Putin is desperately attempting to reestablish a base in the ME, Syria is in shambles, and for the time being will lend a hand, then will replace Assad with a puppet regime. Syrian's are unwilling to stand and fight, evidenced by the mass exodus of able bodied youth, leaving the elderly and those fighting against ISIS and Assad's Russian masters to fight for independence. It only stands to reason the US should provide arms and relief supplies to rebel forces, not ground troops.
His base in the ME has always been his alliances with Iran and Syria. This is nothing new. You need to get up to speed.
And by the way there is no such thing as a rebel force. There is no civil war. There never has been. Just mercenaries and terrorists fighting a proxy war for Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey to overthrow Assad and put in the Muslim Brotherhood and fuck up another country.
wrong again-----there is INDEED a civil war in Syria------and in Yemen----another potential RUSKIE base-------Egypt was once a ruskie base too--------Russia is an equal opportunity OPPORTUNIST
Name the opposition in Syria. I keep hearing about "rebel forces" but no one can ever seem to name a rebel force that doesn't include mercenaries and terrorists.
how would I know the NAMES of the people who oppose Assad in Syria?
I certainly have encountered many people from Syria living in the USA who
have horror stories ABOUT the Assads over the past approximately 45 years,
in general-----Christian syrians
Every real dictator has strong backing from, at least, a large part of population. So, "democracy" practic now really - is a chance of minorities' power and discrimination of majority. It's good for West, because western minorities are citizens too... Which minorities we have usually in Middle East? A pirats, a bandits, a drug-dealers, an ISIS fanatics. Look at Libya. NATO took power from dictator Gaddafy, which upkeeps order and interests of Majority in Libya, and now what? Libya is full of criminals, has criminal governmfent..
Libya was full of criminals during the time of KHADAFFY DUCK ---and to your
delight he sponsored terrorism. Western minorities were citizens? Western
minorities ARE citizens? since when?