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President Vladimir Putin was sworn in for another six-year term on Tuesday as relations between Russia and the West descend into their worst crisis over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. At a traditionally colorful ceremony in the Kremlin, Putin called his compatriots a “great, united nation” and vowed to put Russia’s interests and security above all else. At the end of his speech, the confident Russian strongman declared: “Together we will overcome all obstacles. We will achieve everything we have planned. Together we will win.”
Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, top U.S. spy chief Avril Haines told the Senate Armed Services Committee last week that the Russia-Ukraine war is “unlikely to end anytime soon,” adding that Putin’s “aggressive tactics” It’s dangerous,” he warned. It is likely to continue. ” That’s despite the fact that Congress recently approved another multibillion-dollar military aid package to Ukraine to help fight Russia.
What was in President Putin’s mind at this time? Will the Russian dictator be deterred by our government’s unwavering commitment to funding Kiev? What will be his next step?
As someone who grew up in Soviet Russia, please don’t make America a godless country.
Russian President Vladimir Putin heads to his inauguration ceremony at the Kremlin in Moscow, May 7, 2024. (Sergey Bobilev/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)
After considering Russia’s military posture, the state of Russia’s military and economy, its declared strategic objectives and threat perception, what can we expect from President Putin’s thinking, which I have studied and analyzed during my intelligence career? It is as follows. I also want to note something that President Putin probably won’t do.
First, it is highly likely that the Russian military will launch a large-scale counteroffensive operation in northeastern Ukraine. It could also begin immediately after the Victory Day parade, a national holiday celebrating Russia’s defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. Aiming to take advantage of Ukraine’s shortages in manpower, combat equipment and ammunition, Russian forces aim to break through the front lines by this summer.
To achieve this, the Russian government is preparing 100,000 troops to join the front lines, an order signed by President Putin in December that required the Ministry of Defense to hire 170,000 military personnel. This is in line with the directive to increase the number of troops to a maximum of 1.32 million soldiers. The Russian government also plans to increase defense spending by nearly 70% in 2024 from 2023.
Putin feels that momentum is on Russia’s side throughout the theater because Ukraine is outnumbered in manpower and weapons. That said, he is almost certainly deeply concerned by recent comments made by French President Emmanuel Macron to The Economist. President Macron hinted that he would send troops to Ukraine “if Russian forces break through the front lines and the Ukrainian side requests it.”
Russia plans to conduct military exercises using tactical nuclear weapons, aimed at preventing NATO from injecting troops into the theater. Russia’s Ministry of Defense said President Putin personally ordered the drill, which was aimed at “practicing preparation and deployment for the use of non-strategic nuclear weapons.”
While Russia regularly conducts strategic nuclear exercises with advance announcements, this is unprecedented for Russia to publicly declare non-strategic nuclear exercises. This is a strategic signal to leaders in Washington and NATO commanders to stay away from what Russia considers its strategic security border, which in Kremlin’s view includes Ukraine. intended.
President Vladimir Putin takes the oath as President of Russia on Tuesday, May 7, at an inauguration ceremony held at the Grand Kremlin Palace in Moscow. (Alexander Kazakov, Sputnik, Kremlin pool photo, via AP)
In his inaugural address on Tuesday, Putin referred to Ukrainians living in areas that will almost certainly be annexed by Moscow, saying: “Russian people from all regions of our country, our historical lands, who defended the right to be with the motherland. He expressed his gratitude to the residents. President Putin believes that Russia has a legitimate claim to Ukraine, and that the state’s origins stem from the Kiev Grand Duchy, which is currently occupied by modern-day Ukraine.
According to the Levada Center, 77% of Russians support their military’s actions in Ukraine, effectively agreeing with President Putin. The same percentage of Russians believe Russia will win the war. Levada is an independent polling organization designated by the Russian government as a “foreign agent” to express opinions unfavorable to the Russian government.
Is Russian President Vladimir Putin a devout Christian, or has he weaponized religion to further his personal ambitions?
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday that important U.S. weapons are beginning to arrive in Ukraine in small quantities and the process needs to move faster as advancing Russian forces look to exploit the gap. (Genya Savilov/AFP via Getty Images)
Second, Russian intelligence services are likely to intensify their search for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in an attempt to assassinate him. On Saturday, the Russian government added Zelenskiy to its list of wanted criminals. Russia’s Interior Ministry justified the search warrant against Ukraine’s president as “based on the provisions of the criminal code.”
Zelenskiy has been on the target list since the Russian invasion began in February 2022 and has survived multiple assassination attempts. The day before Putin took office, Ukrainian counterintelligence reportedly infiltrated Zelensky’s security team and disrupted a covert Russian operation aimed at taking hostages or killing them.
Russia has a targeted assassination program based on the federal law “On Combating Extremist Activities,” which President Putin approved in 2002, two and a half years after taking office, and updated in 2006. This law already allows this. Russian intelligence services aim to “remove (Likvidylovat) Zelenskiy and other Ukrainian military and political leaders as ‘persons who pose a threat to the Russian state.'”
Placing Zelenskiy on the “wanted list” would send a signal to Russian security services that arresting or killing Zelenskiy is a Kremlin priority.
Ukrainian soldiers fire on a Russian military position on the outskirts of Bakhmut, Ukraine, June 19, 2023. (Wojciech Grzedzinski/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
Russia is likely to step up efforts to remove Zelensky after his presidential term officially ends on May 20. In November last year, Mr Zelensky insisted that Ukraine must focus all its resources on fighting Russia and called off the 2024 presidential election, leading Moscow to deem him unfit to lead Ukraine. Ta.
Third, Russia will intensify its non-kinetic confrontation with Washington. Russia is concerned about direct war with the United States and NATO due to our superiority in conventional weapons, but it also faces an even more serious risk of eroding the strategic buffer zone on which its security has depended for centuries. I’m looking at it. Washington’s continued support for Ukraine has exacerbated Russia’s concerns about a future conflict with NATO.
The Russian government believes that a direct U.S.-Russia war is “inevitable” in the long term. The Russian General Staff based this intelligence assessment on the basis of the United States’ long-standing policy of democratizing Russia’s neighbors in post-Soviet Eurasia and the United States’ stated intention to admit Ukraine to its hostile alliance, NATO. went.
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Russian military personnel march in the Victory Day military parade commemorating the victory over Nazi Germany in World War II on Red Square in central Moscow on May 9, 2022. (Reuters/Shamil Zhumatov)
Four Russian military planes breached the Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) last week, but did not enter U.S. airspace, according to the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD). Russia regularly flies strategic bombers close to its borders. These exercises are intended to test our response and signal the Russian military’s readiness for an all-out war with the United States for control of the post-Soviet region. Russian weapons systems are already capable of attacking targets across the United States and Canada from long distances, without having to enter U.S. sovereign airspace to deliver weapons.
Russian intelligence has also launched efforts to arrest Americans traveling to Russia in a bid to sway the Biden administration and amass a list of high-paid Russian operatives in U.S. prisons and candidates who do business with Washington. is likely to strengthen. A US Army soldier was arrested on Tuesday in Vladivostok on suspicion of theft. The Russian government, which has conducted a number of prisoner swaps that Putin almost certainly feels favors Russia, may have concluded that it can manipulate the Biden administration into giving up valuable Russian assets to Putin. expensive.
The last thing Putin will not do is invade NATO countries. Despite such claims by politicians in Washington, such a move would be suicidal for Putin, as it would invoke NATO Article 5’s collective defense. President Putin is acutely aware of Russia’s traditional inferiority to NATO.
Putin has routinely used Russia’s nuclear trump card to intimidate the West, and while he is likely to authorize tactical nuclear strikes in theaters such as Ukraine in certain scenarios, it is unlikely that escalation would result. It’s high up on the ladder. But as a rational actor, he would not deliberately choose a battle in which Russia would face the might of the entire NATO fighting machine. Such a claim is illogical. This theory has also been refuted by multiple assessments by U.S. intelligence agencies.
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President Biden and President Vladimir Putin meet and shake hands at Villa La Grange in Geneva, Switzerland, June 16, 2021. (Mikhail Metzel/TASS)
The 2024 Annual Threat Assessment states that “Russia almost certainly does not desire direct military conflict with U.S. and NATO forces, and that asymmetric activity below the estimated threshold for global military conflict” It has become clear that the company will continue to do so.
The following excerpt from an unclassified intelligence report debunks the idea that Russia has the military and economic capabilities to invade NATO member states and cause war with NATO: Russia suffered the highest military losses ever since World War II, with approximately 300,000 casualties, “thousands of tanks and armored fighting vehicles,” and “massive losses in the Ukraine conflict.” Moscow’s military, which has suffered significant losses in equipment and personnel, will face years of reconstruction.
“The Russian military has faced and will continue to face problems of attrition, manpower shortages, and morale problems,” the report said.
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