OPINION — There is a bit of typical Russian humor going around Moscow these days. Vladimir Putin, troubled by the intrusion of enemy forces into Russia and approaching Kursk, summons the spirit of Joseph Stalin. Putin asks him for advice: “Comrade Stalin, the enemy is approaching Kursk, what should I do?” Stalin’s ghost replies, “Comrade Vladimir, do as I did in 1943. Send your best Ukrainian troops to the front and ask the Americans for more aid.”
The recent Ukrainian incursion into the territory of the Russian Federation reminds one of the epic battle fought in the same area between Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany in July and August of 1943. Some historians argue that Kursk, and not Stalingrad, was the turning point of the war on the eastern front in World War II because afterward, Germany never had the offensive capability to defeat the Soviet Union. And the battle paved the way for the Soviet offensives which were to follow in 1944-45, ending with the capture of Berlin.
The battle of Kursk was notable for a number of reasons. It was the largest tank battle in history and involved some 6,000 tanks, 4,000 aircraft, and nearly two million troops.
The current Ukrainian offensive in Russia is much, much smaller in scale, but may turn out to be nearly as significant in strategic terms, as the 1943 battle. The offensive clearly caught the Russians (and much of the world) by surprise. It is certainly a major embarrassment for Putin and follows similar embarrassments the previous two summers of the war.
Last year, the leader of the Wagner forces fighting in Ukraine, Yevgeny Prigozhin staged a mutiny, and his troops not only captured a major Russian command center, but they also began marching toward Moscow.
The summer before, in 2022, Ukrainian forces launched a major counteroffensive which caught Russian forces by surprise and recaptured a large amount of the territory the Russians captured in the initial phase of their invasion. The summer “fighting season” has not favored Putin.
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As the opening bit of humor suggests, there is some evidence that the overall stiffness of the Ukrainian resistance since the beginning of the invasion in February 2022, and now the Ukrainian occupation of Russian territory, (the first time that has happened since the Second World War) is causing discontent in Moscow circles. Reuters reports that, Oleg Deripaska, a Russian billionaire and oligarch, called the war “mad” and criticized Russia’s defense spending. He was quoted in an interview with a Japanese journalist saying, “If you want to stop the war, first you need to stop the fire.” He called for a ceasefire without preconditions.
One can only speculate how much Deripaska’s comments reflect the evolving views of Russia’s oligarch community, but the comments are notable in that public criticism of the “Special Military Operation” has often resulted in unfortunate consequences for the person expressing their views.
The Ukrainian offensive also needs to be viewed in the context of the “anti-corruption” investigations underway in the Russian Ministry of Defense and the “promotion” of Sergei Shoigu from Minister of Defense to the Russian Security Council. It is reasonable to believe these investigations, arrests, and transfers have been disruptive to a Ministry and General Staff already stressed by poor performance in the invasion.
The Ukrainian invasion is certainly putting Putin and his regime under pressure. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy understands there can be no lasting peace for Ukraine as long as Putin remains in control of the Russian Federation.
If the invasion proves another chink in the armor of Putin’s strategic genius and thus his control of the country, that would be a major achievement. (Other chinks include the exposure of just how weak Russia’s conventional forces really are, the emergence of Ukraine as a significant European military power, the addition of Finland and Sweden to the ranks of NATO and the reinvigoration of that organization and the humiliating retreat of the Russian navy from the eastern reaches of the Black Sea.). One wonders how long those who could muster the wherewithal to remove Putin from power will continue to tolerate the reverses that his invasion of Ukraine has brought about.
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Ukraine’s invasion of Russian territory also sends an important message to Washington and other supporters of Ukraine around the world who had become disillusioned by Putin’s costly but steady advances and territorial gains in eastern Ukraine.
In some circles, the prevailing narrative had been that Ukraine was on the ropes and it was time to consider some form of land for peace negotiations. The Ukrainians—even if they are unable to hold the territory they have captured for long—have changed the narrative significantly and may now find themselves in a much better negotiating position should those discussions ever take place.
Moreover, Zelenskiy is smart enough to realize that it is easier to support Ukraine when the narrative is dominated by headlines of Ukrainian success and images of Russian forces being destroyed and soldiers captured. Not to mention images of the displacement of over 120,000 Russian citizens in the Kursk region.
An additional and perhaps strategic success of the invasion is the capture of the town of Sudzha, which would be largest town the Ukrainians have captured in this invasion. Sudzha is also the site of the pipelines that carry natural gas from West Siberian gas fields to Ukraine and onward to Europe. The flows through Sudzha account for about 3% of the natural gas still flowing from Russia to Europe.
Morale is also an important factor in combat success at both the strategic and tactical levels. There is no question the success of the Ukrainian invasion of Russia to this point has been a huge morale boost for Ukrainian forces and back in Kyiv as well. If the Russians are forced to relocate forces from their operations in eastern Ukraine to expel the Ukrainians from Kursk and that operation takes enough time to exhaust the expected timeframe of good fighting weather in that part of eastern Europe, this will be an important development in the continued course of the war.
The Ukrainian offensive provides another opportunity for the U.S. to give Ukraine the tools and ability to use them, allowing them to “win” this war at least in the terms the Ukrainians have set for themselves which is the expulsion of Russian forces from all Ukrainian territory they have occupied since March 2014.
This is no time for incrementalism.
Who knows, maybe the Ukrainians have another surprise up their sleeve and will launch a successful offensive in the north and successfully cut off Russian forces in eastern Ukraine. One can only hope.
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