Newspaper & online reporters and analysts explore the cultural and news stories of the week, with photos frequently added by Esco20, and reveal their significance (with a slant towards Esco 20's opinions)
Last week Ukraine announced offensive operations across the south. This week it said it had recaptured significant territory on multiple fronts in the key northeastern battleground of Kharkiv, where dozens of villages and towns have been under Russian occupation for six months.
The government has imposed sweeping restrictions on reporting in the area, so it was difficult to independently verify its claims or to gauge the toll of the fighting on either side. Ukrainian and Western officials cautioned that the situation was fluid and that gains were far from secure.
But accounts from witnesses, the local Ukrainian authorities, Russian proxy officials, geo-located video on social media and satellite footage all offer a window into the Ukrainian operations now being fought on multiple fronts.
The Ukrainians have pushed past the town of Balakliya, less than 30 miles from the city of Izium, a critical logistical base of operations for Russian forces across eastern Ukraine. They appeared to be advancing east toward Kupiansk, another key railway hub, in a bid to encircle Russian forces in Izium.
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Credit...Source: Institute for the Study of War | By The New York Times
The rapid advance appears to have caught the local Russian authorities by surprise.
The offensive is “eroding confidence in Russian command to a degree not seen since a failed Russian river crossing in mid-May,” the Institute for the Study of War said.
Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that Ukraine had made tangible gains in recent days, but he sought to temper expectations.
Citing the attacks around Kharkiv, the director of the C.I.A., William Burns, said that Russia had underestimated Ukraine’s capacity for combat and that it was “hard to see Putin’s record in the war as anything but a failure.”
September 7, 2022
The total U.S. military assistance for Ukraine comes to more than $15 billion under the Biden administration.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Thursday in Germany that the new $675 million in military aid will include rockets for multiple-launch rocket systems, 105 mm howitzers and antitank systems. Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced during a trip to Ukraine $2 billion in foreign military financing to help Ukraine and 18 other countries in the region bolster their security against Russian aggression, State Department officials said.
Ukrainian residents of the frontline town of Bakhmut waited with their bags to be evacuated on Tuesday.Credit...David Guttenfelder for The New York Times
That means that about 30 percent of the country’s estimated prewar population of 41 million has been forced from their homes, amounting to by far the largest migration crisis in Europe since the aftermath of World War II.
And that is hardly the full the toll. The country does not release public counts of military casualties, and civilian casualties in areas overrun by Russia are guesses, at best, but officials estimate tens of thousands of Ukrainians have been killed and many more wounded. Major cities and smaller towns have been leveled. Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said Tuesday that at least 140,000 residential buildings had been destroyed or damaged, robbing 3.5 million people of their homes.
And each day, the bloodshed, dislocation and devastation grow. Two civilians were killed and five others badly injured trying to flee Russian-held territory in the southern Kherson region on Monday, Ukrainian officials said. The administrator of the neighboring Kryvyi Rih region said Russian forces had fired on their red minibus at “point-blank range.”
In the east, the focus of recent Russian offensives, an emergency evacuation train carrying “women, children, elderly people, many people with reduced mobility” made its way on Tuesday morning to safer territory in the west, Iryna Vereshchuk, a deputy prime minister, said in a statement.
President Volodymyr Zelensky has pleaded with some 200,000 civilians in the east to evacuate the already depopulated areas near the front lines, where Russian artillery has laid waste to whole towns. But many cannot leave — because of age, illness or Russian attacks — and others will not, including Russian sympathizers and the merely stubborn. Most already lack essential infrastructure such as power, heat and clean water.
If they wait until cold weather sets in, there will be little the government in Kyiv can do for them, Ms. Vereshchuk said. By then, Russia may have resumed major offensive operations.
A month after seizing full control of the Luhansk region, the easternmost part of Ukraine, President Vladimir V. Putin’s Russian forces are regrouping for an expected push to conquer what they do not already hold of the neighboring Donetsk region. But the combat never fully lets up, and every day the Russians still pound targets around the country.
The Kremlin insists that it strikes only military targets, a claim belied by images of ruined apartment blocks, houses, schools, farms, hospitals and shops.
U.S. lawmakers have pressured the Biden administration to label Russia a state sponsor of terror, a designation that Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken has so far resisted. On Tuesday, Russia’s foreign ministry warned that it could react to such a move by cutting off direct relations with Washington, along with taking unspecified other measures.
“A logical result of this irresponsible step could be the breaking off of diplomatic relations, after which Washington runs the risk of crossing the point of no return with all the ensuing consequences,” said Maria Zakharova, the ministry spokeswoman.
Russia’s Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that Ukraine’s Azov Regiment, a group with far-right roots whose members made a last stand in Mariupol, was a terrorist organization. That could clear the way for Russia to criminally charge captured Azov soldiers with terrorism, rather than treating them as prisoners of war.
Last Friday, an explosion at a prison in the Donetsk region killed more than 50 of the Azovstal fighters taken prisoner by Russians. Each side has blamed the other for the explosion.
Bad choices, of his own making, are all he has left, experts said.
Unleash the full fury of firepower he's amassed on Ukrainian cities, and Putin risks killing thousands of civilians and destroying homes, buildings and roads. Surround the population centers, choke off water, food and electricity, and Putin assembles the ingredients for a humanitarian catastrophe. Send in ground forces to take control, and Putin invites a blood bath that kills Ukrainians and sends troops in body bags back to Russia.
A building burns after shelling in Kyiv, Ukraine, Thursday, March 3, 2022. Russian forces have escalated their attacks on crowded cities in what Ukraine's leader called a blatant campaign of terror.
Putin's initial plan unraveled, resting on the assumption that Ukrainian officials and troops would capitulate quickly. Instead, the spirited resistance from Ukrainians and poor performance by his own troops have left Putin and his military commanders frustrated and behind schedule, according to a senior Defense Department official.
The Pentagon and military experts expect Putin's forces to regroup, encircle cities and lay siege, shelling and bombing them until they surrender. The Russians will probably seize control of the cities, but deep, hardened resistance awaits them.
"Then it's kind of a giant Alamo," said Colin Smith, an expert on the Russian military at the Rand Corp. "It's an Alamo (Ukrainians) can sustain for quite a long time if they've got the ammunition. They have the deepest subways in the world. It's their backyard. They could fight for a very, very long time."
A man passes the remains of Russian military vehicles in Bucha, near the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, on March 1.
Food and fuel shortages, along with poor training, have contributed to poor morale among Russian troops, according to the defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence findings. The main Russian force arrayed against Kyiv remains stuck about 15 miles from the city's center.
"There's enough evidence that there are Russian soldiers who do not want to fight and are not on board with killing Ukrainians," Smith said. "There's equipment that's been left behind, and they didn't just run out of gas. There's equipment that's been just left behind wholesale – perfectly working equipment – with no Russian soldiers in sight."
Shelling damaged buildings in Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-biggest city of Kharkiv, on March 3. Ukraine and Russia agreed to create humanitarian corridors to evacuate civilians in a second round of talks since Moscow invaded.
Even if Russian forces overrun major cities, the invasion force of 190,000 troops in and around Ukraine is not large enough to control a largely hostile population of more than 40 million, said Seth Jones, senior vice president and director of the international security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"It will likely be difficult for the Russian army to hold territory for long with such a small ratio of soldiers to local inhabitants," Jones said. "High numbers of troops are critical for establishing law and order."
Another problem for a Russian force spread too thin: Ukraine's open western border, through which U.S. and NATO allies have funneled weapons, ammunition and supplies. In the past week, up to $240 million worth of arms, including anti-tank missiles, crossed into the country, according to a second senior Defense Department official.
Gutted Russian military vehicles obstruct a road in the town of Bucha, close to Kyiv, Ukraine, on March 1.
"Russian forces are unable to interdict the growing flow of anti-tank missile systems, surface-to-air missile systems, fighters, artillery, small arms, ammunition and other material flowing into Ukraine," Jones said. "There is virtually no case since World War II of an occupying army successfully pacifying a local population when the insurgency has support from a great power."
Smith raised a darker possibility: Putin has no interest in occupying Ukraine. Instead, Smith said, he wants to crush its government and military, leaving a country incapable of aligning with or joining NATO, even though that is not an imminent possibility.
"I don't think Russia could ever control Ukraine," Smith said. "That was never their intent. I think they just honestly want Ukraine to be a buffer. Regardless of what government goes back into Ukraine, Ukraine has been left so decapitated it can’t field a viable military. It's not going to join NATO, or NATO decides against even considering it. You've created a wasteland buffer."
Putin will attempt to convince Russians that the war in Ukraine was waged to prevent NATO from threatening Russia.
"Can he sustain the spin to stay in power? That will be determined on how long this conflict goes on," Smith said. "Time is on Ukraine’s side. Every day that you can stand in his way is in their favor. But it's also another day that another building and hundreds of civilians are at risk. There's no good outcome at this point."
If the broader patterns of war apply, Russian president Vladimir Putin is making the war as senselessly brutal as possible, likely hoping to force Ukraine to give in quickly before global sanctions completely crush Russia and the return of warm weather eases Europe’s need for Russian oil and gas.
Russian shelling has created a humanitarian crisis in urban areas, and last night, a brief ceasefire designed to let residents of Mariupol and Volnovakha escape the cities through “humanitarian corridors” broke down as Russian troops resumed firing, forcing the people back to shelter. This morning, Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky spoke to more than 280 members of the U.S. Congress to describe Ukraine’s “urgent need” for more support, both military and humanitarian.
Today, Putin said that the continued resistance of President Zelensky and his government threatens Ukraine’s existence. He also said that the sanctions imposed against Russia, Russian companies, Russian oligarchs and their families, and himself by the global alliance arrayed against him are “akin to a declaration of war.” (Remember, saying things doesn’t make them so; words are often a posture.)
The global economic pressure on Russia and the Russian oligarchs is already crushing the Russian economy—today Mastercard and Visa suspended operations in the country—while other countries’ refusal to sell airplane parts, for example, will soon render Russian planes useless, a major crisis for a country the size of Russia. Meanwhile, support is pouring into Ukraine: aside from the military support coming, yesterday the World Bank said it was preparing ways to transfer immediate financial support.
There are suggestions, too, among those who study military strategy that the Russian invasion has been far weaker than they expected. The Russian forces on paper are significantly stronger than those of Ukraine, and by now they should have established control of the airspace. Ground forces are also not moving as efficiently as it seems they should be.
Today, Phillips P. O’Brien, Professor of Strategic Studies at University of St Andrews, outlined how the Russian military, so impressive on paper, might in fact have continued the terrible logistics problems of the Soviet Union. On the ground, they appear to have too few trucks, too little tire maintenance, out-of-date food, and too little fuel. In the air, they are showing signs that they cannot plan or execute complicated maneuvers, in which they have had little practice.
Russia expert Tom Nichols appeared to agree, tweeting: “Ukrainian resistance has been amazing, but I am astonished—despite already low expectations—at how utter Russian military incompetence has made a giant clusterf**k out of an invasion against a much weaker neighbor.”
Meanwhile, Russians are now aware that they are at war—something that Putin had apparently hidden at first—and a number are protesting. The government has cracked down on critics, and rumors are flying that Putin is about to declare martial law. It appears he is already turning to mercenaries to fight his war. The U.S. government has urged all Americans to leave Russia.
And so, time is a key factor in this war: will Russian forces pound Ukraine into submission before their own country can no longer support a war effort?
Closer to home, the Russian war on Ukraine has created a crisis for the Republican Party here in the U.S.
Aaron Blake of the Washington Post reported on Thursday that after Trump won the 2016 election and we learned that Russia had interfered to help him, Republicans’ approval of Putin jumped from about 14% to 37%.
In the Des Moines Register today, columnist Rekha Basu explained how the American right then swung behind Putin because they saw him as a moral crusader, defending religion and “traditional values,” from modern secularism and “decadence,” using a strong hand to silence those who would, for example, defend LGBTQ rights.
Now, popular support has swung strongly against the Russian leader—even among Republicans, 61% of whom now strongly dislike the man. This is widening the split in the Republican Party between Trump supporters and those who would like to move the party away from the former president.
In a tweet today, Representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) referred to the “Putin wing” of the Republican Party when she shared a video clip of Douglas Macgregor, whom Trump nominated for ambassador to Germany and then appointed as senior advisor to the Secretary of Defense, telling a Fox News Channel host that Russian forces have been “too gentle” and “I don’t see anything heroic” about Zelensky.
Possibly eager to show their participation in Ukraine’s defense, when Zelensky spoke to Congress this morning, two Republican senators—Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Steve Daines (R-MT)—shared screenshots of his Zoom call while it was going on, despite the explicit request of Ukraine’s ambassador not to share details of the meeting until it was over, out of concern for Zelensky’s safety.
In an appearance on Newsmax, Trump’s secretary of state John Bolton pushed back when the host suggested that the Trump administration was “pretty tough on Russia, in a lot of ways.” Bolton said that Trump “barely knew where Ukraine was” and repeatedly complained about Russian sanctions. Bolton said Trump should have sanctioned the Nord Stream 2 pipeline between Russia and Germany, rather than letting it proceed, and concluded: “It’s just not accurate to say that Trump's behavior somehow deterred the Russians.”
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