MOSCOW–President Vladimir V. Putin’s order to withdraw the bulk of Russian forces from Syria, a process that the Defense Ministry said it began on Tuesday, seemingly caught Washington, Damascus and everybody in between off guard–just the way the Russian leader likes it.
By all accounts, Mr. Putin delights at creating surprises, reinforcing Russia’s newfound image as a sovereign, global heavyweight and keeping him at the center of world events.
In the case of Syria, the sudden, partial withdrawal more than five months after an equally surprising intervention allows Mr. Putin to claim a list of achievements without a significant cost to Russia in blood or rubles.
If the roughly 4,000 Russian troops centered on a contingent of about 50 combat aircraft had remained in Syria, Mr. Putin risked becoming just another proxy force fighting for the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad. But Mr. Putin wanted to make his mark by forging a solution in Syria, rather than lingering long enough to validate President Obama’s contention that Moscow had jumped headfirst into a quagmire.
“Russia does not want to fight for Assad as such,” said Aleksei V. Makarkin, the deputy director of the Center for Political Technologies in Moscow. “If Russia continued, that would make it more dependent on Mr. Assad and would make it clash with other players directly.”
Analysts noted that Mr. Putin had achieved most, if not all, of his goals–some stated, others not.
First, to thwart another Western attempt to push for leadership change in Syria and to fight the very idea of outside governments forcing political shifts.
Second, to show that Moscow is a more reliable ally than Washington, given that the Obama administration had abandoned long-term allies like former President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt when they faced political upheaval.
Third, to restore to Russia the role it had in the Soviet era as an important actor in the Middle East and as a global problem solver, and to force respect for Mr. Putin as a world leader.
Fourth, to shatter the isolation that Washington had tried to impose on Moscow after the crisis in Ukraine, forging a dialogue with the United States and, to a lesser degree, with Europe.
Fifth, a subset of the previous goal, to distract attention from the war in Ukraine and to get lifted the economic sanctions imposed on Russia–a step the Kremlin is desperate to achieve in the face of continuing economic problems. Saving the estimated $3 million daily cost of the Syrian operations will also help, but it was not considered decisive.
Sixth, to show off the effectiveness of a new generation of weaponry from Russia, the biggest arms exporter in the world after the United States.
Many analysts thought the main goal, of forcing a dialogue with the United States and of reviving the Cold War idea that Washington and Moscow are the main global police forces, had been achieved. Mr. Obama’s spokesman first said that the president had no idea about plans for a Russian withdrawal, but soon after the Kremlin website noted that the Russian and American leaders had spoken by telephone.
“The resurrection from oblivion of Russian-U.S. cooperation is one of the most important political results of the operation,” Vladimir Frolov, an expert on international relations, wrote on the Russian website Slon.ru. “It turns out only two superpowers can stop the war.”
The arrival of the decision like a jack-in-the-box was vintage Putin. According to published accounts of how he seized Crimea from Ukraine in March 2014, the Russian president, a former K.G.B. operative, consults a tiny circle of security and military advisers on crucial foreign policy questions.
The partial cease-fire in Syria, which began Feb. 27, has proved more effective and durable than expected, significantly reducing the level of violence.
They also believe that surprise announcements provide a giant public relations payoff, keeping Russians riveted to the TV news and making them feel that they are included in a parade of thrilling events, Ms. Schulmann said.
“A good decision in today’s Russia should be swift and surprising and take everyone unawares,” she said. “That is considered good political management.”
They are also meant to emphasize that Russia acts alone. “The main goal is to show that Russia acts completely independently,” said Alexander Morozov, an independent political analyst. “We expand our military presence without any prior consultations and wrap it up without any warning.”
Some analysts said the sudden decision was intended to send a message to Mr. Assad, who by all accounts has exasperated Mr. Putin by becoming ever more inflexible at the negotiating table as his battlefield fortunes have improved.
Mr. Assad recently earned a rebuke from Russia for saying that he would continue fighting until he had unified all of Syria, and after his foreign minister dismissed talk of presidential elections, which are supposed to be part of a transition to peace. Arab diplomats in Damascus said that their Russian counterparts had emphasized in recent weeks that Russia was intervening to protect the Syrian state, not Mr. Assad himself.
“I think this is a shot into Assad’s bow, not over Assad’s bow, as Putin’s way of saying that it is now up to you,” said Cliff Kupchan, chairman of the Eurasia Group, a Washington-based consulting firm. “At least for now, Putin is a looming maven of peace, and that is pretty clever.”
The stated goal of the military deployment in Syria was to take the fight against the metastasizing Islamic State to the “terrorists” themselves, before they could take the fight to Russia.
Instead, the main targets proved to be immediate threats to Mr. Assad in western Syria, many of them allied with Western or Arab powers. In summarizing the achievements of the mission, Mr. Shoigu, the defense minister, noted that Russia had helped the government restore control over 400 towns and nearly 4,000 square miles of territory.
Some analysts in Russia and elsewhere also said they thought that Mr. Putin had begun to realize that the violence that Russia was helping to perpetuate in Syria was working at cross purposes with the goal of showing Europe that he is a reliable partner and a peacemaker who does not deserve the economic sanctions that are denying Russia desperately needed access to Western credit markets.
The European Union has hinged lifting sanctions to putting into effect the Minsk II peace accords in Ukraine. The Europeans have also been alarmed that the escalating violence in Syria, now entering its sixth year, is feeding an enormous refugee crisis.
If Damascus begins to flounder without Russian support, the withdrawal is instantly reversible. Dmitri S. Peskov, Mr. Putin’s spokesman, noted that not all forces would be withdrawn from the Hmeymim air base near Latakia, nor from the longstanding Russian naval refueling and repair facility at Tartus.
Russia will also keep its powerful S-400 air defense system in Syria to protect the forces staying behind, Mr. Ivanov, the head of the president’s administration, was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying. That would maintain Russian dominance of Syrian airspace, where bombers were still carrying out attacks on Palmyra on Tuesday, even as others were shown on Russian TV flying home.
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