Steve Gutterman's Week In Russia

I'm Steve Gutterman, the editor of RFE/RL's Russia/Ukraine/Belarus Desk.

Welcome to The Week In Russia, in which I dissect the key developments in Russian politics and society over the previous week and look at what's ahead. To receive The Week In Russia newsletter in your inbox, click here.

The investigation onto the downing of Flight MH17 in 2014 found "strong indications" that Russian President Vladimir Putin was involved -- but ends without reaching "the high bar of complete and conclusive evidence." More than eight years later, the war rages in the Donbas and beyond.

Here are some of the key developments in Russia over the past week and some of the takeaways going forward.

A Probe Implicates Putin

As February 24 approaches, some reports refer to that date last year as the beginning of Russia's war against Ukraine. But an announcement in The Hague this week served as reminder that the invasion Moscow launched that day was in fact a major escalation of a war that started eight years earlier.

At a press conference on February 8, international investigators said there were "strong indications" that Russian President Vladimir Putin was involved in the downing of MH17, the Malaysia Airlines passenger jet that crashed in territory held by Moscow-backed forces in eastern Ukraine's Donbas region on July 14, 2014 -- three months after fighting fueled by Kremlin efforts to foment anti-Kyiv sentiment broke out there following Russia's occupation of the Crimean Peninsula, also part of Ukraine.

In stirring up separatism across the neighboring country's east and south, Putin's goal was the same as it was when he ordered the invasion last February: to gain control over Ukraine, or as much of it as possible, after Moscow-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych abandoned office and fled following months of massive pro-European, anti-corruption protests known as the Maidan.

The rallies had been triggered by Yanukovych's decision in November 2013 -- which came at the last minute but followed a monthslong mixture of pressure and incentives from Putin -- to scrap plans to sign a major deal tightening ties with the European Union and instead pursue more trade with Russia.

All 298 people aboard MH17 were killed. Adults and children from the Netherlands, Malaysia, Australia, and seven other countries headed from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, they were some of the earliest civilian victims of the war in the Donbas and Russia's war on Ukraine.

During an international probe into the crash, the Dutch-led Joint Investigation Team (JIT) concluded that the passenger jet was shot down by a Buk missile that had been brought into separatist-held territory from Russia and then quickly taken back across the border after the downing of the Boeing 777.

'Strong Indications'

And the investigation led, last November, to in-absentia murder convictions in a Dutch court for two Russians and one Ukrainian separatist for their roles.

In its February 8 announcement, the JIT said there were "strong indications that the Russian president decided on supplying the Buk to the separatists."

Among those indications: Recorded phone calls in which Russian officials said that only the Russian president could make the decision to provide military support to the separatists in the Donbas.

"There is concrete information that the separatists' request was presented to the president, and that this request was granted," the JIT said, but it added that "It is not known whether the request explicitly mentions a Buk system."

However, the JIT said it was ending the investigation because while "a lot of new information has been discovered about various people involved, the evidence is at the moment not concrete enough to lead to new prosecutions."

"The high bar of complete and conclusive evidence" had not been reached, it said.

While it fell short of a watertight finding that Putin was involved, the JIT's announcement might have had a greater impact under different circumstances -- had he not launched the unprovoked invasion in February 2022, that is.

Still, it now stands out as one of the deadliest attacks since 2014 -- even amid what U.S. President Joe Biden, in his State of the Union address on February 7, called the "murderous assault" on Ukraine that Putin unleashed almost a year ago.

The single deadliest attack in the war was the air strike on the main theater in Mariupol, in the Donbas, in April, when it was packed with people seeking shelter amid an onslaught that razed the city and led to its capture by Russia. In a journalistic investigation published in May, the Associated Press reported that evidence suggested about 600 people were killed.

In his address, Biden called the Russian invasion a "test for the ages."

Words Of War

Putin is slated to deliver his own state-of-the-nation speech on February 21. Like the U.S. president, Russia's president is required by the constitution to deliver an address to parliament every year -- but Putin skipped 2022 and has not given the speech since April 2021.

Putin's choice of a date for his speech is fitting in a grim way: On February 21 of last year, three days before the morning the first missiles hit, he delivered a dark, ominous address that was laden with resentment -- and convinced many who had doubted Russia would launch an invasion that there was no reason to doubt it any longer.

"This whole speech is...laying the groundwork for the wholesale occupation of Ukraine," analyst Sam Greene tweeted at the time. Or, as military expert Michael Kofman put it the same day: "This is the first step in what will likely be a large-scale Russian military operation to impose regime change."

'Free Ukraine'

The military operation began less than 72 hours later, but regime change didn't happen: what is widely believed to have been a bid to swiftly subjugate Ukraine failed dramatically. Russian forces that had pushed toward Kyiv were driven back and retreated across Ukraine's norther border weeks after they had rolled in.

Russia has taken additional territory in the Donbas and parts of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhya regions in the south, but Ukraine reversed some of the gains last fall and recaptured the city of Kherson -- the only regional capital Moscow's forces had seized since the invasion.

Biden's speech, and Putin's expected address later this month, come a time when the prospects for an end to the war seem no more certain than ever, and perhaps less so. Deadly fighting is raging in the Donbas, and Russia may be gearing up for a major new offensive -- or may have already set it in motion.

Kyiv, meanwhile, is beseeching the West for more weapons to use in its defense -- a chief element of speeches President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has made during a trip this week to London, Paris, and Brussels, where he told an EU summit on February 9 that "free Europe cannot be imagined without free Ukraine."

That's it from me this week. If you want to know more, catch up on my podcast The Week Ahead In Russia, out every Monday, here on our site or wherever you get your podcasts (Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts).

Yours,

Steve Gutterman

RFE/RL intern Ella Jaffe contributed to this report

In his State of the Union speech, U.S. President Joe Biden said that Russia's invasion of Ukraine "has been a test for the ages" and suggested that the West had passed, at least for the time being.

The test will continue -- and it could get tougher.

Speaking almost a year after Russian President Vladimir Putin launched the invasion on February 24, 2022, Biden said the "murderous assault" had raised a stark question: "Would we stand for the most basic of principles?" he asked, including "sovereignty," the "right of people to live free from tyranny," and "the defense of democracy."

"One year later, we know the answer," he said. "Yes, we would. And yes, we did."

Past tense. When it comes to the future, Biden provided fewer details, assuring Ukrainian Ambassador Oksana Markarova that "America is united in our support for your country. We will stand with you as long as it takes."

SEE ALSO:

Biden Calls Russia's 'Murderous Assault' Against Ukraine A 'Test For The Ages,' Says U.S. Will Stand With Kyiv

It may take a long time.

Since the invasion, the United States and the West have shown substantial unity and, with increasing weapons supplies and other support, have helped Kyiv defend itself against an invasion that many officials and analysts initially believed would bring what Putin expected it to bring: the swift subjugation of Ukraine.

Instead, Russia has suffered numerous setbacks. Its forces retreated from areas in the north after their push toward Kyiv was stymied in early spring, and Ukraine regained swaths of land in counteroffensives in the east and south later in the year -- even recapturing Kherson, the only regional capital Russia had seized since the large-scale invasion began in February.

But amid extremely deadly fighting, particularly in the eastern region known as the Donbas, neither side has made major gains in several months. Ukraine's prospects for regaining large amounts of its territory on the mainland -- let alone the Crimean Peninsula, occupied by Russia since 2014 -- seem uncertain at the moment.

Meanwhile, talk of a major new Russian offensive has intensified, and there are signs it has already begun. And while Moscow's chances of taking more territory are also uncertain, any substantial setbacks for Ukraine could potentially shift the moods of some in the West, weakening support for Kyiv and amplifying calls for compromise with Russia despite the death and destruction it has wrought.

This is the main thing Putin is now counting on, analysts say, because while he may still harbor hopes of bringing Ukraine under Kremlin control through military force, that is now all but impossible. Instead, he seems likely to keep the grinding war going in hopes of wearing down the West.

SEE ALSO:

In Ukraine's Donbas, Intensifying Russian Offensives -- An Omen Of Things To Come?

Off the battlefield, political seasons in Russia and the West may play a role. Even if Russia suffers further setbacks, losing more of the land it has occupied and baselessly claimed as its own, Putin seems unlikely to scale down his ambitions -- and particularly unlikely to do so before the presidential election, due in March 2024, in which he is widely expected to secure a new six-year term.

As he demonstrably has done in the past, Putin is almost certainly looking to the U.S. presidential election eight months later and hoping the result will advance his designs on Ukraine and beyond by sowing divisions in the West and decreasing its support for Kyiv.

For now, opinion poll results in the United States present a mixed picture, demonstrating strong and steady support for Ukraine's aim of pushing Russian forces out of the country but suggesting that when it comes to more concrete matters such as supplies of weapons and aid, the ground may be shakier.

A Gallup poll conducted in January and released on February 6 found that 65 percent of Americans would prefer the United States support Ukraine's regaining its territory, even if that means a prolonged conflict.

That was down just one percentage point from the number in August 2022 and included a small majority of Republicans -- 53 percent -- as well as 81 percent of Democrats.

The portion of Americans who would prefer the United States seek to end the conflict quickly, even if it means Russia keeps Ukrainian territory it has occupied, was unchanged from August to January at 31 percent.

At the same time, the poll found that while 39 percent of Americans believe the United States is offering Ukraine the right amount of support, nearly half of Republican respondents -- 47 percent -- said it is doing too much.

A poll conducted in January by the Pew Research Center, meanwhile, suggested that a growing number of Americans from both major parties feel that the United States should scale down its support for Ukraine.

Among Republicans and people leaning Republican, the share of respondents who said the United States is providing too much support rose from 9 percent in March 2022 to 40 percent in the January poll.

Among Democrats and people leaning Democratic, it tripled from 5 percent to 15 percent, and overall it increased from 7 percent to 26 percent, while 31 percent said the amount of support was about right and 20 percent said it was not enough.