Incursion into Russian territory “Kursk”: Desperate Ukraine’s dangerous “gamble”

By E. Hellenbroich

The well-known German General Erich Vad (former military consultant of Chancellor A. Merkel who works today as consultant and published in May 2024 a book under the title “Abschreckend oder Erschreckend”- Deterrent or Scary, Europe without Security) gave a quite sober assessment to the publishing house of his book, “Westend” by analyzing of what had happened with the Ukraine Kursk incursion that was launched August 5/ 6. In contrast to the official line which is spread up to this day by the German, European and US press, whereby the Kursk operation came as “surprise” to everybody, which is related to a chorus of voices of so called military experts in Germany like for example, Roderich Kiesewetter (MdB, CDU) who demanded more heavy weapons to be sent to Ukraine-, Geneal Vad qualified the Kursk incursion as a dangerous “explosive” operation that in reality is leading nowhere on the ground, except producing a huge media hype. In Italy, where the author had the chance to read during 2 weeks of August on a day-to-day basis some of the Italian press, the general line about Kursk were lies and fake news ranging from talk about “Putin the Russian Tsar” who tries to extend his empire, to the line that it’s time to “humiliate Russia and his tsar.” The whole drum beat around Kursk served as appropriate background to “stage” the “Democratic National Convention” in Chicago (August 19- 22) where in a “Hollywood” like show Biden’s Vice-President Kamala Harris got elected as presidential candidate.

The German General Vad pointed to the obvious military dilemma which Ukraine is facing: the 1200 km frontline and the fact that the Ukraine military was still far away from the city of Kursk. Despite their bragging about all the villages which they occupied, he stated, that the entire operation “is not sustainable”. “It’s just like a pin-prick operation.”  From a Ukrainian perspective the operation has a “symbolic” value, since “nobody talks anymore about the desolate situation in Donbass.” Its rather intended as a “political signal.” Being asked to what extent NATO was engaged in the operation, Vad only very generally answered, emphasizing that the Western intent is to strike on Russian soil with western weapons so as to give  a signal and that “Volodimir Zelenskyy wants to extend the war further, similar to some German politicians, who want the war to be carried further into Russia…. Yet the whole thing has no military value!”

On the background of the fact that in the last two weeks as “Westend” noted, 1000ds of soldiers have again died in this operation and tens of thousands of Russian citizens have been evacuated within two weeks, Vad stated emphatically that there is “not going to be any military solution. All you can do is talk. What you need is a “real policy”, there is no military solution. “What is going on in the region of Kursk militarily does not make any sense. 1000ds have fallen dead and others fled.” The discussion about it “reminds me the debate about ‘Wunderwaffen’ that were used in the German ‘Ardennes Offensive’ at the end of World War II, that however ended fatally and brought the war to an end.”

In respect to Europe Gen. Vad deeply regretted that so far not a single peace proposal had been made by the EU, except proposals coming from the Pope and from Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban, who did a remarkable operation. If Trump were to be elected as next US president and not Kamala Harris, Vad was reasoning that while Trump is a very erratic character, it could be a signal that the whole “Western policy toward Russia has become discredited.” And referring to his new book he argued that Europe, while being a partner of the US, has to “define its own sovereign security interests.” He reminded however that “we conduct a war in Ukraine which is operationally “directed from the US HQ in Wiesbaden!  This is not going to lead to a solution which is ‘political’. And lastly no matter what will happen Russia will never disappear from the map.”

Shift from symmetric to asymmetric warfare

The picture gets more complete if one looks at a discussion that Dr. Pascal Lottaz (“Neutrality Studies”) had with the American political scientist and Russian expert Prof. Michael Rossi from the Rutgers University (New Jersey), who qualified the Ukraine incursion into Kursk as a “suicidal act.” According to him the objective of Ukraine was to send its military to occupy the Kursk nuclear power plant (near the city Kurchatov) and use this as a bargaining chip. He characterized the whole operation as a “complete gamble”, while the Russian forces try to encircle and isolate them. There is also no doubt that the Ukrainians made the biggest losses losing 1500 troops (the Russian Ministry of Defense as of Aug 22^nd speaks about 4400 dead and wounded Ukrainian soldiers and major material losses including Himars, armored vehicles and dozens of tanks). At the same time the Ukrainians falsely calculated that the Russians would pull back some of their troops from Donbass, which didn’t happen on any large scale. The Ukrainians, in order to launch this operation, pulled elite fighters away from Donbass which by now is almost completely occupied by Russia, that in the last days has been making inroads into the important logistical hub Pokrovsk where 1000ds of Ukrainian citizens are being evacuated.

Rossi pointed out that it seems that the Ukrainians “wanted to boost their own morale and have a public relations effect and that they want to show we ‘still can do it. We still can humiliate Putin and his military entourage.’ He emphasized that we may see operations of a similar kind in places such as Belgorod, Rostow, Kaliningrad and other places, i.e.  asymmetric warfare operations with the objective to “keep the momentum”, while on the ground there is not going to be any change in Donbass. (More than a year ago Jacques Baud -former Swiss army colonel and intelligence specialist- presented in an interview some facts concerning plans that had been elaborated by the Ukraine military chief of intelligence Budanow who had outlined a plan for asymmetric warfare to be carried into in several Russian border regions including Kursk, Rostow et cetera)

Rossi also underlined that the Russian peace proposal that was presented 6 weeks ago by Putin at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is “gone.” The West ignores Putin as an invader with the delusion of grandeur and the fatal mistake, which US neocons still make, is that they want to use Ukraine to bleed Russia. They still think that Russia is the S.U. Russia is however not bleeding dry as the economic development of its war economy fully goes ahead and more and more volunteers are signing up. According to Rossi the US and NATO basically would like to “continue the whole thing ad infinitum since there is not so much which they would lose, they rather think in terms of Reagans 1980ies Russia policy, whereby they would have to “outspend Russia”, but this won’t happen because in between Ukraine will be turned into a “rubble field.” Rossi pointed to the “endless” series of US instigated wars that had failed in the last decades, including Vietnam, Afghanistan, then Ukraine, and then recently the shift to the Mideast. The real problem according to him is that the “US can’t admit defeat, they will just shift gears” (!) and play another conflict. This is deeply rooted in the American liberalism. There is this messianic crusading zeal to prevent any other hegemon rival like Russia or China ….”

Playing with the fire of nuclear escalation

There have been several US analysts, including former US intelligence officials like Col Douglas MacGregor, the academician Dr Gilbert Doctorow et al, who in the last days kept peddling the line that the Kursk operation had been planned as a special operation between the Ukrainian and US /GB military for a while. They claim that up to 2000 people from NATO i.e. US, GB and Poland were part of the operation on the ground and had been instrumental in training the Ukrainian incursion force while also giving the technology and reconnaissance. It remains a fact however that a lot of military equipment was destroyed within the last two weeks and that Russia is still carefully assessing what has happened on the ground.

Further escalation is not ruled out by such US experts it seems, even at some points that they would like to see an escalation and portray Russia as losing nerves and looking as resort to the use of nuclear response.

Lavrov: Kursk incursion to be examined

On August 20 there was a YouTube featuring British expert Alexander Mercouris who gives regular evaluations about the military situation on the ground in the Ukraine and now Kursk battlefield. He made reference to an interesting interview that had been given by Russian Foreign Minister S. Lavrov during President Putin’s highly significant state visit to Baku (Azerbaijan) August 19^th . (Aside several agreements in the economic and energy field President Aliyev made a demand for Azerbaijan to become member of BRICS.)

Lavrov in the interview with the well- known journalist Pavel Zarubin stated that – while Russia is still carefully assessing a recently published WAPO article by Yves Smith- that “recently there have been rumors about clandestine combats including preparations for a Qatar mediated energy deal between Ukraine and Russia, also claims that they would mediate on food security.” It stems from the Bürgenstock conference gathering several weeks ago which had three working groups: on energy, food, and humanitarian prisoner exchange. “However, any suggestion that Russia might be invited to participate is sheer nonsense,” Lavrov said. “The Bürgenstock process is inacceptable to Russia, as its sole purpose is to advance an ultimatum to Russia. Talks between Russia and Ukraine -direct and indirect- are completely inacceptable and anything taking place within the context of the so-called peace conference is unacceptable. Russia sees the entering into such discussion as a trap, an ultimatum by Zelenskyy.”

According to Mercouris the WAPO story written by Yves Smith was simply a made up and misleading story.  In quotes given by the Russian press about Lavrov’s Zarubin interview one could read Lavrov being asked: “What do you think about the West’s rhetoric and stance on the situation of our border regions? They are denying that they knew about it?” stating in response: “The Defense Ministry leadership assesses the military situation and reports to President Vladimir Putin several times a day. (…) As for the political side, it’s clear that the cap fits and they should long be wearing it. The evolution from ‘we have nothing to do with it and no one asked us’ to ‘they asked us but we said no’ and ‘Zaluzhnyi disobeyed’ is just ridiculous. Everyone is perfectly aware that Volodimir Zelenskyy would never have dared to do this, the decision was certainly his.

“Now he boasts that he is creating a buffer zone and damaging the Russian state. He would not have dared it unless he had orders from the United States. There is also no doubt that Washington is behind the North Stream explosions, which cut Europe of from Russian fuel and consequently a stable foundation for economic growth. For us this picture is crystal clear. For all their dodging, the truth is obvious and known to all objective and unbiased observers.” (One should keep in mind that simultaneous to all this there was a huge hype in the German press alleging that the North Stream pipeline had been exploded by some Ukrainian divers hiding in Germany; another “false flag” operation which was strongly denounced by the Russian UN vice ambassador two days ago as a despicable operation since it cuts out the UN, while at the same time Germany has never responded to Russia’s demands to share facts.)

So Lavrov speaking about careful assessment hints to the fact that proofs will come out that may prove that the US was fully involved in Ukraine’s special operation in Kursk with the aim to seize the Kursk NPP and engage in nuclear terrorism.

According to Mercouris there was a report from the Russian Group of Forces North very much corroborated by the Russia daily “Ministry of Defense reports” that the fight in Kursk remains confined to what it had been days before.

The whole operation stands in dire contrast to the situation on the ground in the area of Donetsk: It was reported by Mercouris that the city of New York, was fully captured by the Russian military. Russian forces also broke into Toretsk and it will probably take some weeks of fighting. Meanwhile the Ukrainians ordered civilians in Pokrovsk to evacuate within next two weeks (80.000).

Incidentally in Komsomolskaya Pravda August 22nd former Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Asarow spoke about the accelerated dying of the Ukrainian state: “Ukraine is a dying country,” he stated, “it began to die after the policy that was planned after the coup in 2014. (…) We talk about the destruction of all Russian including language and economy.” He underlined that the population of Ukraine shrank from 45 million to 17 million and that there are only few young men, the ones above 40 years, double the number of young men and that the birth rate has halved.”

What will be strategically important to watch in order to fully assess what’s going on is to carefully the global world financial markets. It was reported that the US sent a high- level delegation including representatives from the US-Treasury that is keen to discuss with China among other things how to “improve communication in case of acute stress events” (sic). The huge debt mountain of the US (35 trill $) will not go away it’s just a question of time when the next explosion will hit. Equally important to watch is the upcoming Kasan BRICS summit (October 22/23/ 24) under the chairmanship of Russia.