Quotes of the Day:
"I like to praise and reward loudly, to blame quietly."
- Catherine the Great
"I sit on a man's back, choking him and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by all possible means - except by getting off his back."
- Leo Tolstoy
"Wisdom is the right use of knowledge. To know is not to be wise. Many men know a great deal, and are all the greater fools for it. There is no fool so great a fool as a knowing fool. But to know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom."
- Charles Spurgeon
1. UKRAINE CONFLICT UPDATE 9
2. Ukraine Conflict Update - Feb 27, 2022 | SOF News
3. What Ukraine means for America and the world | Opinion By John Nagl
4. Internet becomes battleground in Russia's Ukraine invasion
5. Putin puts Russia's nuclear forces on alert, cites sanctions
6. Putin’s Ukraine Slaughterhouse2/27/22 Korean News and Commentary
7. Putin’s allies abandon him over Ukraine invasion
8. Moscow Retaliates as Online Giants Take Steps to Stem Disinformation
9. Opinion | Putin’s war reminds us why liberal democracy is worth defending
10. Ukraine crisis: Japan should discuss Nato-like nuclear weapons sharing, Shinzo Abe says
11. Ukraine: The Propaganda Wars – OpEd
12. Biden Targets Russia With Strategy of Containment, Updated for a New Era
13. From Korea to Ukraine, Aggressors Believe Their Gains Are Worth the Costs
14. Vladimir Putin sits atop a crumbling pyramid of power
15. Rise of the Rocket Launcher: The end of the Armoured Division
16. The Kremlin’s Gas Wars
17. Fifty Years After Nixon’s Visit, China Tilts Back Toward Russia
18. We Are All Realists Now
19. Jennifer Griffin keeps fact-checking her Fox News colleagues on Ukraine
20. War via TikTok: Russia's new tool for propaganda machine
21. Bigger, badder war storm headed for Ukraine
22. Ukraine: Vote on Draft “Uniting for Peace” Resolution : What's In Blue : Security Council Report
1. UKRAINE CONFLICT UPDATE 9
UKRAINE CONFLICT UPDATE 9
Institute for the Study of War, Russia Team
ISW published its most recent Russian campaign assessment at 3:00 pm, February 26.
This daily synthetic product covers key events related to renewed Russian aggression against Ukraine.
Key Takeaways February 26
- Russia has failed to encircle and isolate Kyiv with mechanized and airborne attacks as it had clearly planned to do. Russian forces are now engaging in more straightforward mechanized drives into Kyiv along a narrow front on the west bank of the Dnipro River and on a broad front to the northeast.
- Russian forces temporarily abandoned efforts to seize Chernihiv and Kharkiv to the northeast and east of Kyiv and are bypassing those cities to continue their drive on Kyiv. Failed Russian attacks against both cities were poorly designed and executed and encountered more determined and effective resistance than Russia likely expected.
- Russian successes in southern Ukraine are the most dangerous and threaten to unhinge Ukraine’s successful defenses and rearguard actions to the north and northeast.
- Russian forces in eastern Ukraine remain focused on pinning the large concentration of Ukrainian forces arrayed along the former line of contact in the east, likely to prevent them from interfering with Russian drives on Kyiv and to facilitate their encirclement and destruction.
- Ukrainian forces retook the critical city of Kherson and Russian forces halted their drive on Odesa. Some Russian troops remain west of the Dnipro River and are advancing on Mykolaiv, but the main axes of advance have shifted to the north and east toward Zaporizhie and Mariupol respectively.
- Russian forces have taken the critical city of Berdyansk from the west, threatening to encircle Mariupol with Russian forces in Donbas attacking Mariupol from the east, likely to pin defenders in the city.
- Russian troops are facing growing morale and logistics issues, predictable consequences of the poor planning, coordination, and execution of attacks along Ukraine’s northern border.
- The United States, Canada, and European allies removed select Russian banks from the SWIFT global financial network and agreed to additional measures that could significantly increase economic pressure on Russia.
- The United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom facilitated a significant expansion of NATO countries’ lethal aid shipments to Ukraine since the Russian invasion began.
- NATO countries began contributing forces to NATO Response Force (NRF) operations in Eastern Europe, reinforcing NATO’s eastern flank.
- Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is set to displace millions of Ukrainians internally and throughout eastern Europe; at least 150,000 Ukrainians have fled the country as of February 26 as urban fighting intensifies.
- Kremlin censors increased crackdowns on independent media amid growing Russian opposition to the war.
Key Events February 25, 4:00 pm EST – February 26, 5:00 pm EST
Military Events:
Russian forces’ main axes of advance in the last 24 hours focused on Kyiv, northeastern Ukraine, and southern Ukraine. Russian airborne and special forces troops are engaged in urban warfare in northwestern Kyiv, but Russian mechanized forces are not yet in the capital. Russian advances from Crimea risk cutting off the large concentrations of Ukrainian forces still defending the former line of contact between unoccupied Ukraine and occupied Donbas. Ukrainian leaders may soon face the painful decision of ordering the withdrawal of those forces and the ceding of more of eastern Ukraine or allowing much of Ukraine’s uncommitted conventional combat power to be encircled and destroyed. There are no indications as yet of whether the Ukrainian government is considering this decision point.
Ukrainian resistance remains remarkably effective and Russian operations especially on the Kyiv axis have been poorly coordinated and executed, leading to significant Russian failures on that axis and at Kharkiv. Russian forces in northeast Ukraine face growing morale and supply issues, likely due to poor planning and ad hoc command structures, as ISW previously forecasted.[1] Russia has surprisingly failed to gain air superiority or ground the Ukrainian air force after three days of fighting. Russian forces will likely increase their use of bombardment in the coming days to overcome heavier-than-anticipated Ukrainian resistance, however. Russian forces remain much larger and more capable than Ukraine’s conventional military and Russian advances in southern Ukraine may threaten to unhinge the defense of Kyiv and northeastern Ukraine if they continue unchecked.
Russian ground forces are advancing on four primary axes, discussed in turn below:
- Kyiv Axis: Russia’s likely main effort to rapidly isolate Kyiv and force the Ukrainian government to capitulate has failed as of February 26. Russian forces entered downtown Kyiv along the western bank of the Dnipro River the night of February 25, but Russian forces have so far failed to enter the city from the east. Russian troops have not yet committed heavy armor and artillery forces to fighting in Kyiv and will likely need to do so to take the city. Ukrainian forces are unlikely to capitulate. If the Russians have abandoned for now the attempt to encircle Kyiv and committed to frontal assaults from the northwest and east/northeast, then they have given the Ukrainians close to the optimal scenario for defending their capital. The Russians could change that situation either by getting forces from the northeast axis across the river south of Kyiv and encircling in that way, by using forces from Crimea to drive all the way to Kyiv from the south, or by re-attempting and finally succeeding in air-landing airborne troops to the southeast of the capital. Russia’s surprising failure to accomplish its initial planned objectives around Kyiv has given the Ukrainians an opportunity.
- Northeast Axis: Russian forces advanced on a broad front between Chernihiv and Kharkiv on February 26 after Ukrainian forces halted direct Russian advances through both cities on February 24-25. Ukrainian forces continue to delay and inflict losses on the Russian advance but will likely be unable to halt further advances if the Kremlin commits additional reserves.
- Donbas Axis: Russian forces continued to deprioritize direct assaults in Donbas or an enveloping maneuver through Luhansk Oblast. Russian forces likely intend to pin Ukrainian forces in place on the line of contact to enable Russian forces breaking out of Crimea to isolate them. The Russians may be content to leave them there while concentrating on capturing Kyiv and imposing a new government on Ukraine. They may alternatively seek to encircle and destroy them or force them to surrender.
- Crimea Axis: Russian forces advancing north toward Zaprozhia and east toward Mariupol threaten to isolate Ukrainian forces on the line of contact in Donbas if Ukrainian forces do not withdraw. Russian forces from the Southern Military District continue to make the greatest advances and demonstrate the highest capabilities of Russia’s multiple axes of advance. Ukrainian forces recaptured Kherson the night of February 25-26. However, Russian forces will likely counterattack within the next 24 hours and Russian forces remain west of the Dnipro River, threatening Mykolaiv.
Russian Activity
Kremlin-sponsored media continues to claim the Russian invasion of Ukraine is largely bloodless and only aimed at so-called “nationalists” to downplay the increasing unpopularity of the war. Russian state media framed Russian victories in Ukraine as largely bloodless peacekeeping operations “de-nazifying” critical civilian infrastructure.[2] Russian media largely misrepresented social media videos of missile strikes, claiming that nationalists opened fire on Kyiv residential areas to frame Russian forces. TV talk shows claimed that Russian forces rescued 82 Ukrainian servicemen with no casualties from Zmiinyi (Snake Island), despite Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s confirmation that a Russian warship killed all 13 servicemen stationed on the island on February 24.[3] TV news programs livestreamed the destruction of a Ukrainian dam blocking water supplies to Russian-occupied Crimea, claiming that Russian forces ended the “years long nationalist genocide” against the peninsula.[4] Russian media is framing a sharp distinction between the Ukrainian Armed Forces and so-called “Ukrainian nationalist units” within the military, claiming that normal Ukrainian forces will likely surrender soon and only “nationalists” are fighting.[5]
Two opposition Russian deputies issued public calls for Putin to end the war in Ukraine for the first time on February 25, and Kremlin media censors imposed new restrictions on any coverage of Russia’s war in Ukraine. Russian Duma (Parliament) Communist Party deputies Mikhal Matveev and Oleg Smolin called for Russia to end its war against Ukraine on February 25. Matveev stated he voted to recognize the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DNR and LNR) to achieve peace in Donbas, not bomb Kyiv, and called on Putin to immediately stop military action in Ukraine.[6] Anti-war protests occurred in 26 Russian cities on February 26.[7] Russian state-controlled media further cracked down on independent media outlets on February 26. The technology and communications regulator Roskomnadzor launched a probe into independent media outlets and stated that references to Russian operations in Ukraine as attacks, invasion, or war are “fake news.”[8] According to the Washington Post, Roskomnadzor is “highly sensitive about reporting on Russian military casualties, strikes on civilian neighborhoods, civilian casualties or Russian prisoners of war.” Independent media outlets face substantial fines and penalties if they continue this reporting. Roskomnadzor restricted Russian access to Facebook in retaliation for Facebook’s fact-checking of Russian state-controlled media outlets.[9] Internet monitoring group NetBlocks reported widespread Twitter restrictions within Russia.[10]
The Kremlin likely lacks a coherent plan to adapt to stronger-than-anticipated Western sanctions, leading to an inconsistent reaction from Kremlin officials ranging from stressing mitigation strategies to bellicose denial that sanctions will have any effect. Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov acknowledged recent Western sanctions are “serious” but stressed that Russia prepared for them in advance.[11] Peskov stated that the Kremlin is currently developing responses that best suit Russian interests and is hopeful for potential opportunities for Russia amidst international sanctions. Contrarily, Russian Security Council Deputy Head Dmitry Medvedev claimed that Western sanctions “are an excellent occasion for a final review of all relations with states that have imposed them” and threatened to end diplomatic relations with all Western states.[12] Medvedev added that Western sanctions will not deter Russia from “protecting Donbas” nor harm Kremlin officials, falsely claiming that they do not have assets in Western banks. Medvedev threatened that Russia will seize the funds and properties of foreigners and foreign companies in Russia in response to Western sanctions.[13]
The Kremlin falsely claimed on February 25 to have set conditions for surrender negations with Kyiv before retracting its claims following Ukrainian dedication to fight on. Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov claimed on February 25 that Putin called on Russian troops to pause their military operation in Ukraine to plan Russian-Ukrainian ceasefire negotiations. Peskov claimed Putin reversed the pause after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky replied that Ukrainian forces will not surrender.[14] Kremlin officials demanded that Ukraine first demilitarize before Russia begins negotiations with Kyiv, indicating the Kremlin may have wrongly anticipated a rapid Ukrainian capitulation.
Belarusian Activity
N/A
Ukrainian Activity
The Ukrainian government stated its refusal to abandon Kyiv and emphasized growing international support for Ukraine in messaging to Ukrainian citizens on February 26. Ukrainian government officials maintained effective communication with Ukrainian citizens in real-time via social media platforms despite Russian cyberattacks disabling most Ukrainian government websites and disrupting internet service providers on February 26.[15] Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky reiterated on February 26 that Ukraine would not surrender.[16] Zelensky reassured Ukrainians on February 25 that the government would not abandon Kyiv and relocate to Lviv or abroad.[17] Zelensky said that Ukraine’s defenses and diplomatic measures “have broken the scenario of occupation” and led to the European consensus to disconnect Russia from SWIFT, reminding Ukrainians that they “have more powerful friends than enemies.”[18] Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov urged Ukrainian citizens to report, detain, or destroy Russian sabotage groups, their equipment, and signals and said the “whole world knows” of Russian aggression.[19] Former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said he is leading a battalion of 300 Ukrainian civilians with small arms in Kyiv. Poroshenko said they are determined to hold out “indefinitely” against the Russian assault.[20]
US Activity
The United States, Canada, and European allies removed select Russian banks from the SWIFT global financial network and agreed to additional measures that could significantly increase economic pressure on Russia on February 26.[21] Severing targeted Russian banks from SWIFT will prevent them from operating internationally and significantly curtail Russian imports and exports. Signatory states also announced an effort to limit the sale of citizenship to wealthy Russians, to work together to combat Russian disinformation, and to convene a transatlantic task force to ensure the enforcement of sanctions against Russia. The German government decided on February 26 to support a limited removal of Russia from the SWIFT financial messaging network after significant pressure from its allies, removing the final barrier to SWIFT sanctions.[22] Germany insisted that the action must be tailored to target the right people and to limit potential negative consequences for European business and financial institutions.[23]
European Commission (EC) President Ursula von der Leyen claimed during a February 26 press conference that the EC will work with the United States to freeze Russian Central Bank assets.[24] Neither the EC nor the US Treasury Department provided further details on the scope or method of this action. The unprecedented targeting of a major power’s central bank may prevent Russia from spending the foreign currency reserves it has accumulated in preparation for a sanctions and economic pressure campaign by Western powers. Russian Central Bank illiquidity could accelerate the devaluation of the ruble and threaten the overall stability of the Russian financial system.
NATO and EU Activity
The United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom have facilitated a significant expansion of NATO countries’ lethal aid shipments to Ukraine since February 24, accelerating on February 26. UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace hosted a conference with 27 countries on February 25 to reaffirm their commitments to send military aid to Ukraine, during which multiple states pledged to provide lethal assistance to Ukraine.[25] Germany reversed its long-standing prohibition on providing lethal aid and on partner countries sending German-made weapons and munitions to Ukraine on February 26, enabling several European countries to subsequently announce lethal aid shipments.[26] European NATO states’ expansion of lethal aid shipments indicates a shift in urgency and willingness to implement more aggressive measures to counter Russian advances in Ukraine.
- US President Joe Biden authorized an additional 350 million USD aid package containing Javelin anti-tank missiles, Stinger surface-to-air missiles, and other unspecified lethal and non-lethal equipment on February 26.[27] The United States has provided Ukraine with a total of 1 billion USD worth of security assistance since January 1, 2022.[28]
- The Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany committed to sending Ukraine a combined 2,000 machine guns, 400 rocket-propelled grenade launchers, 1,000 anti-tank weapons, and 700 Stinger surface-to-air missiles on February 26.[29]
- Germany, Belgium, and Australia also promised to send medical supplies, 3800 tons of fuel, 5,000 military helmets, and other non-lethal aid on February 26.[30]
- The Czech and Slovakian governments respectively approved 9 million USD and 12 million USD worth of ammunition and fuel on February 26.[31]
- French President Emmanuel Macron promised on February 25 to send 300 million Euros in budgetary assistance and unspecified military equipment.[32]
- Estonia shipped anti-tank missiles, anti-aircraft munitions, and non-lethal supplies to Ukraine on February 18, and Estonian Defense Ministry Secretary-General Kusti Salm announced on February 25 that Estonia is preparing to send another shipment.[33]
- Canada followed up a February 19 lethal aid shipment with another shipment on February 23 consisting of rifles, machine guns, tactical equipment, and surveillance devices altogether worth approximately 8 million USD.[34]
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters on February 24 that the United States is exploring alternative methods to train Ukrainian forces on these weapons platforms.[35] Austin said that delivering equipment and training has become difficult as Russian forces advance further into Ukraine. A lack of training may prevent some Ukrainian forces from using new lethal aid shipments with maximal efficacy. Russian forces may seek to open a new line of advance into western Ukraine to sever NATO aid deliveries.
NATO countries began contributing forces to NATO Response Force (NRF) operations in Eastern Europe on February 26, reinforcing NATO’s eastern flank. The United States placed between 10,000 and 12,000 troops on “prepare to deploy orders” on February 25 to take part in NRF or unilateral operations.[36] The UK Ministry of Defense stated on February 26 it will send approximately 1,000 troops to Estonia to supplement the UK tanks and armored vehicles already present there. UK Typhoon fighter jets began patrolling NATO airspace over Romania and Poland on February 25, and the HMS Diamond will join NATO naval forces conducting exercises in the eastern Mediterranean.[37] Belgian Prime Minister Alexander de Croo also said Belgium will send 300 troops to Romania.[38] Lithuanian Defense Minister Arvydas Anusauskas said Lithuania is preparing to receive 70 additional Dutch soldiers as well.[39] US President Joe Biden emphasized that NATO’s unity in the face of Russia’s invasion demonstrates that Russian President Vladimir Putin has miscalculated and is driving NATO and its non-member partner states like Sweden and Finland closer together.[40]
Other International Organization Activity
N/A
Individual Western Allies’ Activity
Turkey continued to call on Russia to end its war in Ukraine and offered itself as a neutral mediator on February 26, seeking to maintain both its economic relationship with Ukraine and its political and economic ties with Russia. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu urged Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to end Russia’s military operation in Ukraine during a February 26 phone call.[41] Cavusoglu reiterated Turkey’s readiness to mediate talks between Russia and Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky falsely claimed on February 26 that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey would deny Russian vessels access to the Black Sea.[42] Erdogan did not confirm Zelensky’s claim; Reuters reported that anonymous Turkish officials refuted the claim altogether.[43] Cavusoglu previously stated that the 1936 Montreux Convention, which governs passage through Turkey’s Dardanelles and Bosphorus strait, allows Black Sea littoral states to return their ships to their bases during wartime. The wartime provision consequently permits Russian vessels access to the Black Sea regardless of Turkey’s decision.[44] Separately, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar assured Ukrainian Defense Minister Olekseii Reznikov on February 26 that Turkey will continue providing humanitarian aid to Ukraine.[45] Turkey has conducted itself as a neutral party since the conflict began and abstained from voting on Russia’s suspension from the Council of Europe on February 25.[46] Turkey is positioning itself for a greater peacekeeping role possibly to hedge against economic and political consequences, regardless of the conflict’s outcome. Erdogan told Zelensky on February 26 that Turkey was attempting to secure an immediate ceasefire of hostilities in Ukraine.[47]
Other International Activity
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is set to displace millions of Ukrainians internally and throughout eastern Europe; at least 150,000 Ukrainians have fled the country as of February 26 as urban fighting intensifies. Russian officials have denied reports of Russian shelling in residential neighborhoods and missile strikes against civilian targets.[48] The intensification of fighting in urban areas, including Ukraine’s two largest population centers of Kyiv and Kharkiv, will likely displace hundreds of thousands more Ukrainians in the coming days, presaging a refugee crisis within Ukraine and throughout Eastern Europe. UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said more than 150,000 people have fled Ukraine since February 24 and an unknown number are internally displaced.[49] Polish Deputy Interior Minister Pawel Szefernaker said Poland has set up reception points for the 100,000 Ukrainians who have arrived in Poland.[50] Romanian Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca said at least 19,000 Ukrainians entered Romania since February 24 and 11,000 have remained in Romania.[51]
[15] https://netblocks dot org/reports/internet-disruptions-registered-as-russia-moves-in-on-ukraine-W80p4k8K
2. Ukraine Conflict Update - Feb 27, 2022 | SOF News
Great quote from President Zelensky: " The fight is here. I need ammunition, not a ride."
His leadership is inspiring the Ukrainian people and hopefully the free world. That said, a friend wrote to me with an interesting perspective. This is exactly why we do need to have plans to evacuate him. While martyrdom by dying at the hands of the Russians will become a rallying event for the Ukrainian people (and go down in Ukrainian and world history as a significant event) perhaps we need his leadership more than his martyrdom. He suggested creating a MacArthur moment - "I shall return" which might have greater benefit than martyrdom. His death will be demoralizing while living to fight another day and continuing to support the Ukrainian people with a government in exile in close proximity may achieve greater effects. Perhaps we should consider a rescue plan to exfiltrate him in extremis even over his objection and protest. Of course doing so will potentially create other possible negative information warfare effects but those would be mitigated with eventual victory in Ukraine ( or failure by Russia).
Another option might be a thunder run from Poland and Romania to Kyiv. The sight of US and NATO armor and air power boring down on the Russian forces with such speed and destruction will cause such fear that the soldiers might surrender immediately. Unfortunately then we will see Putin escalate to a level we do not want to go. Thus we are self-deterred from taking any such decisive action. (I only say this is a hint of bitter sarcasm). But such a major operation in Ukraine by US and NATO forces(if it did not escalate to a nuclear exchange) might be the necessary action to stem the plans of authoritarian regimes around the world by demonstrating strength and strategic resolve.
But these are all words no one wants to read or discuss (except to apn them). My main point is that we now have to think beyond Ukraine and what is going to happen to the international rules based order and foreign affairs and national security for decades to come.
Ukraine Conflict Update - Feb 27, 2022 | SOF News
sof.news · by SOF News · February 27, 2022
A news update about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, NATO response, humanitarian crisis, and Ukrainian resistance. Covers the 24-hour period ending 0600R27FEB22.
BLUF. The speed of the Russian offensive has slowed – likely because of unexpectedly fierce Ukrainian resistance and some Russian logistical problems. The tanks and armored personnel carriers are likely hurting for spare parts and fuel. Special operations forces are taking part in overnight clashes and operations each night around strategic targets. The primary military objective remains the capital of the country and decapitation of the civilian leadership. The world has rallied to Ukraine yet refrains from the use of military forces within Ukraine. Although a ‘no fly zone’ would be a huge factor if announced and enforced by NATO there is little chance of that happening. Although facing a stiff resistance by the Ukrainians the Russian may ultimately prevail due to sheer numbers of troops, tanks, and aircraft.
Three Regions of Advance. The Russians continue to slowly advance from Russian-occupied Crimea, Belarus, and from Russia on the Ukraine northeastern border. The forces coming from Belarus are heading south to Kyiv. The forces advancing from the northeast and Crimea may be pincer movements to cut off the Ukrainian forces fighting in the east of Ukraine. The Ukrainians may have to cede territory and pull back the forces in eastern Ukraine before their lines of communication that run east west are severed. In addition, the Russians conducted a large scale amphibious operation from the Sea of Azov in the vicinity of the coastal city of Mariupol. The S2 Underground YouTube channel has an update on the axis of advances of Russian forces in Ukraine (26 Feb). The Russia-Ukraine Monitor Map is an open, crowd-sourced online mapping utility that can help track incidents and activity in Ukraine.
Russian Troop Numbers. According to a recent U.S. Department of Defense news release on February 26, the Russians have more than 150,000 troops arrayed against Ukraine, with most of them in the country. Over the past 24 hours the Russians have conducted more than 250 missile launches, mostly short-range ballistic missiles. Some civilian infrastructure and residential areas have been hit by these missile strikes.
Battle for Kyiv. The Russians hope to capture the Ukrainian capital soon. It was thought that the Russians would go for Kyiv on Friday night (27 Feb) but apparently its forces were still getting into position, the logistics train was playing catchup, and reinforcements were still arriving in the area. A sizeable Russian forces of troops and tanks is located just north of the city, less than 6 miles from Kyiv’s Parliament and the city center. In addition, Russian forces have cut off the city from the west, presumably with VDV forces from Belarus and that have been moved by air. However by dawn the capital had yet to be fully encircled. ‘Irregular Russian forces’ have continued to fight Ukrainian defenders within the city of Kyiv – but the fighting seems to be at a lower intensity. An oil depot on the outskirts of Kyiv had been hit and was on fire. Saturday night into Sunday morning was another night of sirens and missile explosions.
Map of Ukraine. Congressional Research Service (CRS), April 2020.
Avoiding the Cities? Combat in an urban environment is tough, especially for a force that relies on airpower, tanks, and artillery. The use of these highly lethal and mobile weapons systems is constrained in a city environment filled with thousands and thousands of civilians. Defensive tactics in an urban warfare situation can bog down an offensive operation by an attacking force. The Russians appear to be bypassing the big Ukrainian cities – leaving just enough forces to encircle and isolate them. This is most likely a good strategy for the Russians for now. Read more about fighting in cities in an analysis by Dr. John P. Sullivan entitled “Assessing Urban Terrain Features for Dense Urban Environments”, Homeland Security, February 11, 2022. See also “Urban Warfare: A Practitioners Annotated Bibliography”, Australian Army Research Centre.
Chernihiv Bypassed. The Ukrainian city of Chernihiv located in the north of Ukraine near the Belarus border has put up a strong defense. Russian forces are bypassing the city and likely moving south to take part in the encirclement and isolation of Kyiv.
Kharkiv Under Attack. The northeast city of Kharkiv is located just across from the Russia border. This city of about 1.5 million people is now under siege. As of early Sunday (Feb 27) there was heavy street fighting and many residents were seeking safety in bomb shelters and in the underground metro. The opposing forces are exchanging heavy volumes of rocket artillery fire. As of mid-day Sunday the Russian assault of the city has been halted by Ukrainian defenders. Kharkiv is the second largest city in Ukraine. The city is populated mainly by Ukrainians (63%) with a significant number of Russians (33%).
Ukrainian Defense. The air defenses of Ukraine, including aircraft, continue to operate, engage, and deny access to Russian aircraft in some parts of the country. The Ukrainians have held the major cities; although, in most cases the Russians have bypassed them. The coastal city of Mariupol is under attack but appears to be offering stiff resistance to the Russians.
Ukrainian Civilian Resistance. The Ukrainian military has fought exceptionally well in the face of superior numbers of Russian troops, tanks, artillery, and aircraft. This unexpected high level of resistance has slowed the Russian onslaught. Ukrainian civilians are assisting where they can – placing obstacles in city roads, tearing down street signs, and taking up weapons issued by the Ukrainian government. Members of the Ukrainian Territorial Defense Forces have been conducting weekend training sessions for months in preparation to help defend the country from the Russians. “Weapons to anyone: Across Ukraine, militias form as Russian forces near”, The Washington Post, February 26, 2022. Residents in Dnipro, Ukraine are preparing Molotov cocktails in preparation for advancing Russian troops. Read more on how civilian volunteers and paramilitary groups are taking the fight to the Russian army in “Everybody in Our Country Needs to Defend”, The New York Times, February 26, 2022.
Belarus. The Department of State has issued a travel advisory for Belarus, advising U.S. citizens not to travel to Belarus and urging them to depart the country immediately. Currently Minsk airport and Belarusian land border points are open but could change without significant notice. U.S. citizens should avoid public demonstrations as potential harassment targeted specifically at foreigners is possible. The security situation in Belarus could become critical. The country has been a staging area for Russian troops invading Ukraine. There are reports on social media that Belarus special operations forces will soon take part in the Ukraine invasion.
Russian Misinformation. The Kremlin has four distinct audiences that it seeks to manipulate through falsehoods with regard to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. These are the domestic Russian audience, audiences inside Ukraine, audiences in the former Soviet republics, and audiences in Western Europe and the United States. For many years the Russian media has conveyed a false image of military prowess. Observers need to look at Russia’s real military capabilities with objective eyes to get past the illusion painted by the Russian propaganda.
“Friends From Abroad”. It seems that Ukrainian President Volodymryr Zelensky has promised to issue weapons to anyone who is willing to fight for Ukraine. He is quoted as saying: “Every friend of Ukraine who wants to join Ukraine in defending the country please come over, we will give you weapons.” (inews.co.uk, Feb 25, 2022). Apparently there is a new unit in the Ukrainian defense forces called the International Legion of Territorial Defense of Ukraine.
NATO Response. Germany is looking at establishing a 100 billion euro special fund to build up the Bundeswehr. This according to a statement by Chancellor Scholz. NATO nations have been flowing troops and equipment to eastern Europe and the Baltic States to ensure it is ready to counter any Russian moves against a NATO nation.
European Commission. The leaders of the EC have condemned Putin’s war against Ukraine and have opted to impose severe measures on key Russian institutions and banks and other Russian figures and organizations. Selected banks are to be removed from the SWIFT messaging system which disconnects the banks from the international financial system and harms their ability to operate globally. The EC is imposing restrictive measures that will prevent the Russian Central Bank from deploying its international reserves. It also will limit the sale of citizenship or ‘golden passports’ to wealthy Russians who are connected to the Russian government. See more in “Joint Statement on Further Restrictive Economic Measures”, The White House, February 26, 2022.
Sanctions. The world is tightening up on the economy of Russia. A variety of economic measures and sanctions have gone into effect. One example of how this impacts Russia took place on Saturday when France intercepted a Russian vessel in the English Channel in line with European Union sanctions. Some nations are waffling on the sanctions issue; India is one of them.
Lethal Aid. A number of western nations are shipping arms, munitions, and ammunition to Ukraine. These countries include the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and others. Small arms, MANPADs, and anti-armor weapons are included in these shipments. On Saturday, President Biden authorized an additional $350 million of military assistance from DoD inventories. This included anti-armor, small arms, various munitions, body armor, and related equipment. The United Kingdom has been shipping NLAWs to Ukraine, and they are proving to be very effective anti-armor weapons on the battlefield.
Humanitarian Aid. Many nations around the world are sending humanitarian aid to Ukraine. Typically this entails flying goods to Poland and then transferring the aid to trucks to transport across the border into western Ukraine. On Sunday, February 27th the U.S. Department of State announced that it is providing $54 million in humanitarian assistance to Ukraine. $26 million will be from the State Department and $28 million from USAID.
Closing the Straits. Ukraine has appealed to Turkey to block Russian warships from passing through the Dardanelles and Bosphorus straits which lead to the Black Sea. Under the 1936 Montreux Convention, Turkey has control over the straits and can limit the passage of warships during wartime or if threatened. “Turkey cannot stop Russian warships accessing Black Sea, says foreign minister”, Euronews, February 26, 2022.
Coming Soon – Ukraine Insurgency. Russia’s invasion will very likely unleash forces that the Kremlin will not be able to control. Putin’s best-laid plans could unravel in the face of national resistance and groups of insurgents attacking exposed Russian positions, logistical convoys, and small units over the long-term. Russia can seize as much of Ukraine as it desires. But the more of Ukraine territory that it tries to keep the more Moscow will bleed. Ukraine’s long border with the four NATO states of Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia means that lethal aid can find its way into Ukraine to support a resistance and long-term insurgency. Douglas London was a Senior Operations Officer in the CIA Clandestine Service for over 34 years. He provides a detailed analysis of what could go wrong for the Russians in “The Coming Ukrainian Insurgency”, Foreign Affairs, February 25, 2022.
Russian Threats Against the ‘North Countries’. Finland and Sweden have had a ‘partnership’ with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for years. There are indications that both countries are edging toward joining NATO. Russia has come out with some harsh statements on that topic. “Russia says Finland, Sweden could face consequences if countries move to join NATO”, Fox News, February 25, 2022. Both countries discounted the verbal threats from the Russians, saying that they make their own decisions about their security and won’t be influenced by threats from Russia.
Russia’s Nukes Now on Alert. There is some concern about Putin’s order to put Russian nuclear deterrent forces on alert on Sunday. He has threatened to retaliate harshly against nations that have intervened directly in the conflict in Ukraine. “Putin puts Russia’s nuclear deterrent forces on alert”, Associated Press News, February 27, 2022.
Russia’s Next Target: the Suwalki Gap? A seizure of the the land between Belarus and the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad would close the narrow passage – the Suwalki Gap – that connects the NATO nation of Poland with the NATO nations of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. This would involve the introduction of Russian ground troops onto either Poland and / or Lithuania. And invoke NATO’s article 5. However, given Putin’s behavior, this cannot be discounted as his next aim. Of course, Finland, another non-NATO nation could see itself in the crosshairs of Russian aggression . . . as well as some of the former Soviet republics in Central Asia.
*********
Image: The United States offered President Zelensky a ride out of Ukraine. His response is above.
sof.news · by SOF News · February 27, 2022
3. What Ukraine means for America and the world | Opinion By John Nagl
Excerpts:
If the West holds together on these sanctions, the Russian economy will pay a heavy price for its actions—one that will only grow over time. It is not too much to suggest that, while winning the battle for control of Ukraine in the short term, Putin could easily find that this battle costs him control of his own country — opening the door for a new and better chapter in world history.
What Ukraine means for America and the world | Opinion - Pennsylvania Capital-Star
What Ukraine means for America and the world | Opinion
Putin could easily find that this battle costs him control of his own country, opening the door for a new and better chapter in world history
February 26, 2022 7:01 am
VILNIUS, LITHUANIA – FEBRUARY 24: People hold flags and posters during a protest against Russian attack on Ukraine near the Russian Embassy, on February 24, 2022 in Vilnius, Lithuania. Overnight, Russia began a large-scale attack on Ukraine, with explosions reported in multiple cities and far outside the restive eastern regions held by Russian-backed rebels. (Photo by Paulius Peleckis/Getty Images)
By John Nagl
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine marks the end of the post-Cold War world that began with the collapse of the Soviet Union but also shows how much the world has changed in those thirty years, in many ways for the better.
The twentieth century was marred by great power wars in Europe and Asia, caused by the rise of German and Japanese power and by the fear that that power caused in their neighborhoods.
The defeat of Germany and Japan in the Second World War was followed almost immediately by a forty-five year Cold War with the Soviet Union that turned hot in Korea and Vietnam.
The Soviet incursion into Afghanistan to support a puppet regime created a bloody wound that contributed to the collapse of the Communist regime and the dissolution of the Soviet empire—what Putin has called the greatest catastrophe of the twentieth century. Countries that had comprised the Soviet Union, including Ukraine, chose independence and democracy.
In a bid to reverse that historic choice, and push the prospect of democracy far from Russia’s borders, Putin has launched a war of aggression against his Ukrainian neighbor.
That war has gone worse than Putin had expected–on the ground, at home, and around the globe. While Russia will capture Ukraine in short order, Putin will rue the day he chose this course of action.
On the ground, Ukrainian forces are fighting back harder than Putin expected. Early reports are uncertain, but it is clear that there have been significant tank and aircraft losses for Russia, including at least one airborne platoon that surrendered to Ukrainian forces.
More importantly, Ukrainian resistance to Russian domination is just starting; an insurgency against Russian occupation is almost guaranteed.
Ukraine is a harder country to occupy than Iraq was for the United States, with a larger population, vast territory to occupy, and excellent lines of communication to a number of NATO countries that will likely supply arms and possibly even fighters against the Russian occupation. In Afghanistan, an insurgency brought the Soviet Union to its knees; expect the same here.
The consequences are likely to be severe. Putin expected his invasion of Ukraine to be popular at home, but it has proven to be anything but.
There have already been significant protests against the invasion across Russia; more significantly, Russian intellectuals and business leaders have courageously signed open letters decrying the rape of Ukraine. Putin is terrified of democracy at home, the underlying cause of his invasion of his neighbor; ironically, he has provided his opponents with a just cause to push for his dismissal. The seeds of rebellion against the autocrat are sprouting in the open.
They are being nurtured by an unusual degree of unanimity among the rest of the world’s powers. The principal foreign policy goal of the Soviet Union, and of its successor state of Russia, has been to drive a wedge between the United States and her European allies, but the invasion of Ukraine has brought NATO closer together.
Finland and Sweden, who are not currently NATO members, are meeting with NATO today and openly considering joining the alliance, while the United States has deployed significant combat troops to buttress NATO’s eastern flank. No U.S. forces are deploying to Ukraine, which is not a NATO member, but the Biden administration has made it clear that it will defend every inch of NATO’s soil against any additional Russian offensives.
The world has also imposed an extraordinary series of economic sanctions on Russia in response to the invasion of Ukraine, essentially isolating Russia from the global economy and leading to a loss of nearly half of the Russian stock market’s value and the lowest value of the Russian currency against the dollar in history.
If the West holds together on these sanctions, the Russian economy will pay a heavy price for its actions—one that will only grow over time. It is not too much to suggest that, while winning the battle for control of Ukraine in the short term, Putin could easily find that this battle costs him control of his own country — opening the door for a new and better chapter in world history.
John Nagl is a visiting professor of National Security Studies at the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pa. The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.
4. Internet becomes battleground in Russia's Ukraine invasion
We should also observe how well the Ukrainian people are fighting the information war. Average citizens using social media are having information and influence effects. We need to learn from what is happening so that we can effectively conduct influence operations.
Internet becomes battleground in Russia's Ukraine invasion
Social media platforms are beginning to crack down on Russian state media in response to the Kremlin's efforts to tighten controls around internet communications.
Why it matters: Tech giants that provide services around the world prefer not to take sides in conflicts where they operate in both combatants' territory, but Russia's invasion of Ukraine is making that stance tough to maintain.
Driving the news: Google said late Saturday it is pausing monetization of Russian state-funded media across its platforms, hours after its subsidiary YouTube announced a similar measure, citing "extraordinary circumstances in Ukraine."
- A YouTube spokesperson noted it will also be "significantly limiting recommendations to these channels."
-
Facebook parent Meta on Friday said it would also prohibit Russian state media "from running ads or monetizing on our platform anywhere in the world," per a tweet from its head of security policy, Nathaniel Gleicher.
-
Twitter also said Friday it would temporarily pause advertisements in Ukraine and Russia "to ensure critical public safety information is elevated and ads don’t detract from it."
State of play: Social networks have for many months labeled accounts for outlets such as RT and Sputnik as Russian state media. Russia is beginning to push back on efforts to fact-check content from those accounts.
-
Twitter has been restricted in Russia, as of Saturday morning, according to data forensics from internet monitoring group NetBlocks.
-
On Friday, Meta president of global affairs Nick Clegg confirmed that Russia had partially restricted the platform after Facebook refused to stop fact-checking and labelling of content posted by four Russian state-owned media organizations when asked by Russian regulators.
Meanwhile, Russian state media has quickly become a target for hackers seeking to show support for Ukraine.
-
On Friday, hackers claiming association with Anonymous, the decentralized activist group, said they were responsible for web outages at RT.com and Russian government sites.
-
On Thursday, Reuters reported that Ukraine has been asking for volunteers from its own hacker community to defend against Russian cyberattacks.
The big picture: Security officials warned for weeks leading up to the invasion that Russia would be using disinformation via state media channels to seed justification for the war.
-
Ahead of the invasion, Russia state media accused the West of hysterical over-reaction to non-existent invasion threats — then pivoted to pumping out minute-by-minute coverage of the tensions.
-
Around the world, millions of people are watching the chaos unfold from the ground on platforms like Instagram, Twitter and TikTok. That allows timely reports to spread fast but leaves information context-free and easy to distort or misrepresent.
Between the lines: Ukraine officials have been publicly urging social platforms to take down Russian state accounts.
-
On Friday, Ukraine's vice prime minister and minister of digital transformation, Mykhailo Fedorov, wrote a letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook asking him to block access to Apple's App Store for citizens of the Russian Federation.
-
On Saturday, Fedorov tweeted that Twitter had decided to stop Russians from registering new accounts in Russia, and urged Meta to do the same. Twitter didn't confirm that detail.
-
On Thursday, Ukraine's official Twitter handle wrote, "They should not be allowed to use these platforms to promote their image while brutally killing the Ukrainian people."
What to watch: U.S. regulators are closely eyeing whether U.S. companies are vulnerable to Russian cyberattacks, given reports of attacks on computers in Ukraine ramping up during the crisis.
-
On Friday, the head of the Federal Communications Commission proposed conducting a review of media and telecommunications companies in conjunction with the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security for any links to Russian tech firms that could be a security risk.
5. Putin puts Russia's nuclear forces on alert, cites sanctions
Troubling of course.
Actually, this may be to deter the thunder run of US and NATO forces from Poland and Romania.
I just hope there are Russian Lieutenant Colonels like Stanislav Petrov who is credited with preventing nuclear war in 1983.
Putin puts Russia's nuclear forces on alert, cites sanctions
AP · by YURAS KARMANAU, JIM HEINTZ, VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV and DASHA LITVINOVA · February 27, 2022
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — In a dramatic escalation of East-West tensions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin ordered Russian nuclear forces put on high alert Sunday in response to what he called “aggressive statements” by leading NATO powers.
The order means Putin wants Russia’s nuclear weapons prepared for increased readiness to launch and raises the threat that Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine and the West’s response to it could boil over into nuclear warfare.
Amid the worrying development, the office of Ukraine’s president said a delegation would meet with Russian officials as Moscow’s troops drew closer to Kyiv.
Putin, in giving the nuclear alert directive, cited not only the alleged statements by NATO members but the hard-hitting financial sanctions imposed by the West against Russia, including the Russian leader himself.
Speaking at a meeting with his top officials, Putin told his defense minister and the chief of the military’s General Staff to put the nuclear deterrent forces in a “special regime of combat duty.”
ADVERTISEMENT
“Western countries aren’t only taking unfriendly actions against our country in the economic sphere, but top officials from leading NATO members made aggressive statements regarding our country,” Putin said in televised comments.
Putin threatened in the days before Russia’s invasion to retaliate harshly against any nations that intervened directly in the conflict in Ukraine, and he specifically raised the specter of his country’s status as a nuclear power.
The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations responded to the news from Moscow while appearing on a Sunday news program.
“President Putin is continuing to escalate this war in a manner that is totally unacceptable,” Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said. “And we have to continue to condemn his actions in the most strong, strongest possible way.”
The practical meaning of Putin’s order was not immediately clear. Russia and the United States typically have the land- and submarine-based segments of their strategic nuclear forces on alert and prepared for combat at all times, but nuclear-capable bombers and other aircraft are not.
If Putin is arming or otherwise raising the nuclear combat readiness of his bombers, or if he is ordering more ballistic missile submarines to sea, then the United States might feel compelled to respond in kind, according to Hans Kristensen, a nuclear analyst at the Federation of American Scientists. That would mark a worrisome escalation and a potential crisis, he said.
The alarming step came as street fighting broke out in Ukraine’s second-largest city and Russian troops squeezed strategic ports in the country’s south, advances that appeared to mark a new phase of Russia’s invasion following a wave of attacks on airfields and fuel facilities elsewhere in the country.
ADVERTISEMENT
Around the same time as Putin’s nuclear move, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office said on the Telegram messaging app that the two sides would meet at an unspecified location on the Belarusian border. The message did not give a precise time for the meeting.
The announcement came hours after Russia announced that its delegation had flown to Belarus to await talks. Ukrainian officials initially rejected the move, saying any talks should take place elsewhere than Belarus, where Russia placed a large contingent of troops. Belarus was one of the places from where Russian troops entered Ukraine.
Earlier Sunday, the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, was eerily quiet after huge explosions lit up the morning sky and authorities reported blasts at one of the airports. Only an occasional car appeared on a deserted main boulevard as a strict 39-hour curfew kept people off the streets. Terrified residents instead hunkered down in homes, underground garages and subway stations in anticipation of a full-scale Russian assault.
“The past night was tough – more shelling, more bombing of residential areas and civilian infrastructure,” Zelenskyy said.
Until Sunday, Russia’s troops had remained on the outskirts of Kharkiv, a city of 1.4 million about 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) south of the border with Russia, while other forces rolled past to press the offensive deeper into Ukraine.
Videos posted on Ukrainian media and social networks showed Russian vehicles moving across Kharkiv and Russian troops roaming the city in small groups. One showed Ukrainian troops firing at the Russians and damaged Russian light utility vehicles abandoned nearby.
The images underscored the determined resistance Russian troops face while attempting to enter Ukraine’s bigger cities. Ukrainians have volunteered en masse to help defend the capital, Kyiv, and other cities, taking guns distributed by authorities and preparing firebombs to fight Russian forces.
Ukraine’s government also is releasing prisoners with military experience who want to fight for the country, a prosecutor’s office official, Andriy Sinyuk, told the Hromadske TV channel Sunday. He did not specify whether the move applied to prisoners convicted of all levels of crimes.
Putin hasn’t disclosed his ultimate plans, but Western officials believe he is determined to overthrow Ukraine’s government and replace it with a regime of his own, redrawing the map of Europe and reviving Moscow’s Cold War-era influence.
The pressure on strategic ports in the south of Ukraine appeared aimed at seizing control of the country’s coastline stretching from the border with Romania in the west to the border with Russia in the east. A Russian Defense Ministry spokesman, Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, said Russian forces had blocked the cities of Kherson on the Black Sea and the port of Berdyansk on the Azov Sea.
He said the Russian forces also took control of an airbase near Kherson and the Azov Sea city of Henichesk. Ukrainian authorities also have reported fighting near Odesa, Mykolaiv and other areas.
Cutting Ukraine’s access to its sea ports would deal a major blow to the country’s economy. It also could allow Moscow to build a land corridor to Crimea, which Moscow annexed in 2014 and until now was connected to Russia by a 19-kilometer (12-mile) bridge, the longest bridge in Europe which opened in 2018.
Flames billowed from an oil depot near an airbase in Vasylkiv, a city 37 kilometers (23 miles) south of Kyiv where there has been intense fighting, according to the mayor. Russian forces blew up a gas pipeline in Kharkiv, prompting the government to warn people to cover their windows with damp cloth or gauze as protection from smoke, the president’s office said.
Ukrainian military deputy commander Lt.-Gen. Yevhen Moisiuk sounded a defiant note in a message aimed at Russian troops.
“Unload your weapons, raise your hands so that our servicemen and civilians can understand that you have heard us. This is your ticket home,” Moisiuk said in a Facebook video.
The number of casualties so far from Europe’s largest land conflict since World War II remains unclear amid the fog of combat.
Ukraine’s health minister reported Saturday that 198 people, including three children, had been killed and more than 1,000 others wounded. It was unclear whether those figures included both military and civilian casualties. Russia has not released any casualty information.
Ukraine’s U.N. ambassador, Sergiy Kyslytsya, tweeted Saturday that Ukraine appealed to the International Committee of the Red Cross “to facilitate repatriation of thousands of bodies of Russian soldiers.” An accompanying chart claimed 3,500 Russian troops have been killed.
Laetitia Courtois, ICRC’s permanent observer to the U.N., told The Associated Press that the situation in Ukraine was “a limitation for our teams on the ground” and “we therefore cannot confirm numbers or other details.”
The United Nations’ refugee agency said Sunday that about 368,000 Ukrainians have arrived in neighboring countries since the invasion started Thursday. The U.N. has estimated the conflict could produce as many as 4 million refugees, depending how long it continues.
Zelenskyy denounced Russia’s offensive as “state terrorism.” He said the attacks on Ukrainian cities should be investigated by an international war crimes tribunal and cost Russia its place as one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.
As Russia pushes ahead with its offensive, the West is working to equip the outnumbered Ukrainian forces with weapons and ammunition while punishing Russia with far-reaching sanctions intended to further isolate Moscow.
The U.S. pledged an additional $350 million in military assistance to Ukraine, including anti-tank weapons, body armor and small arms. Germany said it would send missiles and anti-tank weapons to the besieged country and that it would close its airspace to Russian planes.
The U.S., European Union and United Kingdom agreed to block “selected” Russian banks from the SWIFT global financial messaging system, which moves money around more than 11,000 banks and other financial institutions worldwide, part of a new round of sanctions aiming to impose a severe cost on Moscow for the invasion. They also agreed to impose ”restrictive measures” on Russia’s central bank.
Responding to a request from Ukraine’s minister of digital transformation, tech billionaire Elon Musk said on Twitter that his satellite-based internet system Starlink was now active in Ukraine and that there were “more terminals en route.”
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, meanwhile, said Sunday that his country is committing 100 billion euros ($112.7 billion) to a special fund for its armed forces, raising its defense spending above 2% of gross domestic product. Scholz told a special session of the Bundestag the investment was needed “to protect our freedom and our democracy.”
Putin sent troops into Ukraine after denying for weeks that he intended to do so, all the while building up a force of almost 200,000 troops along the countries’ borders. He claims the West has failed to take seriously Russia’s security concerns about NATO, the Western military alliance that Ukraine aspires to join. But he has also expressed scorn about Ukraine’s right to exist as an independent state.
Russia claims its assault on Ukraine is aimed only at military targets, but bridges, schools and residential neighborhoods have been hit.
Ukraine’s ambassador to the U.S., Oksana Markarova, said Ukraine was gathering evidence of shelling of residential areas, kindergartens and hospitals to submit to an international war crimes court in The Hague as possible crimes against humanity. The International Criminal Court’s prosecutor has said he is monitoring the conflict closely.
British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss warned Sunday that Putin could use “the most unsavory means,” including banned chemical or biological weapons, to defeat Ukraine.
“I urge the Russians not to escalate this conflict, but we do need to be prepared for Russia to seek to use even worse weapons,” Truss told Sky News.
___
Isachenkov reported from Moscow, and Miller from Washington. Francesca Ebel, Josef Federman and Andrew Drake in Kyiv; Mstyslav Chernov and Nic Dumitrache in Mariupol, Ukraine; and other AP journalists from around the world contributed to this report.
__
AP · by YURAS KARMANAU, JIM HEINTZ, VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV and DASHA LITVINOVA · February 27, 2022
6. Putin’s Ukraine Slaughterhouse
"shoulda, coulda, woulda"
The free world does have blood on its hands. As an aside, not all the free world is in the West- we need to use "free world" rather than the "West."
Putin’s Ukraine Slaughterhouse
It’s shameful the West did so little to help Kyiv defend itself.
WSJ · by The Editorial Board
A residential building damaged by a missile in Kyiv, Feb. 25.
Photo: Pierre Crom/Getty Images
Watching the indifferent brutality of Vladimir Putin’s assault on Ukraine is sickening, but it’s vital that the world not look away. This is the bloody consequence of unchecked imperialism, and it’s a warning of what will become more common as the multi-decade Pax Americana recedes. There are also stirring examples of heroism that the world shouldn’t forget.
Russian troops are closing in on Kyiv, with U.S. officials saying Mr. Putin wants to decapitate the government as quickly as possible. Thousands of paratroopers may be dropped to take the city center after missile and artillery attacks reduce the resistance. The Kremlin signaled it is willing to talk with Ukraine, but only as long as the democratically elected government in Kyiv surrenders.
President Volodymyr Zelensky has stayed in Kyiv and rallied his countrymen to resist. In a moment that should haunt European leaders, Mr. Zelensky told them on a video call that “this might be the last time you see me alive.” U.S. intelligence believes the Russians have a kill list of Ukrainian officials, and everything the U.S. has said about Mr. Putin’s plans has turned out to be true. He has proven many times that assassination is central to his business model.
Ukraine’s forces are putting up brave resistance despite being overwhelmed in firepower. One soldier sacrificed himself to blow up a bridge to stop a Russian tank column. Another offered an expletive to a Russian gunboat demanding surrender before he and a dozen others were killed by shelling. Europe and the U.S. should be ashamed for not doing more to help Ukrainians defend themselves.
The wars of recent decades have largely been fought in the Middle East or Afghanistan, often clandestinely with special forces away from the cameras. They have been horrible but have been wars to defeat terrorist insurgencies, topple dangerous dictators, or defend against missile attacks as in Israel.
This is a war of imperial conquest by a stronger nation subjugating the weak. Westerners who have lived in peaceful comfort for decades should absorb the awful lesson.
Copyright ©2022 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8
WSJ · by The Editorial Board
7. Putin’s allies abandon him over Ukraine invasion
I hope this is happening.
Putin’s allies abandon him over Ukraine invasion
Several of Russia's closest allies and former Soviet satellite states have sharply rebuked President Vladimir Putin over his unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
Why it matters: As the Western world seeks to make Putin an international pariah, even his closest allies are resisting showing support for his assault on Ukraine.
Driving the news: Czech President Milos Zeman and Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, both historically strong pro-Russian voices in the European Union, condemned the affront as "an unprovoked act of aggression," AP reports.
- "Russia has committed a crime against peace," Zeman said.
-
Zeman, who earlier this week insisted that Russia wouldn't attack Ukraine, changed course and has called for harsh sanctions against Russia, including pulling out of the SWIFT financial system.
- Orban, who has pursued a diplomatic and economic strategy with Putin called "Eastern Opening," condemned "Russia's military action."
- “Hungary’s position is clear: we stand by Ukraine, we stand by Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty,” said Hungary's Foreign Minister Peter Szijijarto, per AP.
What's happening: Kazakhstan, one of Russia's closest allies, denied a request for its troops to join the attack on Ukraine, per NBC News.
-
The Czech Republic closed Russian consulates in the country and stopped issuing visas to Russians except for humanitarian cases.
- The president of Bulgaria, which was Russia's closest ally during the Cold War, said the invasion was "absolutely inadmissible."
- The ruling coalition leaders in Romania called Russia "the architect of the worst security crisis since World War II."
- Moldovan President Maia Sandu said Russia’s attacks were launched "in violation of international norms," and the international community "unanimously condemns these military actions."
- And Germany and Italy, which have strong economic ties to Russia, are both poised to support a European Union measure to cut Russia from the international SWIFT financial system.
Between the lines: China, which has deepened economic and military ties with Russia in recent years, has straddled the fence between supporting Russia's "legitimate security concerns" and calling for Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity to be respected.
-
China abstained from a UN resolution on Friday criticizing Russia's attack, a departure from its usual practice of vetoing Western-led measures.
Axios' Zachary Basu contributed reporting.
8. Moscow Retaliates as Online Giants Take Steps to Stem Disinformation
Excerpts:
Senator Mark Warner, D-Va., chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told the Wall Street Journal on Friday that "In the briefings and the conversations I've had with American intelligence and military leadership and cyber experts, I think we've been surprised that Russia has not gone and ramped up to some of their better tools.”
But that doesn’t mean the Russians aren’t trying to use available tools in the conflict. Observers online said Russian soldiers were using microtasking tools like Premise to geolocate Ukrainian assets for targeting—essentially paying users to locate things like ports, medical facilities, bridges, and explosion craters.
Premise responded by calling the claims “unequivocally false,” but said they were suspending operations in Ukraine out of an abundance of caution.
Moscow Retaliates as Online Giants Take Steps to Stem Disinformation
As Kremlin limits access to Twitter and Facebook, Western observers say the tech companies' moves are years late.
BY PATRICK TUCKER
TECHNOLOGY EDITOR
FEBRUARY 26, 2022 05:27 PM E
Several U.S. tech giants have taken steps to stem Russian-government disinformation and funding as tanks roll into Ukraine, drawing Moscow’s ire—and some praise for the “years-late” action by Western observers.
Saturday, YouTube said it would stop ad payments to “several Russian channels affiliated with recent sanctions,” among others, “in light of extraordinary circumstances in Ukraine.”
Also on Saturday, Twitter reported that Moscow was at least partially blocking access by Russian users, who have been using the platform to share news of the invasion’s progress.
These followed a Friday announcement by Russia’s telecommunications agency that it had begun restricting access by Russian users to Facebook, whose officials said they had refused to stop labeling false information posts by four government-affiliated sites.
Disinformation watchdogs have complained for years that social media and tech companies such as Facebook, Twitter, and Alphabet-owned YouTube aren’t doing enough to keep Kremlin-backed disinformation off their sites. But those calls took on new urgency after the attack on Ukraine began.
Peter Singer, a senior fellow at New America and author of the book Like War, said the move was "the right thing, years late, which is a recurring pattern for the companies."
Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s digital minister, has been publicly pressuring social media giants and other tech companies to do more to police Kremlin-based media operating on their platforms.
On Saturday, he announced that “Twitter just made the decision to block Russians the opportunity to register new accounts in Russian Federation.”
Defense One has reached out to Twitter for independent confirmation and will update when more information is available.
Twitter did tweet that it was experiencing a service disruption in Russia. “We’re aware that Twitter is being restricted for some people in Russia and are working to keep our service safe and accessible,” they said.
The traffic monitoring group NetBlocks reported “live metrics show that Twitter has been restricted on multiple providers in Russia.”
On Saturday, Meta announced that it, too, would bar Russian state media from running ads and monetizing on Meta-owned platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.
Meanwhile, in Ukraine, NetBlocks reported isolated and sporadic internet outages in cities like Kyiv and Kharkiv, but overall, Russian cyber attacks on Ukraine have been far less severe than many feared.
Senator Mark Warner, D-Va., chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told the Wall Street Journal on Friday that "In the briefings and the conversations I've had with American intelligence and military leadership and cyber experts, I think we've been surprised that Russia has not gone and ramped up to some of their better tools.”
But that doesn’t mean the Russians aren’t trying to use available tools in the conflict. Observers online said Russian soldiers were using microtasking tools like Premise to geolocate Ukrainian assets for targeting—essentially paying users to locate things like ports, medical facilities, bridges, and explosion craters.
Premise responded by calling the claims “unequivocally false,” but said they were suspending operations in Ukraine out of an abundance of caution.
9. Opinion | Putin’s war reminds us why liberal democracy is worth defending
Fareed Zakaria asks the key question we all must reflect upon.
Excerpts:
As for the liberal international order, it has more defenders than one might imagine. The most eloquent statement in support of it came this week at the U.N. Security Council, not from one of the Western powers in the room, but rather from Kenya’s ambassador to the United Nations, Martin Kimani. He said that almost all of Africa’s countries have borders that are deeply flawed. They were drawn by colonial powers, often dividing ethnic and linguistic groups. But, he pointed out, African leaders had decided that they would live with their imperfect borders, because to challenge them would have been to invite an endless series of wars and insurgencies. Instead, these countries chose to honor international law and the U.N. system. Kimani said, “Rather than form nations that looked ever backward into history with a dangerous nostalgia, we chose to look forward to a greatness none of our many nations and peoples had ever known.”
...
But what the backlash shows is that liberal democracy and the rules-based international order need to be defended — robustly, even aggressively. With the voices of nationalism and populism so loud, it seems that liberal values have few willing to defend them unabashedly. To those who dwell on liberal democracy’s problems rather than its promise, I say, "Let them go to Ukraine." The people of Ukraine are showing us that those values — of an open society and a free world — can be worth fighting for and even dying for.
The question for all of us is, what will we do to help them?
Opinion | Putin’s war reminds us why liberal democracy is worth defending
The Washington Post · by Fareed ZakariaColumnist |AddFollowToday at 4:23 p.m. EST · February 24, 2022
Russia’s utterly unprovoked, unjustifiable, immoral invasion of Ukraine would seem to mark the end of an era — one that began with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. In that post-Cold War age, Western ideas about politics, economics and culture spread across the world largely uncontested, and American power undergirded the international system. It was not a period of tranquility — think of the wars in Yugoslavia and the Middle East. But it was a time in which American power and liberal democracy seemed triumphant, and the international system seemed to work more cooperatively than at any previous point in history.
The Pax Americana began to wane for many reasons, including the rise of countries such as China and India, the disasters in Iraq and Afghanistan, and financial and democratic crises in the West. But the most disruptive force has been the return of an imperial Russia, determined to re-create a sphere of influence in which it could dominate its neighbors. For the past decade, President Vladimir Putin’s Russia has been the world’s great geopolitical spoiler, actively attempting to unravel the rules-based international system.
For many commentators, the current crisis is proof that this system has collapsed and that the democratic age was a brief fantasy. David Brooks writes that “history is reverting toward barbarism.” Robert Kagan has said that “the jungle” is growing back. But is that kind of pessimism justified? I am more hopeful that within the terrible news of today lie some powerful positive forces.
After all, what caused this crisis in the first place? It’s very simple: the overwhelming desire of Ukrainians to live in an open, democratic society. Let us not forget what it was that enraged Putin and led him to invade Ukraine for the first time in 2014. It was not a Ukrainian declaration to seek NATO membership; it was the efforts of the Kyiv government (a pro-Russian government at the time) to finalize an “association agreement” with the European Union. When the president of Ukraine ultimately balked at this deal — under pressure from Russia — he was greeted by massive street protests, and the parliament voted him out of office. That is what triggered Putin’s first invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine was not alone in choosing a pro-Western path. Over the past three decades, most of the countries that were part of the Soviet bloc have chosen one by one to become more open, liberal, democratic and capitalist. None are perfect — some far from it — but from the Baltic States to Bulgaria, from large countries such as Poland to tiny ones such as Moldova, most have adopted some versions of democratic politics and open, market-based economics. There has been backsliding in countries such as Hungary and Poland. But in broad terms, the movement of those countries toward Western values since 1989 is surely an affirmation of the vitality of the liberal democratic project.
Follow Fareed Zakaria‘s opinionsFollow
Putin’s reaction is a bloody, brutal effort to stem this tide of democratization. He has watched with horror as the movement swept across Ukraine, Georgia and, even by 2020, into Belarus, which experienced the largest pro-democracy protests in that country’s short history. They were savagely repressed, with help from Russia, and now Putin has one more country in which he can maintain control only through fear and force.
As for the liberal international order, it has more defenders than one might imagine. The most eloquent statement in support of it came this week at the U.N. Security Council, not from one of the Western powers in the room, but rather from Kenya’s ambassador to the United Nations, Martin Kimani. He said that almost all of Africa’s countries have borders that are deeply flawed. They were drawn by colonial powers, often dividing ethnic and linguistic groups. But, he pointed out, African leaders had decided that they would live with their imperfect borders, because to challenge them would have been to invite an endless series of wars and insurgencies. Instead, these countries chose to honor international law and the U.N. system. Kimani said, “Rather than form nations that looked ever backward into history with a dangerous nostalgia, we chose to look forward to a greatness none of our many nations and peoples had ever known.”
Far from Europe, what is at the crux of the problem between China and Taiwan? It is the fact that the Taiwanese people want to live in an open, free, liberal society, and they fear that their way of life would be snuffed out by a communist dictatorship.
I don’t want to minimize the troubles that democracy and liberalism face. Almost 25 years ago I noted with alarm the rise of “illiberal democracy” and spotlighted in particular the nasty turn that Russia (among other countries) was taking. I have seen the erosion of liberal democratic values that I hold dear in the country of my birth, India, and the country in which I am a proud immigrant, the United States.
But what the backlash shows is that liberal democracy and the rules-based international order need to be defended — robustly, even aggressively. With the voices of nationalism and populism so loud, it seems that liberal values have few willing to defend them unabashedly. To those who dwell on liberal democracy’s problems rather than its promise, I say, "Let them go to Ukraine." The people of Ukraine are showing us that those values — of an open society and a free world — can be worth fighting for and even dying for.
The question for all of us is, what will we do to help them?
The Washington Post · by Fareed ZakariaColumnist |AddFollowToday at 4:23 p.m. EST · February 24, 2022
10. Ukraine crisis: Japan should discuss Nato-like nuclear weapons sharing, Shinzo Abe says
Excerpts:
“Japan should not treat as a taboo discussions on the reality of how the world is kept safe,” said Abe, who oversaw a steady rise in defence spending during his time as premier that ended in 2020.
Abe also said Japan, which had been devastated by atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the final stages of World War II, would have to maintain its goal of abolishing nuclear weapons.
Hemmed in by a pacifist constitution it adopted after the war, Japan relies heavily on the US “nuclear umbrella” to deter growing regional threats.
“It’s important to make progress toward that goal, but when it comes to how to protect the lives of Japanese citizens and the nation, I think we should conduct discussions by taking various options fully into consideration,” Abe said.
Ukraine crisis: Japan should discuss Nato-like nuclear weapons sharing, Shinzo Abe says
- Nato’s nuclear sharing arrangements let the US keep its nuclear weapons in Europe under its custody
- Abe’s remarks came as foreign ministers of the G7 leading democratic economies were set to meet online on Sunday in an emergency session over the Ukraine crisis
+ FOLLOW
Published: 3:13pm, 27 Feb, 2022
By agencies South China Morning Post3 min
Former Japanese PM Shinzo Abe. Photo: dpa
Japan should discuss a possible sharing of nuclear weapons similar to that of Nato members in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Sunday.
Nato’s nuclear sharing arrangements let the US keep its nuclear weapons in Europe under its custody. “Many people in Japan probably don’t know about the system,” Abe said Sunday on a Fuji Television show.
“Japan should not treat as a taboo discussions on the reality of how the world is kept safe,” said Abe, who oversaw a steady rise in defence spending during his time as premier that ended in 2020.
Abe also said Japan, which had been devastated by atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the final stages of World War II, would have to maintain its goal of abolishing nuclear weapons.
Hemmed in by a pacifist constitution it adopted after the war, Japan relies heavily on the US “nuclear umbrella” to deter growing regional threats.
“It’s important to make progress toward that goal, but when it comes to how to protect the lives of Japanese citizens and the nation, I think we should conduct discussions by taking various options fully into consideration,” Abe said.
Russia’s invasion has prompted broad financial sanctions from major democracies while individuals and organisations across the world have solicited donations to help Ukraine.
The Japanese government has also announced sanctions on Moscow including freezing assets and banning key exports such as semiconductors to organisations related to the Russian.
Abe’s remarks came as foreign ministers of the G7 leading democratic economies were set to meet online on Sunday in an emergency session over the Ukraine crisis.
Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi told national broadcaster NHK that Tokyo wanted to reconfirm its cooperation with its other partners in a bid to “improve the situation”.
He called Russia’s invasion of Ukraine “a unilateral attempt to change the status quo by force”.
The Japanese foreign minister said Russia’s actions were “absolutely unacceptable” as they “clearly violate international law”.
Japan has joined the United States and the Europe Union in imposing sanctions on Russia in the wake of the invasion.
The G7 leading democratic economies consists of the United States, Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Japan.
Meanwhile, Japanese billionaire Hiroshi “Mickey” Mikitani on Sunday said he would donate US$8.7 million to the government of Ukraine, calling Russia’s invasion “a challenge to democracy”.
The founder of e-commerce giant Rakuten said in a letter addressed to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky that the donation of 1 billion yen (US$8.7 million) would go towards “humanitarian activities to help people in Ukraine who are victims of the violence”.
Mikitani said he visited Kyiv in 2019 and met with Zelensky.
“My thoughts are with you and Ukraine people,” Mikitani said in his letter.
“I believe that the trampling of a peaceful and democratic Ukraine by unjustified force is a challenge to democracy,” he wrote. “I sincerely hope that Russia and Ukraine can resolve this issue peacefully and that Ukraine people can have peace again as soon as possible.”
Reporting by Bloomberg, AFP, dpa
11. Ukraine: The Propaganda Wars – OpEd
This is from the RonPaul Institute. Quite a critique of US foreign policy operating for the US elite.
As an aside, speaking of propaganda, I watched RT on YouTube last evening to see what Russia was reporting. In the thirty minutes I watched all the reporting was on Ukraine. Most all the reporting was from the Donbass region and the newly Russian recognized people's republics with reports on targeting of civilian facilities by Ukrainian forces. This included a kindergarten that was a near miss that damaged the walls and blew out 26 windows) according to the report). It allegedly occurred at night so there were no occupants to become casualties. The other significant report was on Chernobyl. They said it was being jointly occupied by Russian and Ukrainian forces and that the radiation levels remain low and within acceptable limits. Interestingly, YouTube posts a warning in the upper left corrner that RT is a Russian state funded news organization.
On the other hand the best influence operations are being conducted by Ukrainian patriots on social media. We have a lot to learn from them and I hope we do so that someday we can "let slip our PSYOP dogs of war" and operate unencumbered at the speed of the PSYOP OODA loop though I doubt Ron (or Rand) Paul would be happy with that based on the OpEd below.
Ukraine: The Propaganda Wars – OpEd
The media and the war machine (or do I repeat myself?) want us to take sides in the Russo/Ukraine war. To those of us with long histories in military conflicts in which the US foreign policy establishment, media, and military have an interest, the terms are always framed as white hats and black hats – and you had better choose a side!
“Are you on the side of FREEDOM or are you a puppet of [insert Hitler proxy here]?”
You must take a side. (In fact you must choose the side the Beltway blob wants you to choose).
The US government never fights in the self-interest of the elites. It only fights (directly and by proxy) for the freedom and liberation of others. If you doubt that you are un-American. History started when they tell you it started. Never mind about the past or how US intervention created the circumstances that led to whatever horrible outcome we witness.
The Iraqis would greet us as liberators, we were told. They will love our bombs. Likewise the Libyans once their leader is knife-raped to death. And then of course the Syrians once our al-Qaeda “moderate” head-choppers are put in charge. The rest of the world is so so grateful that the omniscient Washington foreign policy elites can choose their fate for them. Surely they are too foolish to decide for themselves!
Ironically, as the US government and its obedient media were hysterically telling us we must demand Russian blood for their attack on a Ukraine that had not attacked them first, the US government that same day bombed a Somalia that had not attacked it first. And let’s not even talk about the horrific Saudi genocide (with full US support) in Yemen.
With one voice the US media, political elites, and brainwashed sheeple scream out: “You can’t just go and attack a country that hasn’t attacked you!!!” And the people of Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen, and yes even Afghanistan scratch their heads in wonder at the ignorance, hypocrisy, and cynicism.
Like an alcoholic may occasionally get a moment of clarity, a politician may sometimes get a moment of honesty. California US Congressman and lead “Russiagate” conspiracy theorist Adam Schiff, spilled the beans in a 2020 speech:
US chauvinism & warmongering is so ingrained that @AdamSchiff can openly declare, in Jan 2020, that US uses Ukraine to “fight Russia over there,” and our elites applaud. Fast forward two years later when Russia fights back, and the same circle is outraged. pic.twitter.com/6B4QVFSZvV
— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) February 26, 2022
The US military-industrial-media-Congressional complex that is behind this disastrous policy knows well, however, that war brings bigger dividends:
Biden’s anti-war coalition of Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman sends $350 million in love weapons for NATO’s nonviolent war against Russia and the Azov battalion’s pacifist-style shelling of the Donbas. https://t.co/sYntONlss2
— Dan Cohen (@dancohen3000) February 26, 2022
Perhaps the only thing worse are the third-tier flunkies who do their bidding in international organizations.
Yesterday NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced that NATO countries were going to send more weapons to Ukraine. Brilliant! Bureaucrats, especially stupid ones, always double down then their policies are shown to be failures.
As one report quoted the failed Swedish politico/NATO chief:
‘We see rhetoric, the messages, which is strongly indicating that the aim is to remove the democratically-elected government in Kiev,’ he announced after a meeting with NATO leaders.
What? NATO must send weapons to Ukraine because Russia is attempting to remove its democratically-elected government? How dare they! Don’t they know that’s OUR job?
Here’s the side we should be on in Ukraine and everywhere else: non-intervention in the affairs of others. Today’s Ukraine nightmare is the product of a US foreign policy that overthrew not one, but two elected Ukrainian governments because the people chose a president that Washington’s pampered elites didn’t like.
As I wrote in an article yesterday, one thing we can take with us from Russia actually doing what it long said it would do if Ukraine was armed by hostile governments and pulled toward NATO membership is that:
Yes, this is a good thing and it should be celebrated. Don’t worry – it’s not un-patriotic to applaud an authentically pro-America foreign policy! Now is the time to demand a change in how things are done. It does not weaken the US to decide to not meddle in the affairs of others. On the contrary, we are strengthened by shrugging off the burden of (very badly) running the rest of the globe.
Unless anyone believes we are stronger by burning one trillion dollars for the US military empire each and every year.
Let’s ask the truckers and the waiters and the welders of America how they like billions of their hard-earned dollars laundered to the ultra-rich Beltway elites through corrupt regimes abroad. Foreign aid is falsely perceived as a plate of rice and beans to a motherless child in a war-torn hellhole. The reality is that foreign aid is that which re-models all the bathrooms in million dollars mansions in McLean VA and its evil environs.
Gold plated Beltway toilets. The ignoble flotsam of the corrupt US empire.
12. Biden Targets Russia With Strategy of Containment, Updated for a New Era
I am surprised to read the "C" word. Talk amongst yourselves.
Contain what?
Contain how?
Asked another way: what is the acceptable durable political arrangement(s) that will support, protect, and advance US interests and the interests of the free world?
Biden Targets Russia With Strategy of Containment, Updated for a New Era
News Analysis
President Biden’s plan to counter Russia faces obstacles in an interconnected world. Russia also has a new, if not very enthusiastic, partner in standing up to the West: China.
President Biden and Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, in Geneva last year. Mr. Biden vowed this week to make Mr. Putin a “pariah on the international stage.”Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times
By
Feb. 25, 2022
WASHINGTON — More than 75 years ago, faced with a Soviet Union that clearly wanted to take over states beyond its borders, the United States adopted a Cold War approach that came to be known as “containment,” a simplistic-sounding term that evolved into a complex Cold War strategy.
On Thursday, having awakened to a violent, unprovoked attack on Ukraine, exactly the kind of nightmare imagined eight decades before, President Biden made clear he was moving toward Containment 2.0. Though it sounds a lot like its predecessor, it will have to be revised for a modern era that is in many ways more complex.
The nation that just moved “to wipe an entire country off the world map,” in the words of Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany, also remains a key supplier of natural gas to keep Germans and many other Europeans warm. That explains why Mr. Biden has been constrained from cutting off the valuable export. And the Russia of today has a panoply of cyberweapons that it can use to strike at the United States or its allies without risking nuclear Armageddon — an option to retaliate against American sanctions that was never available to President Vladimir V. Putin’s predecessors.
Those are only two examples of why containment will not be easy. But Mr. Biden has been clear that is where he is headed.
For three decades, American presidents described a series of Soviet and Russian leaders as “businesslike” or even “partners.” They celebrated “glasnost” and ushered Moscow into the World Trade Organization and the Group of 7 industrial nations. Washington even entertained the idea in the 1990s — very briefly — that one day Russia could join NATO. No one has talked that way in years. But Mr. Biden, who came to office last year talking about establishing a “stable, predictable” relationship with Moscow, spoke of a completely ruptured relationship on Thursday.
“Now the entire world sees clearly what Putin and his Kremlin allies are really all about,” Mr. Biden said in a speech from the White House. “This was never about genuine security concerns on their part. It was always about naked aggression, about Putin’s desire for empire by any means necessary, by bullying Russia’s neighbors through coercion and corruption.”
He vowed to make Russia pay “dearly, economically and strategically,” and to make Mr. Putin a “pariah on the international stage.” Those words might have even been familiar to George F. Kennan, the American foreign service officer who became famous as the grand strategist who invented containment, though he later warned, at age 94, that expanding NATO to Russia’s borders was a bad idea, bound to become “the beginning of a new Cold War.”
The “containment” Mr. Kennan described in his famous “Long Telegram,” an 8,000-word dispatch from the American embassy in Moscow, was primarily aimed at putting geographical limits on Soviet ambitions. But even though the Long Telegram was long, it spent the most time explaining the psychology of Stalin’s regime, which Mr. Kennan described as paranoid, viewing the outside world to be “evil, hostile and menacing.”
Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany. Russia is a key supplier of natural gas to Germany and other European nations.Credit...Pool photo by Hannibal Hanschke
The similarities to Mr. Putin’s speech on Monday night, in which he accused Ukraine of triggering genocides and seeking nuclear weapons — both false claims — and the United States of seeking to use Ukrainian territory to strike at Moscow, are striking. So was his description of America’s “empire of lies.”
But as Richard N. Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, said on Thursday, “It’s much more complicated to make containment work today.”
The Soviet Union largely presented a military and ideological challenge, he noted. Yet modern-day Russia is a provider of needed fuel and minerals, “and that gives them leverage over us, even as we have leverage over them.” The force of that leverage was made clear from Mr. Biden’s answer to a question on Thursday about why Russia had not been thrown out of SWIFT, the global communication system for financial transactions.
Barring Russia from that system would be a devastating move, cutting off its government from oil and gas revenue. That accounts for about 40 percent of its incoming cash and would be the one sanction almost certain to hurt Mr. Putin like no other.
But Mr. Biden noted in his speech that “in our sanctions package, we specifically designed to allow energy payments to continue.” When asked about barring Russia from SWIFT, he added, delicately, “Right now, that’s not the position that the rest of Europe wishes to take.” In fact, the debate over SWIFT has been a source of tense behind-the-scenes exchanges, chiefly with Germany. The German objection is clear: If the country cannot pay for its gas, Russia will not deliver it.
The Moscow International Business Center. Barring Russia from SWIFT, the global communication system for financial transactions, would be devastating for the country.Credit...Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times
But the second reason containment may not work is that Russia has a new, if not very enthusiastic, partner in standing up to the West: China.
When Mr. Kennan described containment theory, China was in civil war. Later in the Cold War, when Russian leaders met their Chinese counterparts, Russia was the dominant player of the two countries. No longer. Last weekend, when China’s foreign minister told participants at the Munich Security Conference that Ukraine’s borders needed to be respected, people sat up in their seats.
It sounded, for a moment, as if China was reining Russia in. But that was Saturday. On Thursday, as Russian forces shelled Ukraine, the Chinese government said that it had approved several deals announced during Mr. Putin’s trip to Beijing for the Winter Olympics this month, including one to buy vast amounts of Russian wheat. The word “sanctions” never appeared in the Chinese announcement about the deals this week.
When Mr. Biden was asked on Thursday whether he was urging China to help isolate Russia, he hesitated and then said, “I’m not prepared to comment on that at the moment.”
Containment has another challenge that Mr. Kennan could not have envisioned: the rise of cyberconflict as a short-of-war mechanism for superpowers to attack each other from afar, without resorting to nuclear weapons.
Microsoft reported in October that 58 percent of the state-sponsored cyberattacks it had tracked around the world in the past year had emanated from Russia. And that does not count the criminal ransomware gangs that work from Russian territory.
Understand Russia’s Attack on Ukraine
Card 1 of 7
What is at the root of this invasion? Russia considers Ukraine within its natural sphere of influence, and it has grown unnerved at Ukraine’s closeness with the West and the prospect that the country might join NATO or the European Union. While Ukraine is part of neither, it receives financial and military aid from the United States and Europe.
Are these tensions just starting now? Antagonism between the two nations has been simmering since 2014, when the Russian military crossed into Ukrainian territory, after an uprising in Ukraine replaced their Russia-friendly president with a pro-Western government. Then, Russia annexed Crimea and inspired a separatist movement in the east. A cease-fire was negotiated in 2015, but fighting has continued.
How has Ukraine responded? On Feb. 23, Ukraine declared a 30-day state of emergency as cyberattacks knocked out government institutions. Following the beginning of the attacks, Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, declared martial law. The foreign minister called the attacks “a full-scale invasion” and called on the world to “stop Putin.”
Biden administration officials make no secret of their concern that Russia views its arsenal of disruptive cyberweapons as a way to strike back at American sanctions. Now that Mr. Biden has announced sanctions against some of Russia’s biggest banks, a well-planned cyberattack might be the most efficient way for Russia to try to retaliate against American financial institutions. But as Russia learned last year, the target set of vulnerable American infrastructure is much larger.
Mr. Biden’s one meeting last year with Mr. Putin, in Geneva, was prompted by the Colonial Pipeline hack, which shut down nearly half of the flow of gasoline, jet fuel and diesel on the East Coast — and triggered gas lines at a time of plentiful supply. It was an event that shook the White House and taught the Kremlin some lessons about the vulnerability of American critical infrastructure.
Mr. Biden emerged from the meeting offering some professional respect for Mr. Putin as an adversary. For his part, Mr. Putin said, “There has been no hostility.” At one point, Mr. Biden asked the Russian leader how he would feel if Russia’s gas pipelines were attacked from afar — a comment that some interpreted as a threat to the Russian leader.
For a few months, ransomware gangs were in retreat, and not long ago the Russian police, based on information from the United States, arrested a group of what they described as criminal hackers. But now there is fear that the ransomware gangs could be unleashed, as could hacking groups like Sandworm, which has been linked to the G.R.U., the Russian military intelligence unit. Sandworm is believed to be responsible for hacks of the Ukrainian power grid and multiple targets in the United States.
For more than a month, the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Jen Easterly, has been issuing a series of what she calls “Shields Up” tweets and making public appearances to encourage more resiliency in the nation’s privately-controlled computer networks.
Together with the British, the F.B.I. and the National Security Agency, Ms. Easterly’s agency recently revealed the technical details for a new strain of malware it has seen. It turns out that it was derived from one of the most destructive attacks ever conducted, which was aimed at Ukraine in 2017.
For America’s largest banks and utilities, this was old news: They have studied Russian attacks on Ukraine and other nations for years. But for institutions that have invested far less in fending off attacks, resiliency takes time to build up, so no one thinks that last-minute warnings to lock down vulnerable systems, while helpful, are enough.
For years, the U.S. government has warned that Russia has inserted malicious code in American networks, including the power grid, that could be triggered at a later date. (The United States has done the same in Russia.) But so far, Russia has been hesitant to unleash that “sleeper code.” The U.S.-led sanctions may tempt Russian leaders to unleash it, some speculate.
Then there is the problem of what some call “digital fallout,” in which an attack aimed at Ukraine creates collateral damage.
It has happened before: The Russian-created “NotPetya” attack on Ukraine in 2017 ended up escaping Ukraine’s borders, crippling some operations for shipping firms like Maersk and FedEx.
“You could imagine very rapid escalation into what could be regarded as an attack on NATO,” said Senator Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia and the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, who has focused much of his energy on these kinds of scenarios. It is uncharted territory of a kind Mr. Kennan never had to consider.
13. From Korea to Ukraine, Aggressors Believe Their Gains Are Worth the Costs
The Ukraine AAR is going to be an intersting read.
Excerpts:
An after-action report must consider whether deploying U.S. and NATO forces into Ukraine before the fighting started would have deterred the war. If it is thought that Putin is too rational to risk direct combat between his troops and NATO units, the basis for deterrence going forward, would he not have restrained himself in the face of that risk appearing in Ukraine rather than in Poland or the Baltic states? The deployment of even a few brigades of U.S./NATO troops around Kyiv and along likely invasion routes would have brought the crisis to an immediate end. Putin is ambitious but not insane, an opportunist not a fanatic; or at least that must be the assumption. If he is beyond deterrence, then it would still have been better to find that out in Ukraine, the most strategic spot in Eastern Europe, than later in another theater where the scale of combat could be greater.
The failure to bring Ukraine into NATO years ago was in part an attempt to appease Russia, but as usual this has led to aggression rather than peace. Yet NATO has intervened to protect non-NATO areas before. In 1999, NATO conducted airstrikes against Serbia for its military actions in Kosovo. There was no security threat to any NATO member from the violent breakup of Yugoslavia, but there was an affront to the idea that Europe would no longer be subject to major armed conflicts. Ironically, Antonov raised the same concern when he said in an interview that “The problem is what kind of world order will be in future?”
Almost a month ago, Army general Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, predicted that casualties would be “horrific” if Russia invaded. Yet these expectations did not prompt any U.S. or NATO plans to protect lives, defend Ukraine’s territorial integrity (a stated objective), or deter war by any action stronger than the threat of economic sanctions.
From Korea to Ukraine, Aggressors Believe Their Gains Are Worth the Costs
Ukraine again offers an example, like Korea, of an aggressor seeing seizing an opportunity to act against what it believes to be an unguarded foe.
When Mao Zedong informed Josef Stalin that he was ordering Chinese troops to cross the border into Korea in October 1950, he painted a grim picture of the expected reaction: “We must be prepared for the United States declaring and entering a state of war with China, and we must be prepared for the United States at least using its air force to bomb a good number of major cities and industrial centers in China and using its navy to assault coastal regions.” Yet, Mao went ahead with his plan to conquer South Korea and unite the strategic peninsula because he believed that “the primary problem is whether the Chinese army can destroy the American forces within Korea, and effectively solve the Korean problem.” He believed whoever controlled the territory being fought over would win the war; Once the U.S.-led UN coalition was driven from the Korean Peninsula the war would be over. The bombing campaign and blockade would eventually end (“though the United States might not recognize the Korea victory for a long time”) and China would recover.
Nearly seventy-two years later, Russian president Vladimir Putin is thinking about his invasion of Ukraine in the same way, with fewer dire expectations about the U.S. reaction. His focus is on control of territory “lost” when the Soviet Union collapsed. He has made it clear that he believes Ukraine is inherently part of Russia. Any territory he can regain he will consider to be a permanent acquisition. The sanctions imposed by a shaky alliance of Western governments torn by their own interests and subject to the democratic pressures of corporate and consumer lobbies are likely to be less enduring. And even if they persist for some time, the strategic gains from conquest will be worth the economic costs. Putin learned this from his seizure of Crimea in 2014. President Barack Obama’s declaration at the time that Moscow’s annexation of Crimea, the key to Russia’s domination of the Black Sea, “will not stand” has faded away. Troops have been deployed there and a naval armada assembled to strike deeper drives into Ukraine.
Anatoly Antonov, Russia’s ambassador to the United States, has claimed that U.S. sanctions “cannot solve a thing. It is hard to imagine that there is a person in Washington who expects Russia to revise its foreign policy under a threat of restrictions.” If the threat of “crippling” sanctions did not deter Moscow, their imposition will not roll back Russian territorial gains. Reading from a column on trade statistics will not stop a column of tanks.
In the Korean War, the United States did not make the attacks on China that Mao had expected despite the direct combat between U.S. and Chines troops (and between American and Russian pilots). Gen. Douglas MacArthur, a veteran of World Wat II, was removed from command for advocating such an expansion of the war. Instead, the Korean campaign was treated as a “limited war” and fought on Mao’s terms as a contest for who could control the territory at stake.
The capital of Seoul fell to invaders twice but was then liberated twice. The war’s mobile phase ended in the summer of 1951 and armistice talks opened on July 10. The war had taken the form Mao had most feared. “The least advantageous situation would be … for the two armies to become mutually deadlocked,” he had told Stalin. China would not be able to win the war and end the American campaign to destroy China’s economy which “would arouse dissatisfaction toward us” among the people who are “very afraid of war.” The specter of President Dwight Eisenhower escalating the war by launching attacks against China in ways President Harry Truman had not prompted China to sign an armistice on July 27, 1953.
South Korea remained independent and oriented to the West. It has grown into the tenth-largest national economy in terms of nominal GDP, slightly larger today than Russia. North Korea, in contrast, has stagnated in poverty as a buffer state for China.
Mao, Stalin and Kim Il-sung had not expected the intervention of a U.S.-led army under the UN banner when planning their invasion of South Korea. In a speech on January 12, 1950, Secretary of State Dean Acheson had outlined the U.S. defense perimeter in Asia without mentioning Korea. If Korea was outside the U.S. zone, it was free for the taking. The lightly armed South Korean forces could be overwhelmed by the North’s invasion force spearheaded by tanks supplied by the Soviet Union. Today, Putin can be even more confident that Ukraine will be left on its own by repeated statements by President Joe Biden that Ukraine is outside the U.S. defense perimeter because it is not a member of NATO. Less than forty-eight hours before Moscow launched its attacks across Ukraine, which he termed “imminent,” Biden stated, “We have no intention of fighting Russia.” The light was still green.
Putin can boldly proclaim “Whoever tries to interfere with us, and even more so, to create threats for our country, for our people, should know that Russia’s response will be immediate and will lead you to such consequences that you have never experienced in your history” because he does not expect Biden to be transformed by Truman’s ghost and take action to actually defend Ukraine. In his immediate response to Russia’s “unprovoked and unjustified attack on Ukraine” Biden limited his actions to “coordinate with our NATO Allies to ensure a strong, united response that deters any aggression against the Alliance.” And in his televised address midday, he repeated that U.S. troops would not fight in Ukraine.
It is thought that Putin can be deterred from attacking NATO because it would trigger a war much larger than Moscow is prepared for or can afford. The four NATO members that border Russia are not so sure. Poland and the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania (who were also once part of the USSR like Ukraine) are invoking Article IV of the NATO treaty calling for consultations on whether “the security of any of the Parties is threatened” by Russia’s actions. The answer to the question is obvious, but the issue is: what can be done? At a minimum, the strengthening of NATO military capabilities as urged by both Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump need to be expedited. Beyond this, the Western economies must be decoupled from those of their adversaries. Trump started this process and Biden has continued it. It now must expand its scope, particularly in energy.
An after-action report must consider whether deploying U.S. and NATO forces into Ukraine before the fighting started would have deterred the war. If it is thought that Putin is too rational to risk direct combat between his troops and NATO units, the basis for deterrence going forward, would he not have restrained himself in the face of that risk appearing in Ukraine rather than in Poland or the Baltic states? The deployment of even a few brigades of U.S./NATO troops around Kyiv and along likely invasion routes would have brought the crisis to an immediate end. Putin is ambitious but not insane, an opportunist not a fanatic; or at least that must be the assumption. If he is beyond deterrence, then it would still have been better to find that out in Ukraine, the most strategic spot in Eastern Europe, than later in another theater where the scale of combat could be greater.
The failure to bring Ukraine into NATO years ago was in part an attempt to appease Russia, but as usual this has led to aggression rather than peace. Yet NATO has intervened to protect non-NATO areas before. In 1999, NATO conducted airstrikes against Serbia for its military actions in Kosovo. There was no security threat to any NATO member from the violent breakup of Yugoslavia, but there was an affront to the idea that Europe would no longer be subject to major armed conflicts. Ironically, Antonov raised the same concern when he said in an interview that “The problem is what kind of world order will be in future?”
Almost a month ago, Army general Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, predicted that casualties would be “horrific” if Russia invaded. Yet these expectations did not prompt any U.S. or NATO plans to protect lives, defend Ukraine’s territorial integrity (a stated objective), or deter war by any action stronger than the threat of economic sanctions.
Ukraine again offers an example, like Korea, of an aggressor seeing seizing an opportunity to act against what it believes to be an unguarded foe. This time it seems that Russia will get its fill, though it may not slake its hunger.
William R. Hawkins is President of the Hamilton Center for National Strategy. A former economics professor, he has written widely on defense and foreign policy issues for a variety of scholarly and popular publications. He has also served on the staff on the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee.
14. Vladimir Putin sits atop a crumbling pyramid of power
Going against Bonaparte's dictum to "never interrupt an enemy when he is making a mistake," is there something we should be doing to help the crumbling?
But more importantly, what are we doing to be prepared for the eventual crumbling and collapse of the Putin regime?
Vladimir Putin sits atop a crumbling pyramid of power | Vladimir Sorokin
Putin’s end goal isn’t Ukraine but western civilization – the hatred for which he lapped up in the black milk he drank from the KGB’s teat
On 24 February, the armor of the “enlightened autocrat” that had housed Vladimir Putin for the previous 20 years cracked and fell to pieces. The world saw a monster –crazed in its desires and ruthless in its decisions. The monster had grown gradually, gaining strength from year to year, marinating in its own absolute authority, imperial aggression, hatred for western democracy, and malice fueled by the resentment engendered by the fall of the USSR. Now, Europe will have to deal, not with the former Putin, but the new Putin who has cast aside his mask of “business partnership” and “peaceful collaboration”. There shall never again be peace with him. How and why has this come to pass?
In the final film of Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy, when Frodo Baggins has to throw into the seething lava the cursed Ring of Power, the ring which has brought so much suffering and war to the inhabitants of Middle Earth, he suddenly decides to keep it for himself. And, by the will of the ring, his face suddenly begins to change, becoming evil and sinister. The Ring of Power had taken total possession of him. Even so, in Tolkien’s book, there’s a happy ending …
When Putin was put on the throne of Russian power by an ailing Boris Yeltsin in 1999, his face was rather sympathetic, attractive even – and his rhetoric was entirely sound. It seemed to many that the man ascending the heights of the Russian pyramid of power was an intelligent official devoid of pride and arrogance and a modern individual who understood that post-Soviet Russia had only one possible path into the future: democracy. He talked about democracy quite a bit in his interviews back then, promising the citizens of the Russian Federation continued reforms, free elections, freedom of speech, the observance of human rights by the authorities, cooperation with the west, and, most importantly, a constant rotation of those in power.
“I have no intention of holding onto this chair!” he said.
Vladimir Putin was put on the throne of Russian power by an ailing Boris Yeltsin in 1999. Photograph: AP
In Russia, as everyone knows, people still believe in the words and appearances woven by their rulers. And, back then, this man was “an individual pleasant in every respect”, as Nikolai Gogol wrote of his protagonist in Dead Souls: open to discussion, seeking to understand everyone, serious, but not devoid of humor or even the ability to make fun of himself.
Furthermore, certain politicians, intellectuals, and political theorists, who are now fierce opponents of Putin and his system, supported him, some of them even passing through the doors of his campaign headquarters to help him win the coming elections. And he did. But the fatal Ring of Russian Power was already on his finger and doing its insidious work; an imperial monster began to take the place of this handsome, lively individual.
In Russia, power is a pyramid. This pyramid was built by Ivan the Terrible in the 16th century – an ambitious, brutal tsar overrun by paranoia and a great many other vices. With the help of his personal army – the oprichnina – he cruelly and bloodily divided the Russian state into power and people, friend and foe, and the gap between them became the deepest of moats. His friendship with the Golden Horde convinced him that the only way to rule the hugeness of Russia was by becoming an occupier of this enormous zone. The occupying power had to be strong, cruel, unpredictable, and incomprehensible to the people. The people should have no choice but to obey and worship it. And a single person sits at the peak of this dark pyramid, a single person possessing absolute power and a right to all.
Paradoxically, the principle of Russian power hasn’t even remotely changed in the last five centuries. I consider this to be our country’s main tragedy. Our medieval pyramid has stood tall for all that time, its surface changing, but never its fundamental form. And it’s always been a single Russian ruler sitting at its peak: Pyotr I, Nicholas II, Stalin, Brezhnev, Andropov… Today, Putin has been sitting at its peak for more than 20 years. Having broken his promise, he clutches onto his chair with all his might. The Pyramid of Power poisons the ruler with absolute authority. It shoots archaic, medieval vibrations into the ruler and his retinue, seeming to say: “you are the masters of a country whose integrity can only be maintained by violence and cruelty; be as opaque as I am, as cruel and unpredictable, everything is allowed to you, you must call forth shock and awe in your population, the people must not understand you, but they must fear you.”
Judging by recent events, the idea of restoring the Russian Empire has entirely taken possession of Putin.
Judging by recent events, the idea of restoring the Russian Empire has entirely taken possession of Putin.
Alas, Yeltsin, who came to power on the crest of the wave of Perestroika, did not destroy the pyramid’s medieval form, he simply refurbished its surface: instead of gloomy Soviet concrete, it became colorful and was covered over with billboards advertising western goods. The Pyramid of Power exacerbated Yeltsin’s worst traits: he became rude, a bully, and an alcoholic. His face turned into a heavy, motionless mask of impudent arrogance. Toward the end of his reign, Yeltsin unleashed a senseless war onto Chechnya when it decided to secede from the Russian Federation. The pyramid built by Ivan the Terrible had succeeded in awakening the imperialist even in Yeltsin, only a short-lived democrat; as a Russian tsar, he sent tanks and bombers into Chechnya, dooming the Chechen people to death and suffering.
Yeltsin and the other creators of Perestroika surrounding him not only didn’t destroy the vicious Pyramid of Power, they didn’t bury their Soviet past either – unlike the post-war Germans who buried the corpse of their nazism in the 1950s. The corpse of this monster, which had annihilated tens of millions of its own citizens and thrown its country back 70 years into the past, was propped up in a corner: it’ll rot on its own, they thought. But it turned out not to be dead.
After coming to power, Putin began to change. And those who initially welcomed his reign gradually understood that these changes didn’t bode well for Russia. The TV channel NTV was destroyed, other channels began to pass into the hands of Putin’s comrades-in-arms, after which a regime of strict censorship came into effect; from that point forward, Putin was beyond criticism.
The flags of TVC Channel, Channel One and NTV Channel at the Ostankino TV Center. Photograph: Artyom Geodakyan/TASS
Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the head of the richest and most successful company in Russia, was arrested and imprisoned for 10 years. His company Yukos was looted by Putin’s friends. This “special operation” was designed to intimidate the other oligarchs. And it did: some of them left the country, but the rest swore allegiance to Putin, some of them even becoming his “coin purses”.
The Pyramid of Power was vibrating and its vibrations stopped time. Like a huge iceberg, the county was floating through the past – first its Soviet past, then only its medieval past.
Putin declared that the collapse of the USSR was the greatest catastrophe of the 20th century. For all clear-headed Soviet people, its collapse had been a blessing; it was impossible to find a single family unscathed by the Red Wheel of Stalinist Repressions. Millions were annihilated. Tens of millions were poisoned by the fumes of communism – an unattainable goal requiring moral and physical sacrifices by Soviet citizens. But Putin didn’t manage to outgrow the KGB officer inside of him, the officer who’d been taught that the USSR was the greatest hope for the progress of mankind and that the west was an enemy capable only of corruption. Launching his time machine into the past, it was as if he were returning to his Soviet youth, during which he’d been so comfortable. He gradually forced all of his subjects to return there as well.
The perversity of the Pyramid of Power lies in the fact that he who sits at its peak broadcasts his psychosomatic condition to the country’s entire population
The perversity of the Pyramid of Power lies in the fact that he who sits at its peak broadcasts his psychosomatic condition to the country’s entire population. The ideology of Putinism is quite eclectic; in it, respect for the Soviet lies side by side with feudal ethics, Lenin sharing a bed with Tsarist Russian and Russian Orthodox Christianity.
Putin’s favorite philosopher is Ivan Ilyin – a monarchist, Russian nationalist, anti-Semite, and ideologist of the White movement, who was expelled by Lenin from Soviet Russia in 1922 and ended his life in exile. When Hitler came to power in Germany, Ilyin congratulated him hotly for “bringing the Bolshevization of Germany to a halt”. “I categorically refuse to evaluate the events of the last three months in Germany from the perspective of German Jews … The liberal-democratic hypnosis of non-resistance has been cast off …” he wrote. However, when Hitler declared the Slavs to be a second-class race, Ilyin was offended and the Gestapo soon took him into custody for the criticisms he’d begun to level. He was then rescued by Sergei Rachmaninov, after which he left for Switzerland.
In his articles, Ilyin hoped that, after the fall of Bolshevism, Russia would have its own great führer, who would bring the country up from its knees. Indeed, “Russia rising from its knees” is the preferred slogan of Putin and of his Putinists. It was also taking his cue from Ilyin that he spoke contemptuously of a Ukrainian state “created by Lenin”. In fact, the independent Ukraine was not created by Lenin, but by the Central Rada in January 1918, immediately after the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly by Lenin. This state arose because of Lenin’s aggression, but not thanks to his efforts. Ilyin was convinced that if, after the Bolsheviks, the authorities in Russia were “[to become] anti-national and anti-state, obsequious toward foreigners, [to dismember] the country, [to become] patriotically unprincipled, not exclusively protecting the interests of the great Russian nation without any regard for whorish Lesser Russians [Ukrainians], to whom Lenin gave statehood, then the revolution [would] not end, but enter its new phase of perishing from western decadence.”
“Under Putin, Russia has gotten up from its knees!” his supporters often chant. Someone once joked: the country got up from its knees, but quickly got down onto all fours: corruption, authoritarianism, bureaucratic arbitrariness, and poverty. Now we might add another: war.
A lot has happened in the last 20 years. The president of the Russian Federation’s face has turned into an impenetrable mask, radiating cruelty, anger, and discontent. His main instrument of communication has become lies – lies small and big, naively superficial and highly structured, lies he seems to believe himself and lies he doesn’t. Russians are already accustomed to their president’s lie-filled rhetoric. But, now, he’s also inured Europeans to those lies. Yet another head of a European country flies to the Kremlin so as to listen through their traditional portion of fantastical lies (now at an enormous, totally paranoid table), to nod their head, to say that “the dialogue turned out to be fairly constructive” at a press conference, then to just fly away.
Merkel admitted that, in her opinion, Putin lives in his own fantasy land. If that’s so, what’s the point of seriously engaging with such a ruler? He’s not a writer or an artist, he has to live in the real world and be responsible for every single one of his words. For 16 years, Merkel, who grew up in the GDR and should therefore understand Putin’s true nature, “has established a dialogue”. The results of that dialogue: the seizure of certain territories in Georgia, the annexation of Crimea, the capture of the DPR and LPR, and now: a full-scale war with Ukraine. After the war with Georgia and the seizure of its territories, the “peacemaker” Obama offered Putin … a reset of their relations! Which is to say, c’mon, Vladimir, let’s forget all of that and start from scratch. The result of that “reset” was the annexation of Crimea and the war in Eastern Ukraine.
Barack Obama meets with Vladimir Putin in Moscow on 7 July 2009. Photograph: Jim Young/Reuters
Putin’s inner monster wasn’t just brought up by our Pyramid of Power and the corrupt Russian elite, to whom Putin, like the tsar to the satraps, throws fat, juicy bits of corruption from his table.
It was also cultivated by the approval of irresponsible western politicians, cynical businessmen, and corrupt journalists and political scientists.
“A strong and consistent ruler!” This bewitched them. “A new Russian tsar” was, for them, something like Russian vodka and caviar: invigorating!
During this period of time, I met many admirers of Putin in Germany, from taxi drivers to businessmen and professors. One aged participant in the student revolution of ’68 confessed:
“I really like your Putin!”
“And why exactly is that?”
“He’s strong. Tells the truth. And he’s against America. Not like the slugs we’ve got here.”
“And it doesn’t bother you that, in Russia, there’s monstrous corruption, there are practically no elections or independent courts, the opposition is being destroyed, the provinces are impoverished, Nemtsov was murdered, and TV’s become propaganda?”
“No. Those are your internal affairs. If Russians accept all of that and don’t protest, that must mean they like Putin.”
Ironclad logic. The experience of Germany in the ’30s didn’t seem to have taught such Europeans anything.
But I hope most Europeans aren’t like that. That they know the difference between democracy and dictatorship – between war and peace. In his lie-filled address, Putin called the attack on Ukraine a “military special operation” against “Ukrainian aggressors”. Which is to say: the peace-loving Russia first annexed Crimea from the “Ukrainian junta”, then unleashed a hybrid war in eastern Ukraine, and is now attacking the whole country. Pretty much exactly like Stalin with Finland in ’39.
Now, one thing has become clear: with this war, Putin has crossed a line – a red line
For Putin, life itself has always been a special operation. From the black order of the KGB, he learned not only contempt for “normal” people, always a form of expendable matter for the Soviet Moloch-state, but also the Chekist’s main principle: not a single word of truth. Everything must be hidden away, classified. His personal life, relatives, habits – everything has always been hidden, overgrown with rumors and speculation.
Now, one thing has become clear: with this war, Putin has crossed a line – a red line. The mask is off, the armor of the “enlightened autocrat” has cracked. Now, all westerners who sympathize with the “strong Russian tsar” have to shut up and realize that a full-scale war is being unleashed in 21st-century Europe. The aggressor is Putin’s Russia. It will bring nothing but death and destruction to Europe. This war was unleashed by a man corrupted by absolute power, who, in his madness, has decided to redraw the map of our world. If you listen to Putin’s speech announcing a “special operation”, America and Nato are mentioned more than Ukraine. Let us also recall his recent “ultimatum” to Nato. As such, his goal isn’t Ukraine, but western civilization, the hatred for which he lapped up in the black milk he drank from the KGB’s teat.
Who’s to blame? Us. Russians. And we’ll now have to bear this guilt until Putin’s regime collapses. For it surely will collapse and the attack on a free Ukraine is the beginning of the end.
Putinism is doomed because it’s an enemy of freedom and an enemy of democracy. People have finally understood this today. He attacked a free and democratic country precisely because it is a free and democratic country. But he’s the one who’s doomed because the world of freedom and democracy is far bigger than his dark and gloomy lair. Doomed because what he wants is a new Middle Ages, corruption, lies, and trampling on human freedoms. Because he is the past. And we must do everything in our power to make this monster remain there – in the past – for all time, together with his Pyramid of Power.
Vladimir Sorokin has written numerous novels, plays, short stories, and film scripts. His novels Telluria and Their Four Hearts, translated by Max Lawton, will be published this year
15. Rise of the Rocket Launcher: The end of the Armoured Division
An interesting thesis. But based on reporting from Ukraine that I have seen it does not seem like the Russians are making maximum use of their rocket artillery? Are they conserve munitions? Are they acting with some kind of self restraint? Although we see reports of rocket attacks I have not seen any reports of significant massing of fires to support maneuver or breakthrough operations (but I could be missing the reports).
Rise of the Rocket Launcher: The end of the Armoured Division »
Experimental Feature: Audio Read Version
I believe a rocket division should be at the core of British warfighting doctrine.
It is widely agreed that a division is the lowest formation capable of operational art and therefore able to conduct conventional warfare in the 21st Century. A division should protect the rear, resource the close, and fight the deep. The current British warfighting division is formed around a core of armoured brigade combat teams (BCT), with main battle tanks and infantry. In this context, fires enable the manoeuvre of the combat arms which provide the decisive strike to defeat an enemy. This is an out-dated, industrial age concept, no longer fit for modern high intensity operations. The days of the armoured division are over and manoeuvre should now enable fires.
What is the “deep”?
ADP Land Operations describes the ‘deep battle’ as being ‘conducted at long range and often over a protracted timescale, against an adversary’s forces or resources not currently engaged in the close battle’. The divisional deep cannot be clearly delineated on the battlefield because it depends on a number of factors. It is a flexible and ever-changing area but generally begins 5km from the forward line of own troops or the limit of reconnaissance for the close battle. It extends to the fire support coordination line at 84km, marking the range of the M270 Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System (GMLRS).
Operations in the deep focus on striking targets identified following analysis of the enemy centre of gravity. These targets are often key military objectives such as command and control nodes and striking them aims to defeat an opponent before the close battle begins.
Who currently fights the divisional deep battle?
Before we discuss who currently fights the divisional deep, we must first understand some of the key constraints and assumptions in our thinking. Close Air Support (CAS), delivered by fast air and orchestrated by joint terminal air controllers, was a force multiplier during operations in Afghanistan. However, in a conventional context it will be difficult to use because air defence systems will drastically reduce its survivability. Another constraint is the high probability that GPS systems will be denied. this will limiting effective targeting by aircraft. These factors challenge how our current division, and it’s armour and attack helicopters, wants to fight the deep battle. We need a different model of warfare.
A MLRS firing. Photo: MOD.
Against this operating context the most credible answer is rocket artillery. The British Army committed to growing its GMLRS force from 30 to 44 in the Integrated Review. GMLRS is the only inservice system capable of operating in a GPS denied environment where air power is not available. It has both the range and punch to fight the deep. Experience since 2003 sees small packets of launchers employed as close support. This is an inefficient use of rocket artillery. It has lead to a generation of divisional planners with limited knowledge of massed fires in the deep. Before investing in new artillery, the Army must first define how to fight with it.
The next question is about targeting. What exists 80+ km down range to use the GMLRS? Remote piloted aircraft systems, and other ISTAR assets, are likely to be denied and are unreliable in modern warfare. Therefore the division is unable to conduct the find in the deep. Other sensors, such as electromagnetic warfare and weapon locating radars, are available but unreliable.
During the Cold War ‘stay behind’ Observation Post (OP) soldiers were used to conduct deep targeting. They still exist in the Army today and are the only organic asset the British Army has 80+ km past the forward line of own troops. Despite technological advancements, in 2020 Major General Anthony Stone stated that ‘the most reliable, flexible and effective form of artillery target indication was then, and still is, provided by the specially trained OP soldier. Their eyes, ears, experience and instant decision-making ability being second to none in the process of high-quality surveillance and target acquisition’. The deduction is that finding high value and high pay-off targets falls to Special Observers due to their reliability, low signature, and skills in surveillance. In a degraded environment, technical means won’t provide the solutions, or the certainty, modern warfare demands.
Fighting the deep: ammunition
The GMLRS was designed in the late 1970’s to combat the Soviet Union BM21 and it remains relatively unchanged today. The British Army is moving forward with the recapitalisation of the GMLRS fleet and have bought in a modern family of munitions offering different opportunities. This includes the alternate warhead and the M31A1F1 GMLRS-U ER (extended range) rockets. This allows rockets to strike out to 120km, matching the Russian 9A53-S Tornado.
GMRLS is not, however, the only asset available. The M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), favoured by the Americans, is part of the MLRS family. The HIMARS is a light, wheeled version of the M270 GMLRS, utilising the same rocket pod. It is an option the British Army could purchase and utilise as part of a rocket division.
US Army HIMARs firing in 2019. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. James Lefty Larimer
The family of munitions for the MLRS family is growing and developing. The Army Tactical Missile System (ATACM) will allow the GMLRS to fire out to 300km and is already available to American HIMARS units. The Precision Strike Missile (PRSM) pushes the range even further allowing the ‘very deep’ battle to be struck and influenced with a range of 499km. This is just short of the 500km limit set by the INF treaty (although with the USA set to withdraw from this, rockets could go further).
The Alternative Warhead round, compatible with British GMLRS, would enable a rocket division to both fight the deep and support the close battle. It has a range exceeding 70km with a 200lb class fragmentation warhead which delivers 160,000 tungsten fragments. With an effective area of 400x400m, this warhead is ideally utilised against enemy infantry in the close battle, but can still damage armoured sighting systems, tracks, and weaponry.
Along with the GMLRS, the current depth fires regiment has an Exactor (E2) battery. Capable of striking enemy armour with HEAT rounds with a range of over 30km, E2 fills any gap left by vacating armoured units in the context of a rocket division. This combination offers a range of close support and deep strike assets.
Less than lethal…
It is not just lethal effects that the MLRS family could deliver. In 2019 China tested an electromagnetic pulse ballistic missile effective at 3000km. The rocket creates a chemical explosion generating an electromagnetic pulse. It instantly disables communication and power lines, aiming to reduce an enemy’s will to fight.
Another potential non-lethal rocket has been tested by Russia. The Direct-Ascent Anti-Satellite (DA-ASAT) missile successfully struck and destroyed a Russian satellite in November 2021. Having the ability to destroy enemy satellite systems will effect communication systems, weather forecasting, and the use of GPS. These in turn will degrade the ability for an enemy to conduct cyber warfare, talk and target, across the deep battlespace potentially stopping any conflict before it begins.
The concept of a rocket division
A rocket division is not a new concept. The Russian Army has Strategic Rocket Forces containing three rocket armys, each holding between four and six rocket divisions. A concept Russia has been developing since before the Cold War, Russia frequently exercises to telegraph diplomatic intentions and to threaten other nations. Russia has utilised its rocket divisions in Syria and Crimea massing fires and destroying its enemies’ territories by the grid square.
To achieve a credible rocket division requires a fundamental change to the Army’s task organisation. In this case the two armoured BCT’s would need to reorganise around the core of one or two rocket regiments, with an additional E2 battery to enable the close battle. This would give each BCT two GMLRS units and the division six. Armour would remain, but in a supporting role to protect the rockets and clear remaining positions. This shifts the emphasis of doctrine from manoeuvre to fires. It doesn’t stop commanders fascinating over the close battle. But it does give options to actually fight the deep.
Special Observers and deploying the division
Special Observers and STA patrols are experts in static covert surveillance and the delivery of joint fires in both rural and urban environments. Whilst capable of more traditional subsurface observation, they are equally capable of sub-threshold operations, utilising civilianised vehicles and urban OPs. This makes Special Observers the ideal sensor and fire controllers for a rocket division.
Whilst an array of sensors must be considered and layered, the reliability of the Special Observers must see them heavily involved in any future rocket division. Originating from stay behind OP’s, their role is vastly changed today. Special Observers could deploy forward in geographic areas of interest building up the pattern of life, developing understanding so that if the conflict comes, we are already in a position to react. Special Observers should deploy early during rising tensions in small teams appropriate for each theatre. They should operate sub-threshold and solely use civilliansed platforms to maintain a more discreet posture.
Special Observers practicing the delivery of Joint Fires on exercise. Photo: Si Middleton.
Special Observers can operate effectively in the physical domain but should now look to expand into the space and cyber domains. Whilst expanding their expertise, Special Observers should look to reduce their signature. Targeting using satellite imagery does present problems, questions are raised regarding accuracy and post strike assessment. When fighting the deep battle, it is likely that targets will be static and of such importance that older imagery which risks collateral damage may be used. Special Observers should also look at social media as a method of targeting and influence. This was proven as a concept by Russia who weaponised social media in the Crimea and the Donbass. Social media can be used to build up a pattern of life within an area, in locating specific high value individuals or as a discrete method of communicating. As part of the whole force approach, defence puts people at the heart of decision making and selects the right mix of people and skill sets for each task. Special Observers should look to work alongside specialist agencies such as GCHQ and the Special Intelligence Service, capable of greatly assisting operations in the cyber domain.
Summary
The British Army has a fascination with ground manoeuvre. A rocket division offers an opportunity to think about how we fight differently. Of course, if we are to fight a peer-on-peer conflict, we are likely to be doing so as part of NATO but these shouldn’t be excuses for remaining stagnant and neglecting our ability to fight the divisional deep. A rocket division is a credible contribution.
The British Army’s current trajectory increases the number of rocket assets and grows a Special Observer capability. This will improve our ability to fight the deep battle. However, this is not a ‘silver-bullet’ and is a short-term plan. The longer-term solution is the creation of a division with rocket launchers at its core. The handing over of the baton from armour to rocket launchers is crucial for future success and key activity in the British Army’s fight to remain relevant.
Simon Middleton
Captain Simon Middleton is a Fire Support Team (FST) Commander and Troop Commander at 5th Regiment Royal Artillery – The Army’s Surveillance, Target and Acquisition Regiment. Commissioned in December 2017, he initially posted to 1st Regiment Royal Horse Artillery before his Battery re-subordinated to 26th Regiment Royal Artillery. There he served two tours as a Troop Commander with operational roles of both Battery Reconnaissance Officer and Command Post Officer. He deployed on exercises in the USA, France, Norway, Austria and Germany prior to his FST Commanders course and unit move.
The views expressed in his writing are his and do not represent the views of the Ministry of Defence.
- This author does not have any more posts.
Footnotes
-
British Army. (2021). ADP Land Operations. Available online: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/605298/Army_Field_Manual__AFM__A5_Master_ADP_Interactive_Gov_Web.pdf Last accessed: 5 December 2021
-
Lockheed Martin. (2021). GMLRS: The Precision Fires Go-To Round. Available online: https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/guided-mlrs-unitary-rocket.html Last accessed: 21 November 2021
-
Asia Times. (2021). China’s EMP missile would plunge cities into darkness. Available online: https://asiatimes.com/2021/09/chinas-emp-missile-would-plunge-cities-into-darkness/ Last accessed: 21 November 2021
-
CNN Politics. (2021). US says ‘it won’t tolerate’ Russia’s ‘reckless and dangerous’ anti-satellite missile test. Available online: https://edition.cnn.com/2021/11/15/politics/russia-anti-satellite-weapon-test-scn/index.html Last accessed: 21 November 2021
-
Why Russia Loves Rocket Artillery Weapons (And Ukraine Hates Them). (2021). The National Interest. Available online: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/reboot/why-russia-loves-rocket-artillery-weapons-and-ukraine-hates-them-183022Last assessed: 20 November 2021.
16. The Kremlin’s Gas Wars
Pain is coming.
Excerpts:
To accomplish any of these objectives, which will be painful, the EU will need to develop a constructive format for deciding how each state ought to contribute. European governments will face a series of politically difficult challenges over the next several months, and mutual support is the only way through the crisis. One option is a regular council meeting of ministers—akin to the U.S. National Security Council—that would decide on immediate responses to potential energy shortages.
Finally, the EU should establish a dedicated fund to compensate specific countries, regions, or sectors for sanctions-induced financial losses. Brussels could set up the fund quickly, using the EU Globalization Adjustment Fund or the EU Just Transition Fund as models—both of which were designed to deal with the region-specific impacts of globalization and climate change mitigation efforts. The fund could start with 20 billion euros per year, financed by EU borrowing. Such a mechanism would reduce national vulnerabilities and help Europe maintain its political unity and relevance.
European leaders know that Moscow will try to fragment and weaken the EU response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Europe must step up to the challenge and articulate a coherent answer to Putin’s divide-and-rule strategy. With the right steps, Brussels can implement such a strategy promptly and in an economically feasible manner. But it will need to act quickly. If it fails to do so, the European Union could face a growing energy crisis, leaving Moscow further emboldened to weaponize the world’s energy supplies.
The Kremlin’s Gas Wars
How Europe Can Protect Itself From Russian Blackmail
February 27, 2022
Foreign Affairs · by Niclas Poitiers, Simone Tagliapietra, Guntram B. Wolff, and Georg Zachmann · February 27, 2022
In the days before Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, the United States and its European allies announced stringent economic sanctions on Russia, including its energy sector. Germany, for its part, formally suspended approval of the new Nord Stream 2 pipeline, owned by Russia’s state-owned gas company, designed to deliver Russian gas to Germany. The question now is whether and how Moscow will retaliate. There is a growing fear across the continent that Russia could hit back at Europe where it hurts most: cutting off countries that depend most on Russian natural gas.
For many European states, the threat of losing access to Russia’s energy isn’t an idle concern. Europe imports 40 percent of its natural gas from Russia, and many states have significant trade and investment exposure to Russian markets. Just as important, these energy and economic ties do not affect all European countries equally. The Kremlin will undoubtedly try to exploit these differences to sow disunity in the EU’s response to the invasion. If Russia can use its energy leverage to persuade, say, Germany or Italy to withhold support for the toughest sanctions, it could give Moscow a way to withstand the economic consequences of its invasion.
But the success of this divide-and-rule strategy is not predetermined. Intent on holding Moscow accountable for its illegal aggression, European states can effectively counter Putin. To do so, the EU will have to bolster those members most vulnerable to Russian blackmail and potentially rethink the structure of European energy markets.
DIVIDE AND RULE
In theory, the European Union has a significant advantage in its economic relationship with Russia. Russia relies on European markets for more than half of its exports, whereas the European Union sends only five percent of its exports to Russia. This disparity reflects a difference in size—the EU’s economy is ten times larger than Russia’s—and differing exposure to international trade. Russia is poorly integrated into the global economy and, despite the buzz around a growing rapprochement between Beijing and Moscow, it would have difficulty replacing lost EU export revenue with revenue from Chinese markets.
Conversely, no EU country sends more than 20 percent of its exports to Russia. Although Bulgaria, Estonia, and Lithuania are most exposed to trade shocks, their exports to Russia account for only three, three, and six percent of their GDP, respectively. Russia is even less important for large economies such as those of France, Germany, and Italy, accounting for between one and two percent of their total exports. Any potential Russian countersanctions targeting EU imports would therefore have only marginal effects.
Energy is a different story, however. Natural gas has long been recognized as Russia’s most potent economic leverage in Europe, and it remains so despite the EU’s efforts to reduce its reliance on Russian supplies. Moscow’s ability to exploit that reliance could be exacerbated by wide disparities among member states’ needs. Belgium, France, and the Netherlands import less than ten percent of their natural gas from Russia; Spain and Portugal import none. Germany, by contrast, relies on Moscow for about half of its natural gas imports, and Italy around 40 percent. For Austria, Hungary, Slovenia, and Slovakia, the figure is roughly 60 percent, and for Poland, 80 percent. Bulgaria relies on Russia for all of its natural gas.
These disparities in energy consumption represent an asset for Moscow, as more gas-exposed EU countries may be unwilling to support stronger anti-Russian sanctions, fearing that Russia could disrupt or cut off their gas supply in retaliation. These concerns may, for instance, have explained Germany and Italy’s initial opposition to suspending Russian access to the SWIFT global interbank payment system.
The EU will have to potentially rethink the entire structure of European energy markets.
Still, even the most exposed European countries have alternatives to Russian energy supplies. Should Moscow turn off the gas, the EU could collectively cope—at least for a time. European commercial gas storage reserves are roughly 30 percent full, and some states also have strategic gas reserves (similar to the U.S. strategic petroleum reserve). Through a combination of more withdrawals from these stores, increased liquified natural gas imports, and limited demand-side measures such as industrial gas curtailments, most states would likely make it to autumn of 2022 without severe shortages. But countries such as Bulgaria and Poland that are heavily dependent on Russian gas and poorly connected to their western neighbors would need to significantly reduce their gas demand to manage the situation.
Such actions would, however, drive the price of energy in Europe through the roof, exacerbating an already ongoing crisis. On February 24 alone, as Russian troops crossed the Ukrainian border, gas prices across the continent rose by 60 percent. European countries might quickly see their post-COVID-19 economic recoveries derailed as higher gas prices translate into rising electricity costs—pushing up inflation and eroding household purchasing power and businesses’ competitiveness.
Still, getting through the current winter without further Russian imports is one thing. It will be far more difficult to run the European economy for several years without Russian gas. On the supply side, some states might be able to scrounge up spare import capacity from Qatar and the United States. Allies such as Japan and South Korea might also be able to divert some of their excess seaborne gas shipments. But completely replacing Russian gas would be very expensive and might prove physically impossible. Global gas markets and Europe’s other pipeline suppliers such as Algeria and Norway are already producing and exporting at full capacity. Long-term contracts, moreover, potentially limit the volume of gas that firms could redirect to Europe, even as continental prices rise.
Proactively dealing with these challenges must be Europe’s top priority if it wants to sustain long-term sanctions against Russia. Doing so successfully will involve a series of difficult political, environmental, and social choices. In the Netherlands, for instance, increased natural gas production would cause an uptick in seismic activity around the country’s largest gas field—a factor that once pushed Amsterdam to limit output. Will Dutch households accept that as a consequence of greater access to gas? Should Germany run its nuclear plants longer and even restart some dirty lignite coal plants? What would it take for France to accept more gas and electricity links through the Pyrenees—giving the rest of Europe access to Spain’s vast receiving capacity? And what about the skyrocketing energy bills for the Italian power sector or heating in eastern Europe?
THE LONG HAUL
If the EU hopes to sustain bold and far-reaching sanctions in the face of potential Russian economic countermeasures, Brussels needs to prepare for a long fight. To be effective, after all, Putin must worry that Europe might keep sanctions in place for several years. Time-limited measures might be painful for certain parts of Russian society but are unlikely to fundamentally change Moscow’s calculus.
Europe and the United States should not underestimate the challenge of sustaining such broad-based sanctions. Although political support will be high in the immediate aftermath of the Russian invasion, asset freezes, the long-term exclusion of Russia from the Western financial system, and any countermeasures from Moscow will all eventually hit specific interests across Europe. Beyond the immediate economic impact on everyday European citizens, companies that export to Russia will also be hit hard—as will banks with more exposure to Russian financial markets. The broader the remit of new sanctions, and the longer they last, the greater the chances that Russia’s divide-and-rule strategy will succeed.
To avoid this risk and ensure that the EU maintains its unity, Europe needs to embrace a comprehensive, continent-wide energy strategy. German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock’s announcement at the recent Munich Security Conference that Berlin would be ready to pay a “high economic price” for peace in Ukraine, for instance, is welcome but not enough. Instead, Brussels needs a systematic approach to ensure that all member states’ energy needs can be met—including those who have already voiced concerns over sanctions—in exchange for more robust support for a collective EU response to Russia.
Above all, the EU first needs to conduct a detailed assessment of its member states and companies’ vulnerabilities to Russian pressure. In particular, governments should catalog available options to lower their dependence on Russian gas and private sector exposure to the Russian market. By doing so, national governments and the EU alike can begin to understand potential pressure points that Moscow might use to undermine the emerging sanctions regime. Governments need a granular picture of their countries’ interests to safeguard them properly.
The European Union needs to prepare for a long fight.
Although far easier said than done, European governments also need to reduce their countries’ energy dependence on Russia. In the immediate term, that means that countries with more gas on hand, such as France or the Netherlands, must share with countries facing shortfalls, such as Austria and Germany. States should also explore new long-term contracts with gas suppliers to add additional flexibility to the European market. Governments will also need to encourage gas companies to refill their storage facilities during the spring and summer months, despite historically high prices. States could incentivize stockpiling through mandates and, eventually, financial assistance. Over the long term, the current crisis should spur European states to accelerate investment in renewables and better insulation techniques. Although these measures would not replace Russian gas in the near term, they might yield important results in five to ten years.
To accomplish any of these objectives, which will be painful, the EU will need to develop a constructive format for deciding how each state ought to contribute. European governments will face a series of politically difficult challenges over the next several months, and mutual support is the only way through the crisis. One option is a regular council meeting of ministers—akin to the U.S. National Security Council—that would decide on immediate responses to potential energy shortages.
Finally, the EU should establish a dedicated fund to compensate specific countries, regions, or sectors for sanctions-induced financial losses. Brussels could set up the fund quickly, using the EU Globalization Adjustment Fund or the EU Just Transition Fund as models—both of which were designed to deal with the region-specific impacts of globalization and climate change mitigation efforts. The fund could start with 20 billion euros per year, financed by EU borrowing. Such a mechanism would reduce national vulnerabilities and help Europe maintain its political unity and relevance.
European leaders know that Moscow will try to fragment and weaken the EU response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Europe must step up to the challenge and articulate a coherent answer to Putin’s divide-and-rule strategy. With the right steps, Brussels can implement such a strategy promptly and in an economically feasible manner. But it will need to act quickly. If it fails to do so, the European Union could face a growing energy crisis, leaving Moscow further emboldened to weaponize the world’s energy supplies.
Foreign Affairs · by Niclas Poitiers, Simone Tagliapietra, Guntram B. Wolff, and Georg Zachmann · February 27, 2022
17. Fifty Years After Nixon’s Visit, China Tilts Back Toward Russia
Fifty Years After Nixon’s Visit, China Tilts Back Toward Russia
The anniversary of a trip that opened the door for Sino-U.S. ties is marked in the shadow of a Moscow-Beijing entente
Five decades later, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine constitutes a test of the Sino-U.S. relationship unlike any other crisis since that visit, just as China emerges as a true economic and military rival of the U.S. Beijing has leaned toward Russia in the conflict, muddling its bedrock policy that national sovereignty and territorial integrity are paramount—a core part of a joint statement known as the Shanghai Communiqué released at the end of Mr. Nixon’s week in China, on Feb. 27.
Explosions, Airstrikes, Disbelief: Russia’s Attack on Ukraine
Russian forces advance toward Kyiv, while inhabitants of the capital city flee or brace for onslaught
Ukrainian defense fighters received weapons and ammunition in Kyiv on Friday.
mikhail palinchak/EPA/Shutterstock
1 of 12
•••••
1 of 12
Show Caption
Ukrainian defense fighters received weapons and ammunition in Kyiv on Friday.
mikhail palinchak/EPA/Shutterstock
The document, which has formed the basis for U.S.-China relations since, left no doubt the two nations had major differences. But in what has widely been called a diplomatic masterstroke, it also showed how even adversaries could foster government, trade and people-to-people connections.
Yet today, relations that flourished since the diplomatic opening are fraying, a deterioration now accelerating with China’s embrace of Russia.
“The great irony today is, 50 years ago we were pulled together by the Soviet Union and today we may be pulled apart by the Russian Federation,” said Stephen A. Orlins, president of the National Committee on United States-China Relations, a New York organization that promotes bilateral ties.
Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his military drive into neighboring Ukraine 20 days after he and Chinese leader Xi Jinping forged their own joint statement, one for a “new era.” In a lengthy broadside against the U.S.-led global order that has dominated since the collapse of the Soviet empire, the two autocratic leaders described a friendship that “has no limits, there are no ‘forbidden’ areas of cooperation.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, and Chinese President Xi Jinping deepened the countries’ partnership during a summit in Beijing in early February.
Photo: alexei druzhinin/Sputnik/AFP/Getty Images
Beijing now faces decisions over what its agreement means in practice, such as how much relief to provide Moscow as sanctions meant to punish it over Ukraine bite into the Russian economy. China has refrained from taking a clear stance on Russia’s attack on Ukraine, while urging peace talks and stressing respect for “the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all countries.”
Mr. Nixon seized an opportunity to visit China after Mao had broken ranks with Moscow and the two countries’ militaries had skirmished.
The Shanghai Communiqué that Mr. Nixon crafted with Mao’s deputy, Zhou Enlai, was in part an agreement to disagree. Paragraphs from each side stated opposing world views. Nevertheless, their joint support for dialogue and trade, plus opposition to hegemony, gave both sides hope.
Trade and other links flourished. Supported in the following decades by over $3 trillion in U.S. and other foreign investment, China’s economy grew to be the world’s second largest. World Bank figures show it as 1/11th the size of America’s when Mr. Nixon toured the Great Wall, Hangzhou’s scenic lake and Shanghai, where the communiqué was issued.
U.S. President Richard Nixon and Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai attending a gymnastic show in Beijing in 1972.
Photo: Associated Press
The crux of the communiqué was an ambiguous statement from the U.S. side that became known as the One China policy and is credited with reducing the likelihood that Beijing would seek to recapture the self-governed island of Taiwan by military force: “The United States acknowledges that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China. The United States Government does not challenge that position,” it said.
“This document has become the guiding principle of the relationship between our two countries,” Henry Kissinger, Mr. Nixon’s secretary of state who led the diplomatic breakthrough, recalled in a conference appearance this week.
Mr. Xi’s leanings toward Moscow reflect how China’s leader feels boxed in by successive U.S. administrations and signs of erosion in the U.S. commitment to the One China policy.
Criticized in the West over its human-rights record, early handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and trade practices, China has found resonance in Mr. Putin’s complaint over the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
“The Chinese have a similar prism,” said Paul Heer, a former Central Intelligence Agency analyst now at the Center for the National Interest, a Washington think tank established by Mr. Nixon.
Warming Sino-Russian ties, from major energy deals to personal bonds between their leaders, coincide with ever-deteriorating relations between Beijing and Washington, to the great concern of businesspeople and others with interests in both countries.
And Mr. Putin’s case for Russian dominion over Ukraine—including that U.S.-supported radicals have pushed it in the wrong direction—is echoed in a rising urgency in Beijing to get control of self-governed Taiwan. Though few analysts see Mr. Xi grabbing Taiwan now, he says the issue can’t be passed from generation to generation and his People’s Liberation Army forces increasingly flex muscles along the island’s perimeter.
A Taiwanese warship during a navy drill near Keelung, Taiwan, in early January.
Photo: Ceng Shou Yi/Zuma Press
“The key to international order is restrained conduct and peaceful discussion between these two great societies,” Mr. Kissinger warned in his communiqué anniversary address.
Speaking at a related event hosted by the Richard Nixon Presidential Library in California, China’s ambassador to Washington, Qin Gang, had his own warning: “To maintain peace and stability, the U.S. side should honor its commitments on the Taiwan question, and work with China to oppose and contain ‘Taiwan independence’ separatist forces.”
While the U.S. opening to China for decades was seen as an unqualified success, analysts say times have changed.
Critics argue Washington failed to use the leverage it had when Mr. Nixon visited to force Beijing to liberalize. “Engagement may have been the worst strategic blunder any country has made in recent history: There is no comparable example of a great power actively fostering the rise of a peer competitor,” University of Chicago political scientist John J. Mearsheimer wrote late last year in Foreign Affairs.
In a new book, “America Second,” former journalist Isaac Stone Fish, who runs advisory firm Strategy Risks, writes that Mr. Kissinger himself became “an agent of Chinese influence” by advising multinational-company clients that business success in China hinged on their keeping quiet about its political system.
Reflecting on the relevance of the Shanghai Communiqué today, former diplomat Susan Thornton, now a senior fellow at Yale Law School, said the document demonstrated “how to manage a problem without solving it” to the benefit of both nations.
The Ukraine invasion illustrates how ambiguity in agreements like the Shanghai Communiqué appear clever until they get tested, according to Michael Pillsbury, director of China strategy at Washington-based Hudson Institute, who worries Beijing may seek to attack Taiwan.
The U.S. has maintained the right to supply the island with defensive weapons, but Mr. Pillsbury notes that Ukraine also had received security assurances in exchange for turning over Soviet-era nuclear weapons in a vaguely worded 1994 agreement called the Budapest Memorandum signed by both the U.S. and Russia.
Of the Shanghai Communiqué, he says, “It’s a wonderful deal, but will it last?”
18. We Are All Realists Now
"Fear, honor, and interest." "The strong do what they will and the weak suffer what they must."
All pundits and academics should consider this:
So, I will not attempt to contort this war into oblique professional relevance, and I suggest you refrain from the same. In this moment we ought instead recognize, with the same flavor of disillusionment and existential sobriety that followed the wars of the early 20th century, that our esoteric academic pursuits have become untethered from the fundamental and life-altering questions that necessitated this field in the first place.
We Are All Realists Now
by Ryan Fedasiuk
For weeks leading up to the invasion and even in the hours afterward, the crisis in Ukraine was flattened into an academic debate, abstracted into a case to be studied. The most politically scientific and least affected among us have been offered the luxury of musing about tangential questions:
What might the crisis in Ukraine imply for Taiwan’s security? — as if the immediate cataclysm unfolding in Europe was not interesting enough.
How will Moscow’s decision to invade affect its relationship with Beijing or New Delhi? — as if diplomacy ought to be the object of study, rather than the war it serves to prevent.
Is Vladimir Putin a rational actor? — as if, at this juncture, the distinction really matters.
After a sleepless night spent reading takes about every modern geopolitical issue under the sun I found, honestly, that I could not care less about any of them. Can people get to safety? Where are the medical facilities? How many refugees can the United States admit? — These are the questions that matter. War may be an object of academic study, but it is first and foremost a human catastrophe.
My grandparents, who fled war-torn Ukraine, came to this country so that I might have a better life. In high school I began to love foreign policy and reveled in role-playing Congressman and UN Delegate. I came to Washington with a deep interest in the business of statecraft and a desire to make the world a better place. Then in college and now as an M.A. student at Georgetown, I fell down the rabbit hole of security studies. The problems were complex; the histories and theories engrossed me. I spent years studying Russian, then pivoted to Chinese. Slowly, priorities emerged: Protect our interests. Promote democratic values. Maintain stability. Avoid war.
The most basic purpose of International Relations as an academic enterprise is to explain war so that it may be prevented. And yet we learn on day one of practically every IR program that war is not easily explained — that it is an inherently unstable interaction of emotion, chance, and reason. And now, after all the seminars on threat perceptions, global institutions, civil-military relations, nuclear deterrence, and intercultural communication; it seems we are left grasping and squinting inscrutably at the least common denominators: Clausewitz, Machiavelli, Munich, and the Melian Dialogue.
Like almost every other student of international relations, my professional and academic interests have evolved with time, and now encompass issues far outside the scope of the outbreak and termination of war. I spend a lot of time thinking about China, technology, supply chains, and economic statecraft. Few of these issues are meaningfully related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
So, I will not attempt to contort this war into oblique professional relevance, and I suggest you refrain from the same. In this moment we ought instead recognize, with the same flavor of disillusionment and existential sobriety that followed the wars of the early 20th century, that our esoteric academic pursuits have become untethered from the fundamental and life-altering questions that necessitated this field in the first place.
The irony, of course, is that many IR scholars do debate the origins of warfare between states. In the pages of journals like Foreign Affairs, International Organization, and Survival, academics often advance dueling theories of international relations – realism, liberalism, constructivism, and critiques based on everything in between. But unswerving loyalty to theoretical constructs has bred an academic urge to fit reality to theory. Times of crisis, at least, have a habit of dispelling the madness: It is more important to do right than to be right.
Short of humanitarian activism, there is little to be done when deterrence fails. Weary and overwhelmed with Wednesday night’s news coverage, I followed the lead of every other Beltway security professional. I took to Twitter. Watching the first bombs detonate over Kharkiv, I lamented that few events have so totally shattered my worldview. Someone I do not follow commented:
“Realists 1, other IR ‘schools’ 0.”
Congratulations.
PUBLISHED BY RYAN FEDASIUK
Post navigation
19. Jennifer Griffin keeps fact-checking her Fox News colleagues on Ukraine
Kudos to Ms. Griffin. She and Brett Baier are the only two journalists I can take seriously at Fox. I do watch Fox for their reporting.
But one of Fox's main weaknesses is the lack of significant overseas first person reporting capability. It is not an international news organization. Other than Ms. Griffin's reporting Fox is of marginal utility for reporting on wars and international affairs. Just saying.
Jennifer Griffin keeps fact-checking her Fox News colleagues on Ukraine
Fox News reporter Jennifer Griffin has been pulling double duty lately.
Much like her peers at other news outfits, the national security correspondent has reported live from the Pentagon, telling viewers what U.S. officials were thinking and doing as Russia launched its long-feared assault on Ukraine this week.
But, Griffin has also used her reporting appearances on Fox News programs to push back on some of the assertions made by her colleagues, particularly those who host opinion programs. In doing so, Griffin has performed an exercise in real-time, intra-network fact-checking that is unusual on a television news channel, and particularly at Fox News, which has long valued internal harmony.
The most noticeable back-and-forth occurred when Griffin appeared on “The Faulkner Focus” Thursday morning to explain U.S. strategy: first warning Russia against invading its smaller neighbor, then imposing “shock and awe” sanctions after it launched a widespread attack on Ukraine this week.
“Now comes the part where they will squeeze Russia,” Griffin told the host, Harris Faulkner. “You saw that the Russian stock market fell by half today.”
“Yeah, have you seen ours?” Faulkner immediately retorted. (U.S. markets were diving at the time, though they mostly recovered later in the day.) “We’ve had general after general tell us that the sanctions were not going to work. … When you say, ‘We saw this coming. They saw this coming,’ I’m just wondering why that was still the only strategy deployed.”
“Well, Harris, let me, let me, let me, I need to follow up on that,” Griffin interjected. When Faulkner suggested that the U.S. could have used other tactics to deter Russian President Vladimir Putin’s aggression, possibly involving NATO, Griffin replied that sending troops to the area would have merely given Putin “a pretext” to invade.
Faulkner finally moved on from the exchange and ended the segment by thanking her for her “excellent reporting.”
Griffin’s fans inside and outside the network aren’t surprised by her commitment to factual reporting. She joined the network as a Jerusalem-based correspondent in 1999 and has remained a linchpin of Fox’s news division even as the network’s opinion hosts have gained greater influence in recent years.
“If she reports something on air, it’s because she’s done hard work off-camera to determine the facts of the matter and present what’s true,” said Stephen Hayes, who recently resigned from his role as a Fox News contributor and now works for NBC News. “I suspect she has little patience with Biden-focused conspiracies or commentary that pretends these challenges started in January 2021.”
That much is evident from the clips.
Late last week, the hosts of Fox’s popular show “The Five” were not yet convinced by U.S. intelligence reports that Putin had decided to invade. Panelist Greg Gutfeld went so far as to claim that President Biden and his administration had “manufactured” the Ukraine crisis for partisan purposes.
Griffin pushed back hard. “First of all, I need to level-set with the conversation I’ve just been listening to,” she said. “What we are witnessing right now is not something that just changed in the last 24 hours … This is something we’ve been watching [for at least two weeks].”
Likewise, when Gutfeld and Lisa “Kennedy” Montgomery asserted during the show that Biden’s team was hyping the threat of war to distract from the political trouble at home, Griffin was ready with facts in hand.
“Right now, every American should be watching this and knowing that this is deadly serious,” she said. “This is not some wag-the-dog situation.”
On Monday, Griffin appeared on the 9 p.m. program hosted by Sean Hannity and pushed back on his earlier comments about the Biden administration’s culpability. “Sean, how we got to this point is a long story and it predates the Biden administration,” she said. “It goes back and includes mistakes made by every U.S. president since the Soviet Union fell apart.”
And on Thursday morning, Griffin pushed back when “Fox & Friends” co-host Steve Doocy said that economic sanctions “have not worked.” She argued that it’s too soon to make that conclusion. (Biden announced additional sanctions on Thursday afternoon.)
Griffin’s role at the network has come into sharper focus since some recent departures of prominent Fox News journalists, including Chris Wallace’s abrupt exit in December to take a job at rival network CNN, and the 2019 resignation of Shepard Smith, who was also known to fact-check his colleagues, sometimes ruffling feathers in the process.
Griffin is popular with other employees in Fox’s news division, who came to her defense in 2020, when then-President Trump called for her to be fired after she confirmed aspects of a damaging report about him in the Atlantic. A news division employee who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly commended her work this week and said that Griffin has the respect and support of her newsroom colleagues.
“Jennifer is a straight arrow with real experience,” said former Fox News anchor Greta Van Susteren, a longtime colleague. “She reports facts and does not tell the viewer what to think. What more could you possibly want in a journalist?”
A Fox News spokesperson said on Friday that the network is “incredibly proud of Jennifer Griffin and her stellar reporting, as well as all of our journalists and talent covering this story across our platforms.”
Despite her clash with Faulkner, Griffin was back on her show on Friday morning with her latest reporting from the Pentagon.
20. War via TikTok: Russia's new tool for propaganda machine
Had a long talk with my daughter last evening (senior in college). She is tracking the war on TikTok - 1st person interviews with people in Ukraine, photos on instagram, YouTube news reports, and of course twitter. We were comparing notes and it was amazing how well informed she was without using mainstream media and cable news.
War via TikTok: Russia's new tool for propaganda machine
AP · by DAVID KLEPPER · February 26, 2022
The Russian TikTok video has it all: a cat, puppies and a pulsing background beat. It’s cute, watchable and hardly seems the stuff of state propaganda.
In 2014, Russia flooded the internet with fake accounts pushing disinformation about its takeover of Crimea. Eight years later, experts say Russia is mounting a far more sophisticated effort as it invades Ukraine.
Armies of trolls and bots stir up anti-Ukrainian sentiment. State-controlled media outlets look to divide Western audiences. Clever TikTok videos serve up Russian nationalism with a side of humor.
The effort amounts to an emerging part of Russia’s war arsenal with the shaping of opinion through orchestrated disinformation fighting alongside actual troops and weapons.
ADVERTISEMENT
In the cat video, a husky puppy identified by a digitally inserted U.S. flag swipes at the tail of a tabby identified by a Russian flag. The cat responds with a ferocious jab that sends the hapless dog scurrying. The clip, which has been viewed 775,000 times in two weeks, is the work of an account named Funrussianprezident that boasts 310,000 followers. Almost all of its videos feature pro-Russian content.
“It could just be a patriotic Russian fighting the good fight as they see it, or it could easily be something directly affiliated with the state,” said Nina Jankowicz, a disinformation researcher and expert on Eastern Europe at the Wilson Center in Washington. “Russia has been perfecting these tactics.”
Now they are putting them in play.
Analysts at several different research organizations contacted by The Associated Press said they are seeing a sharp increase in online activity by groups affiliated with the Russian state. That’s in keeping with Russia’s strategy of using social media and state-run outlets to galvanize domestic support while seeking to destabilize the Western alliance.
Across the internet, there’s been a rapid uptick in suspicious accounts spreading anti-Ukrainian content, according to a report from Cyabra, an Israeli tech company that works to detect disinformation.
Cyabra’s analysts tracked thousands of Facebook and Twitter accounts that had recently posted about Ukraine. They saw a sudden and dramatic increase in anti-Ukrainian content in the days immediately before the invasion. On Valentine’s Day, for instance, the number of anti-Ukrainian posts created by the sample of Twitter accounts jumped by 11,000% when compared with just days earlier. Analysts believe a significant portion of the accounts are inauthentic and controlled by groups linked to the Russian government.
ADVERTISEMENT
“When you see an 11,000% increase, you know something is going on,” said Cyabra CEO Dan Brahmy. “No one can know who is doing this behind the scenes. We can only guess.”
The work has been underway for some time.
Researchers at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab analyzed 3,000 articles by 10 state-owned Russian news outlets and noticed a big increase in unfounded claims that Ukraine was poised to strike separatist groups. Overall, Russian media claims of Ukrainian aggression surged by 50% in January, according to the research.
“This is the way they go to war; it’s a central part of Russian doctrine,” said Jim Ludes, a former U.S. defense analyst who now directs the Pell Center for International Relations and Public Policy at Salve Regina University. Ludes said Russian disinformation campaigns are intended to galvanize Russian support while confusing and dividing the country’s opponents.
Russia tailors its propaganda message for specific audiences.
For Russians and pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine, the message is that Russia is trying to defend its own people against Western-fueled aggression and persecution in Ukraine. Similar tactics have been used, including by Nazi Germany when it invaded Czechoslovakia under the guise of protecting ethnic Germans living there, Ludes noted.
“It’s not good guys who use this tactic,” Ludes said. “It’s the language of conquest, not the language of democracy.”
Russia is also using disinformation to confound and demoralize its opponents. For instance, the Kremlin said it resumed fighting Saturday after pausing for possible talks with Ukraine. But AP journalists in various areas of Ukraine witnessed that the Russian offensive never stopped.
The chaotic information environment surrounding the invasion led to confusing and sometimes contradictory accounts. On Friday Ukrainian officials reported that all troops stationed on the strategic Snake Island had been killed after defiantly refusing Russian demands to surrender. Russian state TV later showed what it claimed was footage of the soldiers alive in custody. The AP was unable to immediately verify either claim.
Meanwhile, the U.S. has information indicating Russia is publicizing false reports about widespread surrenders of Ukrainian troops and claims that Moscow plans to “threaten killing family members of Ukrainian soldiers if they do not surrender,” according to State Department spokesman Ned Price.
Russia has also employed cyberattacks in its invasion of Ukraine, and while they pose a serious threat, online propaganda can leave even more lasting damage if it succeeds, according to retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Nagata, a former director of strategic operational planning at the U.S. National Counterterrorism Center.
“What is far more dangerous is Russia’s ability to influence what populations everywhere believe,” Nagata said. “To get them to believe things that are useful for Russian strategic interests... If you’re able to change what an entire population believes, you may not have to attack anything.”
In the West, Russia seeks to sow division and reduce the chances of a unified international response. It does this in part through a stable of state-controlled media outlets such as Sputnik and RT, which publish in English, Spanish and several other languages.
“The invasion is off,” read one headline in RT last week, just days before Russian troops moved into eastern Ukraine. “Tucker Carlson Slams Biden for Focusing on Putin, Ukraine Instead of US Domestic Problems,” reads another in Sputnik News, reflecting a common Russian practice: cite government critics in the U.S. (like Fox News host Carlson) to suggest America’s leaders are out of touch.
The European Union signaled its concerns about RT on Wednesday when it included RT’s editor-in-chief on a list of sanctions imposed on Russian officials. The EU called RT’s leader, Margarita Simonyan “a central figure of the government propaganda.”
On Friday, Facebook announced that it would prohibit RT from running ads on its site and said it would expand its use of labels to identify state-run media.
Ludes said he’s been pleased to see the U.S and its allies forcefully push back on Russian disinformation and even seek to preempt it by publicly disclosing Russia’s plans.
“The Biden administration has demonstrated some creativity in using intelligence to respond,” he said. “We haven’t seen that from the West since the cold war days.”
___
Associated Press writers Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow and Matthew Lee and Nathan Ellgren in Washington contributed to this report.
AP · by DAVID KLEPPER · February 26, 2022
21. Bigger, badder war storm headed for Ukraine
It is going to get a lot worse before it gets better.
Bigger, badder war storm headed for Ukraine
Combat is set to intensify as the West pours in weapons and Moscow deploys ‘poor man’s nukes’ to the Ukrainian frontier
Combat is set to intensify as the West pours in weapons and Moscow deploys ‘poor man’s nukes’ to the Ukrainian frontier
With Russia’s war in Ukraine set to enter a second week, there is no sign of a resolution or a halt to the destruction in sight.
Any Kremlin hopes that its invasion might end with a swift coup de main victory, an uprising against the Ukrainian government, or a collapse of resistance have so far been dashed.
The war winds have not yet risen to hurricane force. Large-scale street fighting, the most murderous and destructive form of combat, has not yet broken out in the capital of Kiev or the second-largest city of Kharkov, though skirmishes are being reported in the streets of the latter. And Russian air-missile strikes remain largely – though not entirely – discriminate, striking military, infrastructure and energy targets.
But with both Russia and the West, including significantly Germany, sending more arms into the conflict zone while the Ukrainian government arms both reservists and civilians, the fighting looks set to intensify in the days and weeks ahead.
Early indications are that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s operation is not only turning Russia into a pariah state, judging by the international community’s rising condemnation, it is also making global heroes of Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky and his embattled people.
A diluted offensive
Russia has advanced on multiple axes across eastern Ukraine – a factor that has necessarily dispersed its attacking forces and diluted their potential combat power.
This lack of concentration, combined with the Ukrainian will to fight, has so far thwarted any hopes the Kremlin may have entertained of a lightning military victory. Russian casualties, unreported in Moscow, are unknown but estimates range from the mid hundreds (UK) to the low thousands (Ukraine).
With fighting reported in multiple locations across eastern Ukraine and missile strikes hitting targets nationwide, Russia’s main point of effort has still not been identified.
Early analyses were that Moscow would seek to carve out the entire Donbass region in the east, or seize a land corridor in the south along the Sea of Avoz, linking Crimea with the Donbass and Russia proper.
Both the above operations appear to be in play. Street fighting is being reported in Kharkov, Ukraine’s second largest city. The site of multiple World War II battles and a key communications hub, Kharkov is strategically located in relation to the Donbass.
However, the fighting around Kiev – or at least the capital’s investiture – in the country’s north-center, suggests an even more ambitious aim.
Absent any ceasefire accord or a shock new ploy by the Russian invaders, the tempo of the fighting looks set to increase for three reasons.
A Russian marine takes his position during the Union Courage-2022 Russia-Belarus military drills at the Obuz-Lesnovsky training ground in Belarus. Photo: Screengrab / Russian Defense Ministry Press Service
Firstly, it is not clear whether the main Russian maneuver force – its full weight of armored battlegroups – has yet been committed to battle.
Secondly, there are early grim signals that indicate the nature of the fighting is going to become more atrocious.
Thirdly, every day that passes grants the Ukrainian authorities, however disjointed they were by the shock phase of the attack, the opportunity to expand the size of their forces.
Though Russia’s active service military outnumbers Ukraine’s by a ratio of over 4-to-1, Moscow has widespread security commitments across both its own vast landmass – the world’s biggest nation – and with its expeditionary unit in Syria. With Kiev both mobilizing reserves and arming civilians, the manpower matrix cannot favor the invading force.
Kiev’s arming of civilians raises the specter of a double-headed conflict. One the one hand, a clash between uniformed, regular troops; on the other, fighting between Russian troops and Ukrainian partisans. The latter format of combat, as military history shows, has a tendency to accelerate atrocious conduct against the civilian population.
There are already social media clips of unarmed Ukrainian civilians stepping up and playing brave, unarmed roles, including by standing in roads to slow the passage of Russian vehicle convoys. How widespread this kind of action could become is impossible to say.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s pleading for weapons is being answered, including from heretofore reluctant armorers.
Germany – a central European power that has customarily been far more reticent than either the Anglosphere or former Eastern bloc nations when it comes to confronting Russia – has announced that it will send anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons to Ukraine. That reverses a long-standing German policy of not sending arms into combat zones.
Already, the US has sent shipments of Javelin anti-tank missiles, while the UK has sent Light Anti-Armor Weapons. While the former is a sophisticated, long-range weapon, the LAW is a simple, one-shot, shoulder-fired throwaway weapon. It can be easily mastered with minimal training, and is highly effective against all classes of armored vehicles at close range.
But it is not just Ukraine that is up-gunning.
A military trainer with Ukraine’s 112th Territorial Defense Brigade works with civilians during a military exercise outside Kyiv on February 5, 2022. Photo: Screengrab / Vox / NurPhoto via Getty / Celestino Arce
Chechen-style end-game?
Things may be set to turn even more unpleasant for Ukraine’s defenders. According to reports from Russia, mobile thermobaric rocket launchers are being deployed toward the Ukrainian frontier.
Sometimes known as “the poor man’s nuke”, these weapons detonate fuel-air explosive to achieve a combination effect that is both explosive and incendiary: In essence, a combination of bomb and flamethrower.
By literally setting air on fire, these fearsome munitions are ideal for clearing well-defended or dug-in positions – such as the strongpoints encountered in urban fighting.
Separate reports claim that pro-Moscow Chechen units are mobilizing for Ukraine.
Since Czarist times, the Caucasus was a cauldron for struggle known to breed particularly martial peoples. Units of both pro- and anti-Russian Chechens have fought in the Donbass struggle, and now reports from Grozny indicate that Chechen units are moving to reinforce the Russian effort in Ukraine.
The mass killing and destruction of Russia’s wars to prevent Chechnya from breaking away from the Russian Federation, which ran from 1994-2009, are well known. Tens, possibly hundreds of thousands of non-combatants were killed; countless more were “disappeared” in the mopping-up phase.
Thus far, the kind of unrestrained firepower that the Russian military used to reduce Grozny and other urban centers to ashes has not yet been unleashed upon Ukraine.
While TV news reports show unmistakable signs of missile and other strikes on civilian targets, these hits appear to be single-shot misfires rather than part of a deliberate campaign of concentrated barrages or old-school carpet bombing.
Whether such gloves-off tactics will be used in the days to come – particularly if Russian forces run short of precision munitions and resort to “dumb” bombs and shells – is still unclear.
And politically, Chechnya may provide a grim model for Ukraine’s future – either the country as a whole, or a semi-Ukrainian puppet state Moscow may seek to carve out east of the Dniepr River.
In Chechnya, Russia suffered immense fallout in terms of the reputation of its armed forces, and was rocked by spectacularly hideous terrorist attacks, such as the massacre of school children in Beslan and mass deaths in a Moscow theater.
Yet, Moscow remained wedded to its long-term aims. Contrary to the faltering national will that doomed US military adventures in war zones such as Vietnam, Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan, Russia stayed the course.
After vicious fighting and mass destruction, Moscow adopted a divide-and-rule policy, striking a deal with former insurgents. Those allies became proxies, who stabilized and now run Chechnya.
Grozny was rebuilt from scratch with massive investment – today,it looks more like Dubai than Stalingrad – but the government of strongman Ramzan Kadyrov, fiercely loyal to Putin, is widely accused of human rights abuses.
Moreover, the successful end game of that war from Moscow’s perspective – Chechnya remains part of the Russian Federation, albeit with significant devolution of power to Grozny – makes clear how determined Moscow is when it comes to maintaining what it believes is its own territory, resources and human capital.
Putin has made clear that he does not consider Ukraine a country worthy of independent statehood.
Blowback storm rising
Meanwhile, across much of the world, Russia’s reputation has plummeted to the point where long-time Putin sidekick Dmitri Medvedev, the deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, has blustered that his country could or should sever diplomatic ties with Western countries.
Meanwhile, the invasion has made an early hero of Ukrainian President Zelenksy. It was never certain that the former comedian had the iron will to withstand such a stern, indeed, existential crisis.
However, his ongoing defiance and refusal to flee his threatened capital Kiev to establish a headquarters in the west of his country, or even a provisional government abroad, has been approvingly noted locally and reported worldwide.
In terms of pushback, Western actions are increasing in their severity.
A consensus has at last been reached by Western bloc nations to deny certain Russian banks access to the global SWIFT transaction system. This action, long threatened and now set for implementation, will leave Russia heavily dependent on China, which is seeking to expand the yuan bloc, for access to global financial markets.
Ousting Russia from SWIFT will have deep and wide implications for the Russian economy. Photo: AFP
Already, the French Navy has seized and impounded a Russian cargo ship carrying cars in the Channel, suspecting it of being linked to a sanctioned Russian financial institution.
And he Russian assault is generating pushback far beyond Western Europe and North America, with anti-Russian demonstrations being reported as far afield as South America.
Even so, not all key players are fully on board.
Despite early reports, the latest indications are that Turkey – in recent years one of NATO’s shakier members, headed by independently minded President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is believed to have amicable personal ties with Putin – has not yet moved to close the Bosphorous passage to Russian shipping.
That potential move, enabled by the Montreaux Treaty which grants Ankara freedom of action in the strait, would trap Russian vessels in the Black Sea, cutting them off from the Mediterranean and wider global seaways.
Meanwhile, with global attention fixated on Ukraine, other actors are conducting their own military actions. North Korea this morning test-launched what is being reported in Seoul as a likely intermediate-range ballistic missile, it’s eighth missile test this year
22. Ukraine: Vote on Draft “Uniting for Peace” Resolution : What's In Blue : Security Council Report
Ukraine: Vote on Draft “Uniting for Peace” Resolution : What's In Blue : Security Council Report
Ukraine: Vote on Draft “Uniting for Peace” Resolution
This afternoon (27 February), the Security Council is expected to vote on a draft resolution calling for an “emergency special session” (ESS) of the General Assembly to consider and recommend collective action on the situation in Ukraine. The draft resolution, tabled by Albania and the US, the co-penholders on Ukraine, was put in blue yesterday (26 February). The draft text is a “Uniting for Peace” resolution, whereby the Council refers a situation on which its permanent members are deadlocked to the General Assembly. If adopted, it would be the first such resolution the Council has adopted in four decades.
Today’s vote takes place amid a large-scale attack by Russian military forces targeting numerous major cities in Ukraine—including its capital, Kyiv—which involves aerial and ground operations. As of 26 February, the Ukrainian government reported at least 198 civilian deaths and injuries to approximately 1,115 people. At the same time, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) documented at least 64 civilian deaths and 176 injuries, while noting that these figures may be an underestimate. Moreover, as at today (27 February), at least 368,000 people have fled Ukraine since the attacks began on 24 February, according to UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi. According to media reports, Russia and Ukraine may soon hold direct talks about the conflict, as Ukraine has agreed to meet the Russian delegation on the Belarus-Ukraine border.
The Council will vote on the draft text in blue two days after Russia vetoed a draft resolution that deplored its aggression against Ukraine in violation of article 2, paragraph 4 of the UN Charter and demanded that it immediately withdraw all its military forces from Ukraine. In addition to the Russian veto, 11 members voted in favour of the text and three members abstained (China, India and the United Arab Emirates). The draft resolution was co-sponsored by 81 member states. (For more information, see our 25 February What’s in Blue story.)
The draft resolution that will be considered today decides to call for an ESS of the General Assembly due to the lack of unanimity among the Council’s permanent members regarding the situation in Ukraine, which it argues has prevented the Security Council from exercising its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. This language is in line with General Assembly resolution 377 A (V) of 3 November 1950, also known as “Uniting for Peace”, which states that if the Security Council, because of a lack of unanimity among its five permanent members, fails to act as required to maintain international peace and security, the General Assembly shall consider the matter immediately and may issue appropriate recommendations to UN members for collective measures, including the use of armed force when necessary, to maintain or restore international peace and security.
Resolution 377 A (V) maintains that an ESS of the General Assembly can be called if requested by the Security Council “on the vote of any seven members [nine since 1965 when the Council expanded from 11 to 15 members], or by a majority of the Members of the United Nations”. Typically, substantive questions considered by the General Assembly require a two-thirds majority and Article 27(2) of the UN Charter states that decisions of a procedural matter shall be made by an affirmative vote of nine Security Council members. Furthermore, Council resolutions referring a matter to the General Assembly have historically been adopted despite a negative vote from a permanent member, and thus have come to be viewed as procedural matters not subject to a veto. (Information on voting on procedural and non-procedural matters can be found in the .) Resolution 377 (A) calls on the General Assembly to convene the ESS within 24 hours.
There have been seven instances when the Council adopted a resolution referring a deadlocked situation to the General Assembly. If today’s draft is adopted, it will represent the first time the Council has done so since 1982. The General Assembly has invoked “Uniting for Peace” on at least four occasions, most recently in 1997. (See our supplemental insert on Security Council Deadlocks and Uniting for Peace: An Abridged History.)
The current scenario bears some similarity to developments following a Russian veto in March 2014 of a draft resolution on Ukraine declaring the 16 March 2014 referendum in Crimea illegal (S/2014/189). In that instance, however, the Security Council did not vote on a resolution referring the matter to the General Assembly; rather, the General Assembly reacted independently to the situation by adopting a resolution on 27 March 2014, titled “Territorial integrity of Ukraine” (A/RES/68/262), which received 100 votes in favour, 11 against and 58 abstentions (24 member states were either absent or were present and did not vote). While the General Assembly could choose to discuss and vote on a resolution on the current situation in Ukraine in the same way, it appears that the goal of several Council members is to send a strong political signal by pursuing a Security Council “Uniting for Peace” resolution.
Sign up for What's In Blue emails
V/R
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow
Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Phone: 202-573-8647
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
