Military expert has little hope
Masala: “Putin has good cards”
February 24, 2024, 5:55 a.m
Two years after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, an end to the war seems further away than ever before. Military expert Masala now considers it almost impossible for the fighting to end this year. A tiny ray of hope is developments in Russia itself.
According to military expert Carlo Masala, the war of aggression in Ukraine that Russia began two years ago will not end in 2024. “I don’t see an end to this war in 2024, there is nothing that could give us hope,” the political scientist told the “Augsburger Allgemeine”. “Ukraine will not find peace because Russia still believes it can win this war,” said the professor at the University of the Bundeswehr in Munich. Time is increasingly playing into the hands of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Today marks the second anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. “Vladimir Putin has good cards, there’s no other way to say that,” said Masala. “His strategy is that the West will eventually tire, that democratic societies cannot sustain such conflicts for long. He seems to be right.” The Ukrainian soldiers are now even lacking ammunition at the front, which is why they are unable to push back the Russian troops.
Timid resistance in Russia
However, one can see that the war is being brought more and more into Russia, said Masala. “The result is that a delicate plant of resistance is growing within the population. The mere fact that many heating systems in Moscow are out and people are freezing because the money is going to the war is what leads to this “That at least some of the Russians are beginning to doubt the meaning of these fighting.” This is something that has not been seen in the past two years. “Putin was skillful in keeping this war away from the Russian majority society.”
The West is also prolonging the war, said the military expert. “On the one hand, he prolonged the war by enabling Ukraine to defend itself. However, he never took this commitment to the point where Ukraine was able to break through Russian logic, who still believes they have more to gain than lose in this war,” said Masala. “So the West is prolonging the war in both a positive and a negative sense,” he added. There will be little movement in this war before the US elections in November.