it does affect Russia's ability to project power and support allied or vassal states with his navy being forward deployed in the Mediterranean and having a base to draw supplies, munitions, and troops from. The loss of Syria is seriously pulling a number of Putin's teeth in the region and going to diminish his influence in both the Middle East and Africa, as well as weakening the axis of evil. Whatever the outcome of Syria's new government, we should thank them for this boon, and thank Ukraine for having weakened Russia to the point that it had to walk away from its investment of hundreds of millions of rubles in propping up Syria, as well as hundreds of Russian lives, and all the benefits to Russia of having its bases there and having an ally in government there.

The interesting part is what comes next for the Russian flotilla that was based in Syria? If the ships all originally were home ported in the Black Sea, Turkey should allow transit through the Bosphorus for them to return home. To become the next series of targets for Ukraine to sink in anchor in the beleaguered Russian ports. Assuming they survive the gauntlet of Ukrainian naval drones and missiles while crossing the full length of the Black Sea to slink into their tiny ports on the eastern coast. Vaunted Russian air defense systems are completely incapable of stopping Ukrainian drone and missile attacks, and increasingly sophisticated and innovative Ukrainian naval drone attacks continue to damage and sink Russian vessels at sea and in port.

I don't have a breakdown of the homeports of the Russian ships based in Syria, but my understanding is that a number of them are not homeported in the Black Sea, which means according to the Montreux Convention, Turkey should not allow them to transit the Sea of Marmara and sail into the Black Sea. If I remember correctly, Turkey didn't strictly abide by this treaty in a few instances early in full blown Russian-Ukrainian war, but it seems unlikely that they would do so for multiple warships at this time. For one thing, the rebels’ quick victory in Syria is partially due to Turkish support and is a victory for expanding Turkish power in the region. This, combined with Russia's rapidly waning star, likely means that Turkey isn't inclined bow to Russia's wishes in this matter.

That leaves at least some of the Russian Syrian flotilla facing a lengthy journey to Saint Petersburg or Murmansk, in winter. You might think that this is a fairly straightforward proposition and wonder why this might be a problem for them, particularly since those vessels sailed all the way to Syria in the first place. Well, for one thing, since then, those ships have been away from properly equipped and supplied repair bases to keep them maintained. Secondly, although Russia was able to sail a small flotilla all the way to Cuba recently, you will notice that one of the few vessels that was part of that group of warships was a tug. There is a very good reason for this.

I am eagerly looking forward to watching the saga of the Russian Syrian flotilla's trip home. I expect it to be, as is usual for the Russian navy, a comedy of errors, with their ships having to be regularly rescued by other nations tugboats and having to ignominiously limp into other nations harbors for emergency repairs to make the journey. Maybe this time they won't mistake British fishing boats for Japanese torpedo boats and open fire on them and each other. Maybe.

I am referring to the Dogger Bank Incident -

Fun video talking about what a fiasco the Russian navy always has been.

It's already been said elsewhere, but I had the same thought so I will repeat it. Syria's collapse seems and in some ways was extremely rapid. But Hemingway's response to how it was that he became bankrupt comes to mind in this situation: "Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly." The Assad regime had been in power for generations, building up 50 years of bad will amongst its people and had been embroiled in a civil war for nearly fifteen years. Despite America's falling into darkness and the very likely ramifications for that, I am actually somewhat hopeful for the outcome of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict at this time, as Russian is entering the "suddenly" phase of its bankruptcy.

Russia may be able to shovel untrained infantry at our machineguns for the foreseeable future and might have another year or two worth of tanks, artillery pieces, and armored personnel carriers they can continue to scavenge from old Soviet stockpiles, but their economy shows ever increasing signs of imminent collapse. On top of things like butter being locked away like it is a rare, high value commodity in grocery stores, because that is what it is becoming, Russia's currency is collapsing, and only temporarily artificially stabilized to some degree, inflation is rampant and nearly out of control, several internal markets are collapsing, like home and automobile sales, Russia is largely a petro state and their fuel revenues have collapsed, as have most of their crops this year, and Russian transportation is grinding to a halt through a combination of lack of bearings for trains, and lack of personnel for the railways due to drafting of some of them for the war and a failure to pay them enough, especially in the face of massive inflation. Russia is massively dependent on rail transport for all aspects of its existence, and it is in the process of collapsing. The magician that has held the economy together throughout the war has basically declared that they have now painted themselves into a corner and have nowhere to go, leaving unsaid that collapse in next.

The big question is will Trump lift sanctions on Russia, breathing new life into their economy and allowing them to limp along for another year or three and continue their war in Ukraine, or will Russia collapse before that can take effect?

I don't know, but I'll be here, in Ukraine, with a rifle in my hand, eagerly watching the evil colonial Russian empire finally collapse.

The good news is that Europe has pledged funds to sustain Ukraine's government through the entirety of next year, and European leaders (other than Scholz and the other usual suspects like Hungary's Orban) continue to communicate that they understand the threat that Russia poses to Europe and that halting them in Ukraine is the smart move and that they will continue to support Ukraine militarily, no matter what the US does. If Trump completely pulls all support from the US for Ukraine, as I fear he likely will, being Putin's puppet, this will definitely create serious hardships for Ukraine and our continued ability to fight on. It will not end our struggle though. When faced with a genocidal invader that has proven time and time again that will be raping and torturing your family before your eyes before they do the same to you and then kill you all, you don't have any choice of whether you will be resisting the invader or not. And there is no negotiating with a country that has proven time after time that its word and treaties are completely valueless.

It doesn't matter how much harder this fight might get with America being led by a fascist clown that is a puppet of Putin, we will fight on.