Russian President Vladimir Putin has always been a cynic. We know, for example, that he has long avoided the use of a personal cell phonethey all know how easily they can be tracked.
Still a Kremlin document A recent disclosure to the media by a European intelligence agency reveals new facts level of suspicion. Visitors can only approach him after going through two lines of investigation. His guardians now have complete control over his appearance schedule; they have ruled out visiting any area related to the military. And about cell phones: Nobody who works close to Putin is now allowed to have one—they can only carry devices that aren’t connected to the Internet. Surveillance systems are installed in the homes of the cooks, drivers, and cleaners who work for him; they are prohibited from using public transport. Most obviously, he and his family members no longer live in their traditional residence. Instead, they stick to secret sites with extra layers of protection. The document claims that Putin now works only in offices scattered around southern Russia.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has always been a cynic. We know, for example, that he has long avoided the use of a personal cell phonethey all know how easily they can be tracked.
Still a Kremlin document A recent disclosure to the media by a European intelligence agency reveals new facts level of suspicion. Visitors can only approach him after going through two lines of investigation. His guardians now have complete control over his appearance schedule; they have ruled out visiting any area related to the military. And about cell phones: Nobody who works close to Putin is now allowed to have one—they can only carry devices that aren’t connected to the Internet. Surveillance systems are installed in the homes of the cooks, drivers, and cleaners who work for him; they are prohibited from using public transport. Most obviously, he and his family members no longer live in their traditional residence. Instead, they stick to secret sites with extra layers of protection. The document claims that Putin now works only in offices scattered around southern Russia.
It is possible, of course, that the spies who passed this document to the media are playing their own game—perhaps using misinformation to sow discord and mistrust within the Kremlin. But the details revealed by the leak make perfect sense given the obstacles Putin suddenly finds himself facing.
In January, American forces succeeded to usurp Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to get out of his compound without getting a single death. At the end of February, the Israelis killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on the first day of the war against Iran—and other senior Iranian leaders as well. Nor was it the first time that they were able to target individuals in Tehran. Americans and Israelis have eliminated these activities through a combination of carefully cultivated human sources and intelligence signals, to monitor the mobile phones and internet usage of not only the targeted individuals but also their assistants, bodyguards and support staff. All this means that dictators can no longer sleep as easily as they used to.
Ukraine’s former military intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov—now President Volodymyr Zelensky’s chief of staff—is known to be a student of Israeli targeted killings. His lessons have paid off: Ukrainians have killed a string of Russian military officers, politicians, and propagandists—some of them in central Moscow.
In December, a car bomb in the capital took out Lieutenant General Fanil Sarvarov. The song appears to have sparked a collective upheaval in Russia’s power elite, allegedly – according to a leaked document –motivate the meeting of senior security officials who made them blame each other for real and imagined wrongdoing. Given that Russia has repeatedly tried to kill Zelensky, Putin has each reason to believe that he also has a target on his back.
Putin may fear internal enemies as much as he fears Ukrainians; rumors of a coup plot are rampant in Moscow. But the problems of the Russian president are bigger than that. He has been able to stay in power for 26 years by keeping a few steps ahead of his enemies. Now he may not have a chance to maneuver.
A Russian attack planned for this spring has been called off before it can be lifted. Ukrainians demand offered 35,000 casualties for Russians in March alone—the fifth month in a row, according to Kyiv, that the number of Russians killed and seriously wounded has exceeded the Kremlin’s recruitment threshold. Perhaps most importantly, the soldiers’ sacrifices were completely in vain; no main goals they were reached. “Ukraine is not doing better than expected,” said Michael Kofman, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “Time is not on Russia’s side in this war.”
Indeed, the Ukrainians now really pushed the Russians back along several stretches of the front. Putin’s military leaders seem to have no new ideas about how to change basic forces on the battlefield. Unless they can change that, throwing new workers into the fray will prove fruitless.
Ukrainians, on the contrary, seem to have an endless supply of new ideas. Every day brings the revelation of a new amazing piece technology or creative use of the old man. Every day also brings news of another fierce strike in the heart of Russia. On April 25, for example, Ukrainian drones hit a Russian airport in the southern Urals city of Chelyabinsk—more than 1,100 miles from Ukraine.
Kyiv forces have devoted considerable resources to eliminating Russian air defenses, which are now insufficient to protect every strategic objective. Once a few weeks ago, the threat of Ukrainian attacks closed all four of Moscow’s international airports at the same time. In fact, the escalation of Ukrainian attacks seems to have influenced the Kremlin’s decision not to include military equipment to participate in the Victory Day celebrations on May 9. Humiliatingly, Putin even felt it. forced to ask US President Donald Trump prevented Ukrainian citizens from attacking during the parade. The Russians are clearly rattled.
However, Kyiv does not conduct such strikes for psychological reasons. Evidence suggests that Ukrainian planners are thinking more than ever about how to maximize the impact of their attacks. In late April, a Ukrainian long-range drone attack on an oil refinery in Perm, more than 900 miles from the border, target distillation columns-systems that facilitate the separation of crude oil into gasoline and other petroleum products. Crashing storage tanks provide spectacular fire images, but are easy to repair; Basic infrastructure like these columns is a completely different matter. “The Ukrainians have developed a theory of victory that involves the destruction of Russia’s oil and gas infrastructure,” said Ben Hodges, the former commander of US Forces Europe. “Without that, it becomes very difficult for Russia to continue what they are doing.”
At the end of March, Reuters analysis he concluded that the strike campaign has succeeded in reducing Russia’s oil export capacity by 40 percent. In fact, this may not be enough to completely offset the gains Moscow has made from the rapid rise in world oil prices caused by the US-Israel war against Iran. However, in the first quarter of this year, the budget deficit of Russia already it has exceeded his goal for the whole year. Finance officials cited a 45 percent drop in oil and gas revenues.
This trend of smart targeting repeats itself across industries. In their attacks chemical plants, semiconductor manufacturing equipmentand steel millsThe Ukrainians continue to strike at the core of the industrial processes that feed the Russian military machine. Ironically, the Russians seem unable to pay Ukraine in the same currency.
The decentralization of Ukraine’s military production—scattered across thousands of small factories in obscure locations—makes it very difficult for the Russians to find suitable targets. So they continue to attack power plants and civilians, brutal tactics that can help strengthen the Ukrainian spine.
That the momentum has changed on the part of Ukraine is also demonstrated by Zelensky’s confidence towards the United States. “In my opinion, Russia played with the Americans again – played the president of the United States,” he said he said recentlycommenting on Trump’s policy of allowing Russia to bypass oil export restrictions. The days of pampering and comfort are over.
Of course, Ukraine has many problems. His embrace of drones is driven in part by his ongoing labor shortages; many Ukrainian men refuse to join the army. And the government continues to deal with corruption scandals.
However, Kyiv is enjoying a boost in its international standing even as Moscow faces new headwinds. The war in Iran has provided new diplomatic opportunities for the Ukrainians, who have been using their anti-drone expertise to make new friends among the monarchies of the Persian Gulf. Trump seems preoccupied enough with his own war that he finds few opportunities to pressure Kyiv into ineffective peace deals.
And defeat in the recent elections Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has robbed Putin of his most trusted friend in the European Union. Orban’s departure has finally empowered the EU break the friction on the 106 billion dollar aid package expected for Kyiv. That’s enough to keep the Ukrainians armed for a long time to come—a far cry from the various arms production partnerships they’ve formed with partners around the world.
To add insult to injury, Moscow is also about to lose one of its new burgeoning allies in Africa: The Moscow-backed military government in Mali is losing its fight against Islamist rebels.
Losing Mali will not be enough to cost Putin his throne. But losing the war in Ukraine certainly could—especially linked to a stagnant economy, restless oligarchs, and a population disenchanted with the Kremlin. recent repression on the internet. Even Russian military bloggers, long the most enthusiastic supporters of the war, are beginning to lose faith. “Little by little, the advantage goes to our enemies,” one of them soon he wrote. “(T)he enemy attacks, and succeeds.” Other Russians may be reaching the same conclusion.
