Putin intends to compensate for his losses in Syria by attacking Georgia again

The fall of Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad and Russia's indifference to it show that for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin it is more important to inflict a decisive defeat on Ukraine, according to an article in the American magazine Foreign Affairs .
The publication analyzed the consequences of the fall of the Assad regime for Russia and came to the conclusion that Putin is ready to sacrifice everything, including the country's previous successes in the Middle East, for the sake of a complete victory in the war in Ukraine.
It is noted that Moscow successfully helped Assad restore military and political control over most of Syria, but was unable to deal a decisive blow to the resistance in the long term. Russia also failed to promote economic development in Syria.
After all, it is claimed, "the Russians always looked at the Syrian expedition with caution and indifference," since the idea of sending soldiers to a distant Muslim country evoked memories of the Soviet war in Afghanistan. But now, with the collapse of the Assad regime, Putin can focus on the war in Ukraine, even though Russia's allies - the "exporter of stability and regime security" - still expected more from him than just saving the life and freedom of the Syrian dictator.
At the same time, Putin's decision to prioritize Ukraine, the newspaper notes, should not be confused with a complete renunciation of Russian ambitions beyond its immediate neighborhood. Rather, the loss of Syria has simply raised the stakes of the war in Ukraine.
"In Putin's scheme, Ukraine has become a tipping point in the global struggle between Western elites and a new Russian-led order: when Ukraine falls, Russia hopes to seize Georgia and any other territory it desires and resell itself as a powerful patron to countries around the world," the newspaper suggests.
To this day, Russia continues to occupy 20 percent of Georgia’s territory and impose its will on the people there, including by claiming the transfer of strategically important lands in Abkhazia to Russia and taking steps to establish a permanent naval base in Ochamchire.