Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February in what it planned would be a blitzkrieg resulting in the conquest of all Ukraine and the toppling of its government.
After more of 6 months of relentless war, indiscriminate bombardment of civilian targets and wanton destruction of Ukraine’s infrastructure, the war has ground down to a war of attrition with no end in sight. Still Kremlin, in its newspeak, calls its full-scale invasion of Ukraine a “special military operation’, pretending that Russia is not at war to avoid declaring a draft of more soldiers.
Anyone calling what is happening by its real name risk imprisonment. Those who dared to criticize the war have either already fled Russia or have been arrested waiting for trial. Kremlin has effectively silenced criticism against the war and there is no chance that the war will end by public protests in Russia.
It continues to stick to its pretext for the war that Ukraine posed a military threat to Russia and that there is no Ukrainian nation with a right to an independent country of its own. In fact, Kremlin wants to restore the former borders and imperial power of Tsar-Russia and Communist Soviet Union.
On Wednesday last week, Russian opposition politician Jevgenij Roizman, a former mayor and governor candidate, was detained by police who said he was being charged with "discrediting" the Russian military by calling the on-going war an “invasion of Ukraine”. In a country which respects freedom of expression, this would of course have been allowed.
The latest sign that Kremlin is planning for a long ‘special military operation’ is its announcement last Thursday to raise the number of the military by 137,000 soldiers to over 2 million. About half of them are active-duty soldiers. The decision implies that Russia will have more soldiers to deploy if the war drags on, but as the new soldiers will have to be trained first, they will not be ready until next year.
In the meantime, Russia continues to deploy mercenaries from the Wagner group, a Russian private para-military organization, and recruit soldiers from other countries, such as Syria. The high toll of war until now would force any other country to reconsider its war aims and define an exit strategy based on negotiations and a political solution.
In Russia, the war losses are considered as state secrets and not discussed openly. According to a summary in The New York Times of the toll of war, Russia’s military losses have been estimated to 25,000 killed and tens of thousands injured. The US has estimated that 70,000 to 80,000 Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded.
The Ukrainian military losses are also heavy and have been estimated to 9,000 dead. The confirmed losses of civilian lives are close to 6,000 but the true numbers are estimated to be much higher. 130,000 buildings have been destroyed and more than 300 bridges and 25,000 km of road have been damaged or destroyed.
Ukraine has also lost control of parts of its territory to Russian forces and its proxies in the so-called People’s Republics in Donbass. The war has forced more than 6.6 million people to flee Ukraine and displaced about the same number of people inside the country. The destruction of buildings and infrastructure in Ukraine has been estimated to at least $114 billion or the same value in euro.
M. Apelblat
The Brussels Times
