Any pretence that Russia's heightened involvement in Syria's messy civil war would focus on destroying the Islamic State has evaporated very quickly. Its aerial assault has targeted rebel groups fighting President Bashar al-Assad's army in the northwest of the country, not the concentration of Isis forces in Syria's east. Dozens of civilians have been killed in the onslaught, and Russia's objective is now very clear. It is determined to ensure the Assad regime clings to power, thereby retaining its chief seat of influence in the Middle East.
There is a very good chance that, in the short-term at least, it will succeed. The United States' unwillingness to commit itself deeply to the Syrian conflict has left a vacuum Russia has filled.
As much as the West may wish to see the despised Assad gone as soon as possible, the Russian action is already forcing a rethink. Britain's Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, has said he could now accept Assad remaining as titular head of Syria for three years or more if it meant ending the conflict. He continues to talk vaguely of a managed political transition, but concedes there is no agreement with Russia on this.
The softened approach is an acceptance of a new and more complex reality in Syria. That is predicated on a prolonging of the conflict as Assad's position is strengthened by the Russian strikes and its supply of weaponry to Syria's army. If Russia's strategy is successful, the West will have no option but to accept a continuing role for Assad in post-conflict Syria. In that context, Russia has little cause to heed Nato's call for it to focus its efforts on fighting Isis and promoting a solution to the conflict through a political transition.
Moscow knows, of course, that Isis will also have to be defeated. Indeed, it has as good a reason as the West for being alarmed by Islamic extremism. It was that very fear which triggered the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.
