Bashar al-Assad flew in to see Vladimir Putin. The meeting of the dictators was conducted in a warm and friendly atmosphere. They are, in fact, quite similar.
Assad gladly destroys his own citizens using heavy weapons and aircraft. Putin delights in assaulting the citizens of Ukraine while calling them “one people” with his own subjects. However, if Russians should ever rise up to fight their criminal regime, Putin will not spare them either. He will mow them down by the millions.
Neither man has achieved anything in life. Bashar al-Assad has inherited power from his father, Hafez, who at least had carried out two military coups, had imprisoned his competitors, and shot thousands of people. Bashar simply was placed on the throne after his father died in order to protect the interests of the family. He began to shoot only later. Putin obtained power from Boris Yeltsin, who at least had destroyed the Soviet Union and expelled Gorbachev from the Kremlin. And Vladimir was simply placed on the throne when the “father” decided to protect the interests of the family. He began to shoot only later. The two nobodies lived in the West. Bashar in London and Vladimir in Dresden. Neither one understood anything about the civilized world and its values. They remained barbarians.
Both live in fear of losing power. They have committed such crimes that they face only one path — to prison. Bashar, in fact, will be quite lucky if he makes it to a prison cell.
They really need each other. Without Assad Putin is nothing in world politics. He has lost in Ukraine. The Russian economy is dying. Syria represents his only chance to prove that he must be reckoned with.
And Bashar without Vladimir cannot hold on to anything. For him, it is a fiasco.
And this is why they gaze at each other so lovingly. As twin brothers. With hope and understanding.
And they will lose together as well.