DUSHANBE, Tajikistan\u00a0\u2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday strongly defended Moscow’s\u00a0military\u00a0assistance to the Syrian government, saying it’s impossible to defeat the Islamic State group without cooperating with Damascus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Putin’s statement comes amid the signs of an ongoing Russian\u00a0military\u00a0buildup in Syria, which the U.S. says signals Moscow’s intention to set up an air base there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking at a meeting of heads of states at a Moscow-dominated security alliance of ex-Soviet nations in Tajikistan, Putin urged other nations to follow Russia’s example and offer\u00a0military\u00a0support to Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We are supporting the government of Syria in the fight against a terrorist aggression, are offering and will continue to offer it necessary military-technical assistance,” Putin said in televised remarks. “Without an active participation of the Syrian authorities and the\u00a0military, it would be impossible to expel the terrorists from that country and the region as a whole, and to protect the multi-ethnic and multi-confessional Syrian people from destruction.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
He said that Assad was ready to conduct political transformations and engage a “‘healthy part of the opposition,” but added that “pooling forces in the fight against terror takes the priority now.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Russia has staunchly backed up Assad throughout Syria’s devastating civil war that has killed about 250,000 people and turned millions into refugees, shielding him from United Nations sanctions and continuing to provide him with weapons despite Western criticism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Putin shrugged off allegations that Moscow’s support for Assad has sparked a flow of refugees, saying that without Russia’s support for Assad’s regime the number of Syrian refugees heading to Europe would have been even bigger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“People are fleeing Syria primarily to escape fighting that has been fueled from the outside with supplies of weapons and hardware, they are fleeing to escape terrorist atrocities,” he said. “Without Russia’s support for Syria, the situation in the country would have been worse than in Libya, and the flow of refugees would have been even bigger.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
The\u00a0Pentagon\u00a0says that Russia is in the midst of a steady\u00a0military\u00a0buildup at an airport in Syria’s coastal province of Latakia, indicating Moscow intends to create a forward air operations base there, although no fighter jets or helicopters have arrived yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Asked earlier this month if Russian troops could join the fight against IS, Putin seemed to keep the door open for that, saying that “we are looking at various options.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Russian leader is set to address the Syrian crisis when he speaks to the U.N. General Assembly later this month, and observers in Moscow believe he wants a Russian\u00a0military\u00a0force on the ground to be ready by that time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday it’s impossible to defeat ISIS without cooperating with Damascus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":61231,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":88,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[15,88],"tags":[],"coauthors":[1432],"class_list":["post-53818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-your-military"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"EUPGCFIR3JAWZPNPDV5VJHH7UA","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/your-military\/2015\/09\/15\/putin-defends-russia-s-military-assistance-to-syria\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n