Juan Pablo Duch
Correspondent
La Jornada Newspaper
Tuesday, November 12, 2024, p. 21
Moscow. Of pure invention and false information Yesterday the Kremlin described the alleged conversation between the president-elect of the United States, Donald Trump, and the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, after the former’s victory in the presidential elections on November 5.
This is the best example of the quality of information that is sometimes disseminated even by media with a good reputation. This news has nothing to do with reality.said the spokesman for the Russian presidency, Dimitri Peskov, alluding to the exclusive of the Washington Post which maintains, in its print edition yesterday, that Trump called Putin to recommend not escalating the war in Ukraine and reminding him that the United States has a large military presence in Europe.
The American newspaper maintains, citing anonymous sources, that Trump would have called Putin on November 7, hours before the head of the Kremlin intervened in the plenary session of the Valdai Debate Club, in the seaside resort of Sochi (Black Sea coast). , where he took the opportunity to congratulate him for having won the elections in the United States.
The office of the Russian presidency, which designs the Kremlin’s communication strategy, according to what is said in the Russian capital, usually adjusts to the rule that it should not be recognized – in the hypothetical case that there had been an unofficial – no official contact with Trump until he takes office on January 20.
For this reason, for the Kremlin, as stated on its website, the most recent telephone conversation between Putin and Trump took place in July 2020, before the magnate left the White House, and everything that is published is different from that. are fake news.
This clarification also served to deny the alleged seven calls that both leaders – already Trump as former president – had made during the period in which Joe Biden has been president of the United States, one more revelation, citing anonymous sources, from the famous journalist. Bob Woodward in his book War (War).
Trump’s re-election for a second term in the White House generates many expectations about the impact he could have on the war in Ukraine and, in the opinion of experts, it will depend on numerous factors, beyond what he may have said as a candidate. presidential (end the war in one dayfor example), of the distribution of the key positions of his team (National Security Advisor, Secretary of State, director of the Central Intelligence Agency, among others), where among the candidates for each position there are those who favor continuing to support kyiv and those who oppose it, and the pressure exerted by manufacturers interested in continuing to arm Ukraine.
Russia is also preparing to reach a stronger position on the war front when the time comes to start talking to Trump, just when the weather forecasts allow the snow to solidify from mid-January and the goals can begin to be fulfilled. which the Kremlin is said to consider condition sine qua non to start negotiating with Ukraine: expel kyiv’s troops from the Kursk region, internationally recognized as part of Russia.
To achieve this purpose, based on satellite images, groups of OSINT analysts (acronyms in English for those who work with intelligence from open sources), detect a possible concentration of 50 thousand Russian troops near combat zones that could be used as part of a new offensive both in Kursk and in the Zaporizhia region, without anyone – except the General Staff of the Russian army in charge of the special military operation– know which direction you plan to hit when the weather permits.
The commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian army, Oleksandr Syrskyi, took advantage of the appearance of these ominous signs in the Western media to send the message that the situation is extremely delicate and, by the way, remember that North Korean soldiers could be used in combatas a reminder to the United States and its allies of how catastrophic it would be to cease arms supplies to Ukraine on the eve of Russia launching another offensive.
Meanwhile, the offensive that, at least since last spring, allowed Moscow release –occupysays Kiev – territory in Donbas (Donietsk and Lugansk) may be finished because the rains are turning the terrain into a quagmire and it is very difficult to advance, especially with tanks, artillery and other types of heavy weapons.
The combat will be with drones
That is why exchanges of atrocious attacks with drones, guided bombs, artillery projectiles and missiles will now predominate on both sides without it being possible to say at this point who is responding to an enemy blow or, on the contrary, within the logic of the vicious circle of war, only adds fuel to the fire.
Until mid-January there will continue to be intense fighting in some localities, even street by street, in places like Kurajove, but we must keep in mind that everything that Russia has achieved with this offensive is equivalent, according to calculations by Yuri Fiodorov and other scholars of this war, to 10 percent of Donbas territory that Russian troops have yet to release to comply with the order that Putin gave, in February 2022, to reach the administrative limits that Donietsk and Lugansk had in 2014.