Putin avoids Russia blame game – for now – after Ukraine attack

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CN—

It was New Year’s Eve, one of the most expensive holidays in Russia. Recruits from President Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine, hundreds of them mobilized just months ago, have been quartered in makeshift barracks, a vocational school in the occupied town of Makiivka in the Donetsk region. Next to it was a large ammunition depot.

The soldiers missed their wives, their families, so they turned on their cell phones and called home. Suddenly, HIMARS rockets, satellite-guided precision weapons that the United States supplied to Ukraine, hit the school, almost completely destroying it and igniting the ammunition cache.

This, at least officially, is how the Russian military explains the deadliest known attack on Russian forces in Ukraine since the war began in February 2022. The Defense Ministry blamed the troops themselves , claiming that the main cause of the attack was the use of mobile phones. contrary to the ban. Russian troops are prohibited from using personal cell phones in the field, as their signals have been geotagged to target and kill other Russian forces.

But that explanation and the details of the attack that surfaced sparked an extraordinarily public national blame game among Russians.

It started with the death toll. The Russian Defense Ministry initially said 63 soldiers were killed, then increased that number to 89. Ukraine claimed it was around 400. But even Russian pro-war bloggers, an element of increasingly influential in how Russian civilians get their information about what’s really going on in Ukraine, the official count dismissed, estimating that hundreds of soldiers had died. The real figure is not yet known.

One such blogger, Semyon Pegov, who uses the online pseudonym War Gonzo and recently received a medal from Vladimir Putin, also dismissed the army’s cellphone claim, calling it a blatant attempt to slander .

Gray Zone, another blogger, called the cell phone explanation a 99% lie, an attempt to evade responsibility. He said it was more likely an intelligence failure.

Russian lawmakers have stepped in, demanding an investigation into who ordered so many troops to be temporarily quartered in an unprotected building. Sergey Mironov, a prominent politician and party leader, said there should be personal criminal liability for any officer or other military personnel who made this decision. And, implying that the military had a lax approach to war, he warned, it’s time to realize that it won’t be like before.

This is a battle for Russia’s future, Mironov said. We must earn it!

Mironov’s comments struck a chord. Hardliners like him think Putin’s partial mobilization of reservists in September, calling up 300,000 troops, didn’t go far enough. They want a total mobilization which would put the whole country on a war footing. And they want revenge on Ukraine.

Nobody so far, but at least publicly, blames Vladimir Putin for the death. Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of the public international network RT and a regular on Russian national TV shows, said she hoped those responsible would be held accountable and their names made public. But she also hinted that the attack could fuel public discontent: It is high time to realize that impunity does not lead to social harmony. Impunity leads to more crimes and, therefore, to public dissent.

Many of the soldiers who perished at Makiivka came from Samara, a town on the Volga in southwestern Russia, and the families of those killed mourn their loved ones, bringing red carnations to a rare public memorial service, as the priests led the people in prayer. and a choir sang the liturgy for young men recently sent to the front.

The Defense Ministry’s admission that a significant number of mobilized soldiers died in the attack, as well as the open debate among military bloggers, are signs that the Kremlin is taking the Makiivka attack very seriously. After all, the Putin government has the wherewithal to shut down reporting on events it does not want the public to know about.

Even in this open discussion, several commentators raised the possibility that informants tipped off the enemy, an inescapable conspiracy theory that Russian state-run propaganda media often promote. Then there’s the usual complaint after nearly every tragedy in Russia, blaming it on khalatnost: negligence.

But the finger of blame, so far, is only pointed at military leaders, not higher. President Putin has made no public comment on the Makiivka attack, a strong sign that he intends to stay as far away as possible from an obvious debacle.

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