Zaporizhia, Ukraine (AP) – Russian President Vladimir Putin used his country’s biggest patriotic holiday on Monday to re -justify his war with Ukraine, but he has not even declared a limited victory or a sign of where the fighting is leading. moved the attack to small signs of significant progress.
But his next speech did not offer new information on how he intended to survive the crushing war, and instead focused on allegations that Ukraine posed a threat to Russia even Moscow’s nuclear forces. is more and the size of the guns.
“The risk is growing every day,” Putin said. “Russia issued a preventive response to the aggression. It was a forced, timely decision and the only correct one”.
Meanwhile, intense ground fighting took place in eastern Ukraine, an important Black Sea port south of Odessa was re -bombed, and Russian forces were trying to put an end to Ukrainian defenders at an iron mill in Mariupol.
Putin has long fought for NATO accession to former Soviet republics in the east and on Monday argued that Russia should invade Ukraine before an “inevitable” confrontation. Ukrainian leaders and their Western supporters have denied that Kiev or NATO is threatening.
As he did throughout the season, Putin incorrectly described the struggle as a fight against Nazism, thus linking the war to what many Russians consider their best time: victory over Nazi Germany. The Soviet Union lost 27 million people in what Russia called the Great Patriotic War.
It also seeks to describe the ongoing offensive to control the Donbass region to the east – focusing on Moscow after its failed attempt to invade the capital Kiev – as a battle for Russia’s “historic land”. He has long tried to deny the millennial history of Ukraine.
Progress in the East, however, has been slow, with many analysts suggesting that Putin could use his speech to declare some victory – potentially Mariupol – on the battlefield against Russia’s heavy defeat and to punish punitive consequences of penalties. at home.
Others suggested it could declare war, not just a “special military operation” and ordered a national mobilization, requesting reserves, to fill the void left by a worsening conflict.
No steps announced.
Critics say the speech overlooked some unfortunate facts facing Putin: because of the delay in his campaign in Ukraine, he did not ask Russians to sacrifice for sanctions and diplomatic isolation.
It also does not answer the question of how much and how Russia will organize more forces in the face of huge losses.
“Without concrete steps to build new forces, Russia will not be able to fight a long war and time is running out for its army in Ukraine,” wrote Philip O’Brien, professor at the University of Strategic Studies, on Twitter. . St. Andrews in Scotland.
Despite Russia’s attempts to suppress the dissident, anti-war sentiment flared up. Several scattered protesters were arrested across the country on Victory Day, while the editors of one of the pro-Kremlin media rioted and briefly published several dozen articles denouncing Putin and the aggression.
Protesters in Warsaw painted the Russian ambassador to Poland red when he arrived at the cemetery to pay tribute to Red Army soldiers killed during World War II.
When Putin laid a crown in Moscow, the sirens of the air strike rang again in the Ukrainian capital. But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a speech on Victory Day that his country would eventually defeat the Russians.
“There will be two days of victory in Ukraine soon,” he said in the video. He added: “We are fighting for freedom, for our children, and therefore we will win.”
The Ukrainian military warned about the high possibility of missile attacks on the holidays, and the British Defense Ministry said in its daily analysis that Russian forces could be subjected to more and more Ukrainians towns and cities in “intense and indiscriminate bombing, with few or no civilians. victims”. They have no precision-guided weapons.
In the eleventh week of the war, fighting took place on many fronts, but Russia was probably the closest to victory at Mariupol.
The fall of Mariupol would deprive Ukraine of a viable port, allow Russia to complete its land corridor on the Crimean peninsula, and free the troops that fought in the Donbas. It will also give the Kremlin the much -needed victory.
Russian forces destroyed the facility over the weekend, believed to house up to 2,000 Ukrainian fighters.
Odessa has been the subject of more and more bombings in recent days. Ukrainian officials said Russia launched four cruise missiles at the southern Crimean city on Monday. He said no civilians were injured, but he did not specify what hit.
The war in a country long known as the “European bread basket” has disrupted the global food supply.
“I saw loops full of wheat, barley and corn ready for export,” tweeted Charles Michel, president of the European Council after a visit to Odessa. “This most needed food has been delayed due to the Russian war and the blockage of Black Sea ports. It challenges dramatic consequences for weak countries.”
Reported by Gambrel from Lviv, Ukraine. Jessica Fish in Bakhmut, David Keaton in Kiev, Yura Karmanau in Lviv, Mstislav Chernov in Kharkov and AP staff from around the world contributed to this report.
Source: Huffpost
