Assad Regime Collapse Could Leave Russia Without Critical Access to Mediterranean

Russia may lose its base at the Syrian port of Tartus after the fall of dictator Bashar Assad, which would deprive the Russians of their only fueling port on the Mediterranean Sea and cripple Moscow’s ability to threaten the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) from the south.

Newsweek on Monday quoted military analysts who saw signs of Russian forces pulling away from Tartus early in the rebel advance last week. Ukrainian intelligence said Russia has “withdrawn its warships” from the port, including a patrol ship and a dry cargo ship.

Satellite photography further showed two Russian naval vessels, the frigate Admiral Gorshkov and an auxiliary vessel, heading back to Russia from the Mediterranean. This would suggest the Russians do not feel comfortable about using the base at Tartus, at least for the time being.

The Russian Navy had five naval vessels and a submarine based at Tartus before the lightning-fast rebel insurgency broke out less than two weeks ago. The auxiliary ship spotted on its way back to Russia, the Yelnya, is an oiler whose functions would be indispensable to operating the other surface vessels.

Russia built the Tartus base in 1977, stopped using it after the Soviet Union fell, and resumed activities in 2015 when Moscow intervened in the Syrian civil war to save Assad. Russia signed a 49-year lease for the base with the Assad regime in 2019 – an agreement that was hailed at the time as a major step toward building a permanent military and economic relationship with Syria.

The Tartus naval base became even more important after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, because Moscow needed NATO to feel vulnerable along its southern flank. The Russians actually wanted to shift most of their Mediterranean fleet into the Black Sea to help against Ukraine, but Turkey refused to allow them to pass through the Dardanelles and Bosporus Straits. Russia contented itself with using its trapped Mediterranean warships to threaten NATO by making the Med risky for aircraft carriers.

The Russians also appear to be abandoning their air base at Khmeimim in Latakia province. Russia built the base in 2015 as a sign of its commitment to the Assad regime, and signed a 49-year-lease for the property in 2017.

Russia used the base to provide air support for its mercenary operations in Africa, in addition to helping the Syrian Army suppress insurgent groups, making the airbase strategically vital to Moscow. Khmeimim is only about 20 miles from the ground the insurgents covered in their swift march to Damascus, and it has been menaced with rocket and drone attacks in the past, so it would have seemed especially vulnerable to Russian military planners.

The Kremlin officially claims the fleet based at Tartus is merely conducting “large-scale naval exercises” rather than abandoning the port.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday that Russian officials are taking “necessary steps to establish contact in Syria with those capable of ensuring the security of military bases.” Other Kremlin sources told Russian state media that Syrian opposition leaders have given assurances that Russia’s military bases and diplomatic facilities will not be molested.

There is some evidence to support those claims, as Russia’s embassy in Damascus was left alone while gunmen stormed the Iranian embassy on Sunday.

Iran, like Russia, fought in Syria on behalf of the Assad regime. Iranian state media tried to spin the humiliating embassy attack by claiming the gunmen were not from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the al-Qaeda offshoot that led the insurgency to victory.