'They Vanished' Regime's forces melted away as rebels drew near

When the rebels finally reached Bashar al-Assad's sprawling palace in Damascus, the gates were open. There was no traffic on the floodlit highways leading into the vast estate, and apparently no defenders were waiting among the carefully tended trees. In the empty guardhouses, coats were still hung on the backs of doors.

- Jason Burke

Asked by the Guardian early yesterday what had happened to the tens of thousands of men of the armed forces, pro-government militias, intelligence services, police and others dedicated to the preservation of Assad's rule, one veteran Damascus-based analyst gave a terse answer: "They have vanished. Every single one."

The rebel coalition that has stormed into the Syrian capital, forcing the departure of Assad after 13 years of costly civil war, had meticulously prepared.

A year ago, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the dominant force, established a military college to organise the necessary resources.

The HTS-led coalition's first attack, from its stronghold of Idlib in the north-west a week ago, was on Aleppo, Syria's second city and commercial centre. Videos posted by the rebels on social media showed government armoured vehicles and tanks destroyed for negligible cost by drones - an entirely new capability developed over the previous year or so.

Equally important were units of shock troops known as the "red brigades" deployed as highly mobile units behind enemy lines.

Broderick McDonald, an associate fellow at King's College London, said: "The red brigades have six months' training and are often veteran fighters who are highly ideological. In Aleppo, they were sent in ahead for sabotage operations and assassinations of regime officials."