Syrian Crisis and Russian-Iranian Strategic Partnership

The Syrian crisis could be perceived as the most important international crisis in the recent decade. Despite its extensively varied regional and international ramifications and repercussions, this crisis has changed Iran-Russia cooperation patterns in significant way. Prior to the outbreak of crisis in Syria, Iran and Russia had limited, traditional cooperation at different junctures in Afghanistan, the Tajikistan civil war and some regional issues in the Central Asia and the Caucasus. However, the new era of Iranian-Russian relations in Syria exhibits a new level of bilateral relations. Thus, the current Iran-Russia bilateral ties could be assessed within the framework of strategic partnership. Iran-Russia strategic partnership pattern has emerged in line with three essential criteria of environmental uncertainty (popular uprisings in the Middle East), strategic fit (compatibility and complementarity of Iranian and Russian interests and resources) and the system principle (opposition to the US new hegemonic order and exercising efforts to institute a desired order in the Middle East). Compared to traditional patterns such as strategic alliance, thematicity and low commitment costs of the new pattern have encouraged Tehran and Moscow to pick it up. This paper attempts to answer this question: what mechanism underlies the development of Iran-Russia relations since the outbreak of the Syrian crisis?