PUTIN’S RESET

claim that Russian weapons used in Syria impress potential customers while Russia
avidly cites Syria as a testimonial for its weapons. 23 Putin has intimated that one goal
of the operation was to test and display capabilities and certainly certain operations,
e.g. firing Kalibr’ cruise missiles from Caspian Sea-based frigates on Putin’s birthday
in 2015 aim to broadcast Russian capabilities to both potential buyers and adversaries
alike. 24
Finally, some Russian objectives have either become more important or
emerged as a result of the fighting, particularly the determination to humiliate Turkey
after it shot down a Russian fighter, and the desire to aggravate European disunity by
a bombing campaign that would generate mass flight of refugees to an overburdened
Europe. 25 An August 2016 Putin-Erdogan summit illustrated the former point as
Putin will only lift economic sanctions gradually upon Turkey to force it to change its
policies. 26 Since political objectives often evolve with the course of combat operations,
this is not surprising. But it is a sign of many analysts’ strategic failings that they
claim that such adaptations signify Russian failure rather than realizing that they
indicate an unexpected flexibility and determination, i.e. attributes of strength, not
weakness.
RUSSIAN OBJECTIVES
As many writers and the Russian government have noted, internal and external
security and the means of achieving them are fused in Putin’s Russia. Since the
National Security Strategy of 2009, virtually all areas of Russian social and cultural life
have been “securitized.” 27 As the state grows increasingly more concerned about
foreign ideas and influences, it has assumed ever more responsibility for steering the
entire socio-economic-cultural and political lives of the Russian people.
Concurrently, there is an ongoing mobilization of the entire Russian state for
purposes of permanent, albeit mainly non-military, conflict with foreign
governments. 28 This securitization and mobilization paradigm provides the context
for understanding Moscow’s Syrian gambit. As Moscow has frequently claimed, its
perspective on the Middle East is closely tied to threats to the state’s domestic
stability, particularly threats from Islamic terrorism. 29
This commingling of internal and external threats is part of the officially
sanctioned approach to national security and foreign policy in Putin’s Russia. As the
2008 Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation states: “Differences between
domestic and external means of ensuring national interests and security are gradually
26