Putin’s 15-year record of executing a more aggressive foreign policy suggests he will intensify Moscow’s role in the conflict rather than retreat in fear of further retaliation by the Islamist extremists now in Russia’s sights. Putin’s flexing of military muscle has fanned Russian national pride and boosted his image as a powerful leader capable of restoring the former superpower’s leading place in the post-Soviet world order.

Kremlin analysts say Putin is likely to take an unwavering stand against Islamic State, which he has equated with the Nazi scourge of the last century. The militants hold more than half of Syrian territory as well as large swaths of neighboring Iraq, and have declared their intent to destroy Western infidels, which they now consider to include Russians.

Putin’s decision in late September to send troops, ships and air power to the government-controlled western coast of Syria could also be viewed as defensive or preemptive. An arc of vulnerable Central Asian states and predominantly Muslim communities in Russia’s Caucasus region is all that stands between Russia and Islamic State’s proclaimed caliphate to the south and Taliban-imperiled Afghanistan to the southeast.