This success, the author says, has strengthened the government's position in the run-up to Syrian peace negotiations, which are scheduled to begin next week in Geneva.
The change in the balance of powers has forced the US and other countries who were demanding President Assad’s immediate ousting to scale back their demands and accede to a plan for a transitional government and to what the author describes as “a vague timeline that promises free and fair elections in 18 months”.
This also forced Syria's neighbors, especially Turkey, to reduce support and the “carte blanche previously given to antigovernment fighters, including Islamic State (Daesh) militants”.
"Assad is winning. Russian air power [has] changed the entire dynamic of what's going on, and it just gives the Syrian army an incredible boost," the author quotes Joshua Landis, director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, as saying in a phone interview.
The expert acknowledges that “Moscow's air onslaught appears to be gaining effectiveness as Russian commanders grow more familiar with the conflict and with the capabilities of allied Syrian ground forces."
"What I'm hearing from Damascus is that it has taken time to digest the new technology, for the Russians to get well situated, get the intelligence they require and know what they're doing," Landis said.
He also noted that the Military Operations Center, an Amman-based logistics hub supporting the rebels in southern Syria and staffed by intelligence operatives from 11 countries including those from the US, has reduced its role.
