Mick Hartley

Mary Dejevsky at Spiked – Reports of Russia’s imminent defeat are greatly exaggerated:

The reality, insofar as it can be gauged, is that Russia is advancing towards its goal of capturing the whole of the Donbas. Predictions that it is running out of troops or weapons, or the will to fight, disregard the fact that it is many times bigger and richer in resources than Ukraine. Its war objectives have also remained remarkably consistent, and there is no sign of Putin buckling, nor is he under domestic pressure to do so.

Discussing the Ukrainian attacks and the petrol queues, Putin offered his own rationale: having largely failed on the existing battlefields, he suggested, Ukraine was now trying to destabilise Russia itself by sowing division, sapping support for the war and forcing Russia into negotiations. ‘We will not give them that chance’, he said, insisting that Ukraine’s long-range strikes would do nothing to alter Russia’s war aims.

This is excellent news.

Why? Well, Dejevsky is a long-time fan of Putin: he’s “sincere and approachable”…”In mind, as in physique, he gave the impression of neatness and discipline, a man comfortable in his skin”. Just prior to the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine she rubbished the idea that her man would contemplate anything so foolish: “There is no rationale for such a war whatever, and scant evidence that Putin or anyone in or near the Kremlin has anything of the sort in mind”. Why would people think such a thing? “One reason may simply be the long history of Western misunderstanding of what Putin is about”. She also suggested, after the invasion, that Ukraine should have taken the “preferable course” and surrendered on day one.

With such a record of getting it wrong, her latest report is as good a sign as any that Putin and Russia really are in deep trouble.