Invading Russia is Zelensky’s riskiest decision yet
https://www.thetimes.com/world/russia-ukraine-war/article/invading-russia-was-zelenskys-most-surprising-and-risky-decision-yet-6nbnfr7sn
原文位置(會員)
https://archive.is/9vWNC#selection-2175.0-2175.51
全文位置
重點
President Zelensky’s personal fingerprints are all over it. It’s been an open secret in Kyiv for many months that the president was pressing his military chiefs to launch a summer offensive.
澤連斯基發動庫爾斯克攻勢既四個目標
1.扭轉國際, 國內輿論
希望避免走向惡性循環
(1)西方認為烏克蘭走向失敗, 援來都曬氣
(2)好多國家唔再比支援 ／ 減少支援
(3)戰況更糟糕
Given Ukraine’s manpower and resources problems, they were hesitant. But Zelensky is desperate to reverse the narrative that Ukraine is losing its war. Successes in the Black Sea and against Russian forces in Crimea don’t get the world’s attention when his country’s army is being pushed slowly but relentlessly out of more territory in eastern Ukraine.
Zelensky is trying to find a way to halt or reverse that dynamic. This strategic military choice is very much his style: bold and risky.
並同時直接借機施壓西方容許武器用於俄羅斯領土
It will also make some western leaders queasy as items of Nato ground equipment are now being used inside Russia — another threshold crossed. If Ukrainian leaders had asked for western permission in advance they wouldn’t have got it, so they went ahead anyway.
2.希望借機拉動俄軍頓巴斯部隊
Ukrainian chiefs will be hoping this attack has the effect of drawing high-quality Russian forces away from other fronts. That includes Russia’s “second invasion” against Ukraine in Vovchansk, 90 miles to the southeast, but more importantly from its ongoing Donbas offensive around the critical Chasiv Yar and on the road to Pokrovsk, where the Ukrainian army is clearly struggling
俄軍正在頓巴斯三個方向發動攻擊
(1) Pokrovsk (烏: 波克羅夫斯克 / 俄:紅軍村)
(2) Toretsk (烏:哲爾任斯克/ 俄: 托雷茨克) 仲有Niu York
(3) Chasiv Yar (察蘇夫雅 / 恰西夫亞爾)
3. 為和談創造條件
Ukrainian forces around Kursk might hope to extend their reach as far as occupying the nuclear power plant — a quid pro quo for Russia’s destructive occupation of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia plant in 2022.
4.嘗試令俄羅斯國內輿論產生混亂
Moscow hasn’t seen a metre of its own territory invaded by anybody since 1941. The images coming out of Kursk will shock the Russian public and the effect may be difficult for the Kremlin to manage.
最後係作者既比較個人看法
Unlike the Inchon landings in Korea, this counterpunch cannot turn the war around. Instead, its military success will be measured by how dearly the Ukrainians can make Moscow pay for the eventual recovery of their territory. If the struggle is long and the price is high, Ukrainian forces may feel a disproportionate benefit elsewhere.
Its political success will depend on how it plays on Moscow’s psychology; whether it creates some genuine doubt within Putin’s circle that the war really is worth its ever-increasing cost. The Kremlin’s initial reaction is to pass this attack off as only a “provocation”; a “terrorist attack”. But even to Russia’s state-controlled media, this looks like straightforward war.
Political leaders, often with no military experience, have to take big strategic decisions and military chiefs do their best to make them work. When Zelensky, the comedian turned politician, appeared on a Kyiv street just hours into the 2022 Russian invasion to declare that he was going nowhere and Ukraine would fight, he took the biggest strategic decision of his life. This week he took the second biggest — and probably the more risky.
