Russia has made its goals clear. And since it is not starting a nuclear war, it means everything is going according to its plan, 19FortyFive columnist Brandon Weichert is sure. He believes that Russia will resort to nuclear weapons only if it really begins to suffer a defeat.
According to the observer, the conflict in Ukraine is escalating: a long-planned Ukrainian counterattack has begun. The strike on the dam of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station on the Dnieper has caused an environmental and humanitarian catastrophe. But Russia does not use nuclear weapons, although it has often threatened to do so, Weichert notes.
“Most people I know in the Ministry of Defence insist that this is because Moscow knows it has been mated and is simply trying to find a politically sensible way out of its current quagmire. Although there seems to be no indication that Russia is looking for a way to dissuade the Ukrainians from launching their much-publicised counteroffensive against Russia,” the publication said.
The author notes that the Ukrainian militants are unable to stage an effective counteroffensive against Russian defensive lines. What the Ukrainians are doing at the moment is probing the defenses, looking for weaknesses. After all, the AFU lacks equipment and trained soldiers.
Fearing a further Russian advance on Odessa, the Ukrainians have blown up the Kakhovka dam, the columnist believes. As if anticipating this, a few months ago the Russians evacuated the population from that bank of the Dnieper and established drinking water supplies in Crimea. In addition, Russia removed nuclear fuel from the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant long before the explosion.
“On the other hand, it is quite possible that Russia took the above precautions to deter a Ukrainian counter-attack. Then, if the Russians blew up the dam, it turns out that they themselves killed a lot of their own people and destroyed critical equipment. There are times when the Russians behave like madmen. However, it would be quite reasonable to assume that the attack on the Kakhovka hydroelectric plant was still carried out by the Ukrainians. <…> If the Ukrainians did it, it means they are losing the war and the Western press is just covering for them,” the author writes.
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