Pro-Russian rebels have been installed in the self-declared separatist regions of Donetsk and Luhansk for years, but still, Russia hasn’t annexed those areas, and its forces are struggling to get through a stiff Ukrainian resistance in big cities. Mykhaylo Palinchak/SOPA Images/Getty ImagesĮven in the east, where Russian forces are trying to advance through the Donbas region, their gains have been limited. “And, of course, you have the very well-documented resistance from local Ukrainians, who didn’t take too well to being occupied.”ĭestroyed and burned Russian tanks along a highway near the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv. Lots of their equipment started breaking because the tanks can only take so much moving around,” she said. “Then it meant that it was tricky to tow the tanks back to Russia for repairs, because they were far away, and so a lot of them were abandoned. Russian forces instead moved by trucks and slow-moving tanks, many of which were bogged down in mud, as warmer weather prevented the ground from freezing and allowing freer movement, Ferris said. Because they never really managed to control those hubs, they never really managed to push particularly far into Ukrainian territory, and it meant that they then had to rely on off-road capabilities.” “And because the Russian motorized ground forces rely on the railways to move all of their troops, their hardware and their tanks. “Some of the logistical problems they had were partly because they never really managed to take major railway hubs at all, frankly, in the whole country,” Ferris told CNN. Meanwhile, Putin’s foes in the West, whom Russia had tried so hard to divide over years, are increasingly united, all for the cause of ensuring victory for Ukraine.Įmily Ferris, a research fellow with the Royal United Services Institute, said that Russia’s failures had been largely logistical. Russia’s guided-missile cruiser the Moskva – once the crown jewel of its Black Sea fleet – is now a wreck, sitting destroyed in the depths of the sea. US provided intelligence that helped Ukraine target Russian warship Images emerged early Monday, April 18, on social media showing Russia's guided-missile cruiser, the Moskva, badly damaged and on fire in the hours before the ship sunk in the Black Sea on Thursday. If anything, the operation in Ukraine has been an embarrassment for him – at least on the international stage. It’s an argument that has no real weight a blatant cover for Russian revanchism.Įven though the Kremlin’s well-oiled propaganda machine has been going at full steam since the February invasion, it will be difficult for Putin to twist Russia’s losses into true victory on Monday. Putin and his government have repeatedly said the aim of their so-called “special operation” is to “denazify” Ukraine, and that freeing the country of Nazis is a matter of Russian survival. Russia’s justification for war in Ukraine suggested a deadline for success by Victory Day. The USSR suffered the biggest losses of any nation – around 27 million soldiers and civilians died. It was on May 8, 1945, (May 9 in Moscow’s time zone) that Germany signed its Instrument of Surrender in Berlin, ending the fighting in Europe. The leader had clearly hoped to have more to celebrate by this Victory Day on Monday, the country’s most patriotic of dates, marking the Soviet Union’s role in defeating Nazi Germany in World War II. It was on that same occasion in 2014 that Putin took the first step in annexing Crimea from Ukraine, through orchestrated pro-Russian protests on the peninsula. It was no coincidence that his invasion of Ukraine came a day after Defender of the Fatherland Day, a celebration of Russia’s military achievements. President Vladimir Putin takes Russian anniversaries seriously.
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