MOSCOW – Russian President Vladimir Putin used his annual New Year’s speech to justify Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, slamming the West over its alleged attempts to use the conflict to divide Russia in a speech apparently aimed at blunting his resolve to signal the war to prolong war.
Mr Putin described 2022 as marked by “difficult but necessary decisions” to secure Russia’s full independence and, he said, strengthen the cohesion of Russian society, which many Kremlin supporters say is undermined by Western influence would.
“It was a year of really decisive, fateful events,” the Kremlin leader said in a remark recorded during a visit to the command of the Southern Military District’s staff headquarters in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don on Saturday. “They have become the border that lays the foundation for our common future, our true independence. That is what we are fighting for today, for the protection of our people in our own historical areas, in the new regions of the Russian Federation,” he said.
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Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February sparked the largest land war in Europe since World War II. The campaign, which Putin said was launched to prevent the West from attracting the former Soviet republic, has claimed the lives of thousands of civilians, forced millions of Ukrainians to flee and unleashed a raft of international sanctions on Russia’s economy. Tens of thousands of Russian and Ukrainian soldiers were slaughtered, prompting Putin to initiate the mobilization of some 300,000 reservists in September to offset Moscow’s mounting battlefield losses.
Mr Putin has also hinted at escalating the war through the use of nuclear weapons and portraying the struggle as an existential struggle against what he calls Western imperialism, while positioning himself as a defender of traditional values.
“The moral, historical truth is on our side,” Putin said in his address.
At the start of the war, Mr Putin was confident his army could win a quick victory, analysts said. But after fierce resistance from Ukrainian forces, Russian military commanders abandoned their initial goal of quickly capturing Kyiv in order to gain territories in eastern and southern Ukraine.
A hotel partially destroyed by an airstrike in the center of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on Saturday.
Photo: Sergei Supinsky/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Senior Russian officials have attributed Ukraine’s resilience to a flood of funding and military support from the West, particularly the US, which has deployed advanced Himars missile launchers to push back Russian forces in many areas.
Earlier this month, the Biden administration announced a nearly $2 billion arms package for Ukraine that includes, for the first time, a Patriot air defense system to help Kyiv defend against the barrage of ballistic and cruise missiles it has been targeting Russia has unleashed on the country’s power grid and power plants, among other strategic goals.
In his New Year’s address, Mr Putin accused the West of deceiving the West about its intentions to help secure peace in Ukraine’s eastern Donbass region, which had been mired in a slow-burning conflict for eight years prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Instead, “the West lied about peace while preparing for aggression,” he said. “They are cynically using Ukraine and its people to weaken and divide Russia. We have never allowed anyone to do this, and we will not allow it in the future,” he said.
But the conflict has helped strengthen Russian society, Putin said, winning the support of loyal Russians — while others, including many young military-age professionals, fled the country to avoid conscription.
A resident of Kyiv on Saturday cleaned up his home in an apartment building damaged by rocket attacks.
Photo: Sergei Chuzavkov/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Passengers on a bus in the southern Ukrainian city of Mykolayiv during a power outage after a Russian missile attack on Saturday.
Photo: Dimitar Dilkoff/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
“This is the year that put many things in their place, clearly separated courage and heroism from treason and cowardice, and showed that there is no higher power than love of family and friends, loyalty to friends and comrades-in-arms, and devotion to own fatherland,” he said.
Nevertheless, the economic costs are increasing. Russia’s central bank said earlier this month it was concerned that the diversion of labor and resources to support the campaign in Ukraine could trigger a fresh spike in inflation next year after it was largely contained. In November, Russia’s Ministry of Economic Development said the economy contracted 5% year-on-year in September and 4.4% in the third quarter compared to the same period last year.
In his New Year’s address, Mr Putin downplayed the implications of Russia “living under sanctions” and insisted the country had defied those in the West who “expected the complete destruction of our industry, finance and transportation,” he said he. In recent months, the Kremlin has also sought to portray Russia as a bulwark against supposedly liberal elites in the West intent on dominating the rest of the world. Mr Putin has strengthened ties with countries such as Belarus, Iran and China, whose President Xi Jinping has said he is ready to work with Moscow to protect their sovereignty.
Significantly, analysts said, there were no signs of an imminent end to the war in Ukraine, and Putin’s New Year’s speech did not change the outlook.
The Kremlin has indicated its willingness to talk, but has already dismissed a plan by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for Russia’s withdrawal, saying that Russian-held territory must remain under Moscow’s control.
“There is a feeling that not only will it not be possible to get out of the war, but that in principle there is no such option,” says Tatiana Stanovaya, founder of R. Politik, which describes itself as an independent company for called political analysis. wrote on Telegram.
On Saturday, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu underscored Moscow’s refusal to back down.
“Our victory, like the New Year, is inevitable,” he said in his own New Year’s wishes to the military.
Russian military on Red Square in Moscow on New Year’s Eve.
Photo: Alexander Zemlianichenko/Associated Press
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