- There will be parliament elections in mid april. Putin wants to keep Assad in charge, so no pipeline from the gulf to Europe will be built. A sovereign Assad caring and fighting for the country's fate will have more support than a puppet dependent on foreign help.
Additionally: all the foreign fighters in Syria will have no vote - and the legal residents know who to support and who to blame. Those strongly supportive to Assad are still in Syria, while the rest is somewhere.
- The "opposition" will have to show its will to find a peaceful solution in Geneva - just like Assad does. If they fall back to war, the western community of values will have to admit them to be the warmongers.
- ISIS stays a major western problem. It's our child, shall we care for this sting in our flesh. If it regains more power in Syria, the world community can observe who supports it.
- Turkey has no justification to call NATO for help against a Russian threat. The West may finally lose its patience with an Erdogan doing business with ISIS while bombing the Kurds.
- How long did it take the Russians to intervene, after they decided to do so? Could it happen again if necessary?
Edit: We may see some matching Russian behaviour soon to prevent the Iranian version of a pipeline (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Pipeline) passing south of Russian influence into Europe.