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Russia will celebrate Victory Day on Monday with a military parade in Moscow’s Red Square.
Vladimir Putin seems to be hoping to use the annual holiday – which commemorates the Soviet Victory over Nazi Germany in 1945 – to present to the Russian people his victory in Ukraine, but the invasion did not go according to plan. And despite the speech that the Russian leader will make tomorrow, his fight can not be called won in any aspect – writes defense analyst Michael Clarke.
Within two months, the Kremlin has moved rapidly from Plan A to Plan C – and even if the Russians now succeed in occupying the entire Donbas and the entire south, they still have to hold those territories for an indefinite future in the face of several million Ukrainians who do not want them there. One way or another, Russia will have to continue to fight in Ukraine, either against the population or against the Ukrainian army, and most likely both at the same time.
Western powers, meanwhile, will continue to supply arms and money to Kiev and will not lift strong sanctions on Russia any time soon. Once Europe’s energy dependence on it is greatly reduced, the US and Europe will be able to enforce low-cost crippling sanctions on their economies. There is no turning back for Vladimir Putin personally and he could even be charged as a war criminal. His only political strategy is to turn the war in Ukraine into something else – part of a struggle for Russia’s survival against the “Nazis” and “imperialists” of the West.
That’s why it suits him to play with the dangerous idea that Russia is facing a “Great Patriotic War 2.0” with the rest of Europe. We will probably hear much more about this on Victory Day. President Putin will pretend to see the light at the end of a very dark and long tunnel in which he has run his country.
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