Russia Matters, 1/3/24

1. Russia has refrained from direct attacks on the three nuclear plants which are located on the territories controlled by Kyiv and which are now responsible for most of Ukraine’s electricity. Rather than target these NPPS in what could trigger a “catastrophic disaster,” Russian forces have recently focused on crippling these power plants’ abilities to transmit power by destroying the substations connecting them to the grid, according to NYT. In an effort to prevent such crippling, Ukraine has asked the IAEA to have its personnel stay at the substations, but the agency has only agreed to send periodic monitoring missions. Together, the three NPPs can provide 7.7 gigawatts of electricity, more than half of the country’s current generation capacity, according to DiXi Group. Thus, Ukraine is left dependent on three old Soviet nuclear reactors for as much as two–thirds of the country’s electricity generation. It is also highly unlikely that the IAEA will agree to have its personnel serve as human shields at Ukraine’s three NPPs.
2. Russia gained 227 square miles of territory (589 square kilometers, roughly the size of Chicago) in the month preceding Dec. 31, 2024, according to The Economist. In the past two weeks alone, the Russian armed forces have captured Makarivka, Sukhi Yaly and Zelenivka, Ukrainka, Dachenske, Novyi Trud and Vovkove, according to Ukraine’s DeepState OSINT group. To compensate for being outgunned and outmanned, the Ukrainian armed forces have recently resorted to badly-needed innovations, such as the first attack relying solely on unmanned ground vehicles, which occurred north of Kharkiv City on Dec. 20. In another instance of innovation, on Dec. 31 a Ukrainian naval drone shot down a Russian military helicopter for the first time, according to Ukraine’s intelligence service cited by Bloomberg.  
3. Ukrainian authorities have launched a criminal probe into mass desertions in the country’s 155th mechanized brigade named after Anne of Kyiv and trained in France, according to Kyiv Independent. At least 50 of the brigade’s servicemen disappeared while they were still being drilled in France, according to Telegraph. By the time the brigade entered battle for the first time, at least 1,700 of its troops had gone AWOL, according to this UK newspaper. Figures published by the Ukrainian general prosecutor’s office show that more than 90,000 cases have been opened into instances of soldiers going absent without leave or deserting since Russia invaded in 2022, according to AFP.
4. The U.S. government has said it will allocate almost $6 billion in additional aid to Ukraine, as Biden rushes to provide Kyiv with fresh firepower before his presidency expires, FT reported. The transfer includes $1.25 billion in assistance from U.S. weapons and ammunition stockpiles, as well as $1.22 billion which allows Ukraine to purchase goods directly from the U.S. defense industry. The package includes ammunition for the high mobility artillery rocket system, air defense munitions and anti-tank missiles.
5. Russia’s two top diplomats have signaled the pending end of what the Kremlin has claimed to be a self-imposed moratorium on the deployment of medium-range missiles that were once banned by the now-defunct Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. First, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov accused the U.S. of deploying such missiles in Asia and Europe in an interview with Kommersant on Dec. 27. Then his boss, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov weighed in two days later, asserting that “it is obvious that, for example, our moratorium on the deployment of INF missiles is already practically unviable and will have to be abandoned.”
6. In the waning days of 2024, Vladimir Putin expressed readiness to meet Donald Trump in the new year to discuss ending the Russian-Ukrainian war, but the Russian leadership was also quick to reject some of the key elements of a hypothetical peace deal proposed by Trump’s aides and his Western European counterparts. Among the rejected elements were immediate unconditional ceasefire, the stationing of a European peacekeeping force in Ukraine and the deferral of Ukraine’s membership in NATO for 20 years. In fact, “nothing from the incoming U.S. administration suggests anything of interest to us,” Russia’s envoy to the U.N., Vasily Nebenzya said of the Trump team’s proposals.
7. A most paradoxical feature of Russian-Ukrainian interaction throughout the course of the war has been that, in spite of the hostilities, Ukraine has continued to allow the transit of Russian gas through its territory. Not anymore. At 8 a.m. on Jan. 1, Russian gas supplies to Europe through Ukraine stopped, following the expiration of the transit contract. The route through Ukraine was one of the last two routes still carrying Russian gas to Europe. Its closure means EU countries will lose about 5% of gas imports in the middle of winter, according to FT.