The fifth day of this Russian invasion of Ukraine, or the Russian-Ukrainian war, has now passed. Not surprisingly, there was no shortage of developments.
And while it has only been five days, Ukrainian forces have managed to keep a stiff resistance. They have attacked Russian supply lines, which has obviously made it difficult for the invading Russians to eat or keep moving with any efficiency.
Putin and Russia continue to see far tougher resistance by Ukrainian forces than they likely expected. It seemed that everyone expected this to be a military cakewalk for the Russians. And while this invasion is not yet a week old, it nevertheless seems clear that Russians are not advancing as quickly as they (and many around the world) had expected or hoped.
However, Russians are certainly trying. They have increased troop presence and there is a Russian military convoy that is estimated to be five kilometers long headed towards Kyiv, and approaching.
One thing that seems almost certain is that Putin did not expect either the fierce Ukrainian resistance, nor the immediate and widespread worldwide condemnation. In Iran, protesters went to the Russian Embassy in Tehran and angrily condemned Russia's actions in Ukraine. There were antiwar protests all around the world, in North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. The antiwar protests were even in evidence in Russia itself, where it is generally known that protesters will face arrest and penalties that will have lasting impacts on their lives, which speaks to their bravery. Nearly 500 protesters were arrested on Saturday across well over 30 cities across Russia. This added to the total of nearly 5,000 Russian antiwar protesters arrested since the beginning of the invasion.
But protests are one thing. By themselves, I would suspect that these do not trouble Vladimir Putin at all, quite frankly. However, what surely does frustrate him is the slow and limited progress of the Russian invasion forces in Ukraine, and the already widespread, and still rapidly growing, condemnation and economic boycotts against Russia spreading around the world.
Earlier today, FIFA banned Russia from international games, something that might not hit so much economically, but serves as a major source of embarrassment and anger internally. This was done to South Africa during the days of apartheid, and while it did not hurt white South Africans financially, but it nevertheless bothered them quite a bit to not have their teams be able to compete in major international sorts competitions.
Yet, the actions taken by other countries went much further than that, and many of them are hitting the Russian economy. Many European countries closed their airspace to Russian planes. Germany closed the oil pipeline from Russia, even though they will now need to pay higher prices. Germany and Sweden broke their neutrality and pledged military support for Ukraine. Even traditionally neutral Switzerland supported and imposed sanctions on Russia.
All of this, in addition to the sanctions that targeted Russian banks and other institutions, are beginning to hit inside of Russia. The ruble fell fairly dramatically, and continues to lose ground to the dollar and the euro. Inflation is increasing dramatically. From reports on television by BBC News, there is no panic in Russia...yet. But there certainly are worries, and the war is not especially popular.
So it seems like both the military resistance inside of Ukraine, as well as the resistance to the Russian invasion outside of Ukraine, is far stronger than Putin surely expected or calculated. My guess is that he expected the West to not be happy, but for them to get over it quickly, much like they admittedly did when Russia took over Crimea in 2014. However, this feels different, at least thus far. The condemnation is very widespread, and it feels like Russia is increasingly isolated from the world community.
The two sides talked for the first time since the invasion began last Thursday. Ukrainians and Russians met in a border town in Belarus, near the Ukrainian border. But the talks did not produce any serious results. The two sides were too far apart. Putin demanded that Crimea be recognized as Russia, and that Ukraine be officially designated as a neutral state, and not be permitted to join other the European Union or NATO, among other conditions. And these are things that Putin had demanded in the days leading up to the invasion. The West and Ukraine said no then, and they still say no now.
It is early yet, and so both the Ukrainians inside of Ukraine and the Russians inside of Russia are not giving into the pressure that they each respectively face. But right now, it is hard to imagine that both of those situations will continue without changes of some sort or other, at some point. It feels like something has to give, to break.
The unanswerable question, right now, is what - or who - will give, and when?
Then, when something does finally break, it will surely open up even more questions. These will also need to be answered as well, surely.
Antiwar protesters take to the streets around the world in support of Ukraine by Matthew S. Schwartz, February 26, 2022:
https://www.npr.org/2022/02/26/1083314709/protests-world-ukraine-russia
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