IŞİD’İN ÖTESİNDE: RUSYA'NIN SURİYE'DEKİ TERÖRLE MÜCADELE STRATEJİSİ, 2014– 2024
BEYOND ISIS: RUSSIA'S COUNTERTERRORISM STRATEGY IN SYRIA, 2014–2024

Summary/Abstract: This article examines Russia's counterterrorism strategy toward ISIS and other Salafi-jihadist organisations in Syria between 2014 and 2024. It argues that Moscow did not conduct an organisation-specific anti-ISIS campaign. Instead, it developed a hierarchical and adaptive approach that ranked threats according to their links with Russian-speaking foreign fighters, their immediate position on the Syrian battlefield, their potential implications for Russian domestic security, and their susceptibility to diplomatic management. The preservation of Asad Regime in Syria is retained not as the article's independent theoretical axis, but as a limited operational context explaining why Russia initially prioritised fronts threatening the Syrian government's western core before intensifying direct operations against ISIS. The study analyses speeches by Vladimir Putin and Sergei Lavrov, Russian strategic documents and statements at the United Nations, and triangulates them with operational research, conflict-monitoring evidence and terrorism scholarship. The findings demonstrate that Russia contributed significantly to dismantling ISIS's territorial caliphate project, yet used an expansive official category of terrorism, failed to eliminate the post-caliphate insurgency, and shifted from military elimination to negotiated containment in dealing with HTS and the Idlib arena. The 2024 collapse of the Assad government reveals both the achievements and the limits of this strategy.

• Details
• Contents