Over 7-8 December, much of Flightradar24’s most tracked flights list was occupied by flights to, from, or near Syria as rebels entered Damascus and news spread that Syria’s Bashar al-Assad had been deposed. With the Russian government announcing it had granted Assad and his family asylum and they were in Moscow, we began to ponder Assad’s possible paths to Russia.

The following options present to us the most likely scenarios, though there are certainly multiple variables that leave open the possibility of additional options.