Putin’s paradox: Don of the Donbas or Czar of Crimea?

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine, regardless of his overarching motive — be it Kievan Rus’, a multipolar world, or visions of a Peter the Great-level of grandeur — may be nearing a crossroads. What began as a mafia-like “hit” on the Donbas and its vast wealth of natural resources, akin to Al Capone’s “Chicago Outfit” taking out the “Northside Gang” in the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre of 1929, is now jeopardizing Russia’s strategic control of Crimea. 

Unless he is utterly blind to it, Putin faces a hard choice: narrow his focus on the Donbas so he can continue appeasing his oligarchs (his capos) by handing out Ukrainian turf and natural resources, or reinforce Moscow’s defenses in Crimea and, by extension, protect Russia’s dominance of the Black Sea. Because of its losses in Ukraine, Russia no longer possesses the military capacity to do both, at least in the short term.

Call it Putin’s “Capone versus Peter the Great” moment: a cartel or an empire. It appears to have become a question of one or the other — or none at all, if Ukraine and the West are victorious. To date, Putin’s military stratagems in Ukraine, antiquated as they are, have been dictated primarily by cartel-like goals: Seize the Donbas to feed the need for graft. 

Despite Putin’s assertions that his war is about saving Russian-speaking peoples, in reality, it is all about the vast reserves of natural gas and deposits of rare earth minerals in the Donbas. Ukraine ranks fourth globally in terms of total assessed value of natural resources — nearly $15 billion in annual pre-war output and a potential untapped aggregate value “as high as $7.5 trillion.” 

This immense wealth in natural resources includes the largest supply of recoverable rare earth resources in Europe, including cerium, yttrium, lanthanum and neodymium, which are used in production of flat-TV screens, aluminum and magnesium alloys, radar filters, camera lenses and magnets. Ukraine’s natural gas reserves, Europe’s second largest, the bulk of which lie under the Donbas, are Putin’s penultimate would-be prize: upwards of 1.1 trillion cubic meters.

Putin’s modus operandi has always been natural resource-centric, at the expense of high-tech investment and development. We witnessed this in his development of the Northern Sea Route and in his reliance on Western European economies to supply Russia’s civilian and military high-tech hardware needs. Natural resource fiefdoms are easy to hand out to capos — and to repossess, if needed, if the human combination codes to their vaults need to be changed because of disloyalty. Putin’s blind spot in this area was in evidence in his failed attempt to use energy to weaponize winter against Ukraine and Europe. 

For now it appears the Donbas region, including the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, are ground zero militarily. Russian forces are continuing assaults on small industrial and mining towns such as Bakhmut, Bilohorivka, Krasna Hora, Avdiivka and Vuhledar, amassing thousands of casualties in the process. 

If we reduce ourselves to Putin’s natural resource-centric way of strategizing, it narrowly makes sense — even if it is a recipe for Russia losing the war. In Putin’s myopic view, the Donbas, in addition to being a means to reward his cronies, is also a way of enticing Turkey to divide Ankara from its NATO partners. 

Putin’s economic gambit is to tap into the gas reserves and build a pipeline to Turkey for eventual global distribution. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan appears willing to hedge his bets, so that if Ukraine falls, Turkey would be the “the best route for redirecting [Russian] gas supplies to the European Union” by establishing the country as a regional trading hub.  

This power play is “classic gangster” in a Capone kind of way: Pay off NATO’s Turkish “police” to look the other way while he and his oligarch capos line their pockets. Everyone wins, except Russia’s street thugs and conscripted soldiers who are dying in the Donbas. Or so Putin wants to believe.

The Kremlin’s obsession with the Donbas is a risky move because it leaves Crimea vulnerable to a Ukrainian counteroffensive. As retired Army Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges correctly assesses, Crimea is militarily “decisive terrain.” The war in Ukraine is likely to be won or lost on the Crimean Peninsula and not in the Donbas.

Russia will be weakened, strategically and geopolitically, if Moscow loses control of Crimea’s ports and airfields that enable the Kremlin to dominate the Black Sea region. These military installations are critical in terms of supplying Russian ground forces in the south of occupied Ukraine and maintaining tactical pressure on the Ukrainian port city of Odessa. The loss of Crimea — especially if Ukraine were to become part of NATO — also would threaten Russia’s forces in and around the Sea of Azov.

Instead of acting decisively to mitigate these threats in Crimea, Putin continues to rack up tactical losses in the Donbas. For example, Russian General Valery Gerasimov lost one of Russia’s most “elite” units, the 155^th Naval Infantry Brigade, near Vuhledar. Even Russian propagandists and milbloggers now openly question whether the Kremlin is capable of launching a successful offensive in the Donbas, after witnessing videos depicting blown-out T-62 tanks and BMP infantry fighting vehicles. 

Over-committed in the Donbas, Moscow’s ability to rapidly shift forces to Crimea is significantly reduced. Since the beginning of the war, logistics has been an ongoing Russian weakness. If suddenly needed in Crimea, Russian forces will be vulnerable to interdiction — a task at which Ukraine is very efficient with the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS). Even Gerasimov’s logisticians have been replaced with mobilized reservists and conscripts, and their inability to accomplish the mission will prove much more disastrous.

Washington and the West seem to sense this developing strategic opportunity. NATO is inundating Ukraine with weapon systems, including Leopard 2 tanks, ground-launched small diameter bombs and, possibly, fighter-bomber jets, enabling combined arms operations and greater offensive capability. The target on Crimea’s back is becoming larger — as is the one on Putin himself.

For now, despite the accumulating losses, Putin continues to reinforce failure with more men and equipment in the Donbas. He seems oblivious that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky gets a vote too, and that his generals probably have an eventual plan to turn Crimea, allegorically speaking, into Putin’s own Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre in Red Square. 

Jonathan Sweet, a retired Army colonel, served 30 years as a military intelligence officer. His background includes tours of duty with the 101st Airborne Division and the Intelligence and Security Command. He led the U.S. European Command Intelligence Engagement Division from 2012-14, working with NATO partners in the Black Sea and Baltics. Follow him on Twitter @JESweet2022.  

Mark Toth is a retired economist, historian and entrepreneur who has worked in banking, insurance, publishing, and global commerce. He is a former board member of the World Trade Center, St. Louis, and has lived in U.S. diplomatic and military communities around the world, including London, Tel Aviv, Augsburg, and Nagoya. Follow him on Twitter @MCTothSTL.