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Nuclear escalation, a sense of victory: Why Putin annexed 15% of Ukrainian territory?


NEW DELHI: President of Russia Vladimir Putin on Friday signed a decree declaring four Ukrainian territories as part of Russia through a widely denounced “illegal takeover”.
“People who live in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia are becoming our citizens – forever,” Putin George’s Hall has the chandeliers of the Grand Kremlin Palace – where he announced in March 2014 that Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula is part of Russia.

The move to annex territories, covering nearly 15% of Ukraine’s area, comes at a time when Russia is almost leaning against the wall. It is now supposed to change the course of the seven-month war.

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For Putin, it could help legitimize his nuclear threats and bring back the sense of victory that has eluded him since the start of the invasion. But some Ukrainians living in the region have begun to fear the worst.
Here’s why Putin annexed four Ukrainian regions and what the war meant:
Nuclear threats
The merger of the four regions adds legitimacy to Putin’s nuclear threats, which have previously been denounced by Western experts as crude.
During the ceremony to officially announce the merger, Putin coldly vowed to protect the newly annexed areas by “all available means”.
While not issuing any new nuclear warnings, Putin also said that the US had set a precedent when it dropped two atomic bombs on Japan in 1945.

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The message is clear: any attack on the newly annexed regions will be construed as an attack on Russia. This would give Putin enough reason to use any means available in Russia’s vast arsenal, including nuclear weapons. Just like he said.
Even before that, Putin had said that his nuclear threat was not a hoax.
His top associate, Dmitry Medvedev, earlier this week said Russia has the right to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine if Kyiv threatens Russia’s state status.
Experts feel the takeover signals the beginning of a “new and very dangerous phase” in the war, one that could escalate to the first use of nuclear weapons in 77 years.

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Diversity moves?
Even as Putin proudly announced the annexed territories on Friday, Russian forces in one of the four regions were on the verge of being surrounded by Ukrainian troops.
On Saturday, Ukrainian troops entered the city of Lyman and announced that they had surrounded thousands of Russian soldiers. This only shows Russia’s grip on some of the territories it is claiming.
Over the past few weeks, Ukraine has been trying to recapture large swaths of its territory and trigger a Russian retreat with the help of advanced Western-supplied weapons.

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Against this backdrop, a glitzy Kremlin ceremony and promises that Moscow would win a “special military operation” helped Putin divert attention from the possibility of facing a military reversal. potential seriousness.
Former Kremlin political analyst and screenwriter, Abbas Gallamov, has linked Russia’s reversal in the war to the push for annexation.
“It looks like an attempt to reciprocate somehow, and it looks pretty pathetic. The Ukrainians are doing something, taking steps in the real physical world, while the Kremlin is building some kind of virtual reality, which is incapable of responding in the real world,” he said.
A victory of sorts
“Victory will be ours,” President Putin said on Friday as thousands of Russians gathered on Moscow’s Red Square to celebrate the annexation.
“Russia not only opened her house to these people, she opened her heart. Welcome home!” he said, prompting people to chant “Russia! Russia!” from the flag-waving crowd on the vast square.
Russia’s Friday programming and storytelling is clearly dominated by the theme of victory. That’s because victory is exactly what has eluded Putin for the past seven months.

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What was supposed to be a quick takeover of Kyiv turned into a seven-month battle with both countries running out of manpower and resources.
In addition to capturing Kyiv, Russia found itself facing stiff resistance from the Ukrainian military, which was bolstered by a Western sense of nationalism and a constant supply of weapons.
Since Putin had no other choice after the February 22 invasion, he had to reframe his war goals to focus on the eastern Ukraine region, where last month’s referendum took place. .
Thus, the formal annexation of the four territories has given Putin the sense of accomplishment he so desperately needed over the past few weeks.
If not a complete takeover, Putin will gladly accept 15% of the country’s territory. But whether Russia can hold out in the face of a tough Ukrainian offensive remains to be seen.
Beating Ukrainians against Ukrainians
The merger of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia opened up the possibility of Putin calling for military service.
According to reports, Ukrainian authorities believe that Russia will try to mobilize young men in occupied areas to fight against Ukraine.
This has been happening in the eastern regions of Ukraine under Russian control since 2014, specifically Crimea.
Russian soldiers have told dozens of men between the ages of 18 and 35 that there is a ban on leaving the country, according to elderly men who have successfully given birth, as well as two NGOs involved in helping them. evacuated residents and local Telegram groups, the Guardian reported.
Before that, the president of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy required citizens in the occupied territories to conceal mobilization by “any means”.
Russia may also consider a call after fears were triggered by Putin’s mobilization call last week.
More than 194,000 Russian citizens have fled to neighboring Georgia, Kazakhstan and Finland – often by car, bicycle or on foot – since Mr. Putin announced the mobilization of part of the reserve force.
In Russia, the majority of men under the age of 65 register as reservists.
(With input from agencies)

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