Ukraine: We Control 1,000 Sq Kms of Russian Territory

Breathtaking

Speaking about the Kursk incursion for the first time, Oleksandr Syrski, Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian armed forces, announced that Ukraine now controls 1,000 square kilometers of Russian territory.

We continue to conduct an offensive operation in the Kursk region. Currently, we control about 1,000 square kilometers of the territory of the Russian Federation- Syrski

Open source investigators tracking this war and military bloggers on both sides have done a great job of increasing the transparency of events on the ground. They have made it extremely hard to lie and escape accountability. This has been extremely important in countering the Kremlin, which has mastered the art of twisting information in its direction.

However, there are limits to what open source investigators can achieve. They rely on information flowing from the frontlines. To maintain operational secrecy, Ukraine has maintained near radio silence from the frontlines. We still get pictures, videos, and sometimes even reporting done by troops operating inside Kursk, but there is no way to know if that information is coming from the deepest line of contact between the two forces.

Every map drawn to show Ukraine’s advance into Kursk is behind the curve. They are not wrong, but they are significantly behind the real frontline.

The odds are very low that Ukraine would exaggerate the numbers. What is the point of claiming control over 1,000 square kilometers when you only have 500?

Ukraine does not operate like Russia, where lies are common and then compounded. Ukraine lives outside Russia. The trust they have earned from people around the world is extremely important. After nearly two years, this is the first time they have attracted positive coverage from the Western media; otherwise, it has always been doom and gloom.

They are not going to put themselves in a position where their own words can be used against them. Now more than ever, they need the trust of the world. So, I take Commander-in-Chief Syrski’s words at face value.

What difference does it make whether Ukraine occupies half a kilometer of Russian territory or 500 times that?

A whole lot of difference.

The first problem is that Russia loses its deterrence, the facade they have carefully built. The image of a superpower with nuclear weapons, where touching them would mean devastating consequences for the entire world, has been shattered.

It was that nuclear blackmail, among other things, that allowed Putin to behave like a mobster and get away with it. There are many reasons why Putin, the aggressor, always found able helping hands in the Western world, but he would never have ventured out had he not counted on the protection provided by nuclear weapons and his armed forces.

“Why provoke the bear?” was a common argument put forth by the appeasement caucus. Since he always cultivated the madman persona, the democratic world indeed feared his response.

No one in the Western world fears the Russian armed forces anymore. That image was lost in 2022. The nuclear blackmail was the last threat standing, and Ukraine has now busted it. They are now holding Russian territory that is half the size of Rhode Island.

Thanks to the dire state of his economy and his armed forces running out of heavy weapons, using a nuclear weapon is not an option for the Kremlin. Putin himself has ruled it out by calling the Russian response to Ukraine’s Kursk incursion a counter-terrorism operation.

To protect his image inside Russia, he has to act like the Kursk incursion is not a big deal. And if this is not a big deal, how is he going to justify dropping a nuclear weapon? He needs the support of the Russian people to go down that road, and he has denied himself that option.

Ukraine has now sent a clear message to Washington, D.C.: There is no escalation ladder. None. Nothing. Nada. If we can capture 1,000 square kilometers and Putin has not responded as you thought he would, then where is the case to deny long-range strikes on Russian military assets?

At the very least, they have enabled the Biden administration and other allies to gravitate toward creating a buffer zone between Ukraine and Russia — a gray zone within Russian territory where Ukraine is allowed to strike all Russian military assets.

It is a bit sad that Ukraine has to take such enormous risks to convince its allies to overcome their fears and do the right thing. But sadly, that is the situation they have found themselves in. There are less than 90 days until the U.S. presidential election. The clock is ticking.

Imagine this: Putin’s forces keep advancing in Avdiivka, maybe capturing Pokrovsk and also breaking into Chasiv Yar. It is two weeks until America votes. Putin says he wants to end the war and is ready to stop the hostilities. He asks Biden and the Democrats to come around. There is a 0% chance that Biden will agree, and Harris would do the same. It may not be a game changer as Harris is on a very different path toward victory compared to Biden. However, such a ceasefire offer and refusal from Biden would take over the headlines all over the world and it will become the number one topic on the day America walks into the polling booth.

It can still be a dampener or momentum staller for Kamala Harris.News cycles can shift momentum from one candidate to another. To this day, Hillary Clinton believes that FBI Director James Comey’s announcement, made just days before the 2016 election, to reopen the agency’s investigation into her private email server caused her to lose the election.

It wasn’t without merit. It did change the news cycle and sucked the momentum out of Hillary’s campaign.

Had Ukraine allowed the status quo to continue all the way until the end of the U.S. election, anything could have happened. The odds of things going in the wrong direction were quite high. As a result, they are trying to take control of the narrative around the war. The key to taking control of the narrative is snatching the initiative from the Russians.

The Kursk operation has already delivered that.

• The theory that Russians are winning has been busted.
• The larger the territory Ukraine occupies, the harder it will become for even ardent Putinists to make that case.
• They could withdraw tomorrow, and yet, Putinists in the Western world will still be wary of pushing the “Putin is winning” theory anymore.

Thanks for reading. Making critical information on Ukraine accessible is one way to fight misinformation. That’s why I’ve made 230 stories free to the public in 2024, inlcuding this one.