Officials in Washington have increasingly been publicly praising Kiev’s surprise incursion into Russian territory, as Ukraine has managed to embarrass Russian President Vladimir Putin, disrupt the Kremlin’s military strategy and seize large swaths of land along the border.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Ukraine earlier this week, said in an interview Wednesday that the “failure to defend Russia is comparable to the complete collapse that forced Russia to withdraw two and a half years ago.”
“I imagine Putin is really angry,” Blumenthal added. “It’s a failure of command, oversight, fighting and resolve.”
President Joe Biden told reporters Tuesday that Ukraine’s advance on Russian territory has put Moscow in a difficult position, acknowledging that the U.S. is in talks with Kiev as the incursion continues.
“It creates a real dilemma for Putin, and we’ve been in direct contact — constant contact — with the Ukrainians,” Biden said. “That’s all I’m going to say about it as long as it’s active.”
State Department spokesman Vedant Patel responded dismissively at today’s briefing when asked about reports that US weapons were used in the raid against Russian targets. Meanwhile, White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre reiterated today that the US was not involved in planning the attack.
But these new expressions of support come as the Ukrainian offensive continues.
Ukraine has already captured dozens of villages in Kursk, and officials in Kiev said on Wednesday that the army has continued to seize more Russian territory, making the Kursk offensive the largest incursion into Russia by a foreign army since World War II, military analysts said. Ukraine attacked several Russian air bases with missiles and drones on Wednesday night.
The invasion also marks the second summer in a row that Putin has suffered a major military humiliation. Last year, Yevgeny Prigozhin and his Kremlin-backed Wagner Group briefly marched on Moscow to demand the resignation of then-Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. Although Prigozhin called off the brief uprising before his Wagner mercenaries approached Moscow, it was the most serious threat to Putin’s grip on Russia in more than two decades.
In some of Zelensky’s first comments confirming the Kursk raid, he compared the offensive to the 2000 Kursk submarine disaster, which killed all 118 Russian Navy members aboard the vessel.
“We see how Russia really moves in Putin’s time. 24 years ago there was the Kursk disaster — the symbolic beginning of his rule,” Zelenskyy said Monday. “And now we can see what the end is for him — and it is also Kursk.”
“Russia brought war to others and now it is coming back home,” Zelenskyy added.
Members of the Russian opposition have also used the Kursk invasion to criticize Putin and his leadership, while trying to walk a fine line to avoid comments that could be interpreted as a celebration of the deaths of Russian soldiers.
Ivan Zhdanov, a top adviser to Navalny, shared a shocking video on social media earlier this week showing dozens of dead Russian soldiers in Kursk.
“The country’s leaders are simply incompetent idiots,” he wrote.
Ilya Yashin, a prominent Russian opposition figure who was released in the prisoner exchange earlier this month, called on the mothers of Russian conscripts to convince their sons to leave the Russian army in a Telegram message.
“Save your children,” Yashin wrote. “Call out conscripts, support them psychologically.”
“Get them out of this hell and save their lives,” he added.
The push has also strengthened Kiev’s position. Zelenskyy also said in his daily update on the war on Tuesday that hundreds of Russian troops have surrendered to Ukrainian forces, allowing Kiev to significantly replenish its “swap fund” for future prisoner swaps.
Some are calling on Washington to increase support for Ukraine given Ukraine’s successes, including Zelenskyy.
“Our Ukrainian drones work exactly as they should, but there are some things that unfortunately cannot be done with drones alone. We need other weapons — missile weapons,” Zelenskyy said Wednesday. “We will continue to work with our partners on long-term decisions for Ukraine.”
“The bolder the decisions of our partners are, the less Putin will be able to do,” he added.
Zelensky will at least have some support in Washington when Congress reconvenes in September.
Speaking in Kiev earlier this week, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) called Ukraine’s military operations in the Kursk and Belgorod regions “bold, brilliant and magnificent” and urged Kiev to “keep going.”
Graham also called on the US to “give them the weapons they need to win a war they cannot lose.”
Former US ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul said that “Putin has killed tens of thousands of Russians in a senseless war of vanity, expanded NATO, including along a giant border with Finland, allowed coup plotters to reach the outskirts of Moscow, and now allowed Russia to be invaded for the first time since 1941.”
“Maybe it’s time for the Russians to reconsider whether Putin is good for their security,” McFaul added.
Eric Bazail-Eimil contributed to this report.
A version of this story originally appeared in POLITICO’s National Security Daily newsletter. Like this content? Subscribe below!
