last time the Russian mercs had no idea what forces they faced and as you said they were “annihilated’ filling all available beds in Moscow and At Pete hospitals plus over Russian 200 dead.
Now the Russian have brought up their advanced jamming units, and they have been playing havoc with our air to ground coms among others making it difficult to impossible for AC130s and arty. Now the Russian navy has taken up positions we uses to launch missiles into Syria.
Will be different this time
Or maybe it is this ... Mattis sending in 100 more marines is saying “Don’t push it, or I give you a war you won’t believe”.