Yesterday night, Belarusian soldiers would open the fire on a Polish patrol committed to defending the border from illegal immigrants pushed by the Lukashenko regime towards the eastern border of the European Union (read article). We do not know if any soldiers from Warsaw were injured, but we will tell you this episode because it helps to understand the evolution of the Russian-Ukrainian crisis.
Early in the morning, the head of the council of the Russian Federation accused Ukraine of preparing a military operation to manually regain control over the occupied parts of Donbass. Ukraine rejected this claim, reiterating that there is only a peaceful solution to the crisis with the Luhansk and Donesk oblast capitals currently occupied by pro-Russian militiamen (or Russian troops in disguise). However, this episode also connects to what is happening. Read on and you will understand why we have told you all this.
In the meantime, it should be noted that the movements of Russian troops - which NATO and Kiev are monitoring with growing alarm - concern, for now, mainly groups whose deployment and above all training has not been completed. On closer inspection, for now the Russians have done a great deal of ammunition, moving and relocating troops, without however significantly increasing the strength of their military threat, which since last April has been represented by about 130 military men deployed along the eastern borders of the country. 'Ukraine and the Crimea. This number of troops is not sufficient for a large-scale offensive, let alone to take entire cities as is the case of Kharkiv about which we had written in recent days, painting a possible scenario (read article).
According to the information gathered in the field, we only know that:
- The Russian National Guard has conducted a series of exercises in occupied Crimea and Belarus to test the use of such force in combat, we still do not know with what results.
- The Russian military is taking active steps to stockpile supplies of food, fuel, lubricants and other material resources
- There is no evidence of the availability of a significant number of medical facilities for use in strike operations, let alone in a ground invasion.
- With the exception of a few bomb alerts, all the critical indicators and intelligence signals that characterize the completion of the Russian army's preparations for a large-scale strategic offensive operation have not yet emerged.
In short, Putin's forces and resources appear at the moment decidedly insufficient to carry out the tasks of a large-scale operation, let alone ready for combat. For that, a lot of time and a significant amount of measures and resources will still be needed. Even if Russia initiates an offensive, it is legitimate to doubt Russia's ability to maintain the occupied territory amidst the resistance of the inhabitants, who by many times exceed the experience of Russian troops in Syria or during other armed conflicts in the country. last decades. It is impossible to calculate the course of this operation and, once it has begun, there is doubt of Moscow's ability to control the entire process: even if Putin dreams of putting the back on the United States thirty years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, no one in their right mind can forget that the American military budget exceeds the Russian one by twelve times (!!!), that the ability to invest in support of the eventual Ukrainian resistance on the part of the United States and the United Kingdom alone would be almost unlimited, that the chain logistics, starting with the Baltic, Poland and Romania, are all in Kiev's favor.
In conclusion, nowadays and for the weeks to come a large-scale offensive operation in an attempt to seize vast Ukrainian territories is an adventure that has no chance of success for Russia, indeed it would be nothing short of a suicide and would cost the current Putinian leadership much more than re-election in the next elections.
At the same time, there is a road that the media is ignoring but that is beautiful and wide open for the Kremlin. On January 19, the Russian Communist Party submitted a draft resolution to the Duma, proposing that parliament submit a request to President Vladimir Putin to recognize the Ukrainian breakaway regions of Donetsk and Luhansk as sovereign states. The resolution states that the recognition of these regions is necessary to protect their inhabitants "from external threats and the implementation of a policy of genocide". Duma chairman Viacheslav Volodin replied that members of the parliament of Putin's United Russia party are also concerned about the issue of protecting the lives of Russian citizens and compatriots living in Donetsk and Luhansk, prompting Volodin to hold consultations with party leaders to discuss the resolution1.
Strengthening discussions on the independence of Donetsk and Luhansk could aim to put further pressure on Ukraine to make concessions to Russia. If Putin decides to recognize these regions as sovereign states, he would put an end to the 2014 and 2015 Minsk peace accords in which Russia participated as a mediator between Ukrainian government authorities and self-proclaimed republics. Recognition of the two breakaway regions could also lay the groundwork for Russia to deploy military troops right there.
And here we come back to the story above, to the Polish patrol that has become a target for the Minsk troops. It is easy to think that the same thing could happen, and not once, to the troops in Kiev, sparking a chain reaction and potentially a conflict, in times when Moscow will be more ready for real war.
Meanwhile, also thinking about this scenario, on 7 and 8 February the foreign ministers of Slovakia, Austria and the Czech Republic will visit Kiev to "show full support to their Ukrainian friends".
1https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/russian-hybrid-thr...
Photo: Straz Graniczna
