Russian invasion of Ukraine - How Putin's War began
Putin announced a "special military operation" on 24th of February 2022
It’s the 11th day of the Russian invasion in Ukraine and thousands of civilians are killed, thousands of soldiers killed and wounded and the war already produced millions of refugees.
On the 24th of February Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, current president of Russia (and de facto leader for the last 22 years) has ordered the Russian army to invade Ukraine. This invasion was named a “special operation” in Donbas, which Putin announced live on Russian Televisions. Less than 2 hours later military operations commenced and from different locations, Russian troops entered the territories of Ukraine (as displayed on the map above).
Earlier the same week, on February 21st, Russia recognized Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic. These two breakaway territories were the outcome of the 2014 military conflict, which was arranged by the Kremlin. After the Maidan revolution, Putin was obviously displeased with the results and instigated the conflict in East Ukraine, similar to what was used before in other post-soviet countries like Georgia and Moldova. At the same time, Russia annexed Crimea in March 2014.
These recognitions, now we know were pretext of what was about to come. In his speech of Feb 24th, Putin “justified” his moves and explained his motives for 30 minutes. Many mainstream western news outlets (like NY Times, Washington Post, others..) covered this speech, essentially a declaration of war with Ukraine with natural carelessness – omitting some details from Putin’s criticisms of NATO wars.
Putin’s February 24th Announcement
Putin’s speech began with the condemnation of the United States and the general politics of the West toward Russia since the demise of the USSR. He discussed how Russia’s all efforts in the past were met with lies, pressure, and blackmailing from the international stage, how North Atlantic Alliance (NATO) expansion towards Russia’s borders. Putin blamed this on the lost balance of power (during the Cold war era) since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Putin labeled the USA as an “empire of lies” and offered rare, direct criticism of US global dominance and foreign politics, mentioning that “whole system of international relations, including allies, are appalled by arrogance of their (US) politics”. He censured US foreign politics and dealmaking, calling it blunt, driven by superiority and a form of modern “absolutism”.
As the US continued pushing their interests without any restraint throughout the 90s, the worldwide situation dramatically deteriorated in many countries they got involved. He touched on many recent wars and conflicts started by the United States and allies:
Belgrad (Yugoslavia) - First without any sanctions from United Nations Security Council, NATO bombed cities and infrastructure for weeks. He noted that Western colleagues don’t like to remember these events.
Iraq – In 2003 United States invaded Iraq without any rationale or pre-agreed resolution. They invented weapons of mass destruction (WMD) narrative, with fake showcase o white sand, that turned out to be a complete bluff. Putin outlined that this lie about the WMD was bullshit fed to the public and partners from the highest levels of government and UN. The war brought horror to the region, a massive number of deaths, irreparable damage, and terrorism once again flourished from the ashes of the US-led war.
Libya – noting that after the NATO coalition’s military intervention in 2011, the country suffered the full demise of government, became a terrorism and extremism center, and is still under the civil war. The ramifications of Libya’s decline messed up the whole region of North Africa and spiked the refugee influx in Europe.
Syria - Putin noted that a similar fate was prepared for Syria as well, as military operations of the NATO coalition without any support from the Syrian government or UN security council is just aggression and direct intervention in the sovereignty of the independent country.
Putin mentioned that the US and the West, who openly declare Russia as their enemy, have indeed considerable financial, scientific, and military capabilities that Russia is aware of. That Kremlin is objectively evaluating constant economic blackmail coming in their way, as well as their own capabilities to stand against this pressure.
Some of the modern historic facts about the United States imperialism Putin listed above are undeniable and others have merits too. However he obviously has no issues with the so-called “imperialist agenda” he outlined, rather he is disappointed that Russia is not the one carving out its own agenda on the world stage. He then continues his rambling speech with nostalgic Russian imperialism, that post-soviet countries know all too well.
Putin declared that “Russian historical territories” are increasingly armed and hostile to Russia. He pointed out that Ukraine (and other post-soviet countries for that matter) were naturally “Russian spheres of influence” and these changes in the political alignment of former satellite countries are posing an existential threat to Russia’s security and sovereign interests. He stated that this is the red line crossed for Russia.
Putin continued his speech proclaiming that leading NATO countries are supporting Ukraine’s far-right nationalists and neo-nazis, who in their regard pose a threat to the security of Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic (East Ukraine puppet states he recognized 3 days before this speech), as well as for Crimea.
Putin said that the puppet states asked Russia for military help and in accordance with Article 51, Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter and with permission of Russia’s Federation Council he decided:
“I made a decision to carry out a special military operation. The purpose of this operation is to protect people who for 8 years are suffering from the genocide of Kiev regime.”
“To achieve this we will seek to demilitarize and de-nazify Ukraine, as well a bring to trial those who perpetrated bloody crimes against civilians, including to Russian citizens.”
“At the same time we do not plan to occupy Ukraine”
He asked Ukrainian citizens for an understanding - “We are acting to defend ourselves from the threats created for us and from a worth peril than it is happening now.” Putin addressed military personnel of Ukraine as well, asking them to lay down weapons and go home and that all the possible bloodshed will be the responsibility of “Kyiv’s regime”.
Putin then announced a threat to any possible external actor - “Whoever tries to interfere with our actions should know that the Russian response will be immediate and will lead to the kind of consequences you have never experienced in your entire history. We are ready for any scenario of events.” - he said.
He said Russia could no longer tolerate a Ukraine that is under Western influence and that ruling forces are hostile to Russia. Therefore, Russia had no choice but to authorize a military operation, it is the only say, he said.
Putin ended the speech addressing the Russian citizens - appealing to the public for unity, strength to overcome possible hurdles. Truth and justice are on our side, he said - power and readiness to fight are vital for independence and sovereignty of the homeland.
This speech, full of nationalism and Russian imperialism continued the themes from Putin’s February 21st speech, which was full of fallacies about the history of Ukraine. Last year, 12 July 2021, Putin published an essay "On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians", which basically denies the existence of Ukraine as an independent state. The essay was widely condemned outside but naturally praised inside Russia. Dmitry Medvedev and Vladislav Surkov (former personal adviser to Putin) then followed up on the topic with even more aggressive articles about Ukraine and other neighboring countries.
Since the last year, tensions were growing as Russia was accumulating force near Ukraine borders, increasing the disinformation and hyping up accusations about Donbas. At the same time, the United States was releasing reports about the invasion plans of Russia, widely covered by the Western mainstream outlets. Nevertheless few believed that Russia will start a direct war with Ukraine, as the most commonly accepted view among regional experts and post-soviet political pundits was that Russia will take over the Donbas region and proclaim independence - the same scenario that worked so well for the Kremlin in Georgia, during Russo-Georgian war of 2008.
Thus the horrible war began, Russian troops invaded from four main directions: north from Belarus, northeast from Russia, east from the Donbas region, and south from the Crimea.
First Days of War
Once the invasion began, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, initiated martial law and general mobilization of all 18 to 60-year-old males in Ukraine. Volodymyr Oleksandrovych Zelenskyy, former actor and current president of Ukraine from the first day of the war became the central figure of this war. Like some of the modern politicians, prior to the conflict, he often relied on Instagram, Twitter, and other social media platforms.
From February 24th, Zelenskyy is very active on social media, transparently communicating with Ukrainians, publicly shaming foreign politicians and countries, and tirelessly asking for help from the international community.
As expected, the United States and European Union have promptly condemned Russia’s invasion. There was a fear that the response from the international community and neighboring Europe will be limited to impotent sanctions and strong words only, as was the case during Russia’s previous military campaigns in Georgia 2008 and Ukraine 2014.
However, the relentless pressure from president Zelenskyy and the united support from the public around the world fueled the strong response from the US and Europe in form of sanctions on Russia and financial and military aid to Ukraine.
During the first two days of the conflict, most experts and tv pundits were expecting “swift victory” from Russia, as they possess significantly more military capabilities than their smaller neighbor. Some US experts claimed Kyiv would fall within just a few days. On the first day, the Russian Armed Forces began bombing airports, military, and strategic infrastructure of Ukraine, they claimed to have control over the skies. On the ground, the bloody conflict started with Ukraine taking up the battles in the south, east, and northeast (Kharkiv area).
It became clear from the first day that Ukraine was not considering conceding anything. Zelenskyy, who was briefly in the spotlight during the Trump-Ukraine scandal (remember Trump-Zelenskyy quid pro quo call?) became the admired leader of Ukraine’s resistance.
On February 26th, at the time of heavy assault by Russian troops on the capital of Kyiv, he was urged to leave Kyiv and offered assistance by Erdogan (President of Turkey) and the United States. Zelenskyy now-famously answered - "the fight is here. I need ammunition, not a ride".
Already he was called a national hero or global hero, was compared to celebrated wartime leaders like Churchill. He continues using social media to reach an increasingly large number of people, where often calls to action specific countries, calls for justice:
“We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will punish everyone who committed atrocities in this war.
“We will find every scum who was shelling our cities, our people, who was shooting the missiles, who was giving orders. You will not have a quiet place on this earth – except for a grave.”
“God will not forgive. Not today. Not tomorrow. Never. And instead of Forgiveness, there will be Judgment.”
After Russia’s recognition of Donbas, Western countries began imposing very limited sanctions on Russia, however, as mentioned above this has changed since the invasion and the public pressure. US, UK, and EU have sanctioned major state-owned or controlled banks in Russia, later cutting from the SWIFT network (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication). From what is known now about Russia’s cut from SWIFT is that the limited access will be retained for the ability to pay for gas shipments. Sanctions included the asset freezes on the Central Bank of Russia - it was claimed that the freeze rendered the chunk of their $643bln FX reserves unusable.
All these sanctions that hit Russia created a panic on Russian and Rubble markets. USD/RUB is at the moment at 132, 60% weaker compared to pre-invasion. On-street market RUB supposedly traded around 200 during the previous 2 weeks. Russian local equity exchanges were closed as investors were rushing to exit their positions. On offshore exchanges, Russian names took a beating as well, for example, Sberbank of Russia fell from around $15 to $0.05 per share.
Germany has stopped the development of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline with Russia. However, as of writing this article, there are no sanctions on Russian gas or oil - the core components of Russia’s exports and annual budget.
Europe is heavily dependent on Russian oil and gas supplies and currently the sanctions are no-go for this reason.
US, where Russian oil and gas imports are tiny is reportedly considering to ban it.
Ukrainian people continue the vigorous battle against the stronger adversary, as the massive backlash on Russian aggression grows all over the world. A vast number of international companies joined the solidarity movement and are now boycotting Russia. Payment processing companies like Mastercard, Visa, AmEx, and Paypal shut down their services in Russia. Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Samsung pay also ceased their operations. Big four accountancy companies (PwC, KPMG, EY, and Deloitte) announced their exit from Russia. Many institutions, science projects, and research foundations also stopped their work or collaborations with Russian counterparts. Similar exits were announced by the number of companies from the food and beverage, entertainment, services, energy, and technology industries.
International Olympic Committee recommended the sports federations and event organizers not to invite or allow the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes and officials in international competitions. Football (Soccer), Hockey, Formula One, Basketball, and many sports federations banned participation with country name Russia or Belarus.
The European union completely closed its airspace to all airlines or air jets registered in Russia. So did the US, United Kingdom, and Switzerland.
Unprecedented response from the international community gives hope that the support will continue, along with the financial and military aid, that are so vital for the people of Ukraine, who fight courageously with the asymmetric force.
The next article on Russia-Ukraine War will cover sanctions and their impacts on both sides.