Vladimir Putin’s European game is playing out in Syria

Russia’s intervention in Syria is not to help the ‘struggle against terrorism’ but to restore political control to the regime that spawned the terrorism, writes Bernard-Henri Lévy

THIS much is clear in Syria: There is no good solution. There has not been a good solution since that black Wednesday in August 2013, when Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s war machine, by using chemical weapons, crossed the ‘red line’ that US president Barack Obama had warned would trigger an American military response.

The moderate opposition still stood, and the Islamic State had not yet emerged from the shadows. Yet, in a shocking last-minute about-face, Obama declined to intervene.