‘Putin Is Afraid That Drone Will Fly To Red Square During Parade’
- 29.04.2025, 21:25
The offer of a truce is an attempt to protect himself.
Russian ruler Putin has initiated another truce. This time, for May 9. Why did he need it? Charter97.org spoke with Ukrainian political scientist, professor at the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv Petro Oleshchuk about this:
— Here Putin may be pursuing several goals that do not contradict each other. Firstly, this is another attempt to manipulate the topic of negotiations and ending the war, which he uses to communicate with the Trump administration.
Putin sees how Trump is interested in announcing his successes in ending the war as soon as possible, that he is fulfilling his election promises. So Putin is manipulating around this topic.
In this situation, he acts like an experienced fisherman - sometimes letting this topic go, sometimes, on the contrary, letting it come closer. Plays on the contrast, like, he is ready to cease hostilities, but he has conditions. He agrees with everything, but at the same time he has comments. Here Lavrov once again repeated the ultimatum demands, which actually mean a refusal to negotiate, and at the same time Putin declares a truce. Like, I am ready, but let me persuade you, what can you offer me?
Secondly, it is obvious that the Russians are seriously planning to use these so-called truces as a tactical element in continuing the war against Ukraine.
Many Ukrainian analysts note that the Russians are using the situation with the so-called ceasefire in order to pull up reserves in certain sections of the front, to prepare for offensive actions in a relatively comfortable atmosphere.
I think Putin is concerned about holding a parade, which should be his personal triumph, but he probably does not feel 100% sure that a Ukrainian drone will not fly to Red Square during this parade. He is also trying to insure himself against this. This is an additional reason.
Putin needs to maintain the image of someone who wants peace first and foremost for the countries he expects to see at the parade. In the countries of the "global South", the idea that Putin is continuing the war is not very popular for many reasons, so he constantly throws out the idea that he is "ready to "end the war now", but for some reason the Americans and Ukrainians "don't want to".
- Is it possible to deceive Trump with such cheap tricks?
- You know, this is purely a question of Trump's motivation. If he wants to deceive himself, then he will deceive himself. So far, Trump is trying with all his might to hold on to the illusion of an imminent ceasefire, because it is beneficial to him. In this way, he is trying to show that he is in control of the situation, success is closer than ever, naturally, Putin feels this and manipulates this topic.
Will Trump agree to continue to pretend that everything is going according to plan and peace is closer than ever, or will he one day decide that such weakness is not beneficial to him from an image point of view, I cannot say.
The US President can simply say, like, everyone is bad, I am leaving here, I do not like all this. He can say that he has more important problems, for example, mass deportations from the USA. Trump's position can change radically in literally 1-2 days.
- Will Ukraine agree to the proposals of the Russian Federation?
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says that it is necessary to achieve a full-scale ceasefire for 30 days, as was previously agreed.
I emphasize that Ukraine will promote the thesis that we need not some kind of "truces", but a full-scale ceasefire for 30 days.
How the situation will develop directly closer to May 9, I cannot say now. There may be different options, and it cannot be ruled out that Russia may be preparing a large-scale provocation involving shelling during this period. It is very difficult to predict all of this.