Ukraine caught the Russian military by surprise and is creating problems for the Kremlin.
The war that Vladimir Putin started against Ukraine is increasingly spreading to Russia. And the surprise attack in Kursk region humiliated the Russian army.
Business Insider writes about this.
“Both the comments and critical posts of Russian military correspondents and video recordings of Kursk region residents pleading with Putin to help the inaction of local authorities are a strong, humiliating blow to the reputation of the Russian dictator – as a person who guarantees Russians safety and protection. Now the columns of civilian cars leaving the western part of the region prove that Putin is incapable of sorting out the situation. And this is a significant blow to his power,” the journalists write.
The longer the Ukrainian Armed Forces hold positions on Russian territory, the more they expand their foothold, the more this will harm Putin's public image inside Russia, the article says.
“Putin must demonstrate that Russia's borders are reliably protected, and the local population will not particularly feel the consequences of the war in Ukraine,” Callum Fraser, an analyst at the British Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), tells Business Insider. They will start to wonder whether Putin is really fit for his job.”
Obviously, these days Putin is recalling the events of the summer of 2023, when the leader of the Russian PMC “Wagner” Yevgeny Prigozhin went with his soldiers to Moscow, the publication writes.
At that time, many of the Russian president's associates were silently waiting to see who would win. The situation showed that Putin has few truly reliable allies. And further security problems on Russian territory will only add to the prospects of a split in the country's elites.
However, in order to achieve the desired effect, the initiative in the Kursk region must remain with the Ukrainians, concludes media.
Recall that in the Kursk region of Russia, hostilities have been ongoing since August 6 after reports that the Ukrainian army had entered the region. Amid the offensive in the region, a federal emergency was declared on August 9.
Vladimir Putin convened a meeting of the Security Council on August 7 and opened it with a televised address in which he called the offensive a “large-scale provocation.” The commander-in-chief of the Russian troops, General Valery Gerasimov, said that the Ukrainian offensive forces could be the size of an entire battalion.
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