The Kremlin rejoices in every passing day of summer and already today is thinking in terms of winter-spring 2023. The main hope of the Russian leadership is that the population of European countries would experience serious discomfort due to the strictest savings of natural gas, oil, coal and other resources supplied to for decades from Russia. Also, Moscow believes that the seven packages of sanctions against the Russian Federation, introduced by the anti-Putin coalition, would harm not only Russia itself, but also the economies of Western countries. In addition, the Kremlin hopes that the resources and capabilities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine would be exhausted before the winter, and the spirit of the Ukrainian people will be broken.
A protracted war, at least until the end of spring 2023, suits the Russian leadership quite well as an opportunity to study in practice the ability of Europe to live without energy from the Russian Federation, the ability of the Russian Federation to live without close economic ties with the West, and the ability of the Ramstein's coalition countries to assist the Armed Forces of Ukraine in confronting the RF Armed Forces.
Moscow launched a war against Ukraine using a mad push tactic, hoping to capture Kyiv in four days and the entire country in two weeks. Now the Kremlin has switched to “salami tactics”.
Russian Foreign Minister S. Lavrov admitted that Russia would claim as many Ukrainian lands as
Russian soldiers could capture. In Moscow, “the need to denazify the government in Kyiv”, “protection of the inhabitants of Donbas” or “the Western transformation of the Ukrainian state into anti-Russia” is no longer the reason for the attack on Ukraine. Lavrov stated bluntly that
“geographical tasks will move further as Ukraine is pumped up with long-range weapons.”
Thus, Moscow will have no complaints about Kyiv only if Ukraine ceases to protect its territory from unprovoked aggression by totalitarian Russia, which is building a neoimperia. On July 17, the ex-president of the Russian Federation D. Medvedev threatened Ukraine with a “judgment day” (probably meant the use of nuclear weapons), if the Armed Forces of Ukraine attack the decision-making centers, infrastructure, warehouses, ships and other places of dislocation of the occupation Russian army in Crimea. In turn, it seemed a little to the head of Chechnya R. Kadyrov (V. Putin's favorite) and promised to demilitarize the entire NATO block and capture not only Ukraine, but also Poland!
While the Armed Forces of Ukraine expect from their allies the heavy weapon, in order to get the opportunity to go on the offensive instead of the defence, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation slowly, mile after mile, cut off new pieces of the territory of Ukraine – in the Kharkiv, Kherson, Zaporizhzhya regions and in the Donbas. In general, the term “salami tactics” describes the constant use of limited failed facts to obtain and consolidate its influence. Instead of achieving the only decisive victory, the goal is to move step by step, providing a total winnings by minimal costs. It is believed that this term was invented in the late 1940s in Hungary in order to describe the actions of the Communist Party in the struggle for full power in the country. Then the parties were gradually destroyed, until only those politicians who agreed to cooperate with the Hungarian communists remained.
It is noteworthy that not so long ago, India accused the Chinese People’s Republic of insidious use of “salami tactics”, which provides with a quiet and gradual, but confident territorial expansion against India, Japan, countries of the South China Sea and other neighbors. In this regard, it is interesting that in October 2022, a fateful XX Congress of the Chinese Communist Party should take place. It will be dedicated to the future of the PRC at the geopolitical and geo-economic levels. It is possible that in Moscow they hope that in the fall of this year in Beijing, they would decide to strengthen the partnership of China and Russia, which is for some time has simply declarative nature.
Thus, Putin's Russia clearly declared that it was not afraid of delaying the war before the winter-spring 2023. The intrigue is to whether the West will be able to not weaken its sanctions influence on the aggressor and accelerate the supply of heavy weapons for Ukraine!?
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