But is it a trap?
have borne little fruit for Russia. It was beaten back from northern Ukraine in the spring. It was routed in Kharkiv province in September. Since the start of the war in February it has lost perhaps 80,000 men, killed and wounded. The only provincial capital it has managed to take is Kherson city, captured in the first week of war and illegally annexed in September.
Ukrainian officials are sceptical that Russia is really prepared to withdraw without a fight. Many of them fear that the announcement is simply a ruse, intended to lure their army into urban combat. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, said on November 9th, after the Russian declaration, that “We see no signs that Russia is leaving Kherson without a fight.” Certainly, Ukraine will not rush into the city. But it is clear that the noose has been tightening.
On Telegram, a social-media forum popular among war commentators in Russia, “nationalist patriots” were furious. Yevgeny Prigozhin, an ex-convict who controls Wagner, a group of mercenaries, compared the situation in Kherson to the rout in Kharkiv: “Then too, there was no understanding of what was going on.” He cited one of his commanders as saying that Wagner would stay even if the army left.
But it also brings parts of Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014, within range of longer-range rocket artillery, notes Rob Lee of King’s College, potentially playing havoc with Russian railway stations, ammunition depots and other facilities there. One well-informed official said that Ukraine had already advanced in Kherson, taking advantage of Russia’s drawdowns, but the extent of this progress is still unclear.
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