Putin's ally in the Middle East is Iran.John wrote: I've written several times that Putin's actions in Syria are insane because they're going to trigger a war. According to Kasparov, Putin actually wants to trigger "some sort of major war in the Mideast," in order to cause oil prices to rise, saving Russia's economy.
To summarize, Putin's actions in Syria have two objectives, according to Kasparov: Create millions more Syria refugees in order to weaken Europe; and trigger a major war to raise oil prices.
Putin undoubted believes that any war that Russia triggers can be contained, just as previous Mideast wars have been contained. From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, what Putin doesn't understand is that as the world goes deeper into a generational Crisis era, as the few remaining survivors of World War II die off, as the horrors of WW II are no longer remembered, the chances of "containing" a new Mideast war become smaller and smaller. The next Mideast war could finally be the one that isn't "contained."
Kasparov concluded that Putin may not stop with Syria. Putin perceives Obama as being very weak, and knows that the next administration could be very different, so he'll "try to gain maximum ground as long as Obama is in office."
As Mr. Kasparov points out - one solution to the Russian economic problems is to have the price of oil spike back to record highs.
Both Iran and Russia are major oil producers and major oil exporters.
The Shia vs Sunni fault line in the Middle East runs right through, or are right next to, the major oil fields in the Middle East ( except, perhaps, Iran's oil fields ). The Sunni-Muslim, vs non-Muslim, fault line in North Africa, runs right through North Africa's major oil fields, and through North Africa's major oil producing countries.
The talking heads are predicting Russia will be bankrupted by involvement in wars, to the contrary, wars in the Middle East and North Africa could spike the price of oil and save Russia economically and the millions of refugees flowing to Europe every 6 months could bankrupt Western Europe and prevent Western Europe from investing in it's own defense - and perhaps even more importantly to Russia - Western Europe's elites fanatical insistence on Eastern Europe maintaining open borders, coupled with millions of refugees entering Europe every 6 months, may drive a wedge between Eastern and Western Europe.