In the absence of a diplomatic solution, confidence was running high in the White House that a limited military airstrike campaign was the most feasible strategy that would prevent the usage of chemical weapons in Syria.

Even a viable path through the UN Security Council had been dismissed by openly blaming Russia for holding the council hostage and thereby shirking its international responsibilities.

Events drastically turned around on September 9, when Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov announced a deal with his Syrian counterpart that would put Syria's chemical arsenal under some form of international control. A breakthrough was made Saturday when the US and Russia reached an agreement on securing and destroying Syria's chemical weapons.

The last minute deal stopped US President Barack Obama's Syria policy dead in its tracks and revealed the utter diplomatic failure of the US State Department in avoiding a military solution.

There is a lot of blame to go around in Washington right now, but Secretary of State John Kerry bore the brunt of the onslaught.

It was his rhetorical remark that offered the loophole the Syrian government was able to exploit.

And it was his department that was unable to achieve what the Kremlin finally did.

Indeed, the White House was quick to loosen its war stance and instead celebrate the threat of US force as a trigger for opening up diplomatic channels.

But there is little to celebrate about when justice for the victims of the gas attacks is nowhere to be found and the killing in Syria is going to continue unabated.

It is confusing and frightening to see that the world's only superpower has surrendered its moral mandate. It was never about the hundreds and thousands of victims whose videos and pictures were causing rolling tears among members of Congress. It was not about the future of Syria, nor was it about upholding international law that was at the heart of US foreign policy.

The Obama administration has been exposed as a warmongering and confused administration that was following the old strategy of using military force rather than exhausting diplomatic means.

The great winner of this episode is Russia, a nation Washington has forgotten to take seriously after the downfall of the Soviet Union.

Russia's diplomatic influence was never really gone. From its pragmatic intervention to strike a deal in the Kosovo conflict that saved NATO in 1999, to the recent embarrassment it caused Washington in the Edward Snowden affair after offering the whistleblower asylum, Russia has been steadily rising out of the ashes, not through military means, but through diplomatic finesse.

Russia has been adamantly creative and skillful behind the scenes to present itself as a credible neutral third party to a lot of conflicts across the world.

While the Kremlin's current solution on Syria is also running short of stopping the civil war, the Russians have made significant progress in presenting the Syrian government as a party that can be integrated in a diplomatic process.

It remains to be seen whether Washington can regain its footing and recover its moral high ground on Syria.

But for the moment the White House strategy of supporting a Syrian opposition that is both fractured and ridden by Islamic extremists has come to an end.

Stefan Soesanto, an MA graduate from Seoul-based Yonsei GSIS University