If there is indeed a shift in strategy to another level of confrontation with Russia, we need to know what we’re getting into.
To judge by its latest statements, the Biden administration is increasingly committed to using the conflict in Ukraine to wage a proxy war against Russia, with as its goal the weakening or even destruction of the Russian state.
As calls grow for a ‘victory’ over Russia, we should examine whether such a win-lose outcome is even possible.
Tell me how this ends. General David Petraeus famously posed this question at the outset of the Iraq War in 2003.
Declaring someone irrational leads to a place in which no one wants to negotiate, because, no one wants to talk to crazy people.
A number of things about Putin’s invasion of Ukraine are not in doubt: that it was a deeply criminal act; that it has been accompanied by great brutality on the ground; that it was based on extremely faulty intelligence; and that in consequence it involved extremely serious political and strategic miscalculations.
On April 27, 2022, the Director of Russian Foreign Intelligence Service [SVR], Sergey Naryshkin, (whom Vladimir Putin publicly humiliated on the eve of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine) claimed that the Polish authorities are planning to take control of Ukraine. Russia has made these charges before[1] but Naryshkin now claimed that the assessments were backed by trustworthy sources.
Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala wants to convince his Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orbán to change his stance on Russia as Hungary is among the countries willing to pay for natural gas imports in roubles – a move unacceptable for Czechia despite its heavy Russian gas dependency.
The Greek government is expected to raise with its EU partners Ankara’s decision not to join western sanctions against Russia, questioning Turkey’s narrative of being a neutral broker, EURACTIV has learned.
“It’s inconceivable that Turkey has managed to escape western sanctions against Russia,” a source close to the matter told EURACTIV Greece.
Now, following Russia’s dramatic decision this week to cut gas supplies to Poland and Bulgaria, the West and its allies must give serious consideration to upgrading the level of military support they provide to Ukraine.
The real reason, though, [that Russia cut gas supplies] is that Russia is trying to blackmail Poland and Bulgaria, which have become high profile supporters of the Ukrainian war effort, to end their support for Kyiv.
“The FSB of the Russian Federation on 9th November 2016 in Sevastopol arrested members of a sabotage and terrorist group of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, who planned acts of sabotage on objects of military infrastructure and life support of the Crimea Peninsula. From the detainees was seized an explosive device of great power, weapons and ammunition, tools, means of special communications, and other material evidences of their criminal activities, including map schematics of the objects of the alleged acts of sabotage,” is a stingy-on-the-details message on the official website of the Russian FSB, which blew up today not only Ukrainian politicians and the media singing along with them, but the part of the Western press that usually stands on the side of the various color revolutions, coups, and other interventions in the affairs of other States.
The Ukrainian Deputy Minister on the issue of the occupied territories Georgey Tuka believes that a “Crimean scenario” is being prepared in Kharkov. On November 9, he wrote on his page on Facebook that the large-scale pro-Russian demonstrations are planned in the city, and urged law enforcement agencies to take decisive action.
Pumping arms into Ukraine by the west is only going to prolong this conflict which at the first place was avoidable. There is no doubt that Ukraine is fighting a battle for their just survival. The Ukraine War in the active combat zones has been a devastating war between Russia and Ukraine producing an increasingly severe humanitarian crisis that includes massive civilian displacement of refugee movements away from embattled cities into the neighbouring countries. The US led NATO allies, their partners and the Western media are aiming to gain the public support for their actions against Russia which are playing on the playfields of Ukraine. “Having pushed Ukraine into war, the US does not know how to save it. Having started it, Russia does not know where to end it.”