The ISIS Terrorist Attack in Moscow Changes Everything for Putin — Why the US Congress Must Act Now
Unsurprisingly, Vladimir Putin took advantage of the Friday ISIS terrorist attack in Moscow that killed at least 133 people and injured 145 at a concert hall on the outskirts of the city.
In a televised address that took him 24 hours to make, Putin blamed Ukrainians, suggesting that “the Ukrainian side” had “prepared a window” for the terrorists to cross the border from Russia into Ukraine.
“They tried to hide and move towards Ukraine, where, according to preliminary data, a window was prepared for them from the Ukrainian side to cross the state border,” Putin said.
We have reached a point when even ISIS has to fight Russian disinformation. ISIS took credit immediately after the attack. On Telegram, the Islamic State said the shooting came within the context of the “raging war” between Islamic State and countries fighting Islam.
Putin is using this terrorist attack to bolster support for the war domestically and mobilize further troops. At least 300,000 troops are being mobilized primarily from reservists, re-contracted conscripts, and staff from defense contractors.
Russia’s war has already claimed the lives of at least 500,000 on their own side alone. How many more is Putin willing to sacrifice? Well, with this terrorist attack, Putin has been once again given legitimacy to do whatever it takes to defeat his imagined enemy in Ukraine.
Let me explain.
“That low-life Putin, instead of dealing with his Russian citizens, addressing them, was silent for a full 24 hours, thinking about how to tie this to Ukraine … It’s all absolutely predictable.” — Zelensky
First, we should address briefly whether we really know that Ukraine is not responsible for the attack since it’s important to challenge Russian disinformation whenever we can.
Well, we can be certain for at least two reasons:
- Ukraine has no history of targeting Russian noncombatants, and
- ISIS claimed responsibility.
What some seem to forget is that Ukraine has had the opportunity to target citizens in retaliation against Russia’s war since the full-scale invasion began in 2022.
Ukraine chooses not to since the rules of war do not allow the needless and indiscriminate targeting of civilians. When Ukraine targets Russian territory, it takes out important military targets or refineries. Ukraine is simply not interested in killing Russian noncombatants.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, said that the remarks of Putin and “other thugs” are typical of the regime.
“What happened yesterday in Moscow is obvious: Putin and the other thugs are just trying to blame it on someone else,” Zelensky said.
He then added,
“They have brought hundreds of thousands of their own terrorists here, on Ukrainian land, to fight against us, and they don’t care about what is happening inside their own country.”
That does not prevent Putin’s propaganda machine from taking advantage of the situation of course.
This is especially the case since this terrorist attack has had the largest number of casualties since the 2004 Beslan school siege, in which 334 people, including 186 children, were killed after being held captive by militants for two days.
We have a record of what Putin tends to do in situations like these. He retaliates indiscriminately. This retaliation is overtly popular with the Russian public, so why wouldn’t he? Putin is not concerned with any moral questions around military interventions.
From the evidence we have, Putin will use this to bolster domestic support for the war just as he did earlier in his presidency when he bombed the capital of Chechnya, Grozny, reducing it to rubble in light of the Moscow bombings in 1999.
Declared State of War
Despite the belief that the Russian dictator, Vladimir Putin, is a “master strategist” his disastrous full-scale invasion of Ukraine has not worked out according to plans. It’s not hard for anyone to see.
From Ukraine’s successful counteroffensive in the fall of 2022 to the stalemate and Ukraine’s successful attacks against Russia’s fleet near Sevastopol in Crimea to Prigozhin’s coup, Putin clearly needs something then to change the narrative.
Just as he needed something like the Moscow apartment bombings in 1999 to gain support, he needed something like this to bolster support for another mobilization of troops at a time when more than 500,000 troops had already died on the Russian side.
In fact, for the first time since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Kremlin has confirmed that they are in a state of war in Ukraine.
“We are in a state of war,” Dmitry Peskov said.
He continued:
“Yes, it started as a special military operation, but as soon as this whole gang was formed, when the collective West took part in all this alongside Ukraine, for us it became a war. I am convinced of this, and everyone must understand it.”
This is a serious development and one of the most significant ones in Russia’s war effort since Yevgeny Prigozhin’s coup in the summer of 2023.
Russia has already retaliated in Ukraine over the weekend with the largest attack on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure this year and one of the largest since the outbreak of the war.
Russia attacked Ukraine’s electrical power infrastructure over the weekend causing widespread outages and killing at least five people on Friday alone. Zelensky said that on Friday alone Russia used more than 60 drones and about 90 rockets.
“Even last winter, attacks on our energy system were not as large as they were this night,” said the head of energy utility Ukrenergo, Volodymyr Kudrytskyi.
So, how will NATO and Ukraine come to this moment?
How This Changes Everything for Putin
There’s good news and there’s bad news.
Let’s start with the good news.
Because of Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the “brain-dead” military alliance, according to French President’s remarks in 2019 about NATO, has actually been awakened from its complacency.
NATO made the much-needed adjustments to their defense, as it became clear that Putin will do anything to “restore” his imagined empire.
EU member states such as Austria, Finland, and Germany, which have largely been pacifistic, have all called on an increased military budget. Sweden and Finland have joined NATO.
Without the US, the EU would be in serious trouble. The only European Member state with nuclear weapons, following Brexit, is France, with some 300 warheads.
Compare that with Russia’s estimated 1,500 nuclear warheads in deployment and another 3,000 in reserve. Putin would have the upper hand here.
Despite my adamant belief in getting rid of nuclear weapons, in the short-term they seem necessary. In the words of the political science analyst, Samuel Charap, on the 80,000 Hours podcast, we now know that nuclear deterrence is effective, otherwise, Putin would have most likely invaded other NATO territories.
NATO’s importance has been restored at least until Trump doesn’t potentially threaten the alliance’s existence in the future.
The bad news is the war is far from over. Without the US Congress, Ukraine will not be able to continue to lose troops in Ukraine. Without significantly more aid, Ukraine will continue to lose precious lives.
We all know now that Ukraine would be able to resist at the grassroots level. They have shown that they are unwilling to cede territory even at the cost they are paying. Read my article, “No, Ukrainians Cannot Just Cede Territory” to see my thoughts on this.
Ukraine needs weaponry to prevent the needless loss of life and show Russia that to win their war, they will have to lose many more troops.
Western intelligence shows that Russia is planning to fight for at least another three years. It’s hard to imagine then that Russia will risk needlessly, but it is likely since because of the terrorist attack, they will have every reason to show Russians that they are the ones in control.
But how will Ukraine respond?
As mentioned above, Ukraine’s response seems to primarily rely on NATO support — and especially that of the US.
There are two areas we can look at to see what Ukraine’s response might be then.
First, we have to of course consider that Ukraine does not have a guarantee of what equipment the West will provide it in the months (and possibly, years) to come. They need consistency.
Second, Ukrainians are increasingly frustrated leading to discussions about who exactly is responsible for the failures in the counteroffensive. As a result, they have made changes in military command from Gen. Zaluzhny to Col. Gen. Syrski.
We don’t exactly know what Syrski’s counteroffensive plans are as of now for the obvious reason that if the plans were leaked, they would thwart the entire purpose of Ukrainian counterattacks. So, unfortunately, we do not know what Ukraine has planned next.
What we do know is that the US Congress acts slowly. Let’s hope they finally see that without ammunition and weaponry, Ukraine cannot repel the enemy.
And because of Ukraine fatigue, Putin’s renewed mobilizations, and Russia’s threatening speech, in the months to come, Ukraine will need all the support it can get.
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