American private institution Atlantic Council assumes that Vladimir Putin underestimated the Ukrainians when invading Ukraine.
They say that the hybrid war started by Russia in Ukraine has been going on for the 4th year. There were times when nobody believed that Ukraine would hold on even for 4 weeks. The thing is, the Crimea was annexed without any fight, which made international experts believe that Ukraine was weak and completely dependent on Russia. This stand point used to be popular in Moscow as well. Some Russian politicians expected a complete victory in a couple of months, but back than Ukraine was vulnerable after the revolution, which lead to the end of Yanukovich’s regime, while the temporary government was lacking legitimacy to seriously resist Russia. Back then, Russia got a chance to occupy the rest of Ukraine. Vladimir Putin seemed to be encouraged by the success in the Crimea.
For the first couple of weeks, it could seem that Ukraine’s chances to survive were close to zero. But eventually Russia failed to implement the ambitious plan of joining the rest of Ukraine. It’s been over 3 years since then but Russia hasn’t advanced more than occupying a small amount of the East of Ukraine. Atlantic Council believes that Russia simply underestimated the Ukrainians.
Back then, Ukraine had only 6000 military, so they couldn’t defend the motherland. However, Russia underestimated the Ukrainian spirit and desire to stay independent. That resulted in thousands of volunteers taking arms to defend their home country from the Russian aggression, not to mention thousands of people backing them and helping them with food and ammunition.
It’s due to this miracle that Ukraine managed to save its independence. Still, experts say that there is nothing strange about the Kremlin’s failure since they have been conducting the wrong policy regarding Ukraine ever since the USSR ceased to exist. That policy was escalated when Putin came into power. The thing is, Putin openly showed his ambition to resurrect Russia’s hegemony in the entire post-Soviet region. Now that Putin can see that the Ukrainians don’t welcome Russia he starts putting the blame on CIA agents, neo-fascists and other mystical villains for separating Ukraine from Russia.
