It's Vladimir Putin's war - or at least that's how the West characterizes it. The Russian president not only made the decision to attack Ukraine, but, according to Western military officials, he is participating in battlefield decision-making "at the level of a colonel or brigadier" as the offensive in Donbas in eastern Ukraine continues.
In part, this observation is not particularly surprising. It would be hard to believe any idea that the Russian president - as commander-in-chief - would not be involved in the battle plans, especially since the war in Ukraine has gone badly. Autocratic regimes usually do not favor military decentralization.
However, it also comes at a time of humiliating military failure. The result of last Sunday's attempted encirclement of Ukrainian forces was nearly 500 killed and the loss of more than 70 armored vehicles in a disastrous attempt to cross the Seversky Donets River, which occurred, according to Western sources, in broad daylight.
Therefore, if the claims of the West are to be believed, it can be concluded that Putin approved that battle plan. Decision-making at the "colonel or brigadier level" implies brigade-level command of two or more battalions, a movement of 1.500 or more troops, which is exactly the kind of force that tried and failed to cross the strategic river.
Professor Sir Lawrence Friedman of King's College London finds credible the military's account of Putin's level of involvement: "Putin rushed the military operation, first by giving very little notice that he was going to attack, and then by pushing hard for quick victories." This is especially the problem of the second phase of the war, in Donbass.
The claims about Putin bring to mind the idea of a political leader who is impatient with or no longer trusts his generals, most notably the fall of Adolf Hitler, who in the later stages of World War II, as described by biographer Ian Kershaw, refused to accept his generals' calls for a tactical retreat in the east and insisted on overly optimistic counter-offensives like in the Ardennes in 1944/45.
However, there are many other examples. In the early stages of the Vietnam War, US President Lyndon Johnson and his administration began a bombing campaign against communist North Vietnam in 1965, which defined targets that could be attacked to avoid offending China or Soviet Russia. That confused strategy was an attempt to break Hanoi's resolve by bombing smaller targets from the air, and a step in an escalating war that the US ultimately lost.
On the eve of the Iraq war, the country's dictator Saddam Hussein decided that the country's air force should play no role in the war, according to a report published in Foreign Affairs three years after the war. The Iraqi Air Force was believed to be no match for the Western invaders - and best saved for a post-war future under his leadership, which did not happen after the capture of Baghdad.
However, despite all the talk of interference, the relationship between the political leadership and the military command is always complex and at times stressful. Friedman says that military decisions during war are "intensely political" and that it is up to political leaders to "set goals, push higher commanders, ask questions."
The goal, Friedman argues, is to ensure that there is a "dialogue between politicians and the military" and that leaders don't override legitimate objections or try to micromanage battle plans when they should be concentrating on broader diplomatic or political strategies.
For Putin, as the war in Ukraine approaches its twelfth week, the question is whether the Russian leader has time to focus on all that lies ahead if he is drawn into the tactical decision-making of the stalled Donbass offensive - and the influence that would further military failures had on his position.
In the past few days, some Russian military bloggers and experts have begun to question that strategy. One well-known Russian blogger, who uses the pseudonym Vladlen Tatarzky, wrote on the Telegram channel: "Until we find out the name of the 'military genius' who set up a battalion tactical group by the river, and until he publicly answers for it, there will never be reforms in the army."
It turns out that the author may have been criticizing Putin himself.
Prepared by: A Šofranac
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