It was brave of the President of the United States to fly into a war zone just to pass more emphatically the message that the United States, and with it the West, stood by Ukraine, a country ravaged by an unjust war. The risks of a POTUS travelling to a country suffering an invasion were enormous. Mr Joe Biden doing so in a lengthy 10-hour train ride from the Polish border adds to the signalling the free world is against this war that has gone on for a year and is seemingly without end.
Many of the Russian President Vladimir Putin’s original objectives in ordering the invasion that began on February 24, 2022, are unmet. A series of military setbacks has only succeeded in creating doubts about the very capabilities of the Russian martial might. And yet there has only been more of the imperialist mindset as reflected in Mr Putin’s speech on the eve of the war anniversary. It appears nothing that has happened in a year may help him change his mind and stop chasing an illogical revanchist dream of restoring a great Russian empire.
The world has suffered, but none more than the Ukrainians as their country has been pummelled by missiles of modern warfare. Even the weapons that the US and major Western and Nato allies supplied to help keep the Russians at bay have just about aided Ukraine’s bravery in standing up to its eastern neighbour.
The signs are that a new Russian spring offensive will pour more than three lakh additional soldiers and rockets into the war though the Russians may have lost about two lakh soldiers already.
The Russian supremo Putin has sold the idea of fighting “Natoism” as an existential threat so well to his captive domestic audience that he is even more of a dominant national hero now than a year ago. It is still believed that India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi or Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan can help influence Mr Putin to give up his misadventure and end the agony of the economic tailspin the world has been put into since the invasion began. Sadly, there will only be more fateful fighting days as even more sophisticated Western weapons shore up Ukrainian defence against an unceasing Russian aggression.
