Severed Nations Imperially Interlinked

Ukraine, Syria and Korea

Russian Missile Strikes

Yesterday (Thursday December 12) there was talk of a likely second Russian “Oreshnik” strike in retaliation for a Ukrainian/US ATACMS attack the previous day near Rostov.

But now, Russia is saying that last night’s heavy Russian missile strike across Ukraine (at least 90 ballistic and cruise missiles, of which Ukraine claims it shot down 81) and drone strike (at least 190, of which Ukraine claims to have down 85) is the retaliation it promised for the ATACMS attack. The extent of the damage - Ukrainian energy authorities said earlier today that at least half of the Ukrainian population is lacking power, at least temporarily - suggests that either there were many more Russian missiles and drones, or that Ukraine shot down many fewer than it claims. It appears that the damage was extensive in Kiev as well as in Western Ukraine, including the regions of Lviv and Ternopil.

We have seen in this war how extensive drone and missile strikes such as Russia’s yesterday, do less damage and less permanent damage than one might think. They have yet to end the war, that is for sure. In this case, Ukraine is seeking emergency power supply from Poland, Romania, Hungary and Moldova. An attack of the size of last night’s would need to have been planned some time in advance. So it is unlikely to have been specifically a response to the ATACMS attack. But Russia can claim that it was in order not to have to proceed with another Oreshnik attack.

Such reluctance could be because Russia does not yet have sufficient Oreshniks at its disposal to want to “waste” any until serial production is well under way; or it could be that the Oreshnik impact on Dnipro was not as extensive nor as deep as earlier claims had suggested (there is now quite a lot of controversy about this).

Or, it could be that in light of US President-elect Donald Trump’s stated hostility to the Biden decision to give the green light for the use of precision guided missiles against Russian targets and because of optimistic rumors emerging from early pre-negotiation maneuvers between Russia and the Trump transition team via the mediation of Hungarian President Orban, Russia has decided to sit it out for the next few weeks until Trump’s inauguration.

Some of the latest reports of what is being considered as a negotiating position for Trump seem to be approaching the minimum requirements for Russian engagement (e.g. Ukrainian neutrality, Russia getting to keep land it has invaded), although Trump will need some major concession if he is to be able to walk away and still look tough. There are broader questions here, however, that go well beyond the Western capacity to even imagine let alone contemplate. These range from the speed of Russia’s current advance, and the leverage that gives to Russia, to the question of whether the West, through Trump, can demonstrate that the West can be depended upon to keep an agreement (it cannot, in my view), and whether Russia will be content in coming to some local arrangement to end the war when the real nature of the war has to do with the rise of the Global South in challenge against US hegemony.

Besides, it is not clear that Trump can come to an arrangement with Russia that would also have the support of NATO and the EU - interlocked entities that are trying to sound as tough as possible on Ukraine, determined, in the words of NATO’s secretary general, to put their “security” over social welfare (i.e. to push their populations further into poverty to the eventual demise of the European social order.

Europe is temporarily emboldened perhaps by the US transfer of a $20 billion dollar loan yesterday (or at least, a theatrical simulacrum as to what such a transfer might look like if indeed it was real) and by its growing confidence that Europe (or the G7) will be able to lend Ukraine $30 billion to be covered (like the US loan) from the interest payable on seized Russian assets, even if it is very unclear that the interest on these assets will be sufficient to cover what Ukraine needs. And there is excited chatter about transfers of weapons, lots of them including, some reports say, a million or more 255 shells - mainly Russian and Iranian - from the recently conquered Syria to Ukraine, although it is not clear why Turkey, HTS, Israel, the Kurds or any other players would want to forgo these bounties of war.

Russia is close to taking Pokrovsk in southwest Donetsk, and once it succeeds in doing so, it will be able to proceed westwards towards the Dneiper with little by way of enemy fortifications to detain it.

One of Ukaine’s major bargaining cards, its invasion of Kursk, is shrinking by the day. Dima today cites Russian sources are confirming the presence of North Korean troops in Russia’s successful fight for Plyokhovo. If correct, this is yet another surprise for commentators like myself who have been highly skeptical of the claim of North Korean troops on the front lines. We should note, however, that this is a fight on Russian territory against what are supposedly Ukrainian invaders, even if their number includes NATO personnel. Such a North Korea presence in Ukraine might also help explain why President Yoon of South Korea acted in the way that he did when he attempted an illegal order of martial law. Was Yoon under pressure from the Americans to demonstrate a (deeply unpopular) South Korean initiative to parallel North Korea’s initiative in Ukraine?

Yoon faces a second bid to impeach him tomorrow, Saturday. Although he faces strong opposition, said to represent three quarters of the people of South Korea, he has been making defiant speeches at odds with his more humble public demeanor during the first attempt to impeach him (from which he was saved by his own party). This perhps reflects his hope that he may be saved by Korea’s constitutional court if he can come up with a good enough argument as to why martial law was necessary (of course, it wasn’t).

If Yoon is a US patsy, he is in good company with Asian counterparts Ishiba in Japan, Marcos in the Philippines, Sharif in Pakistan and Yunus in Bangladesh, though (much) less popular.

In Syria, it is still uncertain that Russia will be forced to give up its naval and air bases in Tartus and Kheimem. There are even reports that Russia has acquired some of the bases that were previously controlled by the Syrian Army. It is possible that there will be some kind of deal between Russia and HTS that will allow Russia to keep at least its historical bases, and this may be because HTS and, behind HTS, Turkey, find it useful for Russia to retain a presence in the country to help consolidate a balance of power between Russia and the Alawite regions to the West, HTS and the SNS in the north and center (HTS is also reported to have pushed out the Kurds from Deir al-Zor to the east), the Kurds and the US in the north east and Israel to the south.

A Russian air presence may also act as a deterrent to Israel from taking advantage of its now closer proximity to Iran, and of the destruction of Syrian radar and air defenses. Iran is looking more vulnerable, given what the New York Times today reports as considerable popular opposition to what appears to have been Iran’s failed foreign policy over several decades of promoting itself as a regional force, a strategy which involved backing Assad and the militia of Hezbollah and Hamas to help it face down Israel. At the least we can say that the fall of Assad has widened the fissures within Iranian religious, political and military elites.

Paul Craig Roberts today castigates what he considers is the weakness of both Russia and Iran in pulling their punches, of holding back from whole-heartedly protecting Syria and of doing so in the name of a form of gentlemanly and moral diplomacy that no longer exists and certainly no longer works.

In the case of Russia we can conclude that if indeed Russia did hold back (although it certainly engaged in serious bombing of terrorist positions until it became obvious that the Syrian Army was not putting up sufficient resistance, and that Assad no longer had the will to fight), it did so in order to maintain its primary focus on Ukraine. If Russia is successful in Ukraine, then perhaps it will find the way and the means to recover influence in the Middle East and Africa (North Africa and the Sahel, for instance) that it may otherwise be in danger of losing altogether.

Russia can still be a force in Syria but I dont think it can enjoy anything like the advantageous position that it had enjoyed when it was the most powerful of Syria’s patrons. The loss of Syria is still a loss for Russia, and it is a loss for Iran which now has less protection from Israel.