Chaos also gripped an Air Force intelligence branch elsewhere in the city, according to a soldier who gave only his first name, Mohammed, for fear of retribution from the rebels. As the rebels approached, orders came to defend the capital, he said. But on their phones, the soldiers saw images of their comrades elsewhere taking off their uniforms and running away.
After night fell, their orders changed.
“Burn everything: documents, files and hard disks,” Mohammed recalled being told. “At this moment, I and my colleagues all felt that the regime was falling.”
He, too, changed into civilian clothes and walked out of the base, he said.
Inside the palace, the hours ticked by as Mr. al-Assad’s aides waited for the speech, the insider recalled.
“The idea that he had fled never came to mind,” he said.
After midnight, they received a call telling them that the president had escaped, he said. Then the head of security for the area called to say that the guards were gone and that he was leaving, too.
Terror set in, the insider said, and he ran to his car, finding the palace empty and its gates open. He rushed into hiding, he said, concluding as he drove that there had never actually been a plan for a speech. It had, he believed, been a ploy to distract Mr. al-Assad’s staff while the president sneaked away.