On the one hand, openness to diplomatic dialogue. On the other, the sound of boots at the border.
While hinting at a certain easing in the Russian-Western conflict that has been playing out on Ukrainian territory since last December and continuing to deny that he has any invasion plans, the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, has nevertheless intensified this week the movements of its troops along the border with the former Soviet republic.
Contradictory signals that could lead to believe that the good will exhibited for a few days by the Kremlin to avoid war would in fact only be an attempt at diversion which would serve to buy time and put the final touches to the final preparations before an attack of Ukrainian territory.
On Wednesday, the Chief of Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, General Valery Gerasimov, arrived in Belarus, a country neighboring Ukraine, where Russia and its longtime ally have planned 10-day joint military exercises that will start Thursday. The main Russian military commanders accompany him, while at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Moscow, the senior officers continued, in the aftermath of the diplomatic marathon led by France and Germany, to accuse the West of “blackmail and pressure”, but above all to stir up tensions by arming Ukraine.
The Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, has also justified the military maneuvers in Belarus by evoking “unprecedented security threats, much greater and much more dangerous than before”, that Westerners would now pose to Russia. . The expansion of NATO’s influence to the east, with the possible integration of Ukraine into the Alliance, is one of the components of the Gordian knot.
Scenarios studied
Tuesday, while from Kiev, the French President, Emmanuel Macron, estimated alongside the Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, to have obtained the commitment of his Russian counterpart concerning a possible de-escalation, the Russian Ministry of Defense specified its new intentions in the black Sea.
Moscow has moved six landing craft there from its Baltic and Northern Naval Fleet, capable of carrying thousands of troops. According to a statement from the Russian Navy, these amphibious vessels were deployed off the coast of Ukraine to “take part in planned military exercises”. However, with the Russian forces already in place in the region, Moscow has just increased its assault capabilities in the event of an attack on the Ukrainian coast, whose defense system is limited, according to military analysts.
An invasion of Ukraine via the Black Sea is among the possible scenarios, according to a risk assessment by political scientist Seth Jones and ex-CIA agent Philip Wasielewski published on the Center for Strategic and International Studies page. It would weaken the former Soviet republic by enclaving it, after taking control of the country’s ports.
The deployment of troops in Belarus, for its part, poses a threat to the capital, Kiev, located barely 220 kilometers from the border between the two countries. These military exercises are still perceived by the United States as a pretext for an attack which could intervene “at any time”, the White House said on Sunday, and could above all provide cover for a plan to invade Ukraine. in several times.
Moscow must also deal with a short window of opportunity for a ground invasion due to the rasputitsa, the thaw season feared by the Russian armies which, from March in Ukraine, transforms the frozen steppes into a field of mud, complicating thus the movement of troops.
Very real perception of risk
An attack, despite the somewhat calmer declarations of the Kremlin, is still possible, according to Lubomyr Luciuk, professor of political science at the Royal Military College of Canada and specialist in Ukraine. “A bluff from Putin? I don’t believe it, he said in an interview. His strategy is to tear the ties that bind Ukraine to Europe to convince Ukrainian society that it is alone, that the West is not as favorable to its territorial integrity and political independence as it had hoped. . And an invasion, by creating possible tensions in the west over how to oppose it, could serve this cause.
Nevertheless, on Wednesday, Ukrainian diplomacy displayed a rather optimistic tone on the eve of the start of military exercises in Belarus, seeing now “real chances of a diplomatic settlement” of the crisis, said Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kouleba.
For her part, Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Ganna Malyar dismissed the idea of an imminent Russian assault, calling the threat Russian “blackmail” aimed at “ruining Western political and security alliances”. “We see a concentration of armed forces, but there is no formation of assault units. We do not see any necessary infrastructure being put in place for an immediate escalation. »
In Europe, a Russian invasion of Ukraine is seen as increasingly certain by the majority of people in Poland, Romania, France, Germany and Italy, a poll released on Wednesday shows. by the European Council on International Relations. A perspective that Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov maintained when he said that Russia was still considering how it would respond to the rejection of its demands by Washington and NATO and that the final decision would be up to Vladimir Poutine. The president who, on Monday, during his meeting with Mr. Macron, promised in a nebulous way not to be “at the origin of the escalation”, thus repeating with other words his attacks against Washington, which he accused of being responsible for this crisis, the outcome of which is still uncertain.
With Agence France-Presse