Kursk – from a symbol of glory to that of ignominy
The Ukrainian diversionary counter-offensive targeting Russia's Kursk region continues. It’s into its fifth day and the Russian, and now also the vassal Belarusian, regimes, are in a panic. In July-August 1943 this was the site of one of the major battles of World War II which resulted in a strategic victory for the Soviet side. Historians estimate that it resulted in around 800,000 Soviet casualties and 200,000 German. For Russia, this region has, therefore, been one associated with “glory.” It appears that this is changing as the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) expose the vulnerability and inherent weakness of the present-day would-be Russian military colossus. From this week, whatever the eventual outcome of today’s much smaller-scale fighting, the Kursk region will be linked with Russian failure and disgrace and known as the nemesis of the Putin regime.
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Who is stunned and why?
Apart from Putin himself and his entourage, particularly his military and intelligence chiefs, it’s the masses of ordinary Russian people who are rattled. They had bought the crazed imperialist and xenophobic ideology of their Führer of “Russia über alles,” the unworthy Ukrainian and other Untermenschen who need to be pacified and Russified, the fickle and rotten West, and gullible anti-Western states eager to side with Moscow. But now angry Russians are expressing their confusion and anger. It is one thing for them to see footage of Ukrainian cities being destroyed, millions of Ukrainians displaced, and Ukrainian territory being forcibly annexed, but quite another when Russians themselves are exposed to a minute taste of this suffering and hell. And worst of all for them, the sudden shame and loss of a deliberately cultivated sense of invincibility and impunity.
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Not only Russians are shocked
One wonders what Russia’s partners in its anti-Western axis – China, North Korea and Iran – feel watching what is going on. Or, for that matter, the other pro-Russian states and fence-sitters. And closer home, not only Putin’s shaking stooge in Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, but also the pro-Russian leaders of Hungary and Slovakia. They cannot be happy that the AFU’s foray in the Kursk region enables it to take or destroy the Sudzha gas pumping station and cut off energy supplies from Russia to their countries via the Orengoi-Promary-Uzhhorod pipeline. And, as I’ve already written, Ukraine’s successful thrust into Russia and the feeble nervous Russian response shows its Western partners that the fight has to be taken into Russia itself. Timidity and appeasement are not a recipe for dealing with a Russian bear on the rampage. He has to be hurt and pacified, if not tamed.
Time for Zelensky to appeal directly to the Russian and Belarusian people
This is precisely the time when President Zelensky should seize the initiative and, finding the right words, declare an international crusade against Russian despotic imperialism and what it represents. He should rally and unite supporters from neighboring or affected countries, such as Belarus, Georgia and Moldova, and within Russia itself – both among its ethnic non-Russians and Russians themselves. He should appeal by all means available directly to the Russian population. He should assure it that Ukraine has no imperial or nefarious “Western-dictated” goals aimed at Russia but wants to live in peace with a neighbor that also respects its rights as a sovereign state and its self-identification with the democratic world.
Zelensky should lead an international movement for regime change in Russia
Kyiv cannot simply criticize its Western supporters for any hesitation, or purported ambiguity or softness. Zelensky should set an example and not shy away himself from advocating regime change in Russia and Belarus. Putin, from the outset, has called on Ukrainians, Russians and the outside world to overthrow what he has branded as the Nazi regime in Kyiv. At this stage, when Russia is a deadly threat not only to Ukraine but, by brandishing its nuclear weapons, the entire world, Zelensky should call on Russians and Belarusians to overthrow their despots and reclaim their proper place in a rules-based international system. But that is not all. For the struggle with Russia is not so much over territory as it is over values and freedom. Kyiv has to become not only the capital of the state fighting Russian oppression but the authentic international center of a broad movement for defending democratic values – whether it’s in Iran, Venezuela, Mali, Syria, or elsewhere. And in doing so, Zelensky will be able to compare himself not only to Churchill, but Bolivar, Gandhi and Mandela. And Ukraine and the world need such a figure.
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