Madina Newspaper Nations are like people. They love and hate. And they long for the past. Peoples of nations with long histories are most nostalgic about their past, They cannot separate themselves from their history. In the 21st century, there are at least five nations which look back upon empires which reigned for sometime before they fell and vanished. Iran, which nurtures a nuclear dream, longingly looks back to the lost glory of the Persian Empire. Turkey longs for the days of the Ottoman Empire and tries to revive the faded glory of its past in its pursuit to make its presence felt in the region with an Islamic touch this time to suit the present situation. We also have India and China which are driven by their pasts to rise as fast as they can to become global powers for the world to reckon with. Russia also feels nostalgic about its past. Until the disintegration of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, it led almost half of the world. When the Soviet Union crumbled, it lost its strong political clout. It is possible that Russia's position on the Syrian crisis is a throwback to its past. Although its economy has crumbled, it keeps on projecting its lost image as a global superpower. The officials at the Kremlin belong to the past generation which dreamt of a mighty Russian Empire. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, a candidate for the forthcoming presidential election, appears to be banking on Russia's lost glory with his election slogan: “Powerful leader for a powerful country.” Syria is the only country in the Middle East which has strong ties with Russia, which supplies Damascus with military arms. Russia is trying to make Syria a tool to expand its influence in the region. Let's take a look at what happened after Russia vetoed the Arab League-backed UN resolution asking Bashar Al-Assad to step down and condemning his regime's butchery of the Syrian people. Russian Foreign Affairs Minister Sergey Lavrov visited Syria right after the UN resolution veto, along with Mikhail Fradkov, head of Russian foreign intelligence. They asked Al-Assad to allow Russia to reactivate an electronic spying station above the Qassioun Mountain to spy on the American missile shield project in Turkey and monitor the activities of NATO in the Mediterranean. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia had only one passageway to the Mediterranean, Syria's Latakia seaport. Russia has 150 military experts at the Russian base at Latakia, in addition to other officials who were sent to help the Syrian regime. Russia's decision to side with Syria is in keeping with every country's motivation to advance its own interests. With strong pressure by Western and Arab countries, Russia and China joined the UN resolution calling for the Syrian regime to allow UN aid for humanitarian reasons. Viktor Litovkin, a top Russian military official, said that Russia will not wage war to defend Al-Assad's regime and that Russia has other partners in the Mediterranean like Algeria, Cyprus and Greece. Like China which has problems with its ethnic minorities, Russia has problems with Chechnya and other former allies. If China and Russia agree to international intervention in Syria, they may face the same fate in the future. But some analysts believe that Russia will discard its Syrian card if Washington strikes a bargain with Moscow that will allow the Kremlin to keep Syria within its sphere of influence when Al-Assad's regime falls. Russia lost in Serbia, Iraq and Libya. It does not want to lose in Syria. __
