President Obama, addressing Russian intervention in Syria at a White House press conference, said Tuesday Iran and Syria President Bashar Assad represented Russia’s entire coalition “and the rest of the world makes up ours.”

He had this bit, too:

This is not a contest between the US and Russia. We’re not going to make Syria a proxy war between Russia and the United States. Our battle is with ISIL.

Putin is using it as part of the contest between Russia and us; he’s using Syria as one front of his proxy war with us.

Even accepting your assessments of the two coalitions as accurate, Mr Obama, who else does Putin need to defeat your policy, and you, especially given your clear lack of understanding of Russia’s presence?