By Alexander Motyl
National Security Journal
Aug 11, 2024
Ukraine’s goals in launching a “special military operation” in Kursk Province—the term Putin used in announcing his invasion of Ukraine in February 2022—are still the subject of much guesswork. Were the Ukrainians hoping to divert Russian forces from the eastern front? Are they hoping to seize the Kursk atomic energy station, the pipeline in Sudzha, or the railroad connection between Kursk and the Donbas? Will they dig in for the long haul or retreat at the earliest convenient moment?
We’ll know soon enough. In the meantime, three possible political consequences of the Kursk attack are worth considering.
First, Ukraine has demonstrated to the world, especially its Western allies, that, as the first line of the Ukrainian national hymn goes, “Ukraine is not yet dead.” The operation shows that Ukraine is not stuck in a permanent stalemate and an endless war.
Quite the contrary, there’s movement, and it appears to be significant. Regardless of the special operation’s denouement, the Ukrainians will have shown that they have spunk and will not just roll over and die. Supporting Ukraine with more and better weapons is not just a way of prolonging a hopeless struggle; it’s a way of enabling the resourceful Ukrainians to win.
Second, if the Ukrainians manage to hold on to even a sliver of Kursk Province—and considering that they may control close to 200 square kilometers at the moment, that’s perfectly possible—they will deprive Russia’s self-elected president of one of his key talking points: that a ceasefire should be based on the existing distribution of forces.
There is no way that Putin, the champion of Mother Russia’s territorial integrity and sanctity, can possibly countenance the loss of even one square kilometer of Russia to Ukraine. Russia’s so-called “Z-patriots”—the rightwing imperialists who’ve supported the invasion since day one—would see that as a betrayal, as would significant elements within the elite.
Losing territory to Ukraine could easily result in Putin’s losing his head. And were negotiations to take place, Ukraine could offer a territorial exchange as its starting position. Russia won’t agree, but compromise-ready Ukraine will have won the PR war.
And third, retaining even a sliver of Kursk Province will enable Ukraine to oversee the solemn proclamation of a Kursk People’s Republic by Ukraine-friendly Russians and thereupon insist on the KPR’s official recognition by the international community. If Ukraine’s offensive continues, Belgorod and Bryansk People’s Republics could follow, especially as all three provinces were once solidly Ukrainian and their inhabitants still speak a mixture of Russian and Ukrainian.
Just as Russia claimed to be liberating the Russians of eastern Ukraine from the Ukrainian neo-Nazis in 2014 and 2022, Ukraine could claim that it’s liberating the Ukrainians of western Russia from Russian fascists in 2024. At the very least, Ukraine could offer to exchange its three republics for the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics and the independent Crimea created by Russia in 2014.
Naturally, Putin won’t agree to any of these measures. Like his German predecessor, Adolf Hitler, he’ll prefer to go down fighting, regardless of how many more Russians will have to die in a senseless war. But he will be hoist with his own petard, and watching him squirm could have as much of an impact on Western perceptions, Russian and Ukrainian morale, and thus the outcome of the war as conditions on the ground.
Kursk may prove to be Putin’s curse. The Kursk submarine sank in August 2000, a year after Putin’s coming to power. He’s obviously hoping that the relevant comparison will be with the Kursk tank battle of mid-1943, in which the Soviets inflicted a devastating defeat on the German forces.
But, if the true lesson of that battle is that invaders lose to people who have no choice but to fight to the finish, Putin may discover that Ukraine’s accursed Kursk operation could spell his demise.
Dr. Alexander Motyl is a professor of political science at Rutgers-Newark. A specialist on Ukraine, Russia, and the USSR, and on nationalism, revolutions, empires, and theory, he is the author of 10 books of nonfiction, including Pidsumky imperii (2009); Puti imperii (2004); Imperial Ends: The Decay, Collapse, and Revival of Empires (2001); Revolutions, Nations, Empires: Conceptual Limits and Theoretical Possibilities (1999); Dilemmas of Independence: Ukraine after Totalitarianism (1993); and The Turn to the Right: The Ideological Origins and Development of Ukrainian Nationalism, 1919–1929 (1980); the editor of 15 volumes, including The Encyclopedia of Nationalism (2000) and The Holodomor Reader (2012); and a contributor of dozens of articles to academic and policy journals, newspaper op-ed pages, and magazines. He also has a weekly blog, “Ukraine’s Orange Blues.”