Russian Sensitivities to Ukrainian Intransigence

"[Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelenskyy knows when it may end. It may end tomorrow if he wishes so."

"There are occupied territories in several new regions of the Russian Federation that need to be liberated."

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov

 

"It's enough for us to make a move and there is a lot of noise, chatter and outcry all across the universe."

"It will not obstruct us from fulfilling combat tasks."

"[The fighting in Ukraine] could be a lengthy process. Moscow's gains in land is] a significant result for Russia; the Sea of Azov] has become Russia's internal sea."

Russian President Vladimir Putin

 

"Although questions are almost certainly usually vetted in advance, the cancellation is likely due to increasing concerns about the prevalence of anti-war feeling in Russia."

"Kremlin officials are almost certainly extremely sensitive about the possibility that any event attended by Putin could be hijacked by unsanctioned discussion about the 'special military operation'."

U.K. Defence Ministry

Parts of the drone are seen at the site of a building destroyed by a Russian drone attack, as their attack on Ukraine continues, in Kyiv, Ukraine Dec. 14, 2022.

Vladimir Putin cannot afford to back down from the corner he boxed himself into. His right-wing critics in Moscow, the hardlinersm have taken an increasingly vocal stance denouncing Mr. Putin as weak and indecisive, calling for strikes on Ukraine to be ramped up further. Putin acknowledged that his war is taking longer than anticipated, wrapping up the campaign could become a "lengthy process".

 

And that is because he cannot afford to now draw his troops back into Russia and say, sorry folks, big mistake, gotta go now. The Kremlin has put the next move in Volodymyr Zelenskyy's lap. All Kyiv has to do is admit defeat, agree to losing its territory, and pledge to disarm. Along with surrendering its ambition to have Ukraine become a NATO partner. Somehow, Mr. Zelenskyy's intransigence in judging Russia's invasion as an act of war and the Russian military as 'war criminals', refusing to surrender its territory, and insisting that Russia must be prepared to financially compensate Ukraine for Russia's wholesale destruction is responsible for dragging out the war, not Russia.

 

Russia faces the fact that the war it has imposed on Ukraine has besmirched its reputation and degraded relations between it and most of the rest of the world, sanctions harming its economy and its future. The Kremlin has been clear on the matter; Ukraine must accept the conditions Russia has imposed on it for an end to the fighting to take place. Kyiv must recognize that Crimea, the Donbas and other geographic areas wrested from Ukraine are now irretrievably part of greater Russia; not to do so, it suicidal, sniffs the Kremlin.

An explosion lights up the sky at around 6 a.m. on Monday morning in the city of Engels in Russia. Photo: from Twitter

However, the reality is that mere weeks after Russia incorporated areas of Ukraine into Russia, the Ukrainian counteroffensive drove Russian troops from the Kharkiv area, forcing Russian troops to leave Kherson and parts of the Kherson region, one of four annexed regions of Ukraine. The Russian troops fled ignominiously, leaving behind all the munitions and instruments of war that Russia had insisted were taken along with the evacuated troops. Furthermore, since then Ukrainian forces have sent drones on destructive missions into Russia itself.

The result of a brooding Russia whose plans have gone awry, having nothing to celebrate lately has seen its president put off his annual news conference, given the battlefield setbacks. President Putin has used his year-end ritual of availability to credit himself with his strongman position in honour of Russia's grand past and grander future. He is in no position at present to boast of his domestic and foreign policy successes.

With his troops in disarray in Ukraine it seemed to him preferable to avoid uncomfortable questions relating to the blunders of the Russian military. Nor would Mr. Putin hold a news conference as expected. Previously at such events he has gloated and preened over his professionalism, his adeptness at guiding Russia to the forefront of successful global nations. His annual televised call-in show has been cancelled as well. 

Questions from an adoring public can no longer be guaranteed to nurture his father-of-the-nation image he so pompously conveys. The annual televised state-of-the-nation address has also failed to materialize. He has much to answer for, but has no plans to leave himself wide open to criticism from an ungrateful public that the Kremlin effectively muzzled in the liberal anti-war camp. Independent media was shuttered, the spread of any opinion differing from the official has been criminalized.

Putin's campaign is not to be called a war, under duress of imprisonment. New polling data has revealed that Russian citizens narrowly support negotiations to end the Ukraine war. But those same citizens overwhelmingly reject the possibility of annexed regions of Crimea or Donbas be returned to Ukraine.

The Moscow-based Levada Centre in conjunction with the Chicago Council on Global Affairs conducted a joint survey to extract those results.

Firefighters stand on heaps of fruit while working inside burnt market stalls hit by shelling in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in Donetsk, Russian-controlled Ukraine, Dec. 6, 2022.