More than two weeks after Ukraine’s surprise invasion of Russia, Kremlin forces have slowed their advance, with the hardening front line in Russia’s Kursk region paving the way for the next phase of a battle with major political interests at stake for both sides.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has vowed a decisive response to the first invasion of Russian territory since World War II. But so far the response has focused on containing the incursion rather than reversing it, raising questions about what Russia’s depleted military is willing to risk to drive out the invaders – or whether it is even capable of doing so.
The unforeseen invasion of Kursk has exposed the Russian military’s persistent intelligence deficiencies, as well as Russia’s lack of combat-ready reserves in a war fought on a 1,200km front. Ukraine’s rapid successes have also upended global perceptions of Russia’s slow but inexorable march to victory in a war of attrition.
As Ukrainian troops advanced, videos of surrendering groups of Russian conscripts and border guards shocked many in Russia, shaking Putin’s claim that the war in Ukraine was being fought far from well-paid, determined volunteers.
Still, fighting in Russia’s border regions is still in its early stages, and the current pace of the Kursk invasion is giving Putin time to fine-tune his response. Rather than weakening the Kremlin’s power, the invasion could ultimately lead to more Russian citizens rallying behind the flag, analysts say.
The invasion of Kursk was “certainly a blow to the Kremlin’s reputation,” Russian political scientist Tatiana Stanovaya wrote on social media on Tuesday. But it was “unlikely to trigger a significant increase in social or political discontent among the population, nor will it lead to a rebellion among the elites.”
Militarily, Ukraine’s move has also created an opportunity from Russia’s perspective to further weaken its own limited forces and achieve successes on other fronts. This could turn a short-term political victory for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into a strategic defeat, Russian military analysts said.
( Kyiv and Moscow record battlefield successes as hundreds of Ukrainians flee eastern city as Russian advanceOpens in new window. )
These analysts point out that the Kursk operation was initially hailed as a brilliant military move, but may ultimately turn out to be a trap for the Ukrainian army.
“The invasion of Kursk merely expanded and prolonged a war of attrition in which Russia enjoys a resource advantage,” said Vasily Kashin, a political scientist at the Moscow State School of Economics who studies the political impact of Russia’s war.
Analysts say Russian generals may, among other things, try to create an overwhelming new force to destroy the Ukrainian bridgehead at Kursk or use their superiority in air and artillery weapons to gradually force Ukrainian troops to retreat.
Implementing these two strategies could take weeks or even months and would come at the expense of other fronts, reflecting the reality of a war in which neither side has enough resources to force the opponent to stop fighting.
Putin himself – who must weigh the political cost of losing Russian territory against the cost of drafting more troops – gave little indication of his strategy. On Tuesday, he toured a provincial candy factory and examined packages of sugar-free apple candy.
The calm of this scene stood in sharp contrast to the opening days of the Kursk invasion, when Putin taunted his subordinates and promised a decisive response.
Analysts are still studying how and why Russian forces were so unprepared on August 6 when undetected Ukrainian units poured across the border. They pushed aside the poorly equipped and inexperienced Russian conscripts sent to protect that sector of the front and advanced dozens of kilometers into Russian territory.
Some analysts believe the Russian command has not deployed significant troops to the area because it has no obvious military value there. “The attack fell flat,” said Dmitry Kuznets, a military analyst at the independent Russian news channel Meduza, which has operated from Latvia since it was banned by the Kremlin.
Another Russian military expert, Ruslan Pukhov, believes that Ukraine’s attempts at negotiation this summer may have caused the Russian leadership to become complacent.
After the first week of fighting, Ukraine claimed to control nearly 1,000 square kilometers of Russian territory and had taken hundreds of prisoners.
( Military analysis: Kursk invasion increases pressure on eastern UkraineOpens in new window. )
But as Ukraine’s supply lines became increasingly scarce and Russia brought in reinforcements, the pace of advance slowed significantly in the second week. Most military analysts believe that Ukraine no longer poses a threat to strategic targets, such as the Kursk nuclear power plant or the provincial capital.
These analysts believe that Russia has now concentrated enough forces in Kursk to largely corner the invaders in a trench warfare similar to that seen on other fronts of the war.
To repel the incursion, the Russian command relied on a combination of conscripts, volunteers from units formed in the rear at the time of the attack, and hand-picked experienced units from relatively quiet sectors of the front in Ukraine, Kuznets said.
For example, Russian Black Sea marines were moved to Kursk from Ukraine’s Kherson region, where the front line long followed the difficult-to-break Dnieper River, Kuznets said. Other parts of the original Kursk rapid reaction force came from Ukraine’s Zaporizhia and Kharkiv regions, where the front line has barely moved for weeks, Russian military analyst Valery Shiriaev told Newsroom, an independent Russian news channel.
Kuznets said that while Putin had time to plan the Kursk counteroffensive, he could not allow Russian territory to remain in enemy hands indefinitely without risking a nationalist backlash.
The Russian authorities have indirectly acknowledged that the fight to expel the Ukrainians could take weeks or even months. For example, they brought up the idea of providing financial assistance to refugees from the occupied parts of the Kursk region to settle in other parts of Russia.
“If Ukraine hoped that the shock of the attack would cause Russians to lose faith in the war, that has not happened,” Kashin said. “More likely, it will lead to anger and an acceptance that the war was inevitable.”
The Kursk Offensive revealed the shortcomings of the Russian strategy of waging a protracted war based primarily on the support of volunteers attracted by ever-increasing amounts of money.
This strategy allowed Russia to largely compensate for its losses in Ukraine without resorting to another unpopular round of mobilization. However, it also meant that the influx of volunteers was insufficient to create strategic reserves that could respond to a new crisis such as the invasion of Kursk.
In putting together a rapid reaction force, the Russian military command has so far left part of the front untouched. According to analysts, none of the units fighting in Kursk come from the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine, where Russia is conducting an offensive.
Since the invasion of Kursk, Russian forces have only accelerated their advance on the strategic Donetsk stronghold of Pokrovsk, and in recent days they have also scored successes in other areas of eastern Ukraine where the most brutal fighting of the war has taken place.
The Ukrainian government said it had withdrawn some units from the front to support the invasion of Kursk troops, possibly aiding the Russian advance.
( Kursk: How Ukrainian and Russian television presented different narratives of the situation on the groundOpens in new window. )
Although the long-term effects of the Kursk invasion are still unclear, it is clear that the front has expanded by another 100 kilometers or so in the foreseeable future, forcing both sides to deploy their limited forces even further.
Ultimately, the expansion of the war into new territories will, over time, favor the side with greater resources, Russian analysts said. With a population three times larger and a larger industrial base, that side remains Russia. – This article originally appeared in the New York Times
