War has come home to Russia
ON May 9, the war with Ukraine will be dramatically brought home to millions of Russians — not through violence, hopefully, but in peace and quiet. The shadow of conflict will, however, turn that quiet into a peace of the graveyard.
Putin will do all it takes to achieve his objectives in Ukraine because it is a matter of Russia’s very existence.
Saratov, Kursk, Voronezh, Belgorod, Pskov and Oryol are among Russia’s regions (in Russia, the term ‘region’ denotes state or province) that have cancelled their May 9 Victory Day parades, which commemorate the defeat of Nazi Germany in what Russians call their ‘Great Patriotic War’. Crimea also cancelled the Victory Day parade after a suspected Ukrainian drone hit its Sevastopol port and set ablaze an oil storage depot on April 29.
Pskov is the farthest from Ukraine — and beyond Moscow — as the crow flies. Saratov is also far, on the border with Kazakhstan. The imperative of not exposing crowds of Russian people even in regions distant from the war theatre to Ukrainian kamikaze drone attacks points to a new and more dangerous development in the 14-month Russian military operation against Ukraine. This was stunningly captured in global headlines after two unmanned aerial vehicles were brought down over the Kremlin grounds by radar-linked Special Services exactly a week prior to the traditional Victory Day parade on Red Square. The Presidential Press Service said it was “a planned terrorist attack and an assassination attempt on the (Russian) President, carried out ahead of Victory Day and the May 9 parade.” No parades anywhere in Russia were cancelled in 2022 although the conflict in Ukraine was already under way.
There were suggestions immediately after the drone attack on the Kremlin that the parade on Red Square should be cancelled in view of security risks. At the time of writing this, it is only likely that the famed aerial displays associated with Victory Day may be scrapped because of the danger of drones interfering with the air shows.
Cancellation of the parades, be it in the capital or in the regions, will bring home the war because every year, millions of Russian children await the Victory Day celebrations. It is that time of the year when the bitter Russian winter gives way to a beautiful spring and the school holiday makes the day special for everyone, especially children. Any change to this historical routine will affect them. Besides, every Russian continues to be proud of his or her nation’s success in the ‘Great Patriotic War’.
Fourteen months into the conflict, the only predictable thing about it is that nothing about this war can be predicted — not just the unexpected longevity of the government in Ukraine or Russia’s remarkable survival of deep and widespread sanctions. Going beyond these, unpredictability has been the hallmark of even the war theatre. For example, last month, when President Vladimir Putin visited Ukraine’s Kherson region, now under Russian control, by his side were two Generals — Mikhail Teplinsky and Oleg Makarevich. The former, a native of Donetsk region in Ukraine, was said to have been dismissed in January. Now, he appears to be the most important military man conducting Russia’s war on the Kherson front.
Similarly, who would have thought that a minister from Ukraine would use her yoga and spiritual connections to wangle a trip to India. Emine Dzhaparova, the First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, who visited New Delhi from April 10 to 12, is a relative lightweight in Kyiv’s power structure. India was not keen to receive her because she would have wasted the time of Indian ministers and officials, a senior diplomat, who closely follows Ukraine, told this writer. But a visit to Raisina Hill, the seat of power in New Delhi, and photo opportunities with Indian ministers would have enhanced Dzhaparova’s stature back home. According to reliable stories circulating in the national capital’s diplomatic circuit, she used some extra-constitutional connections and Raisina Hill gave in.
In a sea of unpredictability in global diplomacy set off by the Russia-Ukraine conflict, a rare factor of predictability is the consistency in Indian policy on the issue. The Narendra Modi government’s fundamental position on the issue has not changed one bit since the start of the war. The Indian position seeking an end to the war, negotiations between the combatants and respect for international law offers ample opportunities to interpret — and misinterpret — New Delhi’s statements. Foreign leaders, depending on their proclivities, have been using those statements to claim that Modi’s government is “now” moving towards greater identity of views with them. Such a trend towards disinformation can be expected next month when Modi visits Washington and again in July when he goes to Paris. It is particularly important not to believe western media interpretations of India’s position when Modi is in Washington because those interpretations will be subjective and based only on facts that suit them.
In the three decades since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Kremlin has become used to transatlantic efforts, first to buy Russia through proxies, and when that failed, Moscow’s enemies tried their best to dismember Russia and destroy it. American thinkers like Henry Kissinger have tried to point this out, but in the present toxic environment, their voices are attempted to be suppressed. The experience of over two decades of Putin’s leadership teaches us that there will be no specific retaliation for the attempt last week to assassinate him through a drone attack on the presidential home in the Kremlin. There will be a definite escalation in fighting, but Russia has been planning it for months and was waiting for the inhospitable winter to end. The West knows this too, and the so-called Ukrainian counter-offensive now in the works is part of such war efforts by both sides. Putin will do all it takes to achieve his objectives in Ukraine because it is a matter of Russia’s very existence.
The number of able-bodied Ukrainians to fight the war is dwindling. The cocktail circuit chatter in Washington is that the Joe Biden administration will support the war against Putin until the last Ukrainian. How much more cynical can it get?
