Ukraine - Russia Conflict
- Thread starter randomradio
- Start date
Russian President Vladimir Putin has landed in an unenviable position. His country has the resources to inflict damage on Ukraine in perpetuity. But because the first phase of the war has been so costly for Russia and because Ukraine’s military is mounting such stiff resistance, Russia faces serious difficulty achieving anything meaningful on the battlefield without committing much more manpower than it currently has available.
Calling up large numbers of reservists while putting Russian society openly on a war footing solves the problem in theory. But it is something for which the Russian public is fundamentally unprepared. To date, Putin has referred to the war in Ukraine as a “special military operation” and held only one mass rally in support of the war. Full-out mobilization, which would make war an inescapable fact of Russian life, would revolutionize the regime Putin has constructed since coming to power in 2000. Putinism has been a formula: the government discouraged people from meddling in politics, while leaving them mostly on their own, and the people readily surrendered their responsibility for decision making. In 2014, he could achieve his military aims in Ukraine without radically redefining Russian politics. That is no longer an option.
If Putin decides to mobilize, he will be altering the deal he’s made with the public and potentially destabilizing his regime. As the United States watches from the sidelines, it may feel tempted to encourage Russians to turn against Putin. Without having much or perhaps any real influence on Russian public opinion, however, the Biden administration can do its best to avoid costly mistakes. Most important will be its effort to understand how and why Russians think what they do. In the long-term conflict that is unfolding, curiosity will be a precious commodity.... cont.
Foreign and Ukrainian journalists came under direct shelling in Ukraine, several journalists, including the Ukrainian military, were injured.
The Ukrainians committed a war crime there?
The Russians evacuated from a town to create a demilitarised zone for the evacuation of civilians, and the Ukrainians launched an attack at that point.