The Washington Post komt, twee dagen terug alweer, met een verslag van de jaarlijkse -pseudo jaarlijkse- nieuwsconferentie van de Russische president Poetin.
Russia will win war in Ukraine, Putin tells news conference and call-in show
Deelartikel:
https://wapo.st/48iGqFR
Pseudo jaarlijks, want vorig jaar werd de "jaarlijkse" nieuwsconferentie overgeslagen. Nu is dat anders, want er komen verkiezingen aan, en Poetin vertrouwt op de vaderlandsliefde van de Russen om weer herkozen te worden. Op het vlak van concrete toezeggingen over de nabije toekomst voor de Russen bleef de vertoning wat achter bij de verwachtingen:
Yet he appeared to have little to offer in terms of economic relief to ease the costs of the war on the population, other than an increase in the minimum wage, and skirted some of the most sensitive questions, including on delays in soldier’s pay, fear among residents of regions bordering Ukraine affected by the fighting and a controversial push to ban abortions.
Russische kiezers zijn vooral begaan met de eigen portemonnee....en minder.... met de Oekraïne invasie.
Constituents also repeatedly pressed Putin about rising consumer prices, suggesting some voters are more concerned about pocketbook issues at home than the push to conquer territories in Ukraine. The president even issued a rare apology after a pensioner, Irina, complained about expensive eggs, telling her that it was a “failure in the work of the government.”
Dat Poetin weer wat zelfvertrouwen heeft verzameld kunnen we afleiden uit de ruimte die er was voor kritische geluiden:
One asked: “Mr. President, when will the real Russia be different from the TV Russia?” Another said: “There’s no need to run for the election. Give way to a younger person.”
Poetin blijft volharden in de al zo vaak gehoorde onzin doelen, blijkbaar omdat ze in Rusland nog steeds als legitiem worden geslikt:
Putin signaled that he feels confident to push ahead with the invasion, saying there will be peace with Ukraine “only when we achieve our goals,” which he identified as “de-Nazification” and “demilitarization” of the country as well as Ukraine’s neutrality, presumably outside of NATO, which Kyiv hopes to join.
[...]
The Russian president repeated his false claims that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is leading a Nazi regime, and he insisted that Russia’s military was destroying the weapons that the United States and other Western nations were supplying to Kyiv.
[...]he also described the war in Ukraine as “a great tragedy resembling a civil war between brothers,” but he insisted southeastern Ukraine was historically Russian. He again blamed Ukraine, saying Kyiv had refused to accept normal relations with Russia, and accused the United States and Europe of facilitating the conflict and “leading us into a tragedy.”
Volgens de Russische leider gaat het top met het offensief
“Almost all along the line of contact our armed forces, shall we say modestly, are improving their position, almost all are in an active stage of action and there is an improvement in the position of our troops throughout,” Putin said.
“Victory will be ours,” he later told a volunteer from an occupied region of east Ukraine.
The Russian leader said that Ukraine’s counteroffensive “hasn’t panned out” and that he is confident that Western support for Ukraine will eventually collapse.
Tenslotte wat getallen, voor wat ze waard zijn:
Putin ruled out another conscription wave, claiming that an aggressive Defense Ministry campaign to attract contract soldiers had succeeded in recruiting 486,000 men and asserting that 1,500 men were enlisting each day.
Een ander getal tilt onbedoeld een tip van de sluier op over de Russische verliezen:
He estimated the current Russian force in Ukraine to be 617,000-strong, with some military experts noting this statistic may have inadvertently confirmed massive losses Moscow suffered in Ukraine.
Een expert hierover:
“We have 244,000 mobilized. 486,000 volunteers and together there are only 617,000 at the front, some entertaining military mathematics from Putin,” Russian analyst Ian Matveev wrote in a Telegram post.
“Just with these number it turns out that the losses were 113,000 but there was also the invasion group and those who were recruited before mobilization, around 250,000,” Matveev added. “So Putin literally admitted irretrievable losses in the amount of 363,000.”
De Amerikaanse geheime dienst kwam kortgeleden tot een terughoudender inschatting:
A recently declassified U.S. intelligence assessment said the Ukraine war has cost Russia 315,000 casualties.