All of A Sudden Putin is the River on a Sinking Tank

New York Times

After the rout in Kharkiv, some of the loudest criticism has come from pro-war bloggers.Nicole Tung for The New York Times

Suddenly, Putin is  in a bind

The rout that Ukraine inflicted on Russia in the northeast has put the Kremlin in an unfamiliar position.

Under President Vladimir Putin, Russia has spent years crushing his domestic opposition. After the start of the war, he cranked it up by criminalizing dissent from the Kremlin’s narrative of the war. In last week’s issue of this newsletter, the independent journalist Yevgenia Albats described how the system worked.

But the weekend defeat, in which Ukraine gained more ground in a few days than Russia had in months, drew protests from the opposite side of the political spectrum — the bloggers and politicians who make up the pro-war camp, my colleague Anton Troianovski writes.

Some of the loudest criticism has come from pro-war bloggers who have huge followings on social media and want the Kremlin to ramp up its fight in Ukraine.

Over the weekend, when Putin presided over the opening of a Ferris wheel in Moscow as Russian troops fled the battlefield in Kharkiv, one such blogger, Pyotr Lundstrem, was livid.

“You’re throwing a billion-ruble party,” he wrote in a widely circulated post. “What is wrong with you? Not at the time of such a horrible failure.”

On Russian state television, where criticism of the Kremlin is rare, there is now some debate. Supporters of the war are pointing fingers over what they describe as a disorganized and insufficiently concerted invasion; others are raising the idea of suing for peace.

So far the criticism has not been directed at Putin but toward the military leadership and officials, saying they have not waged the war the right way or have not delivered all the facts to Putin. This despite reports in May that Putin was micro-managing the invasion.

Source: Institute for the Study of War | By The New York Times

Daring to hope

Putin’s opponents have also been emboldened. This week, more than 40 elected officials across Russia signed a two-sentence petition demanding Putin’s resignation — an extraordinary step in a country where people have been jailed for calling the war a war.

“Many have the hope that something will finally break,” Ivan Kurilla, a historian at the European University at St. Petersburg and a Putin critic, told Anton. “We are probably wrong, it’s probably not yet time, but since everyone has been waiting for half a year for something to crack, this hope is very strong.”

Putin marked Moscow’s founding over the weekend, as Ukraine defeated Russian troops.Gavriil Grigorov/Sputnik, via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Putin now finds himself in a bind. The Kharkiv defeat has undercut the image of competence and might that he has worked to build over two decades. Hawks are calling for a full mobilization, but that would shatter the image of normality that the Kremlin has built around the war. The Kremlin still refers to the war as a “special military operation” and has refused to resort to a draft.

As a result, Putin faces an increasingly energized and motivated enemy in Ukraine, while his army is spent and often demoralized. The Russians do not appear to be prepared for the sacrifices that could come with an escalating conflict.

What next

Putin faces no good options, analysts say. Escalating a war whose domestic support may turn out to be superficial could stir domestic unrest. Continuing retreats on the battlefield could spur a backlash from hawks who have bought into the Kremlin narrative that Russia is fighting “Nazis” for its very survival.

A Russian lawmaker, Konstantin Zatulin, said an “urgent adjustment” to the war effort was needed. But he cautioned: “It must be underlined that this criticism should not go overboard. Otherwise, it could spark an uncontrollable reaction.”

Ukraine has continually upped its definition of victory, from a Russian withdrawal to lines before Feb. 24, to the recapture of all territory including Crimea and Donbas areas under separatist control since 2014, to reparations and war crimes trials, Russia expert Anne Applebaum wrote in The Atlantic.

A victory for Ukraine on its terms would bring about the fall of Putin, Applebaum wrote. “It is inconceivable that he can continue to rule if the centerpiece of his claim to legitimacy — his promise to put the Soviet Union back together again — proves not just impossible but laughable,” she wrote.

But such a scenario would also bring uncertainty because “there is no transition mechanism in Russia. There is no dauphin,” she wrote. “The possibility of instability in Russia, a nuclear power, terrifies many. But it may now be unavoidable.”