Today Ukraine will start pulling out heavy armour from Donbas and may soon re-establish control over its border with Russia. But don’t expect to see much about that on Russian state-controlled television. Ukraine is last season’s drama. This season is all about Syria, which conveniently provides a new narrative at a time when the war in Ukraine is turning into a frozen conflict, and its costs are becoming ever more apparent. The new Syria-related storyline is that Russia is a great geopolitical force capable of rivalling (or at least outsmarting) America. At the same time—contradictorily—it is overcoming international isolation because it shares a common enemy, Islamic State, with America. What the Russian people make of all this is another matter. Privately, many fear another Afghan-style entanglement, of the kind that sapped Soviet morale in the 1980s. Don’t expect to see that discussed on the TV talk shows, either. ​