You make a good point; Putin is pushing the Russian armed forces for a quick military victory, and is also pushing for a quick diplomatic solution to the Syrian conflict because of the effect on his economy.
The whole Syrian war was about the Saudis and Gulf Emirates building a gas pipeline to Europe to break the Russian monopoly on European gas supplies. The Russian support of Assad, aside from their historical interest in Syria, is to block that pipeline. Part of the war is economic; the Saudis are flooding with world with cheap oil to break Russia’s oil-driven export economy.
Putin needs a quick victory in Syria; he gets the Saudis to realize there will be no gas pipeline before Russia goes broke. Then the Saudis reduce oil production to a “normal” level and drive the price back up. The Saudis also have an interest in driving the oil price back up, as they are also losing money in this war. They just had more cash on hand than Russia did when it started.
The real question is whether Russia can win a military victory before it runs out of money, and/or whether they can convince the Saudis to give write off the loss and go back to making money off the oil they have.
Meanwhile, while these powers are playing an international chess game, our president sits in a corner and plays with himself.
“The whole Syrian war was about the Saudis and Gulf Emirates building a gas pipeline to Europe to break the Russian monopoly on European gas supplies.”
So Saudi Arabia and the EU banksters unleashed this misery,,,, to build a pipeline. I think also to spread wahabbism. Very disgusting.
-The real question is whether Russia can win a military victory before it runs out of money, and/or whether they can convince the Saudis to give write off the loss and go back to making money off the oil they have.-
Without that pipeline to the Mediterranean the Saudis will be in a much worse position when Iran goes nuclear. Iran has a huge portion of their military in positions to block the Persian Gulf. Iran had an estimated 30-50 thousand mines in warehouses ready to deploy to block Saudi Arabia in. The Saudi oil war was supposed to break Iran-s back. But Obama rescued Iran. So, to put it mildly, Saudi Arabia is screwed. They have little else they can do now except go to war directly to topple Assad so they can have their pipeline.
I have to think, though, that Saudi Arabia would lose eventually even if by some miracle they or their proxies took Syria. A long pipeline would be easy to sabotage. Also, I suspect Saudi Arabia-s military may look good but is actually almost useless. It is, essentially, a huge palace guard mostly lead by posers with connections.