Putin’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Week
But it made things worse for everyone else, too
After Ukraine’s successful counter offensive in Kharkiv, it was only a matter of time before Putin acted out. Last week, he did.
The Russian dictator launched an illegal, sham referendum in four regions of Ukraine: Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson. It’s a replay of his 2014 Crimea gambit when he conducted a referendum at the point of a gun. Shockingly, the people of Crimea “voted” to join Russia.
The international community declared it illegal and did not recognize the annexation but took no meaningful action. Putin didn’t pay a price for his hubris.
As I discussed on NPR’s 1A last week, here we are eight years later and he’s using the same tactic, but on a much larger scale. We all know the outcome of the five-day referendum — Ukrainians in the occupied regions are going to “vote” overwhelmingly to join Russia.
Images and videos of people being marched into polling places are spreading online. It is criminal.
Once again, the international community will condemn it in the strongest terms, because that’s what the community does. Putin and his lap dog Dmitri Medvedev have asserted that Russia will defend the territory it is stealing by whatever means necessary.
Bottom line: any attacks on “Russian territory” or attempts to reclaim the appropriated land would constitute an attack on Russia, and a nuclear response is on the table.
As ludicrous as it would be to use nuclear weapons today, it would also be ludicrous to dismiss it as an empty bluff. Putin has followed through with all his threats so far.
Back in January and February, many analysts (myself included) thought Putin was going to walk his invasion threat to the edge to force negotiations and concessions regarding NATO expansion and European security agreements. It seemed ridiculous to go forward with an invasion because he would make it impossible to gain any of the concessions he sought. Quite the opposite, his invasion reinvigorated NATO and Europe and drove Sweden and Finland to apply for NATO membership.
Putin forged ahead with his invasion, which was met with profound resistance in Ukraine, and the international community rallied to support the underdog. While Russia seized territory across much of Ukraine, it suffered severe losses in the process — senior commanders and some of Russia’s most advanced weaponry were casualties.
I had the chance to speak with one of Ukraine’s deputy defense ministers last week, Maj. Gen. (ret) Volodymyr Havrylov, and here’s some of what he had to say about Ukraine’s successful counteroffensive in the Kharkiv area:
First of all, Ukraine learned a lot from the previous six months of the war. Now we have very motivated and trained troops. And that is the core of the success, but of course because of the new weapon system, up-to-date modern weapon system we received from United States, first of all, and from our partners in Europe. It was a guaranteed supply of artillery and ammunition at the same time. We succeeded to stop Russian advancing first of all, and then, with that technological superiority and situational awareness, we started counteroffensive.
And we found that Russian army in the current shape and is in a very poor state. They lost the best troops and the most advanced systems during the first four months of the war, and now they're trying to fill the niche with the old-fashioned equipment and totally disoriented personnel. They lost a lot of officers and even generals during the first stage of the war. This way we see many Russian soldiers abandoning their positions and attempting to desert.
He said that Ukraine captured some 200 tanks and armored vehicles and enormous amount of ammunition. He also went on to list some of the weapons and supplies Ukraine is hoping the west will deliver, such as more drones, armored fighting vehicles, and winter gear.
So, it comes as no surprise that on the heels of the Russian humiliation in Kharkiv, Putin decided to hold the sham referendum, and he announced the mobilization of 300,000 reservists. That did not go over well in Russia. Protests broke out across the country.
The mobilization pierced the narrative bubble Putin had been maintaining about his “special military operation.” The call up of reservists — few of whom have combat experience, recent training, or functional equipment — signaled that things are not going well in Ukraine and the swift victory Putin promised is nowhere to be seen.
Adding to Putin’s bad press last week was a prisoner exchange negotiated by Saudi Arabia and Turkey. The exchange involved the release of 215 Ukrainians, including commanders of the controversial Azov Regiment.
Here’s the irony: the Azov Regiment formed as a paramilitary in 2014 in response to the Russian invasion of the Donbas, and at the time, there were avowed white supremacists and neo-Nazis in the force. Since then, the regiment has come under the control of the Ukrainian government and has cleaned up its ranks a bit, but there are still some hardcore people coming from around the world to join its ranks.
Hence, the Azov Regiment fits Putin’s narrative about Nazis in Ukraine. Yet, he agreed to release several of the regiment’s members in the prisoner exchange. That sent pundits and Putin cronies through the roof. If the operation was meant to de-Nazify Ukraine, and Putin just handed over members of a regiment with white supremacists and possibly neo-Nazis in its ranks, then what is the operation really about?
Plus, in exchange, Ukraine released about 50 Russians or pro-Russian Ukrainians, including Viktor Medvedchuk, a Putin ally in Ukraine who was under house arrest and escaped before the invasion.
Basically, Putin handed over 215 Ukrainians, including some that Russia would classify as Nazis, in exchange for a Putin lackey.
Furthermore, the UN General Assembly took place last week, and Putin did not fare well. Leaders from around the world denounced him and called on “fence sitting” nations to get on board with the anti-Russia nations.
There was one other piece of bad news for Russia at the United Nations last week. · A UN commission of inquiry announced findings to the Human Rights Council that Russia has committed war crimes, including the rape and torture of children, as wells as detentions and executions of civilians. The commission visited 27 towns and interviewed more than 150 people about Russian atrocities. The commission is continuing to investigate and will have further reports.
To recap, Putin responded to the Ukrainian counter offensive by staging a bogus referendum as a pretext to annexing territory in eastern and southern Ukraine, he started calling up reservists, and he agreed to a bad deal (for him) prisoner exchange. Now, more Russians are turning against him, Russian men are trying to flee the country to avoid ending up cannon fodder, world leaders are denouncing him, and Ukraine is even more motived to fight Russian troops who are in disarray.
A reasonable person would read the writing on the wall and sort out a face-saving exit and concoct a bogus narrative of victory to sell to the gullible back home. Instead, he’s upping the ante again with the threat of nuclear weapons.
Unfortunately, the only viable option for Ukraine and the west is to continue the slow bleed of Russia. The longer the war drags on, the greater the toll on Putin and Moscow. Europe will have more time to develop alternatives to Russian petroleum, although it’s going to continue to hurt in the short term. Ukraine will keep fighting, and Russia will not be able to replace equipment, weapons, and senior officers. Reservists and conscripts will be sent in as cannon fodder, and Russian public opinion will continue to turn.
It has all the hallmarks of Afghanistan in the 1980s. The Soviet Union (just as the United States did during the last 20 years) did not cut its losses. It stayed in the fight against the Mujahideen too long, and that accelerated the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The same dynamic could play out again if Putin doesn’t figure out a plan-B to get out of Ukraine. China is experiencing buyer’s remorse, and Iran is not in a great position to provide much help to Russia right now.
Of course, the problem with all of it is the ongoing human toll. It’s easy to talk analytically about turning this into a long grind to wear down Russia, but it means more death and suffering in Ukraine. And it means ripple effects across the world with refugees flooding into other countries and overwhelming a humanitarian system that is already beyond capacity dealing with Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, East Africa, the Sahel, and the list goes on.
I want to close with an excerpt from an earlier draft of my book about my reporting trip to Serbia, Kosovo, and Russia in October 2007. Kosovo was about to declare independence, and Russia was vehemently opposed. I met with Russia’s top diplomat in Pristina, Andrei Dronov, and here’s the excerpt:
Andrei was quite personable and well spoken. He gave me the “party line” on Russia’s historic affiliation with Serbia and its interests in Kosovo. He conceded that Russia’s self-interests coincided with the interests of the Serbs, so it was a convenient relationship as much as, if not more so than, it was historic.
We chatted for about 30 minutes, and by the end of the conversation it was clear that Russia saw itself as a player again and that it would use all international norms and bodies to assert itself on the world stage. For example, if Kosovo declared independence without agreement from Belgrade (which is what happened), Russia would view that as a violation of international law that could serve as a demonstration effect for pro-Russian enclaves in Georgia, Ukraine, or other former Soviet states to declare independence and align with Russia.
This is the weird thing about Russia over the last 15 years or so: it has pretty much told the world what it was going to do at every turn, and up until this year, it has paid little to no price for its foreign interventions, invasions, and annexations.