Who needs Santa when you have Vladimir Putin? Just in time for Christmas, the Russian president has promised his military ‘everything it needs’ and an extra half a million men. On one level, this represents a further militarisation of the state – but at the same time, it is unattainable, and probably a misreading of the lessons of the Ukraine war.
While Volodymyr Zelensky was receiving an ovation in the US Congress, Putin was hunkered down with his military leaders. He was in no mood to be stingy, saying that there were no ‘funding restrictions’ for the military and that ‘the country and the government will give everything that the army asks for. Everything.’
The target of recruiting an extra 290,000-plus kontraktniki seems wildly optimistic
Calling Russian soldiers ‘heroes,’ he confirmed what had been assumed, that half of Russia’s 150,000 mobilised reservists had not been deployed to the battlefield yet, but were being trained and equipped to form units ready for a spring offensive.
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