SAA has been outnumbered at Hama since the beginning, falling back eventually was the expectation, the only question is how much time they bought. There's no sense in holding positions when outnumbered, throwing men into defending land for propaganda is why Ukraine now has to conscript 18 year olds.
All parties know if Iran send troops and Russia divert their airforce ISIS will lose, conversely if they do nothing Syria will fall. So the first question is will Russia and Iran abandon Syria, and second question is if not can they arrive in time.
If you believe Russia and Iran has abandoned Syria, then Russia will pull out of their bases, Assad will be in Russia and SAA will be surrendering rather than retreating. If on the other hand Russia and Iran hasn't abandoned Syria, then SAA's objective becomes buying time and Russia will be flying sorties to slow down ISIS advance while bombing Idlib to degrade logistics.
The war wasn't frozen in a satisfactory state but NATO is desperate and it's unfrozen now, unfrozen means it can go either way, it could mean fall of Syria, or it could mean much more satisfactory condition with even greater Iranian presence on Israel's border.
We already went through this 10 years ago, nobody thought Russia would even join and after they did most thought Russia won't make a difference. A lot has changed in the last 10 years but Iran and Russia are certainly no closer to NATO.
