As Hemingway once wrote about bankruptcy, the collapse of autocratic regimes tends to happen gradually and then suddenly—slowly and then all at once. This is not just a literary metaphor. A tyrant’s followers will only remain loyal to him as long as he can offer them protection from the wrath of their compatriots. Doubts about President Bashar al-Assad certainly slowly grew in Syria after his Russian backers began transferring men and equipment to Ukraine starting in 2022. The recent Israeli attack on the Hezbollah leadership prevented Iran, Assad’s other ally, from helping him.

After a well-organized, highly motivated group of armed opponents took the city of Aleppo on November 29, many of the regime’s defenders abruptly stopped fighting. Assad has disappeared. The scenes that followed today in Damascus – the toppling of statues, the taking of selfies in front of the dictator’s palace – are the same ones that will unfold in Caracas, Tehran or Moscow on the day that the soldiers of these regimes lose their trust lose the lead. and the public also loses its fear of these soldiers.

The similarities between these places are real, as Russia, Iran, Venezuela, North Korea and so far Syria all belong to an informal network of autocracies. Russian troops and mercenaries have fought in Ukraine, the Middle East and Africa over the past decade. Russian political and information operations actively aim to undermine, dominate or overthrow democratic governments in Moldova, Georgia and most recently Romania. Starting in 2015, Russian troops supported Assad in collaboration with Iran and its proxy Hezbollah. In Ukraine, Russia’s war is enabled by drones from Iran, soldiers and ammunition from North Korea, and covert aid from China. Russia, Iran, Cuba and China are working together to keep a regime in power in Venezuela that has also disastrously failed its people.

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Many of these are military conflicts, but Russian President Vladimir Putin also believes he is waging a war of ideas and has persuaded others to follow his lead. In both Syria and occupied Ukraine, Russia has consciously supported or created regimes that have not only sought to repress opponents but have also gone out of their way to blatantly disregard human rights and the rule of law – ideas it believes this includes the past. When Putin speaks of a new world order or a “multipolar world,” as he did again last month, this is what he means: He wants to build a world where his cruelty knows no bounds and where he and his fellow dictators enjoy impunity and in which there are no universal values, not even as aspirations.

The results are stark. Since 2011, the Syrian Network for Human Rights has documented more than 112,000 cases of enforced disappearances – men, women and children arbitrarily arrested and detained without formal or legal justification. The regime has tortured tens of thousands of people in brutal prisons, keeping them in the dark and banning them from any contact with the outside world. It is notorious that Assad used poison gas against his own people and then lied about it. Joint airstrikes by the Russian and Syrian governments targeted hospitals and carried out “double-tap” attacks, bombing a civilian target and hitting the same location soon after, killing rescue workers.

Russia’s war against Ukraine was equally cruel and lawless, in many cases copying the tactics used in Syria. Thousands of mayors, local leaders, teachers and cultural workers have also disappeared in invisible custody in occupied Ukraine. The former mayor of Kherson, kidnapped in June 2022, is reportedly being held in an illegal prison in Crimea; The mayor of Dniproprudne recently died in custody. In the rest of Ukraine, Russia is targeting hospitals and other civilian infrastructure, just as Russian and Syrian government aircraft did in Syria. Double tap attacks are also common in Ukraine.

Read: Syria’s new Assad statues send a grim message: ‘We are back’

There is a logic to this kind of cold, deliberate and well-planned cruelty: brutality is meant to breed hopelessness. Ridiculous lies and cynical propaganda campaigns are designed to fuel apathy and nihilism. Arbitrary arrests have forced millions of Syrians, Ukrainians and Venezuelans abroad, creating large, destabilizing waves of refugees and leaving those who remain in despair. Despair is again part of the plan. These regimes want to deprive people of any ability to plan a different future in order to convince them that their dictatorships are eternal. “Our leader forever” was the slogan of the Assad dynasty.

But all of these “eternal” regimes have one fatal flaw: soldiers and police officers are also members of the public. They have relatives who are suffering, cousins ​​and friends who are experiencing political oppression and the effects of economic collapse. They too have doubts and they too can become insecure. In Syria we have just seen the result.

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I don’t know if today’s events will bring peace and stability to Syria, let alone freedom and democracy. A group calling itself the National Transitional Government has reportedly issued a statement calling on Syrians to “unite and stand together,” “rebuild the state and its institutions,” and initiate “comprehensive national reconciliation.” including the return of all refugees. Leaders of the rebel armies include Islamic extremists; In an interview with CNN, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the leader of the largest group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, described his former affiliation with al-Qaeda as something of a youthful mistake. This may be tactical language or propaganda, or it may be unimportant. As I write, Syrians in Damascus are looting the presidential palace.

Nevertheless, the end of the Assad regime is not only creating something new in Syria. There is nothing worse than hopelessness, nothing more soul-destroying than pessimism, sadness and despair. The fall of a regime supported by Russia and Iran suddenly offers the possibility of change. The future could be different. And this possibility will inspire hope around the world.