12 March 2022
Few people can understand this predicament than perhaps Tamils…as one of the continuously speaking lingo ethnic groups in the world, who have held out against proselytisation of all forms, retaining their own culture, religious denomination, their medicine, their art, drama and literature, one of the greatest balancing acts that this people have performed so far is how they have managed to keep themselves pragmatic and integrated to a larger pan subcontinental identity, including a post Independence Indian one. That is why Ukraine to the Tamil analyst is so pointless. It is a war between sisters, or mother and daughter, one that is senseless, but being egged on by a world array of forces, Anti West and Pro West, deftly converting what should have been Thucididis trap between Sino and American rival camps, into a proxy where Ukraine is holding up cudgels for Western Democracy as Russia gets painted into the Chinese camp.
It is ironical, that even as the mechanised column stretching miles and miles short of Kyiv and which was resting for a week has now melted away, dispersing in the neighbourhood through an advance along multiple prongs, moving up about 5 miles closer in last 24 hours, that Americans interpreting the war are talking of Russian failure. Gen Wesley Clark under whom NATO had gone to war in Bosnia was of the view that Mr Putin was just beginning in Ukraine, that ultimately Russia would swallow up all those East European countries who were now NATO members. Really? Is the former Commander of European military alliance aware of some things that inform him so? He is not alone. Any number of American and British experts inform us, that Ukraine is just the beginning. Why? How else, can the world make this a rest of the world versus Russia? Or at least rest of Europe versus Russia? In the last 24 hours, the EU met at Versailles, they offered monetary and material support to Ukraine. No word on Ukraine’s request for air support, on membership of EU, or a no fly zone. What remains as EU’s best bet is that Ukraine will some how hold out, will keep the Russians at bay for at least till June, by when the first effects of the sanctions imposed would start becoming visible for Russia. In their best case scenario, an Afghanistan like situation in Ukraine where Russians get bogged down. Their best situation would be a string of encircled Ukrainian metropolitan areas surrounded by Russian forces, where the volunteers from Canada, US, UK and other countries now totalling 16000 men, would play a vital role by sniping at besieging Russian militia, which would give this regional war a global footprint. Is it?
Americans are hoping that EU remains with them, for this is at best an American scenario. Americans have doubled down on aid, they are hoping all the anti tank man portable missilery would deter Russians from frontal assaults with armour, forgetting that air dominance the Russians currently enjoy would mean increasingly aerial strafing and bombing, to create lanes for advance by ground forces, where Su25 Frogfoot which is the equal of the A10 Warthog would play a key role. There is also speculation of graded asymmetry by first using thermobaric weapons, typically a type of high fuel air explosive devices which suck out oxygen and generate much greater heat than conventional bombs. Then the accusation by Russians of Bioweapons laboratory run by Americans near Kyiv , claims which were boosted by Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson on his Twitter handle, when it stated that 26 such facilities operate in Ukraine. President Zelensky is right in apprehending that such a claim is a false flag operation, it could be a ruse to legitimise Russian use of such weapons in the Ukraine theatre. The MiG29s that Poland has offered to be delivered to Ramstein Air Base has been cold shouldered by Pentagon. NATO has ruled out this and other requests by Ukraine as escalatory.
So clearly the NATO’s goal is for a bloody long drawn out conflict in Ukraine as its best case scenario, one that would leave Russia economically battered and militarily exhausted. Currently we know that about three Army groups of Russia are in the fray, some support elements of Air and Naval forces, and the quality of these forces suggests that these are largely Russian reserves and not elite frontline forces. There is no hint of larger mobilisation, though some air fields in Belarus have shown more Russian fixed wing and rotary aircraft in recent days. The entire military posture of Russia is Ukraine specific. So the escalation NATO hopes would come from Putin losing his patience. From Russian generals eager to call this campaign victorious and please their leader.
The view from afar is however not so muddled. Clearly the Ukrainians are the ones blowing up bridges, of forcing their civilians to leave from surrounded cities without any help from her military, as we can see from filming by BBC and other Western channels. Ukrainians have been using the Russian humanitarian corridors for military tactical buildup and feints that since they were announced first by Russians, local Russian commanders have violated these, shelled or even sent troops to snoop in or snipe at such Ukrainian tactics. That is why Kharkiv and Mariupol are still ‘holding out’ because those civilians who are trapped within are unable to get out. That is also why Kyiv has seen a revised Russian military plan in last 24 hours. Unlike Western military experts, I am of the view, that Russian military holds the upper hand in Ukraine so far. That their plans are constantly evolving because of an initial surmise that Ukrainians will see sense sooner than later, that it would be better to resolve issues by pummelling fists on the table than entire cities. However, to think that Russians who have invaded will not cross the next threshold forever is foolhardy. So the next 72 hours will matter.
I am now increasingly of the view that President Zelensky wants to go down in history. He does not appear to comprehend that at this stage, when he has accepted Russian positions on new autonomous republics on his eastern flank, when he has accepted Russian aversion to Ukraine’s NATO membership, continuing to fight on ground and delay diplomacy, would end up exhausting his options for an honourable peace. Officially the Russians said even yesterday that their goal is not regime change in Kyiv, yet Zelensky and his team have moved so far West that it would be difficult for them to retain power by doing an about turn and heading east into Moscow’s embrace. Ukrainian culture and her unique place in the overall Slav or Russian civilisation is somehow unable to imbue her present polity with a sense of perspective that would allow her to claim a neutral ground, one where both Moscow and NATO were comfortable. This denouement has come about only because of the slide from her cultural moorings, where she in her eagerness to embrace Western Civilisation has gone this slippery slope to become a pawn in the larger game of international oneupmanship. The images of ordinary writers, housewives, journalists, oddjobsmen and women signing up as Reserves, carrying personal firearms and talking about how Russia can take their lives but not their freedom makes a case for more sombre assessment not jingoism. So perhaps willingly or unwittingly, Ukraine seems to brace for a war of attrition. It is bracing to pay a heavy price with not just internal displacement of more than 60% of its population but with an exodus of refugees already more than 2.5 million to neighbouring countries. When a country of 40 million sees such a mass uprooting of its population, the near term prospects of returning to normalcy are non existent, even if armistice is declared overnight. Human toll and tragedy from this ever lengthening war is going to be a nightmare, not just for Ukraine or for EU but for Russia as well.
Yet, Russia till now shows signs that it will not play into American hands by trying to storm cities, or by quickening the pace of the campaign. Already we see reports that Dnipro is now facing short range artillery, which means that the Russian plan as appreciated on Day 6 of this war of encirclement of Ukrainian forces and major nodal cities is unchanged. There is no sign of any urgency or shift in tactics that would mean a reassured military chain of command, quite unlike the German military postures during Operation Barbarossa. It means that Russian higher military leadership is well aware tactically and strategically and engaged fully in directing the higher aim of this war- which is to get Ukraine to agree to Russian demands.
So has Ukraine, once flag bearer of the ‘colour revolution’ and Western Democracy’s Chosen Child , become Destiny’s Devil? A pawn of her own making between Russia and America? President Obama must be one most amused as he was often to use Putin or Russia to show the Republicans as a party that is politically living in an alternative reality. Yet, his own Vice President and now President, seems so far to show no indication of an ” ‘out of box’. devoid of rhetoric and posture” position on Ukraine. An American nudge to Ukraine would have made her accept peace on Russia’s terms easily, an American acceptance would have allowed France, Germany and Israel to mediate and hammer out a deal for Ukraine even now. Has American intransigence spiked the Climate of Strategic Uncertainty’s convergence over China? Would America recalibrate her position vis-à-vis China, to help isolate Russia internationally?Would America’s sanctions war on Russia lead to softening her criticism of Middle Eastern countries including allies like Saudi Arabia, Turkey and to oil rich Venezuela, reopening regional jockeying and rewarding dictators? The devil is in the detail…the bedevilling of international strategic calculus due to Ukraine!
indiarubberman.com 