The time came to bend your knee – or at least bend to reality.

A delegation of Russian diplomats arrived last Tuesday in the White SUV caravan at Damascus and the unenviable task: lay the foundations for Russia to retain their military bases in Syria, less than two months after the rebels preferred Moscow’s preferred power, Bashar al- Assad.

To do this, the delegation should win over the people that the Russian army was ruthlessly, helping Mr. Al-Assad for years.

Wait them were Ahmed al-Sharawho survived the decade of Russian air attacks to appear as a new temporary leader in Syria. He stood in the presidential palace and faced the Kremlin envoys for the long -awaited account.

The conversations that followed, the first between Moscow and Damascus from the end of the nearly 14-year war, ended the draw. But they marked the beginning of potentially drawn negotiations on what role, if any, they would play in post -war Syria, losing his offer keep Mr. Al-Assad in power.

The meeting showed the type of geopolitical trading of horses that began after the Civil War in Syria-S potential to rewind the Middle East. World forces are sent to influence, because Syrian new leadership tries to win legitimacy, security and help through disciplined and stone-shaped realpolitics.

“I think the general air is in Damascus:” We Syrians do not need a fight with Kim at the moment, including our former enemies, “said Charles Lister, an older colleague of the Middle East Institute in Washington. games.”

Still, the Russians asked to make concessions. Mr. Al-Shara emphasized that all new relations with Moscow “have to deal with past mistakes” and requested the compensation for the destruction that Russia has caused, his government states.

He also demanded that Moscow surrender Mr. Al-Assad And his best associates face justice, according to two officials in the Government of the Guardian with the knowledge of the meeting.

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, a former spy that rewards loyalty, would almost certainly not agree. Asked the day after the meeting whether Mr. Al-Shara asked for the extradition of Mr. Al-Assad, a spokesman for Mr. Putin refused to comment.

Mr. Al-Shara otherwise seemed surprisingly comfortable to cooperate with Russia, unlike Iran, Another key ally of Mr. Al-AssadWhat new authorities in Damascus say is no longer welcome in Syria.

In an interview with the BBC at the end of December, Mr. Al-Shara quoted Syrian “longtime strategic relations” with Moscow and said that “he was not in a hurry to get Russia out of Syria, as some people imagine.”

In a separate interview with Saudi State Television, he noted that Russia has been supplying the Syrian army weapons for decades and providing experts who manage power plants in Syria. Implication: Damascus may need Russia in the future.

“They are absolutely desperate for legitimacy and international support,” Mr. Lister said of new Syrian leaders. “The application of any major international rupture would be the worst thing you could consider.”

In addition to the possible delivery of oil and cereals from Russia, what Mr. Al-Shara should do not play a spoiler in her effort to reconstruct Syria and build a government, said Hanna Notte, analyst at James Martin Center for Non-Welky Studies.

“This is a country now, politically watched, built from the ashes,” she said. She noted that Russians are permanent members of the UN Security Council and could prevent Mr. Al-Shar in many ways, if they decide not to be “political well-meaning”.

Mr. Al-Shara himself noted that Russia was considered to be the second most powerful military army and said that his newly established government was unable to oppose great forces.

At the meeting, where Russia represented his top envoy of the Middle East, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Mihail Bogdanov, it seemed that no side was in a hurry to make any big decisions. What the rest of the world, and especially the United States, the European Union, Turkish and Saudi Arabia, requires new Syrian leaders could also affect the fate of Russia.

In recent weeks, Damascus has arrived in a rush of diplomats from these and other countries to get acquainted with Mr. Al-Shar.

Russia wants to retain its naval base in the Mediterranean in Truthus, which dates back to the Soviet era. Also tries to maintain the air base of Hmeimim beyond Lataki, which Moscow used as the center of supply and stop for expeditional operations in Africa. Until now, the new Syrian authorities have not said no, and Russia has been placed, despite moving the materials from the base.

Syrian pragmatic rhetoric returned in Moscow.

After years of defending the Assad regime on the battlefield and in the United Nations, Russian leaders have encouraged the loss of their longtime ally as a victory and expanded the olive to new authorities, which Moscow has long denied as terrorists.

“I would call it improvised opportunism,” Mrs. Notte said. “It’s a fairly extraordinary turn.”

Mr. Putin, speaking in December at an annual press conference, said Russia had won and did not lose, in Syria, because Moscow prevented the country from becoming a terrorist enclave. He said he had not yet seen Mr. Al-Assad, even though he had at some point committed to meeting him. It is unclear if they have met since then.

The Russian leader offered the use of Russian bases to provide humanitarian aid to the Syrian people, which was just a few weeks before the Russian air attacks.

There he would hold the presence of Russia, he said, only if the Moscow interests were coincided with those political forces who took control.

In the United Nations, the Russian ambassador, Vasily Nedenzya, said in January that these forces were “behaving quite competent.” The friendship of Russia and Syria, he emphasized, “not associated with any regime.”

He carried a navy suit and a relationship of Mr. Al-Shara with a meeting with Russian delegates, which is the past while the Al Qaeda fighter turned into an Islamist rebel leader. Thus, his non -confrontation rhetoric followed in conversations and his recognized willingness to do beautiful with former enemies, including the United States.

Mr. Al-Shara welcomed a delegation of a top-notch statue of the December, despite spending time in Iraq closed by US forces and the US government appointed a $ 10 million value terrorist. (Washington withdrew its wealth after the interview.)

Mr. Al-Shara need relief of sanctions from the United States, as well as the support of Washington in the Security Council, for Syria to begin economic recovery and approaches to international assistance.

The United States also still have troops on the ground, supporting the forces leading Kurdska in northeast Syria that Mr. Al-Shara does not control. He stated his desire to hold the state whole, which would include the territory, where Washington supported local forces to destroy the Islamic State.

European officials visited Damascus and offered a path to sanctioning relief, but made it clear that they did not approve of retaining Russian military presence in the country.

It is not clear how Trump’s administration will approach the issue. In December, as the Assad regime fell, Mr. Trump on social networks said that the war in Syria “is not our struggle” and that the United States should not have anything to do with it.

The question of Mr. Al-Assad’s fate adds the sensitive nature of the negotiations between Moscow and Damascus.

Mr. Al-Shara is still trying to establish a legitimacy among the Syrian people and various Syrian groups, and prone to a contract with Russia as he was killed by a strong man who killed so much Syrian could underestimate his position. This is one of the reasons why delaying any commitment to Moscow could make sense.

Mr. Lister described the request for Mr. Al-Assad as a maximum initial request, characteristic of an early stage negotiations.

“It achieves a mark in terms of setting the principle:” We may be ready to be pragmatic today, but we have not forgotten history, “said Mr. Lister.” Russian Saucenevo in all kinds of war crimes in Syria is not something Syrians will soon forget. “

Within Syria, Mr. Al-Shara still conducts the remains of the forces of the Assad regime to consolidate control; Moscow could make that task difficult.

Although the loss of base in Syria would suffocate the power of Russia in the region, Moscow has other options. The Kremlje’s support of the military ruler of East Libya could offer an alternative place for a Russian Navy base in the Mediterranean. Already, Russia used libiyan air base for flights.

The status of a Russian base in Syria may not get rid of it soon.

“I think both sides benefit from delaying the negotiations of the fate of the base,” said Anton Mardasov, a Russian expert on military affairs focused on Syria. “Moscow can preserve its image, because it has already been able to withstand as long as possible and not go immediately after the fall of the Assad regime, and Damascus can negotiate the abolition of sanctions for now.”