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PUTIN HAS PUT HIMSELF AT RISK
Russia this week stepped up its crackdown on protests against President Vladimir Putin's order for a "partial mobilization" to bolster his war effort in Ukraine. Putin last week ordered 300,000 military reserves onto active-duty status, prompting crowds to pour into the streets of Moscow and other cities, with many chanting, "Send Putin to the trenches!" and "Let our children live!" There were 17 attacks on conscription centers, including one in Siberia where a young man who was upset his friend had been drafted allegedly shot and gravely wounded a chief recruiter. Young men desperately trying to avoid conscription rushed to the border or to board planes to get out of the country.
The unpopular mobilization came after a Ukrainian counteroffensive forced Russian troops into an embarrassing retreat from parts of eastern Ukraine they seized early in the war. Western officials say Russia has suffered a staggering 70,000 to 80,000 casualties since invading Ukraine in February. Russian media reports have said young men who have never served in the military, not just reservists, now are being drafted, as are some men beyond draft age, fueling suspicions that Putin is trying to mobilize more than a million new soldiers. The Kremlin denies that, but the draft is even upsetting some Putin allies. "They're infuriating people, as if on purpose, as if out of spite," Margarita Simonyan, editor in chief of state-backed RT media outlet, told Radio Free Europe. Has Putin miscalculated so badly that his political survival is at risk?
PUTIN HAS PUT HIMSELF AT RISK
Vladimir Putin's effort "to mobilize Russian men to fight has turned into a debacle," says The Washington Post in an editorial. After managing to keep the Russian public calm about his unprovoked war "through a combination of propaganda, lies, censorship, and harsh punishment of criticism and dissent," Putin has shattered the quiet with his unpopular mobilization, sending young men dashing for the exits and awakening a suddenly angry population.
"Behind the upheaval is a deeper fissure." Putin for years could do what he wanted thanks to an unspoken agreement under which "people agreed to stay out of politics in exchange for the government not interfering in their daily lives." After the war started, most Russians carried on as before, ignoring the invasion as the casualties and economic costs mounted. Now, as sociologist Greg Yudin has noted, "Russians are quickly snapping out of lethargy and asking questions that they hadn't for a long time." This "might weaken" Putin just when he needs the public on his side to pull off his "desperate grab for cannon fodder" as his war effort falters.
PUTIN HAS ANGERED ALLIES AS WELL AS CRITICS
Putin has provoked increasing pressure from all sides in Russia, say Michael Kimmage and Maria Lipman in Foreign Policy. There are the war opponents, of course, but Putin also getting pushback "from those dismayed by the military's startling incompetence and seeming lack of determination. The first group has almost no political power. The second, however, has the potential to coalesce into a challenge to Putin" from even some of his "most ardent supporters."
The Week
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