In his letter to the president of the Russian Federation, the president of Ukraine asks how much additional suffering does the hope of future victory justify? Has Vladimir Putin stopped to reflect on this terrible and crucial question? Will Putin take over the consequences of his sick stubbornness in forcibly occupying Ukrainian territory, despite the fact that every month Russia suffers 30,000 casualties, most of them fatal, in a carnage that has no precedent?
Vladimir Putin The war breaks out at 6:00 in the morning Ukrainian time on Thursday, February 24, 2022, with the declared objective that its “Special Military Operation” would allow it to take over Ukraine in just 48 or 72 hours. Fresh in his mind was the invasion he ordered in 2014, in which he seized Crimea without resistance or protests from anyone.
Airborne troops arrived in kyiv, and some special commandos loitered in the vicinity of the government buildings area with strict orders to kill President Volodymyr Zelensky and his ministers. Planes and helicopters flew over the capital while a huge convoy entered Ukrainian territory.
In towns adjacent to the capital, such as Bucha, runaway Russian troops committed countless torture, executions without trial, non-selective attacks, deprivation of liberty, attacks against civilians, sexual violence and displacement of children and civilians, until they were expelled from the national territory.
Putin’s immediate plan failed, and it has been almost four and a half years of war, with an enormous cost for Ukraine, and even greater, superlative, for Russian society. Despite the shipwreck, the Russian president has continued with the war at a cost that is already endangering the national economy, and threatens catastrophic consequences for the national demographic, given the extremely high number of casualties, unlike any war in the modern history of humanity.
Will Putin assume the consequences of his sick determination to take Ukraine even though he has not been able to achieve it in more than four years of war? How long will you continue to expose Russian youth to three tens of thousands of monthly casualties? Zelensky’s question in his letter is accurate.
From another angle, Zelensky tells Putin that “The war must end through direct negotiations before it continues to produce more human, economic and political losses,” and challenges him to set a date for a meeting in countries other than Russia or Ukraine.
The president of Ukraine recalls in his letter that what led Putin to the invasion was a personal decision – delusions of grandeur, being like Peter the Great – and not the geopolitics of the North Atlantic Organization (NATO). Furthermore, it shows that the Russian population would be showing fatigue in the face of the war due to: inflation, restrictions, mobilizations, insecurity and lack of prospects for its completion.
Zelensky points out that Russia is increasingly dependent on allies such as China and North Korea and faces international sanctions. On the other hand, it shows that Russia underestimated Ukraine’s capacity for resistance. This erroneous calculation is costing the population of the Russian Federation very expensive.
Although Ukraine has regained modest amounts of territory in recent weeks, the Ukrainian president indicates that neither country is achieving a decisive military victory. In other words, Russia is stuck, and on some fronts, in small setbacks. Prolonged attrition is turning negotiation into a necessity rather than a concession.
Consequently, Zelensky calls on Putin to negotiate peace between the two, with the participation of third-party guarantors, a ceasefire, exchange of prisoners (one by one) and search for security guarantees. In short, the message is to move from the language of confrontation to one of negotiation.
The author of the letter affirms that history will judge the decisions made during the war, and that current events will have lasting consequences for both peoples, so, although decisions have been made with the present in mind, the future evaluates them in light of their long-term results.
Zelensky regrets in his letter that the war has definitively broken the previous long-standing relationship between both countries, and in several regions with very closely related communities. Irreversible political, social and cultural consequences are already being seen.
It is a sensible letter, from a person of the people, sincere, without manipulation or politicking, that puts things in their true place, and that, in the current circumstances, is a lifeline so that Putin can come out less upset from this conflict that is prolonging and costing him so much.
