Military success in Syria gives Putin upper hand in proxy war with US

Washington: The Syrian military was foundering last year, with thousands of rebel fighters pushing into areas of the country long considered to be government strongholds. The rebel offensive was aided by powerful tank-destroying missiles supplied by the CIA and Saudi Arabia.

Intelligence assessments circulated in Washington that the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, was losing his grip on power.

But then the Russians arrived, bludgeoning CIA-backed rebel forces with an air campaign that has sent them into retreat. And now rebel commanders, clinging to besieged neighbourhoods in the divided city of Aleppo, say their shipments of CIA-provided anti-tank missiles are drying up.