Aug 23 Buonasera Mag
Day 181: South and east UA, Zaporizhzhia, train Moldova, Netherlands, Estonia, Mariupol, ITA elex, Poland, EU. Arts & Posts: Dugina, Khapaeva, Shishkin, Ukraine Spaces, Rachman, UA trolling
Catching up…
EA Worldview’s Ukraine Up-date- hop over to Scott’s amazing hourly Ukraine up-date page. I’ll fill in with some bits and bobs.
Stories we’re following…
Zelenskiy has said Ukraine will not agree to any proposal to freeze the current frontlines in its conflict with Russia in order to “calm” Moscow, which now controls about 22% of Ukraine including Crimea.
Ukraine’s military destroys Russian equipment in southern Ukraine. Operational Command “South” reported that they killed 17 Russian troops and destroyed one Buk missile system, a 120 mm heavy mortar system "Sani", ammunition warehouse, and five armored and military vehicles.
ISW: Russian proxies in Zaporizhzhia Oblast designate incoming Ukrainian citizens as ‘asylum seekers,’ obliquely declaring region’s independence.
The US state department has issued a security alert warning that Russia is stepping up efforts to launch strikes against Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure and government facilities in the coming days. A security alert issued by the US embassy in Kyiv on Tuesday reads: “The department of state has information that Russia is stepping up efforts to launch strikes against Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure and government facilities in the coming days.”
General Staff: Russia adds to military presence on Ukraine’s northern borders. According to the General Staff of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, Russia continues to maintain substantial forces in Russia's border regions of Bryansk and Kursk.
Zelensky: Rail link connecting Ukraine to Moldova now operational. Ukraine has restored a rail link to neighboring Moldova after nearly 25-year hiatus and the connection could carry 10 million tonnes of freight a year, according to President Volodymyr Zelensky's video address on Aug. 22.
Russia says over 1,000 children from Mariupol 'adopted' in its remote cities. The local authorities in Russia’s Krasnodar said that over 1,000 Ukrainian children from the occupied city of Mariupol “have found new families” in Tyumen, Irkutsk, Kemerovo, and Altai Krai.
The US is expected to announce an additional military aid package for Ukraine of about $3bn (£2.5bn), according to reports. The money will be used to train and equip Ukrainian forces to fight for years to come, as well as fund contracts for drones, weapons and other equipment that may not see the battlefront for a year or two, the sources said.
Johnson: UK will never recognise Russia’s annexation of any Ukrainian territory. Boris Johnson has urged world leaders not to allow Vladimir Putin to repeat the annexation of Crimea in other parts of Ukraine.
The EU is discussing a major military training operation for Ukrainian forces. A broader EU training operation will complement Britain's initiative, which has enlisted NATO countries, Sweden and Finland, as well as training from the Baltic States like Lithuania that are focused on territorial defence from Russian aggression.
Poland will spend 1% of its GDP on helping Ukrainian refugees. A remarkable statistic. Duda: Ukraine's entire territory must be liberated, including Crimea. "Crimea is and will be a part of Ukraine, just like Gdansk and Lublin are part of Poland," President Andrzej Duda said at the Crimean Platform summit in Kyiv on Aug. 23.
Netherlands to provide Ukraine with at least 65 million euros for reconstruction. Dutch Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation Liesje Schreinemacher and Minister of Defence Kajsa Ollongren announced on Aug. 22 that the Netherlands will deliver 65 million euros ($64.64 million) to Ukraine for aid and investment.
Estonia pushes full embargo on Russian energy in new EU sanctions package. “We must seriously raise the price of the war for the aggressor before winter. The seven previous packages proved insufficient to push Putin to end the war,” Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Reinsalu said.
Ukraine asks UN, Red Cross to act against sham trials in Mariupol. Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets appealed to both organizations and Russia's ombudsman to prevent "yet another violation of the Geneva Convention."
MoD Lorenzo Guerini: First Medvedev, today Suslov who hopes for the victory of the center-right to make Italy a laboratory in the EU to end support for Ukraine. Some love affairs never end ... This is also at stake on 25 September.
Dugina- Russian sabre-rattling & developments
Dugina’s funeral was held today- that was fast.
Christo Grozev: “FSB's announced suspect in Dugina's assassination was entered into a Russian doxxing site for "Ukrainian nationalists" as a member of the Azov regiment back in April 2022. How did she get into Russia with that easily discoverable military footprint?”
The Italian state broadcaster RAI 2 News repeats ad verbatim the FSB/Kremlin story incriminating a Ukrainian of the Dugina murder. No caveats, no context, no rebuttal. “Russia demands extradition.”
Russian Senator Dzhabarov warns that Estonia could be viewed as a state harbouring terrorists if it does not extradite Dugina's FSB-accused assassin.
Former Putin advisor Sergey Glazyev says that Dugina’s killing necessitates a total mobilization of forces in the Russian World against Ukraine. This illustrates how Dugina’s death also is being cited as a reason to reject Turkey and Israel’s mediation efforts with Ukraine.
Note: Alexandr Dugin founded the International Eurasian Movement in 2003. Drawing inspiration to the teachings of René Guénon’s Integral Traditionalism, he believed that history was divided into two broad cycles: ‘the golden age’ and ‘the age of vice’. ‘The Golden Age’ is characterised by a closed and hierarchical model of society (Eurasia), while the ‘age of vice’ by decadence and and death (the democratic West).
In a world of the ‘golden age’, Russia would lead the Eurasian Empire, and Germany would lead in ‘Mitteleuropa, Italy and the former territories of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.’
The Power of Propaganda
Dina Khapaeva, Putin Is Just Following the Manual- The Atlantic (must read)
No one can read Vladimir Putin’s mind. But we can read the book that foretells the Russian leader’s imperialist foreign policy. Mikhail Yuriev’s 2006 utopian novel, The Third Empire: Russia as It Ought to Be, anticipates—with astonishing precision—Russia’s strategy of hybrid war and its recent military campaigns: the 2008 war with Georgia, the 2014 annexation of Crimea, the incursion into the Donetsk and Luhansk regions the same year, and Russia’s current assault on Ukraine.
If Putin were to lose power…
Russian novelist Mikhail Shishkin believes that even if Putin were to step down as Tsar of Russia, another dictator would step in:
In 2014, shortly after the annexation of Crimea, I wrote, with increasing urgency, that “in the 21st century there is no such thing as a distant, localised war any more. Every war is now a European war. And this European war has already begun.”
I warned that Vladimir Putin’s annexation of Crimea would “create a wave of patriotism. Sooner or later, this wave will break, and then Putin will need a fresh wind.” I wrote of how years of chronic instability in the Balkans would create cripplingly high levels of migration to European countries, with an “inconceivably greater wave of refugees from Ukraine”.
Back then, there was still a chance to stop the aggressor. Yet European politicians closed their eyes to reality in an effort to curry favour with voters. Voters wanted peace then, too; jobs, no price rises and nice holidays. Corrupt Russian experts insisted that we should understand Putin’s point of view and make concessions.
Gideon Rachman, The global reach of Alexander Dugin- FT
With his extravagant beard and wild rhetoric, Alexander Dugin has found it easy to attract attention. Some have even labelled the far-right philosopher “Putin’s brain” or “Rasputin”. Other commentators, however, have dismissed the idea that Dugin is taken particularly seriously in the Kremlin, pointing to the fact that he lost his job at Moscow State University in 2014.
Primo Trolling
Emma Graham-Harrison: “Ukraine continues trolling Moscow. Putin reportedly expected a rapid victory parade through Kyiv. Ukraine's military said some Russian soldiers deployed with formal uniforms to prepare. Today Russian military vehicles finally lined up down main street of Ukraine's capital...
