Russia Pushed Assad to Flee Syria After Concluding He’d Lost War
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With Syrian opposition forces advancing rapidly toward the capital, Damascus, President Bashar al-Assad’s fate lay in Russia’s hands as his army melted away.
Still haunted by video of the mob killing and mutilation of Libyan leader Moammar Qaddafi in that country’s civil war in 2011, the Kremlin moved to save its ally even as it concluded that it could do nothing to prop up Assad’s regime any longer.