Dear Mr Eclectic, you're on a pilots forum .... well pilots and others intimately connected past or present to military flying. Let me guess, you've never served in the Air Force ..... or the Army ...... or the Navy. I further guess that you've never worked for the MoD, Foreign Office or Intelligence ..... am I close? I suspect that you are very anti-Russian being unable to differentiate between modern Russia and the historical Soviet Union. A little thoughtful reading perhaps of a wider variety than usual might be helpful in seeing the differences because surprisingly, there are many (as well as similarities).
I rather suspect that Mr Putin will win out over ISIS and perhaps Mr Assad will remain in power. I suspect that America may now have to seriously re-think its middle east policy. What worries me is if either Clinton or one of the American Conservative candidates takes power - either way we are on dangerous ground of their being mis-advised into thinking that they could win against Russia.
I would hope that if they are so ill-advised, our government will sit on its hands and refuse to allow the UK to be a base for attacking Russia.
We simply don't need any such stupidity which some people seem to think would be good.