Putin declares martial law in annexed areas and high alert in Russia

Eight months after invading Ukraine, Russia saw the war it started reach its territory. Eight regions of the country, including the capital Moscow, were placed on high alert, and the neighboring country’s four annexed areas under martial law.

The decision was announced on Wednesday (19) by President Vladimir Putin at a meeting with his Security Council, which was televised. It is a tacit admission that the situation is getting out of hand, the first of its kind in the war.

With the alert, the transit of people and vehicles will be limited and subject to stricter inspection by the police and military forces. A committee headed by Prime Minister Mikhail Michustin is expected to detail additional measures.

Martial law in the two self-proclaimed republics of Donbass, Lugansk and Donetsk (east), and in the administrative regions of Kherson and Zaporijia (south), implies complete control over civilian life and the possibility of more drastic military measures.

“We are working to solve large-scale, very complex tasks to ensure a credible future for Russia and our people,” the president said.

In practice, the emergency has already started in Kherson, an area that according to the new Russian military commander of the invasion, Sergei Surovikin, is under imminent threat of an attack from Kiev. The local government has mandated that 50,000 to 60,000 people be evacuated from the regional capital and its surroundings to areas further south, physically protected by the Dnieper River, which separates a slice to the northwest from the rest of the region.

According to the pro-Kremlin administrator of the site, Vladimir Saldo, told Russia 1 state TV, “the whole government is already changing today. [quarta]” to the left bank of the Dnieper.

The move adds complexity to the current phase of the invasion that began on February 24. Kherson, neighboring Zaporijia and the two self-proclaimed republics of Donbass in the east were annexed by Putin after hastily held referendums by local officials in September.

At the same time, the Kremlin began an unpopular mobilization of 222,000 reservists to, in Putin’s words, stabilize the fronts. According to the president and his advisers, the new territory is “Russian forever” and will be defended if necessary with nuclear weapons, which has generated great alarm in the West.

There are fears that the Russians could use a low-power, tactical nuclear warhead to stop troop movements and scare the Ukrainians. Militarily it does not seem to make much sense, as many would be needed, raising the risk of contamination, and politically the Kremlin would be risking World War III with NATO (a US-led military alliance).

In this way, the threat seems to be that, to buy time. Since last week, the dynamics of the conflict have changed. Using an attack attributed to Kiev on the bridge linking Crimea that it annexed in 2014 to Russia’s Krasnodar region, Putin ordered attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure.

The result, according to President Volodymyr Zelensky, was the destruction of 30% of the country’s electricity distribution centers, leaving another 1,000 cities and towns without electricity or water – the system needs electricity to function. The attacks continued, with Iranian missiles and kamikaze drones, on Wednesday.

Now, martial law on what it calls Russia’s new frontiers. The move in Kherson is especially symbolic because the region’s eponymous capital was the first major Ukrainian city to fall into Russian hands, early in the war.

But its position exposed to two Ukrainian fronts and with the Dnieper River having its main bridges destroyed by American artillery operated by Kiev, made it almost indefensible. What seemed to deter Kiev from taking more action was the fact that it had a good part of its 300,000 inhabitants.

Evacuation, if effective, will pave the way for either the handover of the city or its transformation into a bombing inferno — the nuclear option seems far-fetched at this point. A humanitarian crisis, however, is guaranteed right away. Indeed, the Zelensky government called the measure “a propaganda show.”

The measures on recognized Russian soil will have an impact that is still uncertain on the morale of the population. Putin’s approval had already begun to fall, still at stratospheric levels, however, with the mobilization expected to end next week. In Moscow, for example, it has already been closed.

One thing is certain: the war had already entered Russian daily life little by little, with Western sanctions and, later, mobilization. Now, you can change the residents’ routine for good, with unfathomable effects.