Even senior figures are beginning quietly to admit their despair at Putin's unwillingness to recognise the scale of his mistakes Analysis from MarkGaleotti
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s plan to invade Ukraine has spectacularly backfired, uniting the West and turning Ukraine against him A year ago, Ukraine was divided and uncertain under the shadow of Russian guns, and the Russian population, while perhaps wearying of Vladimir Putin, could scarcely conceive of his not being master of the Kremlin., uniting and galvanising Ukraine while increasingly undermining his legitimacy even among the security forces who were once his fiercest supporters.
At the same time, his economy is having to become a wartime survival one, in which the needs of the population at large take second place to fuelling the invasion. He is committing Russia to the long haul, militarising not just the economy, but society as a whole, with pre-draft military training and “patriotic education” returning to the school curriculum. These are the kind of measures a state adopts when it thinks it will be at war for years, not months.
Mr Putin’s gamble is that he can outlast us, and that if and when Western assistance begins to dwindle, he will be in a stronger position to dictate terms to Kyiv.
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