Deputies from United Russia and Communists demand to recruit people of legal age and Kremlin rejects this
“How is a special military operation different from a war? The military operation can be stopped at any time. You can’t stop the war – it ends in victory or defeat. There is a war and we have no right to lose it.” Gennadi Ziuganov, leader of the Communist Party, personified in the Russian parliament on Tuesday the demand to account for councilors, ex-military veterans, editors, deputies and Senators – some of them attached to their own hard core – have begun to lead the president, Vladimir Putin, so far hermetically protected from criticism for the invasion of Ukraine thanks to the laws against anything “discrediting the government”.
But that wide umbrella seems to have cracked. In its environment, and among several opinion leaders adept at official strategy, it is believed that a “general mobilization” is needed to feed soldiers to the units deployed to the front and alter the course of the invasion. Last weekend’s shameful withdrawal from Kharkov has created the feeling that the war is not only at an impasse, but can continue ‘ad infinitum’ without a fight.
The Kremlin head opposes such depth, and this Tuesday his government again rejected it, because of its unpopularity that would mean sending the children, husbands and wives of Russian families to fight. Aside from giving conflict the nature of full-fledged war, the Kremlin has preferred to focus at all times as a rescue operation for some separatist enclaves suppressed by Kiev.
Elected from Samara and Novogod, this Tuesday joined nearly a hundred councilors from 18 Russian districts who have signed the letter demanding Putin’s resignation and even accusing him of “treason” for leading the country into human drama and economic suffocation. . But it was Gennadi Zyuganov’s statement in the Duma that broke the lock. For the first time, he calls Putin’s conceptual ‘special operation’ a war. The Communist Party is one of the two backing him at the head of the executive. The other is his own formation, United Russia, whose deputy Mikhail Sheremet – attached to Parliament’s security committee – has also asked to mobilize all adults. The deputies of this committee have even proposed that citizens with three or more minor children in their care sign a contract to get into the mobilization reserve, when until now they automatically had the right not to be called up.
“You do not have to be scared. We need a full mobilization of the country, we need completely different laws,” Zyuganov claimed. “Without full mobilization, including that of the economy, we will not get the right results (in Ukraine). Today society needs to be as consolidated as possible and proactive for victory,” stressed Shremet, who went even a little further by proposing the application of a war economy.
The pressure, at least in these first hours after the Kharkov debacle, has not caused an apparent dent in the Kremlin. Its spokesman, Dimitri Peskov, assured that the executive is not considering a general mobilization and attributed the parliamentary spokesmen’s discrepancies to “pluralism” in Russia. While no one is aware that the demands come mainly from nationalist sectors and those close to the president, Peskov stressed that the Russians maintain their support for Putin.
Body bags burn. Neither the president nor his ministers want them to get off the Russian military planes when they return from the Ukrainian front. And less with young and inexperienced recruits. According to the Levada survey of August, 81% of citizens support the invasion, but enthusiasm among the youngest of combative age falls by more than 20 points; that is, to be mobilized. That duality, or discontent, has allowed Putin to navigate somewhat smoothly through seven months of stalled invasion.
The promoter of the letter signed by nearly ninety elected officials asking for Putin’s resignation, St. Petersburg Mayor Dmitri Paliuga, was prosecuted on Tuesday and fined by the Smolny court to pay 47,000 rubles (about 800 euros) for accusing the president of treason. Another councilor, in this case from Moscow, Aleksei Gorinov, was luckier in July: he was sentenced to six years in prison for criticizing the invasion of Ukraine. Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov warned that “you have to be very, very careful” between what “plural” means and “discredit the government,” which could lead to jail terms.
The truth is that the unexpected and indisputable last Russian defeat on Ukrainian soil has left the Kremlin in a nest of snakes. “Negligence”, “treason”, “dishonor” or “great defeat” are some of the swear words Putin went to bed with on Monday and woke up on Tuesday. Nationalist broadcasters, ex-military veterans, bloggers and analysts question the ineffectiveness of the military and Russia’s future in the face of an increasingly elusive conflict.
Putin is angry. This is believed by some international media who suspect he is considering resigning from his military leadership. He’s done it before with every major flop. But his critics are even angrier than him. Like-minded bloggers wonder if he is well aware of what is happening in the neighboring country. For example, it’s not well understood that the flight of Putin’s soldiers — and the deaths of hundreds of them during the attempt — caught him in a Moscow park inaugurating a Ferris wheel. Igor Guirkin, a retired officer who co-led the 2014 pro-Russian uprising in Donbas, believes Sergei Shoigu has proven to be a “negligent” defense minister. Another active expert on military affairs, Yuri Podoliaka, accuses the General Staff of trying to trick the population into believing the withdrawal is a “devious plan” of regrouping, while other critics argue that significant territory has been lost and arsenals hands of the Ukrainians. “Many senior officials in uniform deserve a dishonorable discharge and some of them, jail or even execution,” attacks political journalist Vladimir Soloviov. The head of the RT channel, Margarita Simonian, condemned: “If we are at war with NATO, then we should probably fight as (as it were) with NATO”, alluding to the Kremlin that its units have more military power and gives men. on the front side.
The dissidents demand that Putin do whatever it takes to retake the reins of war and seize the newly won initiative in Kharkov of Kiev. They warn that the Russians are in danger of being surrounded in other Donbas areas, where local units took new villages yesterday.
On the ground, the near future depends heavily on what the Kremlin does, especially if its top boss gives in to general recruitment and bolsters the military. Moscow can still launch a high-intensity counterattack. It retains one-fifth of the former Soviet Republic in its power. There it maintains several well-fortified lines and attempts to break through them have cost the Ukrainians many lives and artillery. For some analysts, this still remarkable performance removes the risk of a nuclear winter.
The Chancellor, Social Democrat Olaf Scholz, has called Russian President Vladimir Putin for the first time in many weeks, demanding the withdrawal of his troops from all over Ukraine and the search for a diplomatic solution to the conflict. During a 90-minute meeting, the German chief also demanded from the Kremlin head an immediate ceasefire and respect for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit announced.
Scholz further warned that further Russian attempts at territorial annexation at the expense of Ukraine would not go unanswered and would not be accepted or recognized in any way. The occupier was recently forced to postpone a planned referendum on Ukrainian territories to integrate them into the Russian Federation.
During the conversation with Putin, Scholz also spoke about the situation at the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe and which has been occupied by Russian troops since the start of the invasion in March. The Chancellor insisted on the need to ensure the safety of the plant, demanded to avoid any step that would lead to escalation and immediately apply the measures recommended by the UN International Atomic Energy Agency.
The German Social Democratic politician also demanded from the Russian president that Ukrainian prisoners of war be treated in accordance with the standards of international law and that representatives of the International Red Cross have unrestricted access to the places where they are held. Likewise, the Chancellor spoke about the world food situation and the scarcity of grains in Third World countries as a result of the war.
The last time Scholz spoke to the Russian president by phone was in May. Last week, he called Ukraine’s president, Volidímir Zelensky, to whom he promised more economic and military aid from Germany. (By JUAN CARLOS BARRENA)
Source: La Verdad
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