Putin, After a Year of Bucking the West, Takes Control of Maryinka and Counts His Other Gains

On Christmas Day one of the world’s authoritarians, President Putin, received a small gift — news that Russ forces had taken control of Maryinka, a town in eastern Ukraine just west of Donetsk and due north of Mariupol, the Ukrainian city the Russians flattened in 2022. If Mr. Putin hoped the West would forget about the calamity that he authored there, he would be right. Those who thought this year would mark Mad Vlad’s death spiral must now be either sorely disappointed or close to delusional. His grip on the Kremlin is tighter and his resolve on Ukraine firmer than a year ago. Against all odds, Mr. Putin has either managed to ensure that Moscow is calling the shots or to manufacture the appearance that he is doing so. At risk of sounding cynical at Yuletide, every trend or incident that Moscow chalks up as a win is a loss for America, and a portion of this can be ascribed to President Biden. How else to account for the fact that, say, an enterprising young correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, Evan Gershkovich, has now spent more than 260 grim days in a Russian prison?Mr. Putin has paid no real price for his systematic violation of basic human rights. The main opponent of his regime, Alexei Navalny, is not only imprisoned on bogus charges, but has been moved to a remote penal colony north of the Arctic Circle — an act of particular cruelty even by Mr. Putin’s low standards. Rumors of the Russian president’s alleged ill health that circulated on and off at the beginning of 2023 seem to have petered out and are unlikely to reappear as the new year begins. At 71, Mr. Putin is no spring chicken, but neither is he without a good deal of fight.As the wishful thinking about illness taking him down dissipated, there was more hope from the West that insubordination might do the trick, but it did not. The Wagner group’s insurrection that started on June 23 seemed capable of becoming a coup d’état at first but quickly foundered. Two months later Wagner’s chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin, was killed in an “accidental” plane crash.By the second half of 2023 the Ukrainian frontlines more or less stabilized to attritional fighting in the trenches. Kyiv’s persistent issues of manpower and corruption notwithstanding, the stark fact is that Russia is once again favored to win, or at least not lose, in the long term simply on account of its military and demographic superiority.Furthermore, sanctions against the aggressor never had the effects that some in the West hoped for — naively, given that sanctions have not even eradicated authoritarian regimes in countries much smaller and crazier like Cuba, North Korea, and Iran. No one should underestimate Beijing’s economic support for Moscow. Russia could eventually see itself transformed into a vassal state colonized by Red China, which currently has a GDP that is 10 times higher than Russia’s. For now, though, the Western goods in short supply on Russian store shelves are simply being replaced by cheaper Chinese ones.Other arrows in Mr. Putin’s quiver this year come in the form of the decisions by a member of the North Atlantic Treaty, Turkey, as well as by India, the Arab world, and almost the entire “global south” to not apply American and EU sanctions to Moscow. That reality is at odds with the narrative of isolation promulgated by Department of State stalwarts like Victoria Nuland and Secretary Blinken. America’s military aid, in the meantime, has, with few exceptions, always been a step behind, as well as many months late, when it comes to providing the Ukrainians with the advanced weaponry that can make a difference in the field. As for the Europeans, they have not even begun to rebuild their deliberately reduced armed forces after years of post-Cold War languor. That President Trump has been booted from the ballot in Colorado will not change many Europeans’ views of American politics, at least not in the early days of 2024. Mr. Trump’s strength in the polls has in effect conferred on certain parties on both sides of the Atlantic a gleaming alibi.In a year’s time America could fall back on a more isolationist foreign policy and see the beginnings of efforts to abandon Kyiv to its fate. Add to that political dissent within Ukraine ahead of eventual presidential elections. Washington and the EU have told President Zelensky that Ukraine would at some point be admitted to the North Atlantic Treaty, but gave no date. That meant, in effect, NATO does not want to integrate a new member while that state is at war, because then it would be obliged to fight to defend it. That is catnip to the Kremlin, essentially delegating the decision on NATO membership to Moscow.Following the outbreak of war in the Middle East this October, President Putin made working visits to Saudi Arabia and the UAE. He will greet the new year a far less isolated figure than he was a year ago. In 2024, Russia, as a member of the expanded oil cartel OPEC+, could secure its place as a contender in the planet’s energy economy.

Putin, After a Year of Bucking the West, Takes Control of Maryinka and Counts His Other Gains

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