On June 12, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton raised U.S.-Russian tensions over the crisis in Syria by publicly accusing Russia of providing MI-25 attack helicopters to the Assad regime. Clinton detected, “We are concerned about the latest information we have that there are attack helicopters on the way from Russia to Syria.”
Accusations that Russia is supplying the Assad regime with weapons to attack civilians mark a significant hastening of tensions between the two countries caused by America’s frustration over the letdown of the UN peace plan for Syria. To nobody’s surprise, the accusations are currently being received with rage by the Putin administration in the short term, but there is a good chance that they could advance U.S. policy goals over the long term.