real politik

In ten days of direct intervention on behalf of the Syrian government, Russian President Vladimir Putin has achieved what the West couldn't do in four years.
Mr Putin has almost overnight put an end to the Syrian civil war.
He has put Isis, the Muslim Brotherhood, and all the other Al Qaeda franchises in Syria on the run.
Already his exultant forces threaten the existence of the Isis caliphate enclave which had spilled over from western Syria into Iraq.
This particular charnel house in the world wide Jihad is coming to an end.
To do it, Mr Putin had to bomb the self same rebel factions which President Obama of the United States had been succouring.
Those Al Qaeda affiliates had been wrongly described by Mr Obama as pro Western freedom fighters.
They have been similarly and equally wrongly so described by commentators I respect, among them Charles Krauthammer on the Fox News Channel and Pat Robertson of the Christian Broadcast Network.
In my view Mr Krauthammer and Mr Mr Robertson are way off on this one.
There are no pro Western freedom fighters in Syria and there never were.
Al Qaeda hijacked this rebellion almost from the beginning.
Mr Obama's pro Western freedom fighters were in fact anti Western Jihadis.
Mr Obama's pro Western freedom fighters had in fact spent the past four years providing a buffer zone between the Isis Islamic State caliphate and the Syrian government forces of Bashar Al Assad.
The supposedly pro Western freedom fighting Jihadis were absolutely integral to what Isis was doing in the carving out of an Islamic State in western Syria, and to the creation of the grand illusion that Isis had a secure capital at Raqaa.
The pro Western rebels had spent four years running pass defence for Isis while Barack fed them, trained them, and armed them, and while four million Syrians simply left the country, two million of whom are currently attempting to force their way into Europe.
So the great buffer zone preventing Assad from moving against Isis was erected and maintained by Barack's wrongly described pro Western rebels.
Mr Putin went right through them and was absolutely correct to do so.
If we'd left it to Barack any longer we'd soon have had eight million Syrians trying to force their way into Europe.
Neither America nor Europe should allow President Barack Obama to embroil us further in his misguided and mendacious succouring of Jihadis in Syria.
Interestingly enough I have spent a lifetime waiting for the Assad regime to fall.
I have spent the past fifteen years hoping the Russians would opt for  something better than Putin whom I have deemed to be an amoral assassin of individuals and nations.
But I hold with Winston Churchill on these matters.
If Al Qaeda invaded hell I would at the very least give a favourable mention to the devil in the Heelers Diaries.
Let the Russians finish the job.