Shoigu.

This is coolbert:

WHO will be first? That is the question?

Once more from the latest edition of the DEBKAfile newsletter:

Prestige is at stake. NO ONE wants to be second.

"Shoigu in Damascus, Tehran for anti-ISIS drive"

13 September.

"After a tense conversation with Bashar Assad in Damascus Tuesday, Sept. 12, DEBKAfile's military and intelligence sources discovered the Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu had flown secretly to Tehran the next day. He then proceeded directly to Sochi to brief President Vladimir Putin on his mission, which was to assert Russian control of Syrian-Iranian-Hizballah operations against ISIS on the Syrian-Iraqi border."

. . . .

"As of Wednesday evening, the SDF [combined Kurdish-Arab forces allied in opposition to ISIL] was just 6 km away from Deir Ez-Zour, ahead of the Russian-backed armies which were taking the brunt of ISIS attacks."

Hezbollah overland relief of the besieged Syrian army garrison vicinity Deir Ez-Zor stalled?

coolbert.