As Moscow Strikes Odessa, It Also Tightens Grip on Mariupol

August is here and that means holiday time for many in Europe, but President Putin is taking no vacation from his unrelenting assault on Ukraine. Parts of the strategic port of Odessa, which early in Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine girded for battle but have so far largely avoided it, came under renewed fire overnight. Russian forces struck port infrastructure with Iranian-made Shahed drones, sparking a blaze at grain export facilities and damaging a grain elevator. Following the Russian strongman’s breaking off a deal that allowed Ukraine to safely export grain via Odessa, Russia has trained its sights on the city, launching drones and missiles at the region’s river ports as well the storied port itself. So much for Mr. Putin’s respect for the tranquility of a city for which he is known to have some attachment on account of its historical significance. While the latest drone strikes targeted Odessa’s industrial infrastructure, the world knows that for Russia nothing is off limits. Kyiv remains vulnerable to attack and indeed, 10 Shahed drones were fired at the capital overnight. All were intercepted. Yet while Russia ramps up its torment of Odessa, it is also tightening its grip on a Black Sea port farther east that it practically destroyed early on in the invasion: Mariupol. By late May 2022 Russia had secured total control over that once thriving city on the north coast of the Sea of Azov, but only by laying waste to as much as 90 percent of it. Its pre-invasion population of more than 400,000 has by now shrunk to 100,000. The city, or what is left of it after the intense Russian bombardment, has been described by eyewitnesses as similar to Guernica or Aleppo. Simply leaving the city behind as a pile of rubble, though, was never in Russia’s plans.When drone strikes happen just about anywhere, whether at Odessa or Moscow, they tend to capture the media’s attention. Yet a quieter part of the dark saga of Russia’s war is that it is slowly but surely transforming Mariupol, once a thriving commercial hub, into a military and logistics hub that Moscow needs to solidify its hold on the Donetsk region and the land bridge to occupied Crimea.An advisor to Mariupol’s mayor said via a Telegram post on Tuesday that “another large transfer of manpower and ammunition through Mariupol in the direction of Berdiansk” had been observed, including “more than 20 trucks and engineering vehicles in columns.”Berdiansk is a port city southwest of Mariupol in the Zaporizhzhia region. It was captured by the Russian invaders early on in the invasion. The movement of men and material in that direction demonstrates how Russia is consolidating its hold on that portion of Ukraine’s southern coastal area, and with considerable impunity. Ukrainian sources also have reported that this week, for the first time this year, a Russian ship sailed from Mariupol laden with pirated Ukrainian steel rebar. Prior to the invasion, a robust metallurgy industry in the Donetsk region turned out more than 3.5 thousand tons of rebar in a single shift. Where Russia was shipping the looted steel and for what purpose was not immediately clear. The occupying forces are reportedly preparing a second ship for departure from Mariupol, presumably with more stolen goods on board. There are very few, if any, journalists at Mariupol, making it difficult if not impossible to corroborate Ukrainian claims. But Russia is up to no good there as elsewhere, clearly if surreptitiously marking out what it mistakenly perceives as its rightful territory. This slow, undramatic process is unfolding at the same time as Ukraine’s counteroffensive stalls, with only one village recaptured so far, according to multiple accounts. Kyiv’s reserves of manpower are limited and the risk of stalemate is in effect already here. Assault columns have arrived at locations near many of Russia’s hastily thrown up fortifications, where the so-called dragon’s teeth are planted in the ground. But there is essentially nothing new on the critical Zaporizhzhia front. That is what makes Russia’s ongoing plunder of Ukraine’s resources all the more troubling. President Zelensky says he will take the war to Russia while President Putin is still getting away with anything he can. The dark fate of Mariupol is a cautionary tale of where this war might be headed — especially as President Biden, not for the first time at important moments, elects to hit the beach.

As Moscow Strikes Odessa, It Also Tightens Grip on Mariupol

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