It is far from trivial! Russian President Vladimir has chosen the International Day of Peace, September 21, to escalate the tension to a new level in the war of invasion he launched against Ukraine on February 24. How ? By a speech to the nation delivered Wednesday morning and in which he has just called for a partial conscription of Russian reservists to reconstitute his armed forces pushed back and pruned for months by a Ukrainian resistance that the strong man of the Kremlin did not have suspected.
An unprecedented call since the Second World War in Russia, used by Putin to once again defy Western countries, against which Moscow claims to have to defend itself, but which, in the end, could lead the Russian president elsewhere than where he finally hopes go. Decryption.
What is Vladimir Putin looking for with his speech?
Almost two weeks after a successful Ukrainian counteroffensive in northeastern and southern Ukraine that illustrated the fragility of Russian invasion and occupation, Vladimir Putin needs to reassert his control over the war and the call for partial conscription is part of this logic. In essence, the Kremlin hopes to call nearly 300,000 men to send them to fight in the former Soviet republic.
Moscow also wants to replenish its troops on the front, while minimizing the losses that its army has suffered since the outbreak of the conflict. On Wednesday, the Russian Defense Ministry mentioned a human toll of less than 6,000 men. Figures well below the 53,000 Russian victims assessed by the Ukrainians, but also by the detailed analysis of the compensation paid to the families of soldiers who died in combat by the Russian Ministry of Finance. A recent document leak allows us to deduce that these losses were 48,000 men at the end of last August.
Putin’s call comes a day after the announcement of annexation referendums held in four regions under Russian occupation since the start of the conflict. The ballots were urgently called to begin this Friday and in the coming days. Through this staged public consultation, Putin could then seek legal bases to intensify his war against Ukraine, but also against Westerners who support the former Soviet republic.
In his 7-minute speech to the nation, he once again brandished the nuclear arsenal against the West, insisting that he was “not bluffing”. The threat took up the main lines of that formulated by Moscow at the beginning of the war, on February 24th.
What does Vladimir Putin risk with this speech?
After almost seven months of a war in Ukraine experienced by the Russians from the comfort of their living room, in an environment of daily life that the Kremlin has done everything to maintain in a certain normality, the call for conscription, even partial , now brings the conflict closer to the lives of millions of Russians. With the risk of raising a challenge from within the country that the failure of the promised lightning war and the recent debacle of the Russian army in the face of Ukrainian resistance have only fueled.
Sign of resistance to Putin’s war project: an hour after his speech almost all flights from Russia to countries where Russians can go without a visa were full. This affected trips to Georgia, Turkey and Armenia. Within hours, flights from Moscow to Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan stopped showing available seats in the search engines of Russian travel sites, Russian media RBC reported.
The conscription of reservists has become the target of the anti-war movement Vesna which, in the wake of Putin’s speech, called for a general mobilization against Russian aggression in Ukraine and called for demonstrations on Wednesday evening in all the cities of the country.
“We call on Russian servicemen in combat units and on the front line to refuse to participate in the “special operation” and to surrender as soon as possible,” said the group. “You don’t have to die for Putin. You are more useful in Russia for those who love you. For the authorities, you are just cannon fodder, where you are going to be wasted for no good reason and without any purpose”.
Where could this lead the Kremlin strongman?
For Ukraine specialist Alexander Motyl, a professor at Rutgers University in Newark, Putin’s speech and his call for conscription leave no doubt that “the Russian army has been defeated and Russia is losing,” he wrote in the digital pages of 19Fortyfive magazine.
Russian political analyst Dmitry Oreshkin told The Associated Press (AP) that Putin’s announcement sounded like “an act of desperation” as the British government called the remarks a “clear admission” that the invasion of Ukraine is a failure for Putin.
On Twitter, the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, indicated that the European Union would remain “firm” in its support for Ukraine. There is “only one aggressor, Russia, and only one attacked country, Ukraine”, he indicated in opposition to the alternative reality that Putin once again sought to impose during his announcement.
On Wednesday, pro-Kremlin analyst Sergei Markov and ex-member of Putin’s party spoke out for it by defending conscription on the BBC. He said: “Ukrainians are our brothers, but Ukraine is occupied by Western countries and it is Western countries that are fighting against the Russian army using Ukrainian soldiers as slaves”.
Vladimir Putin’s new bravado has not only elicited unanimous condemnation from Western countries. China, yet an ally of Russia in general and in this conflict, called on Wednesday for a “ceasefire through dialogue” in the conflict in Ukraine, and insisted on the need to respect “the integrity territory of all countries,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said at a press conference.
“The time is serious,” said Mr. Motyl, betting on “the failure of conscription” and the “galvanization of the opposition” against Putin. “Revolutions often start when regimes do something extremely brutal or stupid. The mobilization decreed by Putin may be the spark that will trigger a political and social explosion and put an end to his regime,” he predicts.