Cruise missiles fired from warships, the latest jets pounding far-off targets: Russian President Vladimir Putin's show of strength in Syria looks aimed at proving that a resurgent Moscow can rival the West, analysts said, according to AFP.
Since late September Russia has flexed its muscles in a bombing campaign across the war-torn country that has put a US-led coalition in the shade and angered Washington and its allies.
The dramatic military campaign is Moscow's first outside the former USSR since Soviet troops went into Afghanistan in 1979 and has led some to suggest that an emboldened Kremlin is aiming to reassert some of its lost super power status.