Evidence tilts towards Ukraine war likelihood

Analysis

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz travels to Kyiv today and Moscow tomorrow amid a sense that efforts to prevent conflict are failing.

Diplomacy has stepped up over the last week as French President Emmanuel Macron and UK foreign and defence ministers visited Moscow, but the mood of talks appeared to sour progressively.

US President Joe Biden called Putin on February 12, as did Macron. Both concluded that Putin had not shifted position.

Until February 11, it appeared that diplomacy was making progress, at least in presenting a viable alternative to war. Twin tracks had developed:

• Russia has received US and NATO responses to a list of demands it presented in December. It expressed dissatisfaction with the responses but a willingness to continue talking.
• French-German-mediated 'Normandy format' negotiations on the future of eastern Ukraine have resumed. A meeting on February 10 failed to produce even minimal agreement, but this is not unusual for these talks (see UKRAINE/RUSSIA: Conflict talks stumble, predictably - February 11, 2022)

Step-change in alarm

On February 11, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan warned of a "credible" and "immediate" threat of invasion. Similarly, Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke of "a window when an invasion could begin at any time", including before February 20, when the Beijing Winter Olympics end (there were suggestions Putin would hold off to avoid embarrassing Beijing).

Sullivan noted that Washington did not believe Putin had taken a "final decision" yet.

US officials have indicated that their statements about the probability and timing of an invasion are based on solid intelligence.

Sullivan told CNN yesterday that Washington was "laying out for the world what we see as transparently and plainly as we possibly can".

"We are putting forward this intelligence to stop a war" rather than start one, he said, arguing that this created added credibility.

The flow of US warnings, shared with and repeated by NATO partners, has caused some consternation in Ukraine, where senior officials have said they see no evidence of imminent invasion. Despite this, Washington has pursued its policy of robust warnings. The reasoning is probably to let Moscow know its military communications are being intercepted to reduce the element of surprise.

Putin's options

Russia's military positioning is clear, in general terms. It has:

• at least 125,000 troops stationed in regions adjoining Ukraine, with armour, artillery, missiles and air support;
• up to 30,000 troops (according to US assessments), also with equivalent armour, missiles and aircraft, in Belarus for exercises officially ending on February 20; and
• more than 30 naval vessels including frigates and six recently arrived amphibious landing ships taking part in a new round of exercises in the Black Sea.

This array of forces allows Putin to pick one or all options. The caveat here is that the options appear to be mainly derived from a Russian military document that pre-dates the current crisis and envisages all of them being executed in an integrated sequence (see RUSSIA: Moscow has options other than full invasion - February 3, 2022). They include:

• military occupation of the separatist Donetsk People's Republic (DNR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LNR), and possible advances outside them;
• an assault to take parts of southern Ukraine's coastline, probably to create a bridge from the Russian 'mainland' to Crimea;
• a massive ground invasion from western Russia;
• a 'second front' southward drive from Belarus; and
• air and missile strikes to demoralise Ukrainians and destroy heavy weapons and infrastructure.

Because of the great human costs and sanctions penalties ensuing from a ground invasion, one plausible scenario cited in recent weeks a limited intervention in DNR and LNR, occupying them "for their own protection" but avoiding significant clashes with Ukrainian forces. Western sanctions would be limited in scope, Moscow could claim a victory, and further negotiations would be possible.

In an examination of Putin's options, Oxford Analytica identified three main aims:

• securing a pro-Russian government in Kyiv;
• keeping Ukraine out of NATO; and
• changing Europe's security architecture.

We concluded that a full invasion would secure the first and second aims but preclude the constructive talks needed for the third. This would trigger maximal Western sanctions, and entail large casualties on both sides.

A half-way scenario where Russia carried out air and ballistic missile strikes would produce the same outcomes, again triggering broad sanctions but causing fewer casualties. In some ways, that makes it the optimal choice in terms of costs versus results. However, limited or unclear success could force Putin into ordering a ground offensive.

At the other end of the scale, the triumph of diplomacy would avoid sanctions and might result in some negotiated changes to the European security architecture, but probably not enough to satisfy Moscow. Moreover, diplomacy would not change the government in Kyiv and is unlikely to kill Ukraine's NATO accession hopes.

Evolving evidence

Comments by US officials and other evidence indicate that a large-scale offensive is possible, despite the high costs for Russia and the availability of lesser options, including continued diplomacy.

According to Sullivan, a "significant barrage of missiles and bomb attacks" would be followed by the "onslaught of a ground force moving across the Ukrainian frontier".

Open-source intelligence creates the impression of an offensive on a broad front.

Russian movements could of course be conducted as a bluff or to distract attention from other plans.

Still, there is some evidence pointing to recent redeployments closer to Ukraine.

Satellite imagery from Colorado-based space firm Maxar indicates the deployment of additional soldiers and equipment at Kursk in western Russia and in Crimea and Belarus.

The Conflict Intelligence Team of Russian investigative journalists has reported tanks and self-propelled artillery from the First Guards Tank Army being transported forwards from sites in Voronezh, Moscow and Smolensk regions; some of these tanks were spotted at locations 15-20 kilometres from the Ukrainian border.

Video has emerged of helicopter gunships and troop transport helicopters near the Ukrainian border in Belgorod region (western Russia) and Belarus's Gomel region

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said yesterday that his government wanted to discuss the new reinforcements and redeployments at a meeting within 48 hours with Russia and other signatories of the Vienna Document (signed by members of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe).

This request followed Moscow's failure to respond to Kyiv's February 11 activation of the Vienna Document's risk reduction mechanism requiring details of troop numbers, locations and plans.