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0:18

you doing a regimen but read

0:21

but he goes enemy is for about an idiot

0:23

i know stubborn or pretty good nirvana

0:25

he's getting jersey she's teach them have enough

0:30

This week in Russia, the

0:32

stakes of their war in Ukraine just

0:34

got higher. Russian president Vladimir

0:36

Putin announced he is drafting

0:38

hundreds of thousands of civilian men

0:40

to fight in the war. And that

0:43

is obviously a huge change

0:44

domestically for Russians because

0:46

they for a very long time, we're told

0:49

that this is of your limited, targeted,

0:51

successful operation that is

0:53

fought by professional soldiers. Reporter:

0:55

reporter,

0:55

Mary Luchana, has been speaking

0:57

with Russians dealing with this draft.

0:59

like a man in Moscow who just

1:01

got his summons on Wednesday. Already

1:03

on Thursday, he is going on

1:06

a training course and he's potentially gonna be

1:08

in the front lens in the span of

1:10

two, three weeks, so it's incredibly

1:12

rapid.

1:14

Many Russians are panicking. people

1:17

are trying to flee the country, people are

1:19

looking for ways to avoid

1:21

being summoned to avoid being cold

1:23

up.

1:26

There are videos of people lining up

1:28

at airports.

1:28

Stuck in traffic

1:30

at borders. Tickets to other

1:32

countries where Russians don't need visas

1:34

are all sold out for week. And

1:37

I'm monitoring all these chat groups, like,

1:39

they're giving live updates of

1:41

which man crossed the border wearing

1:44

and like how was it? What kind of questions

1:46

border guards asked him? There's a huge

1:48

mobilization to avoid

1:49

mobilization.

1:52

And

1:52

then there are the protests. According

1:59

to an independent Russian human

2:02

rights group, there were more than one

2:04

thousand three hundred protest

2:06

related arrests on Wednesday, and

2:08

over thirty rush some cities.

2:17

From the newsroom of the Washington

2:19

Post, this is post reports. I'm

2:22

Martine Powers. It's Friday,

2:24

September twenty third. Today,

2:26

Putin is escalating the war in Ukraine

2:28

after major military defeats. His

2:31

strategy? More bodies. and

2:34

staged boats in Russian occupied territories.

2:41

You know, I find this so interesting

2:43

because it feels like up

2:45

until this point during this war in Ukraine,

2:48

we've gotten a sense that Russians partially

2:50

because they have not gotten the full story about

2:52

the war that they have been in support

2:55

of it or at least Vladimir Putin

2:57

has enough of the support of rush people

2:59

to keep going. But it seems

3:01

like we're seeing both people trying to

3:03

flee to not participate in this war effort,

3:06

but also protests. Can you describe

3:08

a little bit of what we've seen on the streets of

3:10

people who are very publicly saying

3:13

that they are not okay with what

3:15

Putin is doing?

3:16

yeah, on the same day

3:18

that mobilization was announced, we

3:21

perhaps seen the biggest outpouring

3:24

of public discontent since the very

3:26

beginning of the war because people,

3:29

despite the fact that it's really, really difficult

3:31

to show any kind of descent, in

3:33

Russia at the moment because the

3:35

punishment is so high, you know, even

3:37

saying the word war or, you know,

3:40

saying that you criticized the war

3:42

can get you in trouble, can get you in prison,

3:44

can, you know, get you fine. All of

3:46

these things can happen to you. You can be targeted, and

3:48

you can lose your job. A lot of things can happen.

3:50

So it's still remarkable to see, you know,

3:52

thousands of people come out across over

3:55

thirty cities in Russia on Wednesday night

3:57

to say no to war

3:59

and say that they don't want to be mobilized

4:00

and that they're not willing

4:03

to die for Vladimir Putin.

4:05

And I think to your point that a lot of people

4:07

you know,

4:07

come it felt like there was a lot of support,

4:09

but we also

4:10

need to understand that for about seven

4:12

months, the Kremlin has been telling the Russian

4:14

public that it's a very limited special

4:16

military operation. It's not a war.

4:18

In March, Putin said, like, don't worry, reservists

4:21

are not gonna be cold. And now

4:23

it'll it's all changed. So

4:25

the reaction to the war

4:27

also changed. And how has the

4:29

Russian government been reacting

4:31

to that reaction of seeing people actually

4:33

protesting? Well, the

4:35

most evil trick that we've seen

4:37

and, you know, there are

4:38

people in Moscow at least who

4:41

protested and they got detained.

4:43

And in the police stations, young

4:45

men were given summons

4:47

there, like, anti war protesters

4:50

are now being essentially called up

4:52

to join this war that they're protesting. Mhmm.

4:54

So that is really really, you

4:57

know, kind of out of this world.

4:59

for this people who actually came out to protest.

5:01

And the Kremlin said, you know, they publicly

5:03

commented on the on this and said it's

5:05

not against the law, so they don't see any problem

5:07

with this. I

5:08

saw some headline that in Russia,

5:10

Google searches of how to break your

5:12

arm at home have gone up. Is

5:14

that true? Yeah. I've checked as well.

5:16

It has gone up. It's not the most

5:18

popular search. The

5:20

searches about how to leave Russia

5:23

ASAP. or, like, visa

5:25

free destinations for Russians is much

5:27

higher on the rank. But there are -- Mhmm.

5:29

-- bikes and those kind of queries

5:31

because one of the ways

5:33

to get out of this draft

5:36

essentially

5:36

is to be not fit

5:38

for service, which means if you have a broken

5:40

arm or if you're sick in any shape

5:42

or form, that

5:43

means you can not go fight.

5:45

I'm curious to hear more about the conversations

5:47

that you've had one on one with Russians

5:49

about how they're feeling in this moment or

5:51

how they understand what's going on. and

5:54

why this seems like a kind

5:56

of turning point for whether

5:58

they are willing to go along with what

6:00

Putin is doing. you

6:01

know, we spoke to a mother

6:03

who, you know, her son is twenty four, so

6:05

he's very much at risk. And she's

6:08

sending him to Armenia this week. That's

6:10

it. I know, you know, one of my

6:12

acquaintances he's my former colleague.

6:14

His father signed up for the war

6:16

even though he is over fifty and he fought

6:18

in a Afghanistan war,

6:20

but he went on his own. So there

6:22

are some people who are volunteering for

6:24

this effort But the overwhelming feeling

6:26

that I get from conversation that

6:28

I've had with people is, you know, they're

6:30

shocked that this the war came

6:32

home and that it's potentially gonna target

6:34

their relatives and not

6:37

many people are willing

6:37

to go through with this. Howard

6:39

Bauchner: And how much

6:42

does that matter to Putin.

6:44

Like, does it actually make what

6:46

he wants to do that much more difficult

6:48

if people are you know,

6:51

kicking and screaming when they get drafted and

6:53

and when they end up in the military? Or is it

6:55

like whether or not people like it, he

6:57

has enough power to be

6:59

able to continue with this war effort

7:01

as long as he wants to do it

7:03

regardless of whether people are protesting

7:05

in the streets or not.

7:06

I think it definitely has enough power

7:09

to see this through because Russia has a

7:11

really big, you know, administrative

7:12

resource, which means that the

7:15

just the judging from the amount of people per capita

7:17

who serve in law enforcement, army,

7:20

police, military services,

7:23

officers, all this kind of stuff. They are

7:25

there are a lot of them, and they can definitely go

7:27

and fulfill frivolous order. And,

7:30

you know, some people are trying

7:33

to avoid this. I wouldn't say, you know,

7:35

produce, obviously, some people show that they

7:37

are kicking is screaming, but there are also

7:39

videos emerging on Thursday from several

7:42

cities with people still lining up

7:44

quietly and going to this bus.

7:50

It's a very grim mood with mothers

7:52

and wives and daughters and their

7:54

children crying around them, but they are

7:57

going because it is criminalized

8:00

not to do that. So once you've got the summons here,

8:02

essentially, they have you because if

8:04

you don't show up you can end up in jail,

8:06

so you don't really have much choice. And

8:08

it's very, very difficult undertaking

8:10

to try and avoid that and try to get out

8:12

of those.

8:13

So so what's happening right now?

8:15

I mean, this is all happening just a couple of

8:17

weeks after Ukraine had

8:19

this very surprising counter offensive

8:21

where It took back control of some

8:23

huge swaths of land in eastern

8:25

Ukraine. So how much are Putin's

8:28

actions now a direct response

8:30

to what we saw in Ukraine a couple

8:32

weeks ago and a sense that the

8:34

tide is turning in the

8:34

war. I think this is

8:36

a direct response to the

8:38

dramatic losses that Russia has sustained

8:40

in northeast and Ukraine a couple of

8:42

weeks ago. In a lot of ways,

8:44

that was a culmination of a lot of

8:46

problems that have been piling up

8:48

within the Russian military, it's

8:50

the lack of manpower, lack of

8:52

equipment, problems with

8:54

the chain of command, with the strategy,

8:56

and general underestimation of

8:59

how great of a force Ukraine is.

9:02

So I think it was a catalyst for we're

9:04

seeing now because Putin has also been under a

9:06

lot of pressure from Russian

9:08

hardliners who have been calling for this

9:10

mobilization, who have been saying that Putin is

9:12

not harsh enough. that Putin has shown weakness

9:14

by suffering these

9:16

strategic blunders and not responding harshly

9:18

enough.

9:19

And, you know, perhaps

9:21

he was susceptible to that.

9:23

Perhaps to decide, yes, exactly, we this

9:25

is the time to go all out.

9:28

And he called for this measure,

9:30

which you know, resisted for a long time, and it

9:32

was clear that it's gonna be unpopular

9:34

because, you know, Russians and masks

9:36

don't want to go die in in

9:38

the trenches. been living in

9:40

sort of oblivion and try to

9:42

kind of tune this war out, but

9:44

now it's very real to them.

9:46

So if they're gonna be a bunch of new

9:48

guys who are joining the military

9:50

and are going to be fighting Putin's

9:52

war, what does that mean for Ukraine? I

9:54

mean, are things about to get worse for

9:56

Ukrainians if this is part of a

9:58

kind of new wave of intensity

10:00

coming from the Russian military.

10:02

Well,

10:03

that's the thing every analyst is watching

10:05

this right now. But so far, there are a lot

10:07

of questions whether that's actually gonna

10:10

be a huge game changer for

10:12

Russian forces, or it's gonna just prolong

10:14

the suffering for both sides. Because

10:17

on one hand, yes, you have three

10:19

hundred, a thousand more people or potentially

10:21

even more. but they're

10:23

not a super motivated because

10:25

they're they were, essentially, forced to go

10:27

and fight. And this will b,

10:29

it's not clear how well trained they are in

10:31

two weeks of training if you, you know,

10:34

never thought as not enough. And

10:36

even if you have some previous combat experience, for

10:38

example, in the chenchen wars, but

10:40

that's still well over a decade ago.

10:42

And also, you know, the

10:43

third really important component

10:46

here is whether the Russian

10:47

army can have enough or

10:49

supply enough equipment to

10:51

mobilize a list force because they need personal

10:53

gear, they need weapons, they need tanks,

10:55

they need logistics to be working, and

10:57

all of those things were problematic for

10:59

the Russians even with the current

11:01

force that they have now, which is much smaller.

11:03

So I think it's

11:05

gonna definitely help them to hold

11:07

ground in Ukraine, but that's

11:09

not a given that it will help

11:11

them advance. and do, you

11:13

know, offensive action there. So, you know,

11:15

we'll obviously have to see how it unfolds. But

11:17

so far, it's really unclear whether that's

11:19

gonna bring the, you know, Russia's

11:22

victory any closer

11:24

to Vladimir Putin.

11:25

And I can imagine that not only are

11:28

many of these guys, like, completely new to the

11:30

military or relatively untrained,

11:32

but that they are now going up against a

11:34

Ukrainian military that has

11:36

been doing this for at least half a year

11:38

that is incredibly motivated, pretty

11:41

case hardened by what they've seen so far, and

11:43

I imagine that that might be more

11:45

formidable challenge.

11:47

Of course. And not

11:50

only in the past years because, you know, we

11:52

get to understand that for the Ukrainians,

11:54

this war started in two thousand fourteen, and they

11:56

have been preparing for this in some shape or

11:58

form for several years. They've been trained by

12:00

some western experts. They

12:02

have way more west equipment

12:04

right now and, you know, more is coming.

12:07

They're now well trained to

12:09

use it and use it effectively as they've

12:11

already proved

12:12

so they were up against a

12:14

pretty significant rival

12:15

here, so it's starting to

12:17

be easy.

12:21

After the break, We'll talk about why

12:24

Russia is holding referendums in

12:26

the Ukrainian territories they're

12:28

currently occupying. We'll be

12:30

right back.

12:42

This

12:42

podcast is supported by Cain Brothers,

12:45

a division of KeyBanc Capital

12:47

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on your favorite podcast

13:08

app. So I

13:10

wanna also talk about

13:12

some of the other things that are happening in this conflict.

13:15

We've heard that Moscow backed

13:17

officials in occupied parts of

13:19

Ukraine are essentially staging

13:21

referendums. Tell me more

13:23

about these referendums what they do and

13:25

why they're important.

13:26

So Russia has been talking

13:29

about conducting these

13:31

referendums, which is really just

13:32

a pretext to illegally

13:35

index these occupied

13:37

territories and add them

13:39

to the Russian Federation four

13:41

months. They've been talking about them since, you know,

13:43

at their least end of spring, beginning

13:45

of summer. they were hoping that it's gonna

13:47

happen really quickly. It appears that they

13:49

were

13:49

also thinking that people in those

13:51

regions will respond to them really well and we'll

13:53

just welcome them with open rest arms, which didn't

13:55

really

13:55

happen in a lot of places, but

13:57

it did not happen because of the Ukrainian

13:59

counter

13:59

offensive. So now they feel a little bit

14:02

like their running out of time. So

14:04

they have pretty

14:06

quickly scrambled to

14:08

implement those plants and organize

14:10

this vote that essentially, you

14:11

know, the ballot will have one or

14:13

two questions basically

14:15

saying, do you agree to join

14:17

Russia and unite with Russia?

14:19

And then That's

14:21

essentially the only question. There's really

14:23

not much to vote on. It's just yes or

14:25

no. And, yeah, once

14:28

that's done, it's gonna be the same as premier

14:30

in two thousand fourteen where also there

14:32

was this sham referendum, then

14:34

they recognized as their own land, and then they

14:36

took

14:36

it. Interesting. I'm

14:38

just imagining that scene of, like, so these are

14:41

places in Eastern Ukraine that Russia now has

14:43

control, and they're basically asking everyone,

14:45

like, so you wanna be part of Russia.

14:47

Right? Like, check yes.

14:49

If so, check no and,

14:51

like, maybe that won't be great for you

14:53

since Russian troops are everywhere.

14:55

And, yeah, it just seems like a very fraught kind

14:57

of experience. Yeah. Of course.

14:59

And this is again

15:00

occupied land with huge

15:02

military

15:03

presence and you know, police, you know,

15:05

patrolling police ballast that station.

15:07

So there

15:08

is no, you know, no even

15:10

no facade here that's gonna be in any

15:12

way a fair election or even a

15:14

vote. And all of the Western countries already

15:17

said that they're not gonna recognize this

15:19

territory. Ukraine said it's absolutely

15:21

changes nothing and they will continue

15:23

regaining this land. What's also

15:25

interesting here is that Russia doesn't

15:27

control none of these regions fully. Like,

15:29

they have quite a bit of territory in

15:31

the Wuhan region are separate

15:33

just there who have been supporting Russia for

15:35

years in Valebs as

15:37

well. But those regions are not

15:39

fully under Russian control, even less

15:41

so in the Parija region. The

15:43

main town of that region is not under

15:46

Russian control. So it's really

15:48

unclear how they're trying to you know,

15:50

grab

15:50

these lands without actually having any

15:51

control of them. Well

15:53

then, what's the point of these

15:55

referendums? I mean, why bother

15:57

at all if especially the

16:00

the the wider world is gonna look at them

16:02

and say, these are not valid elections.

16:03

Putin has to

16:06

present something to the public as a

16:08

win, and that would be a

16:10

claim that, you know, they've liberated those

16:12

areas from

16:13

the neo Nazi regime as they call

16:15

the government of Vladimir Zelensky

16:16

and that

16:19

they

16:19

brought those

16:20

people, Russian speaking people,

16:23

home. And that's their whole -- Mhmm. -- kind

16:25

of motto there. We're bringing these lands home.

16:27

We're saving Russian people from abression.

16:29

So he wants to sell

16:30

this image as well. Howard Bauchner:

16:31

So when these referendums

16:34

happen and they invariably come

16:36

back

16:36

saying, oh look, surprise surprise. Like, everyone

16:39

who lives here wants to be part of Russia and

16:41

they're so glad we're here. What will

16:43

be the Ukrainian response to that?

16:45

Like, what will president Vladimir

16:47

Zelens he do when he

16:49

sees these I think you could call them like

16:51

sham elections take place.

16:53

I

16:53

think they're gonna probably motivate

16:55

the

16:55

equation for even more to

16:57

continue their advance, to continue

17:00

fighting there, and continue to

17:02

regain the the towns

17:03

that they've lost to Russia

17:06

in in the previous months. And I

17:08

think, you know, they've said it's fundamentally

17:10

for them, that does not change anything. They

17:12

still think it's the Ukrainian sovereign

17:14

land, and that will

17:16

just only mean that the fighting is gonna

17:18

go on as probably intensified.

17:20

And so in that scenario, I mean, is

17:23

there a world where where

17:25

Putin could respond with

17:27

nuclear weapons at this idea of, okay, we

17:29

have now been invaded because

17:31

Ukraine has tried to

17:33

reclaim these territories that we now

17:35

consider to be Russia. Yeah.

17:37

That's the fear here because

17:39

under

17:39

certain Russian laws, if

17:42

there is a

17:42

direct aggression against Russian sovereign

17:45

land, which it will be considered, again in

17:47

the eyes of Russian

17:47

law, that in Putin's

17:50

mind can mean that

17:51

it unties his hands to use more

17:53

severe weapons like tactical nuclear weapons, maybe

17:56

strategic

17:56

nuclear weapons against

17:58

whoever is attacking

17:59

Russia. And they have

18:02

been saying, like, you know, these

18:04

territories. We're there. We're occupying them.

18:06

They're essentially already hours, but we need

18:08

to, like, bring them home and legally you

18:10

know, unite them as part of Russia and, you

18:13

know, to make this one

18:15

great motherland. And if that motherland

18:17

is attacked, that

18:18

is

18:19

another pretext for

18:22

aggression.

18:22

And I think that gets at the question

18:24

that I know a lot of people, especially

18:26

here in the U. S. are wondering about all this

18:28

is, like, where is this going? Like, how,

18:30

you know, we've been asking since the first

18:32

month of this conflict. Like, when is this going

18:34

to end? But it seems like this

18:37

escalation, both in terms of the

18:40

military mobilization and also this

18:42

annexation vote, that

18:44

these are these are things that

18:46

suggest that we are nowhere near

18:48

anyone, any side giving up

18:50

or or being ready to

18:52

negotiate a conclusion.

18:53

Yeah.

18:54

It's, you

18:56

know, at

18:56

least in public, Vladimir Putin,

18:58

is doing the exact opposite

19:00

of of moving towards negotiation,

19:03

moving towards any signs of backing

19:05

down. But he's also not known to

19:07

do that. I think, you know, I don't

19:09

recall him ever apologizing for

19:11

anything or ever

19:12

kind of backing away from some plans

19:14

without kind of

19:15

repackaging and selling it to the public in a

19:18

different light. So I

19:20

think he publicly also cannot

19:22

afford to do that in Russia because he's been

19:24

he he put Russia through this through

19:26

this war. And if he just

19:28

backs out without any gain

19:31

that would not go down well for him.

19:33

But at the same time, I've you know, there are

19:35

also opinions amongst some Russian

19:37

analysts that maybe in, you know,

19:39

some probably ideal scenario,

19:41

the

19:41

sort of really

19:43

tough rhetoric

19:44

that we've been hearing is maybe a sign

19:46

that he's willing to sort of raise the stakes

19:48

and then go in for negotiations

19:50

and hopefully just get a better deal

19:52

out of it because he's been threatening Ukraine

19:54

and pretty much the entire world at

19:57

this level. So perhaps that will be the

19:59

case. But so far,

20:01

unfortunately, I think the fighting is

20:03

gonna continue. And,

20:05

you know, for at least the foreseeable future,

20:07

you know, this force is getting trained now.

20:09

They're gonna probably end up

20:11

in the trenches in the next

20:13

weeks and probably in about a month, there

20:15

will be reinforcement. So,

20:17

unfortunately, people are gonna die on

20:20

both sides. It

20:21

seems like one of the other potential

20:23

outcomes from this annexation vote is

20:25

that if Putin

20:27

can at least say to Russians,

20:30

look, Like, we now officially have control of

20:32

these parts of Eastern Ukraine. These

20:34

people said that they wanna be part of Russia, and

20:36

we're just giving them what they want. And, you know,

20:38

we have a a real standing to

20:40

say that this is part of our country

20:42

now. And if Ukraine attacks

20:44

those those places or tries to reclaim those

20:46

places, I mean, I wonder if Putin

20:48

could frame it as, oh, well, now Ukraine has

20:51

directly attacked Russia, that we

20:53

are being invaded, that we are the victims

20:55

here, and that that could be a

20:57

source of even more

20:59

escalation.

20:59

Yeah. Absolutely.

21:01

And

21:01

that is the fear that

21:04

that might happen. And also, not

21:07

even that Ukraine is invading because

21:09

increasingly we've been hearing from Russia

21:11

that now, you know, why they're losing is

21:13

not really because they're fighting against Ukraine.

21:15

They're fighting against the entire NATO alliance.

21:18

They're fighting against the United

21:20

States. From like state TV

21:22

propagandists, especially you know, they've been

21:24

selling this line that Washington is

21:26

pumping a Ukraine with weapons,

21:28

and now they will

21:30

be directly essentially attacking

21:32

Russian land once these

21:32

territories are part of

21:35

Russia. So that is, of course, very

21:36

scary development here in terms of

21:39

the rhetoric

21:39

that's already been going on. And

21:41

the big question if that's gonna

21:44

mean the Putin is gonna be even more

21:46

aggressive in his attack. Mary,

21:47

thank

21:50

you so much for all of this.

21:53

Thank you. Mary

21:59

Olushina reports on

21:59

Russia for the post. Eliza

22:02

Dennis produced this story. It

22:04

was mixed by Ted Muldoon and edited by

22:06

Maggie Petman. On Friday, our

22:08

colleagues reported that the US has privately

22:10

been warning Russia against using

22:13

nuclear weapons in Ukraine, saying

22:15

that grave consequences would

22:17

follow.

22:18

That's it

22:20

for post reports. Thanks for listening. Our

22:23

executive producer is Maggie Penman.

22:25

Our supervising senior producer is

22:27

Rina Flores. Tad Mouldoon is our

22:29

senior Our producers are

22:31

Eliza Dennis, Charlotte Freeland,

22:33

Alana Gordon, Aerioplasmic, Arjun

22:35

Singh, Jordan Marie Smith, and

22:37

Renny Spronofsky. Savy

22:39

Robinson and Emma Telkoff are our

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assistant producers. Sean

22:43

Carter is our engineer. Our intern

22:45

is Natalie Betendorff. The post

22:47

director of audio is Rene de Jablance I'm

22:50

Martine Powers. We'll be back on Monday

22:52

with more stories from the Washington

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