The slow-grinding Ukrainian offensive in the country’s south has forced many to accept that the war against Russia might turn out to be a prolonged conflict. But while military experts debate whether or not Ukraine can win this war, and how such a victory could be achieved, the focus on military hardware and territory has skewed the West’s approach to the war and potential solutions. Russia’s war against Ukraine war is not a territorial conflict: it is an identity war aimed at extermination. It will not and cannot be solved by territorial changes or security compromises. Just listen to Putin and take him seriously.
This week, the Russian President sent a message that was extraordinary even by the standards of Russia’s unrestrained wartime propaganda. Speaking to a Kremlin advisory group, Putin declared that 1.5 million Jews, a quarter of all Holocaust victims, were killed by Ukrainian ‘nationalists and anti-Semites’ and that even the Nazis ‘didn’t consider it possible to take part in these mass repressions.’
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