Down but not yet out

HAVING dramatically entered Syria’s war on September 30th with a slew of air strikes against the forces battling Bashar al-Assad, Russia upped the stakes again a week later. On October 7th it hit the opposition with cruise missiles launched from hundreds of miles away in the Caspian Sea. The missiles and the strikes are said by Russia to be part of a campaign against “terrorism”, but have almost exclusively been directed not against Islamic State (IS) but against opposition groups, including some supported by America, much closer to Mr Assad’s remaining heartland.

Supporting ground attacks by the Assad regime, Russian planes have for the past week repeatedly bashed groups in the north-western rebel-held province of Idlib and pockets around the city of Homs, in some cases making indiscriminate use of cluster bombs.

The rebels consider Russia’s intervention a second “occupation” in addition to the one by Iran, Mr Assad’s other main ally, says Abu Amin of Thuwar al-Sham, a small rebel outfit. But whether this spells serious trouble for the armed opposition depends on two as yet unknown factors: what else Mr Assad’s allies, Iran and Russia, have in store, and the reaction of the opposition’s backers, chiefly America, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey.

Air strikes alone cannot defeat the rebels, who are made up of an astonishing 7,000 different groups, according to the Carter Centre, a think-tank. Bombs will drive more Syrians out of the country, but they will not allow Mr Assad and his allies to recover and hold on to territory. Until the Russian move, Syria’s opposition was in a better state than at any time since the war started in 2011.

In recent months non-IS rebel groups, who range from the non-ideological to al-Qaeda’s Syrian arm Jabhat al-Nusra, have co-ordinated their fighting well despite their differences. In March Jaysh al-Fatah (the Army of Conquest), a coalition of northern rebel groups including Jabhat al-Nusra and Ahrar al-Sham, a Salafist outfit, took Idlib city. South of Damascus the Southern Front, backed by Jordan and America, is increasingly potent.

The rebels will be in much more danger if Russia sends in ground troops. On October 5th the head of Russia’s parliamentary defence committee said “volunteers” from Russia’s war in eastern Ukraine may turn up in Syria; he and the Kremlin have since contradicted that. But even without them, there are reports that Iran, Mr Assad’s other ally, is already funnelling more Shia militiamen into the country, under the direction of its own commanders. Hizbullah, Iran’s client militia in Lebanon, has long been fighting for Mr Assad, as have other Shia militias. A full-scale ground assault with Russian air support seems increasingly likely and may already be under way.

Rebel groups are urging international backers to give them more and better weapons. “The fact that the Russians are sending a strong message that it wants the regime to win likely will force the other side to escalate,” says Peter Harling of the International Crisis Group, a think-tank.

So far the opposition’s backers have largely kept quiet about their plans. What happens next will depend largely on Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey, since America has lost much of its influence in the war. Although the CIA has trained and equipped some rebels at a cost of $500m, this programme has failed badly. Only four or five men are currently in Syria fighting—barely enough to fill a pickup truck. Following Russia’s intervention, Barack Obama is said to have authorised the Pentagon to distribute more ammunition and some weapons to 30,000 troops who he hopes will advance on Raqqa, IS’s Syrian capital.

Yet America’s allies are not holding their breath. They are already disheartened by Mr Obama’s feeble response to the Russian bombings. That 25,000 of America’s proposed ground force are Kurds and only 5,000 Arabs bodes badly for prospects of taking back Syria’s Sunni heartland. The lack of credible Sunni representation is feeding instability in both Syria and Iraq and is pushing more Sunnis into IS’s embrace. The Gulf states have long wanted to give anti-air missiles to the opposition, but have been held back by Mr Obama. But recently they have shown less subservience. The capture of Idlib came about largely because they gave more backing to their proxies despite American objections.

So Syria is probably in for another period of escalation. On October 5th Turkey complained that it had intercepted a second Russian plane in its airspace in as many days. Many Iraqi officials have said they would welcome Russian intervention against IS there too, raising the spectre of a widening Russian campaign. Syrians, not least the armed opposition, are once again subject to the whims of outsiders.