War in Ukraine | “To conquer, the Russians destroy”

Lyssytchansk fallen, Sloviansk and Kramatorsk are in the crosshairs of the Russian forces.

Janie Gosselin
The Press

Debris on the ground, pieces of crumpled sheet metal, crumbled glass: the images captured Monday in Sloviansk, in the east of the country, show its inhabitants busy picking up the damage after Russian rocket attacks. The front line is approaching this city of Donetsk, after the fall, on Sunday, of Lyssytchansk, about sixty kilometers away.

“I believe that what awaits us is going to be even worse, I have already thought of leaving” from Sloviansk, said Andriï Gerassimenko, a thirty-year-old met on the spot by Agence France-Presse.

The cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk have suffered heavy shelling in recent days. The regional governor, Pavlo Kirilenko, reported on Monday 10 dead, including 2 children, the day before in Sloviansk and the surrounding area.

The two Donetsk municipalities, which each had over 100,000 inhabitants before the war, seem to be the next stage of the battle in Donbass.

The fall of the city of Lysychansk to the Russians on Sunday would have marked their full takeover of Luhansk — the administrative division which, together with Donetsk, forms Donbass.

To claim victory in Donbass, which had already been partly controlled by pro-Russian forces since 2014, there remains Donetsk to conquer for the Russians.

And this progress goes through the cities.

Protect cities

The Ukrainian General Staff announced the withdrawal of its forces towards the Siversk-Fedorivka-Bakhmout border to protect Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

The battle for these two agglomerations could be decisive for the Donbass, believes Dominique Arel, professor and holder of the Chair in Ukrainian Studies at the University of Ottawa.

“From the beginning of the war, the Ukrainians made the tactical choice to seek to protect the cities because it is much more difficult to protect spaces which are very large with few agglomerations, he explains. So from the start of the war, the Russians, who had already controlled 40-50% of Luhansk since 2014, increased to 80-85%, because they sent the army to conquer the small towns. »

Recovering a large municipality conquered by the Russian army is very difficult for Ukrainians.

“To conquer the cities, the Russians destroy them,” he notes.

At least 750 billion dollars will be needed to rebuild Ukraine, pleaded the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky – by videoconference – and his Prime Minister, Denys Chmyhal, on Monday. The two men spoke at the Conference in Lugano, Switzerland, to discuss reconstruction. The event had been planned before the start of the conflict and was then to focus on the reforms to be carried out.

“Symbolic” victory

Although the capture of Luhansk was celebrated Monday as a victory in Russia, it is “more symbolic than anything else,” said Pierre Jolicoeur, full professor in the department of political science at the Royal Military College of Canada. He recalls that Russia now controls about a fifth of Ukraine, a figure that has changed little after the first offensives, launched on February 24.

“It took them a long time to take territory that is not particularly important or difficult to take,” comments Maria Popova, associate professor of political science at McGill University.

The Donbass is the industrial region of eastern Ukraine, less important, strategically, than the capital, Kyiv, which the Russians failed to conquer, she underlines. Or that Kherson, agricultural territory in the south of the country, whose provincial capital fell under Russian control shortly after the start of the invasion.

Rumors of a Ukrainian counter-offensive on this territory are circulating these days. Zelensky hailed positive signs in the region on Monday.

The battle could be important. Kherson is the neighboring division of Crimea, illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.

Passage way

The Donbass, bordering Russia, also serves as an entry point for the occupation in southern Ukraine.

The region was already divided. Pro-Russian separatists had declared the independence of the “republics” of Luhansk and Donetsk in 2014, not recognized internationally.

At the very beginning of the war, speculation about the real intentions of the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, fueled discussions – could he agree to peace in exchange for Donbass?

This is obviously not the goal, says M^me Popova. “It’s pretty clear that the goal is not the Donbass and it’s not going to stop there,” she explains.

The Russian president ordered his troops on Monday to continue and “carry out their mission”.

With Agence France-Presse