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The withdrawal of Russian troops from the city of Limán (Donetsk) which took place this Saturday after the siege of the Ukrainian soldiers has revived the possibility that a nuclear war. A fact that adds to the already existing tension after the signature of accession treaties of some territories and the successive defeats of the invaders on the battlefield.
The invading army has withdrawn from the strategic city of Liman “due to the risk of being surrounded” and moved to “more advantageous borders”, according to the Russian Defense Ministry. The Ukrainians had cornered some 5,000 soldiers in the city and had controlled access. This came a few hours after Vladimir Putin sign “accession treaties” that formalized the illegal annexation of four occupied regions in Ukraine (Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia).
The city’s position on the banks of the Siversky Donets River means that its reconquest by Ukrainian forces would give them a significant strategic foothold for further advances to the east. Furthermore, this would exert additional pressure on the Kremlinwhich has been facing internal criticism for its failures on the battlefield and the forced recruitment of thousands of men to fight.
[Rusia abandona Limán tras el cerco ucraniano, un día después de que Putin firmara su anexión]
In Putin’s fierce speech proclaimed last Friday after obtaining these annexations, it was clear that a new and very dangerous phase in the war. Some Western analysts fear it could escalate to the use of nuclear weapons for the first time in 77 years. Furthermore, in this statement, the Russian leader presented Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as part of an existential conflict with the Westwhom he described as “the enemy”.
In addition, some Russian officials are pressing for Moscow to consider using low-yield nuclear weapons in Ukraine, such as the head of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov.
risk of nuclear war
“In my personal opinion, more drastic measures should be taken, up to the declaration of martial law in the border areas and the low-yield use of nuclear weapons”, Kadírov has indicated through a message in Telegram.
Kadirov has spoken a day after Putin proclaimed the annexation of these Ukrainian regions and placed them under Russia’s nuclear umbrella. The president assured that Moscow would defend the lands that he had obtained “with all our forces and all our means.”
Russia has the largest nuclear arsenal in the world.including low-yield tactical nuclear weapons that are designed to be deployed against enemy armies.
[Putin está jugando una guerra de nervios]
Other important allies of Putin, such as the former president Dimitri Medvedevhave suggested that Russia may need to resort to nuclear weapons, but Kadyrov’s call has been the most urgent and explicit to date.
The influential ruler of the Caucasus region has been a point man for Moscow during the seven-month war in Ukraine. Chechen forces have been part of the vanguard of the Russian army in different regions. Kadyrov is considered a person close to Putinwho appointed him to rule Chechnya in 2007.
In his message, the Chechen leader described Colonel General Alexander Lapin, commander of the Russian forces fighting in Liman, as “mediocre”, and suggested that he should be stripped of his medals for failure on the field in battle.
“Due to lack of elementary military logistics, today we have abandoned several settlements and a large part of the territory,” said Kadyrov, who two weeks ago raised the possibility of suffering a defeat in Limánbut the chief of the general staff of Russia, Valery Gerasimovdiscarded the idea.
Putin celebrates with his ministers this past Friday the annexation of four Ukrainian regions.
Reuters
Putin’s plans
Putin has previously threatened to resort to nuclear weapons if Russia’s goals in Ukraine continue to be frustrated. Annexation brings the use of a nuclear weapon a step closer by giving the Russian leader a possible justification on the grounds that “the territorial integrity of our country is threatened,” as he put it in his speech last week.
He renewed the threat on Friday with a comment that the US atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki created a “precedent” for the use of nuclear weapons.
US and European officials say they still believe Putin is unlikely to carry out his threats. Most likely, they say, it waits discourage the West from providing increasingly sophisticated military assistance to Ukraine, while the mobilization of an additional 300,000 troops allows Russia to reverse or at least halt its military setbacks on the battlefield.
First footage of Ukrainian troops (National Police) inside Lyman city.#russia #ukraine pic.twitter.com/Nmg4WJ6qbl
— BlueSauron?️ (@Blue_Sauron) October 1, 2022
global response
It has been of little use that the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkovclarified shortly after that Russia does not threaten anyone with nuclear weapons, at a conference dedicated to the 60th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The US President Joe Bidenhas taken advantage of his intervention in the UN General Assembly to accuse Putin of doing “irresponsible threats about the use of nuclear weapons”.
[Rusia presume del “éxito” de los referendos mientras siguen los ataques y bombardeos en el frente]
In the same line, the NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberghas criticized Putin’s “dangerous” nuclear rhetoric after Zelensky applied to join the Atlantic Alliance following Friday’s Russian annexation of the four Ukrainian regions mentioned above.
the one who called “largest annexation of European territory by force since World War II” it does not change the “commitment to support Ukraine”, he assured. “All democracies in Europe have the right to apply for NATO membership,” she added.
