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Paul Goble
Staunton, Sept. 4 – The Kremlin has continued to lie about the Ukrainian advance in Kursk Oblast and Western analysts have dismissed it as a tactical move to draw off Russian forces from Ukraine or to create a more favorable negotiation position for Kyiv in talks with Moscow, Vladislav Inozemtsev says.
But in fact, the Russian commentator says, this Ukrainian action has created “a new reality” in at least five major ways, one that affects not only the future of the Russian conflict with Ukraine but the future of Russia and its leaders as well (moscowtimes.ru/2024/09/04/i-nevozmozhnoe-vozmozhno-ili-pyat-parametrov-novoi-realnosti-a141168).
First, Inozemtsev says, the Ukrainian advance has made it clear to all that “Vladimir Putin isn’t capable of managing the situation and achievingthe goals he has set even on purely Russian territory.” Indeed, his inability to defend Russia is something entirely different for elites and masses than his inability to conquer Ukraine.
Second, Ukraine’s move is going to force Putin to spend more on the war and move toward mobilization, deeply unpopular moves that will exacerbate the problems of the Russian economy and compromise the Kremlin leader’s standing with the population regardless of what the polls say.
Third, the events in Kursk have led to the appearance of almost 150,000 internally displaced Russians, creating a significant threat to stability within their country much as such movements of people have had elsewhere in the former Soviet space over the last 30 years, the commentator says.
Fourth, it is now clear as well that Kyiv isn’t going to stop at Kursk but will attack more Russian regions further afield in the coming weeks and months, lengthening the war and raising questions about the situation in a country whose people do not demand its defense even when a foreign army is occupying a part of it.
And fifth, whatever Russian propagandists say, Moscow is going to shift some military resources from Ukraine to defend Russian territory, a movement of arms and personnel that will ensure that the war will continue well into next year at a minimum and “in much more difficult conditions for Russia” than those that obtain now.
In conclusion, Inozemtsev makes two additional observations. On the one hand, he says, “the most important element of this new reality is that the West will become convinced that military support of Ukraine is much more effective than economic war with Russia” and decide to provide significantly more aid to Kyiv.
And on the other, he suggests, Ukraine may well decide to send its army into Belarus, “a weak and unstable ally of Russia,” whose current situation recalls the position of “Romania or Italy as far as the Third Reich was concerned.”