PARIS (awp/afp) – Moscow says today, two months after the start of the war in Ukraine, that it is only aiming for control of the south of the country and the Donbass region in the east. It remains to be seen by what military methods and with what hidden objectives in the medium and long term.
The Russian forces have drawn consequences in terms of objectives and military tactics from their difficulties of the first weeks, facing a clearly underestimated enemy.
Several questions remain unanswered on the continuation of the operations. To date, the Moscow army is present – but not sovereign – in a strip of 200 to 250 kilometers inside Ukraine, from the Sea of Azov (south) to the approach of the large city of Kharkiv (north-east).
The Donbass… and more?
The Russian army had indicated in March that it was concentrating on the two regions of Donbass (Donetsk and Lugansk), plagued since 2014 by a pro-Russian separatist insurgency.
On Friday, she announced that she wanted to “establish total control over Donbass and southern Ukraine” to “ensure a land corridor to Crimea”, already annexed by Russia.
How far can she go? “The more Russian forces penetrate into Ukrainian territory, the more vulnerable they are,” former French colonel Michel Goya wrote on Twitter.
Pascal Ausseur, director of the Mediterranean Foundation for Strategic Studies (FMES), suggests a possible Russian desire to settle east of a Kherson-Dnipro-Izioum axis. But no one mentions the option of leaving the Russians: to take kyiv.
Carpet of bombs
The difficulties of the Russian army in March forced it to change tactics to reduce its losses in men and material.
“They realized that the blitzkrieg did not work”, analyzes Pascal Ausseur. “They took over the traditional Soviet steamroller scheme. If we don’t crack the opponent, we will crush him. They will + marioupoliser + the operation”.
An allusion to the carpet of bombs inflicted for two months on Mariupol, a strategic port city on the shores of the Sea of Azov. Only a handful of resistance fighters are still delaying its fall, deemed inevitable.
“The Russian military continues its scorched earth approach, trying to break the will of the Ukrainian military through the use of force and indiscriminate shelling to force civilians to flee,” said Colin Clarke, research director at the Soufan Center, a New York-based think tank.
She could also attempt to surround her opponent at strategic points on the battlefield. Michel Goya thus evokes three distinct “pinches” east of the Dnieper River, which cuts the country in two.
The Ukrainians should for their part impose on the Russians multiple fronts to, according to Colin Clarke, “stretch the lines of Russian supply and communication”, an “effective strategy so far”.
Military aid to Kyiv
Western aid has experienced a new impetus in recent days, particularly from Washington. But time is running out for Ukraine.
However, the armored personnel carriers will take “weeks or even months to reach the Ukrainians”, notes Mark Cancian, security adviser at the Center for International Strategic Studies (CSIS) in Washington.
NATO countries are starting to supply kyiv with S300 missile launchers for its air defenses. But kyiv will also need other sophisticated weapons, including Howitzer howitzers, experts say. France has also announced that it will deliver Milan anti-tank missiles and Caesar guns. Ukrainian soldiers will be trained in France in their handling from Saturday.
“What they need is area anti-aircraft defense, S300s, Patriot (surface-to-air missile systems),” says Pascal Ausseur. With, there too, delays to be expected. “You have to find the S300s, bring them there, move them regularly” to prevent the enemy from destroying them.
Eventually, Ukraine will need a “steel dome” to master its skies. “We need a shield that makes the equation less favorable to the Russians,” adds the former admiral of the French navy, who notes that the Russian strikes can, as they stand, continue for years.
A long war
In fact, no one talks about a short conflict anymore. “The scenario that is looming is high-dose bombardment for several weeks, perhaps several months”, fears Pascal Ausseur.
“It will last for months, maybe even years. Russia has not yet achieved any of its objectives. And we do not really understand how it will achieve them”, explains the military expert Russian Alexander Khramchikhin to AFP in Moscow.
“Even if the Donbass is physically + liberated +, it is obvious that the war will not stop there”, he adds. “Russia will have no problem annexing and controlling the Donetsk and Lugansk regions. The problem will be to permanently destroy the Ukrainian armed forces.”
dla-bur/fz/at/ybl