Russian top security officials urging Putin to escalate war in Ukraine, there will be mobilisation

High-ranking Russian security officials seem to assess that Russia needs to escalate the war against Ukraine rather than seek a way out through negotiations. They are not ready to give up the war because of heavy losses.

This is reported by the American Institute for the Study of War (ISW).

The analysts pointed out the material of the Meduza publication before presenting their conclusion. It said that Russian security forces and the Russian military can recognise that Russian troops are not making significant territorial gains proportional to the losses in manpower and hardware they suffer during the war against Ukraine.

The Russian military command has so far tolerated exorbitant personnel losses in exchange for tactical, yet not operationally significant successes. In turn, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin's theory of victory is based on accepting such losses as long as the Russians continue to advance in Ukraine.

However, average daily Russian offensives slowed by about 9 kilometres square in December 2024, after three consecutive months of increased territorial gains and personnel losses in September, October and November. As a result, Russian military commanders may be less prepared than Putin to sustain such high casualties if the pace of Russian troop advances continues to slow. At the same time, the Russian military, as well as the security forces, donot seem ready to give up the war because of these losses. Instead, they are allegedly in favour of Putin stepping up Russia's military efforts. In particular, he has called for an additional partial call-up of reservists and an official decision to switch to martial law. Presumably in the hope of filling the battlefield with manpower and hardware.

Analysts continue to believe that Putin is resisting a partial forced conscription of reservists or further mobilisation of the Russian economy, as such decisions would be highly unpopular among Russians and would further exacerbate Russia's labour shortage and economy.

At the same time, it remains to be seen whether the group of Russian military and security officials calling for further mobilisation of the workforce and economy will succeed in persuading Putin to take more drastic measures to satisfy Russian troops in the war against Ukraine.

However, ISW suggests that rising losses of personnel, as well as problems in fulfilling the voluntary recruitment of men for the war, may force Putin to conduct an involuntary partial call-up of reservists in the near future.