How Ukraine Put Putin on the Defensive
KHARKIV — According to President Vladimir Putin, Russia is not at war.
So it may have been a surprise to many Russians living near the Ukrainian border when they were invaded by foreign soldiers.
“Dear Vladimir Vladimirovitch [Putin], we the residents of the Russian Federation, Kursk Oblast, Sudzhansky District, we are contacting you,” pleads a middle-aged woman standing amid a crowd of dozens of civilians, in a video circulating on Russian social media. “On the 6th, foreign troops with NATO equipment entered our land… Our relatives, husbands and neighbors are defending Donbas [in Ukraine]. We lost our lands, we lost our homes. Please help us… Please send someone… Please help us get our lands back.”
In a surprise attack begun in the early hours of Aug. 6, Ukrainian forces crossed the border and seized territory in Kursk Oblast — the first time Russian land has been occupied by a foreign army since World War II.
For months, Russia has been inching forward across eastern Ukraine in what it calls a “special military operation,” sacrificing tens of thousands of soldiers to grind out territorial gains against their outnumbered foes. Meanwhile, far from the frontlines, daily life for Ukrainians has become ever harder as the Kremlin’s missiles, bombs, and drones target infrastructure, while Kyiv mobilizes tens of thousands of additional soldiers and cracks down on those seeking to dodge the draft.
But war by any name is an unpredictable beast. Few expected Ukraine had the ability or desire to invade Russia — apparently not even Moscow.
