A lot of water passed under the bridge, but the clashes continue. The first stage of the invasion, which included a weeks-long siege of Kyiv and the attack on big cities like Kharkiv, added to the seizure of nuclear power plants by Moscow, gave way to the second phase in which the government intends to focus on the region of the donbas, where the self-proclaimed independent republics of Donetsk and Luganks are located.
Ignatius Hutin, Master in International Relations and graduate in Journalism, who lived in Ukraine during 2017, spoke with this medium to try to explain the situation of the conflict and what this new stage consists of. “This second phase of the special operation has to do with stopping attacking western Ukraine, to focus solely on the east and south,” he said, stating that a priori, from Russia’s point of view, this would mean “that the phase of demilitarization of the north and the west is accomplished”.
Author of the books “Ukraine, chronicle from the front” Y “Ukraine/Donbass, a renewed Cold War”Hutin believes that from now on Moscow will focus on what was its main objective from the start: control of the Donbas region, the Crimean peninsula, the Azov Sea coast and even, perhaps, Odessa.
Russia’s central motive for advancing on Ukraine is still an open issue today. There are those who believe that Moscow got involved in the civil war between kyiv and the independent republics to keep all the Ukrainian territory. For Hutin, it is a way of seeing it, although he does not share it. “Russia never aspired to conquer kyiv, the capital, nor Lviv, which are big cities and difficult to control. What interested him is the east and the south”, assured the expert in Eastern Europe.
However, he is aware that there are other views of the conflict that show contrary aspects. “There are those who think that Russia is withdrawing because she could not take kyiv. It is a way of seeing it. We don’t know,” he said, though to his knowledge it doesn’t seem like he’s backing down to an advancing Ukraine, “or because kyiv has achieved a victory, but it’s a look to be reckoned with.”
Edward Martinez, Professor of Geopolitics and international analystcoincided with Hutin’s gaze and assured that the second stage of Russia can be defined by two objectives. The first is to strengthen the self-declared independent republics and add, as far as possible, an advance towards Odessa. “This would cause Russia to close the passage of the rest of Ukraine to the Black Sea and prevent it from trading maritimely through the Mediterranean Sea. If it were a medieval war, Russia would be encircling the castle and making it landlocked,” he metaphorized.
The second objective, according to Martínez, is “to try to undermine all economic chances of Ukraine’s survivalsince Russia stayed with the Donbas where the main metallurgical companies are, attacked trains and took over nuclear power plants to weaken it and take advantage of the difficult situation in which it leaves it in the future”.
Regarding the current situation, he pointed out that “the inefficiencies of the great powers and the ambition of Russia are being exposed” as a result of the destruction generated and the humanitarian crisis. And he did not hesitate to affirm that they have left Ukraine “in an enormous weakness” to the point that they have transformed it “into a Syria within Europe, with the risk of becoming a lebanization, that is, in a endemic conflict, in a divided country and in constant civil war”.
Both experts agreed in stating that it is a long-term conflict. On the one hand, Martínez pointed out that both Russia and Ukraine and their allies in the NATO they are militarily prepared so that “no matter how much Moscow withdraws tomorrow, a long-standing conflict remains with the two armed parties and a divided country. It is evident that this conflict is going to last a long time”.
Hutin considered that it is unlikely that either of the two parties will achieve a total victory over the other, for which the scenario that had been occurring in the past could be repeated. donbas since 2015. “I do not believe that Russia can achieve a total war victory and that it can take the Ukrainian territory and beyond as well. At the same time, I also don’t think that Ukraine can achieve it, that is, expel all Russians and regain control of Crimea and Donbas. It is very difficult and unlikely. If neither of the two can achieve a total military victory and there is no possibility of agreement or ceasefire, we are headed for a long conflict, increasingly stalemated and bogged down, ”he predicted.
sanctions
The measures imposed by the Western powers on Russia, such as the withdrawal of the Swift system for international transfers, the sanctions against banking entities, the Central Bank of Russia and private and state companies, generated a shock in the Moscow economy and pushed countless of foreign companies to leave the country.
In response, Moscow, the main supplier of gas to Europe, ordered in retaliation that from now on the supply be paid in rubles, something that was not originally in the contracts. Precisely in the last few hours, the Russian group Gazprom announced in a statement that it will interrupt from this Wednesday the shipment of gas to Poland Y Bulgaria because the firms involved in the purchase ignored Putin’s decree.
Both countries reported that they have the necessary gas to meet demand and assured that there will be no shortage. “There will be no shortage of gas in Polish homes,” the Polish climate minister tweeted, Anna Moscow, who stated that “from the first day of the war” the country is ready to assume “full independence from Russian raw materials.” As the spokeswoman for the Bulgarian government, Lena Borislavova, assured that the supply is “guaranteed” and “there is no risk for the energy security of the country”.
“The sanctions for now do not affect too much. The ruble recovered everything that had fallen and Europe continues to buy Russian gas and oil. However, at some point the Europeans are going to turn around. The result of the measures could begin to be seen from July and August”I consider Hutin, in particular because Russia is very isolated in political terms.
In that sense, he pointed out that China, his most important ally, is not buying too much gas and oil. “Basically it can’t because there’s no gas pipeline. They can be built but it will take time. In addition, today half the country is quarantined due to the Omicron variant. Russia could not depend on China,” he explained.
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For Martínez, the sanctions “have a big blow in Russia”, but he affirmed that he is resisting an attack from the West because Moscow considers that they cannot last too long. “When they close the door to Russia to the West to trade and so on, the West also closes it to collect Russian debts, with which they cannot be closed forever,” he added.
And he deepened: “In the same way that despite sanctions against Russia cutting off the purchase of gas, making it lose between 208 and 238 million a day, the truth is that Europe could not resist without that gas for more than 6 months. With which, all the economic sanctions, although they have an impact, Russia knows that they cannot last too long.
From Hutin’s point of view, what China does to help its ally will be central. “I think it will depend on the will and the ability of China than Russia. I also think of India, Pakistan and Brazil, as big markets, but the point here is how much will China support Russia commercially, ”he pointed out.
what to expect
About the end, both gave their panorama of what can be expected in the future. “Ukraine’s defense with the resources it has is absolutely limited,” Martínez considered, since there is a resource that cannot be renewed: the human. “There are no military professionals left, people are defending themselves as best they can and more and more civilians are dying, which is a situation that is very difficult for them to sustain,” he said.
Beyond the difficulties Ukraine is facing, NATO’s support continues to be central to prolonging the conflict and avoiding capitulation. Forcing Russia to negotiate a ceasefire already seems like a utopia. The ball is and has always been on Moscow’s side, as are the war crimes charges.
“The only thing that is holding up the kyiv government is NATO’s ghost of a possible intervention, which I personally don’t think will happen, but Russia takes it as a limit,” said the professor of Geopolitics and he affirmed that from the perspective given by what has happened so far “it is enough for Russia to keep what it has obtained in the east”.
The long war would benefit Moscow more than kyivin the opinion of Hutin, since “he has weapons to spare and because he cares nothing about losing soldiers”, with which he can bet that the war will stall and even reduce the number of military and civilian casualties due to the intermittence of clashes.
“Then it will be easier for him to control the territory. From time to time there will be clashes and deaths and we will continue to have disputed territories, which is basically what happened in Donbas between 2015 and 2022, where there is neither progress nor setbacks. I think we are on our way to that”, as long as China supports Russia commercially and NATO does not enter the conflict.
“For now, he’s not messing around. He can send weapons and money, but he is not sending troops and it is important, because the moment he gets involved, everything goes to shit. And there one would have to believe (Sergei) Lavrov, who said yesterday that there would be a risk of a third world war. That would change the whole scenario and it would be a very terrible outcome”, concluded the expert on Eastern Europe.
Within the current scenario, the negotiated solution would seem to go beyond the factual plane. Although both countries were willing to reach an agreement to end the conflict, the truth is that, as analysts pointed out, the most concrete probability points to an extensive war, possibly of lesser activity. As long as Russia manages to avoid a severe impact of sanctions and Ukraine continues to defend its territory, the conflict will not come to an end.
Source: Ambito
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