Russia avoids delimiting annexed borders after further defeats in Ukraine

In a sign that the pressure on the battlefield is being felt in the ideal world designed by the Kremlin, the Russian government said on Monday (3) that it does not know the borders of the four regions it declared annexed on Friday. (30).

“We will continue to consult with people who live in these areas,” said spokesman Dmitri Peskov, when asked by a reporter about the status of the two annexed areas in southern Ukraine, Kherson and Zaporijia.

In the first, Russian domination is almost complete, but on Monday (3) the occupation authorities said that there was an advance of tens of kilometers by a Ukrainian armored column along the Dnieper River. Kiev did not confirm details, but Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had recaptured some villages in the region.

In Zaporijia, the northern part of the territory was never taken by the Russians, who stopped their advance at the height of the homonymous nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe.

Meanwhile, the Duma (the lower house of parliament) unanimously approved, even without defining borders, the annexation condemned by the international community. The Federation Council, equivalent to the Senate, will do so this Tuesday (4), as is predictable.

Peskov did not talk about the Donbass, the eastern area that was the point of origin of the war, in the civil conflict that started in 2014 after Vladimir Putin annexed Crimea in retaliation for the overthrow of an allied government in Kiev, aiming to prevent Ukraine from entering the structures. western European Union and NATO.

There, Putin annexed Lugansk, where Russian control is almost complete, and Donetsk, which has about 40% still under Ukrainian administration. On Saturday, Russia abandoned the Liman bastion in western Donetsk to avoid encircling approximately 5,000 troops in the city.

Territorially it doesn’t mean much, but symbolically it was a major defeat for Putin, as the city had become Russian the day before. But the situation in Kherson could raise tensions. “There have indeed been advances,” said the head of the occupied region, Vladimir Saldo.

All of this tests the bellicose rhetoric of the president, who has vowed to even use nuclear weapons to defend what he considers new parts of Russia.

The Kremlin’s vague terms on the borders also aim to avoid drawing red lines that would oblige Putin to say what he came for. Zelensky, encouraged by the West, appears to be doubling down on a Russian military collapse.

The US has already said it has warned Putin of the “horrific consequences” of perhaps employing tactical, relatively low-powered nuclear weapons and less radioactive contamination of the environment. In an interview with ABC on Sunday (2), retired General David Petraeus, former director of the CIA, exemplified what that would be.

According to him, the US would not give a nuclear response, but could “destroy all Russian forces in occupied territory” and sink the entire Black Sea Fleet, which is in Sevastopol, Crimea. What he doesn’t explain is the built-in risk of starting an all-out war between Washington and Moscow, potentially apocalyptic because it would involve the owners of 90% of the world’s atomic weapons.

While the stalemate continues, Putin’s astral hell continues – not just metaphorically, for those who believe that, as the leader turns 70 on Friday (7). After Chechen ally Ramzan Kadirov criticized the conduct of the war over the weekend and called for the use of tactical nuclear weapons, another member of the Putinist hardliners came forward to speak ill of the Armed Forces.

And it wasn’t anyone. In a statement, the founder of the Wagner mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigojin, supported Kadyrov and added: “All these bastards must be sent barefoot to the front with automatic pistols.” In this case, the bastards were the targets of criticism from Kadyrov, the command of the Armed Forces and the generals appointed to deal with the war.

Prigojin is known as “Putin’s chef” as his conglomerate ran food services for the Kremlin. Peskov was asked about the Chechen president and said he had the right to express himself, “but these are very emotional times, and emotions have to be excluded from evaluations.”

The duo’s main target is the Russian Chief of Staff, Valeri Gerasimov. The problem for them is that taking down No. 3 in the country’s military chain of command implies an attack on No. 2, Defense Minister Serguei Choigu, who put him in charge. And, of course, Putin, who rules us both.

But there are signs of movement. According to the RBC website, Putin replaced the head of the Western Military Command, General Alexander Juravliov, in the latest change among the military directly involved in the war.

In addition to criticism from Prigojin and Kadyrov, there was also a shift in narrative tone on ubiquitous Russian state TV. “I really wanted us to attack Kiev and take it tomorrow, but we know that partial mobilization will take time. For a while, things will not be easy for us,” ultranationalist presenter Vladimir Soloviev said on Sunday.

Last week, Putin ordered the deployment of at least 300,000 reservists to fill the war’s shortage of personnel. The move has generated many protests and Russians fleeing abroad, showing why the Kremlin has put it off for so long: the war is at home now.

There are attempts to correct course: this Monday, the governor of Khabarovsk (Siberia), Yuri Laiko, said that it was necessary to curb “abuses” in the enlistment and ordered that thousands of calls were canceled for not meeting the legal requirements.