Point to point navigation describes the long-lost art of celestial navigation, the ability to use the stars to chart a course across the open seas in the age before compasses. The key to successfully executing point to point navigation lay in fixing one’s position vis-à-vis the North Star. Failure to do so meant risking sailing aimlessly about a sea with no fixed reference points, an act that leads to death or, perhaps worse, becoming a castaway on some unchartered point on earth.
After a storm, a ship’s captain and his navigator would scan the skies for the North Star, from which they could establish not only what direction true north was, but also where they were in reference to the position of the North Star in the sky, so that they might navigate to safety.
When special operations forces are compromised behind enemy lines, they conduct what they call “escape and evasion,” the act of avoiding detection and probable death or capture, while making their way to a pre-designated haven from which they can regroup or be extracted. The CIA trains its operations officers in similar skill sets. Both colloquially refer to such actions as “finding their true north.”
The perpetrators of the horrific attack on the Crocus City Hall and Concert Center in Krasnogorsk, a metropolitan community located to the northwest of Moscow, were no different than any other terrorist/militant before them; after their act of mass murder, they sought out their “true north” to make good their escape.
Western governments, analysts, and pundits have loudly proclaimed that the men who carried out the attack on the Crocus City Hall had nothing whatsoever to do with Ukraine, and instead have collectively embraced a narrative that paints the men as members of the Islamic State-Khorasan (ISIS-K). ISIS is an off-shoot of Al-Qaeda-Iraq (AQI) which emerged in 2013 when core AQI members relocated to Syria. In 2014 ISIS declared itself to be a caliphate and began a series of operations which saw it take control on a third of Syria and a quarter of Iraq before being driven back and ultimately defeated by a coalition which included Iraq, the United States and Iran.
In 2014 Central Asian fighters affiliated with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan formed a branch of ISIS in Afghanistan known as ISIS-K, where they stood for Khorasan (ISIS-K). Khorasan is an ancient term for the territory encompassed by modern day Iran, Turkmenistan, and Afghanistan. ISIS-K continues to operate today in Afghanistan and Iran, as well as inside the former Soviet Central Asian republics, including Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
According to US officials, the United States collected intelligence that ISIS-K was planning an attack on Moscow in early March. This intelligence was behind a public warning issued by the US embassy in Russia on March 7 that “extremists” were planning an imminent attack on large gatherings in Moscow. “US citizens should be advised to avoid large gatherings over the next 48 hours,” the warning, published on the embassy website, stated. American citizens were warned to avoid crowds, including concerts. These US officials likewise claimed (and Russia has acknowledged) that Russia had been informed about the intelligence behind the March 7 warning. This information was shared based upon the “duty to warn” principle where US intelligence about potential terrorist attacks must be shared with the suspected targets. However, rather than passing this information through formal channels, it was done unofficially, through informal channels, significantly diluting the impact of the information.
The attackers posted a photograph of them reciting the Shahada, or Islamic oath and creed ("I bear witness that there is no deity but God, and I bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of God") which, if made sincerely, is all that is required to be identified as a Muslim in the eyes of God. While Islamic scholars note that it is only necessary to recite the words, for jihadists reciting Shahada accompanied by a raised right index finger, has become de riguere—Osama Bin Laden delivered it in this fashion, as did Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the founder of the Islamic State.
Shahada is a ritual, and those who make Shahada must understand its importance for it to have any meaning. As such, if one incorporates the raising of the right index finger as part of the Shahada ritual, it must be done piously. The use of the right hand is critical—in the Muslim faith, the right hand symbolizes all that is good, and the left is reserved for unclean acts: “No one among you should eat with his left hand or drink with it, for the shaytaan (devil) eats with his left hand and drinks with it.”
The four attackers delivered this oath by raising their left hands.
They also published this photograph with their faces blurred—they were shielding their identity.
There can be no subterfuge when reciting Shahada—it is an oath made before God and in the eyes of men.
Moreover, the blurring of their faces indicated that the attackers intended to survive their mission.
For most militants affiliated with ISIS-K, true north is the path to martyrdom, a one-way ticket to paradise. Their goal is to inflict as much harm as possible before being dispatched from this mortal earth, an act that is usually made certain using a suicide vest detonated at a time when more death and destruction can be wrought.
The perpetrators of the Crocus City Hall attack, however, did not wear suicide vests. Indeed, they had no intention of losing their lives, but rather to live and be able to enjoy the fruits of their labor, a purported $5,500 payment for services rendered.
These weren’t Islamist militants.
These were mercenaries who disguised themselves as Islamic militants.
And when they finished their murderous rampage, the purported ISIS-K fighters jumped into their car and headed toward their “true north.”
Ukraine.
Ukraine. The source of their money.
Ukraine. The source of their motivation.
The Russian investigation into the terror attack is still in its early stages. There are many facts left to be uncovered.
But there is a plethora of data which allows one to populate the puzzle with enough pieces to begin to see a discernable shape take form.
Russian authorities went out of their way to make sure that all four perpetrators were captured alive.
The perpetrators are in the process of being interrogated. Many of the techniques being used by Russia would not be permitted in the United States as they could readily be classified as torture. And many intelligence professionals—me included—discount the value of any confession made under severe duress.
But the Russian interrogations are aided by the fact that the Russian investigators are not engaged in a fishing expedition, but rather are guided by specific facts derived from the forensic examination of the cell phones of the four terrorists, which are currently in the possession of Russian authorities. One of these phones was recovered at the crime scene, and the data contained on this phone was used by Russian security officials to track the terrorists as they drove out of Moscow, toward Ukraine. Telephone numbers contained on the recovered phone allowed the Russians to zero in on the remaining phones, and monitor phone calls made by the terrorists in real time—including numerous calls to persons inside Ukraine who were working to create a gap in the Russian-Ukrainian border that the terrorists could escape through.
True North.
The Russians have been able to identify the core structure of a support network in Moscow which provided the four terrorists with transportation and housing.
Eleven arrests have been made in this regard.
The Russians have identified a network operating in Turkey who were affiliated with the recruitment, training and logistical preparation and support of the terrorist operation in Moscow.
Forty arrests have been made as a result.
But more importantly, Russia has gathered enough information to issue a warrant for the head of the Ukrainian security service, Vasyl Malyuk, on charges of public incitement of terrorism. Likewise, the head of the Russian security service, Alexander Boritnikov, has stated that when it comes to delivering justice to Ukrainians who may have been involved in the attack on the Crocus concert venue, “Everything is ahead of us.”
Russia, it seems, is navigating point to point.
Not toward a safe haven, but rather on a path of retribution.
And its “true north” is the same as that of the terrorists.
Back in the Summer of 1997, at the height of yet another crisis surrounding the seemingly never-ending saga of UN weapons inspection teams led by yours truly trying to gain access to sites considered by Iraq to be sensitive to their national security, I had surrounded the headquarters of the Iraqi intelligence service (the Mukhabarat), and was insisting that I be granted access to specific locations inside the headquarters deemed relevant to the Security Council’s mandate governing the disarmament of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction programs. My chief interlocutor was General Amer al-Sa’adi, the former head of Iraq’s military industry and, at the time, a special advisor to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
I briefed General Sa’adi on my desire to gain access to two specific locations, one in the M-4 (Operations) Directorate, and the other in the M-5 (Counterintelligence) Directorate. General Sa’adi informed me that these were the most sensitive aspects of the Mukhabarat’s work and granting me access would be impossible. I was persistent, however, and at the time I had the backing of the Security Council, which had made it clear in a recent resolution that a denial of access to my team would constitute a material breach of Iraq’s obligations to disarm, paving the way for the US to attack Iraq. This was no empty threat—in the Persian Gulf, the US had deployed an aircraft carrier and missile-carrying ships and submarines, backed up by US Air Force fighter-bombers operating out of bases in neighboring countries.
After denying my team access for several hours, General Sa’adi finally relented, and I took my team to the offices we had singled out as being of interest, where we found documents which furthered our understanding of how Iraq had conducted covert procurement of proscribed items in the early years of our disarmament work in Iraq. When the inspection was finished, I approached General Sa’adi and rebuked him. “We could have been done with this hours ago, and without any drama,” I said.
Earlier in the day, while my team was parked at the various entrances to the Mukhabarat compound, preventing any exit of personnel, vehicles, and/or documents, the Iraqi security forces responsible for our protection intercepted an enraged Iraqi citizen who, armed with an AK-47 automatic rifle, was planning to carry out a drive-by attack on me and my team. He was stopped less than 50 yards from where my command team and I were standing.
“Mr. Scott,” General Sa’adi replied, “we do not like you sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”
“You yourself saw that the information we found was relevant to our mandate,” I replied. “We are simply doing our job.”
“Yes,” Sa’adi noted. “It was relevant. But only as history. We no longer have the weapons you are looking for. We have declared everything. And now you are engaged in an academic exercise that puts our national security at risk.”
I took umbrage at his comments. “We had asked you about the relationship between the Mukhabarat and weapons procurement in the past. You denied there had been a connection. We had information that said there was. As such, we had a duty to assume that your denials were de facto evidence that these procurement activities were continuing.”
I pointed back at the main headquarters building, where we had conducted the searches. “And the documents we discovered proved that we were correct—there was a connection between the Mukhabarat and covert weapons procurement.”
“Yes,” General Sa’adi replied, “you were correct. But so were we. The documents also proved that this procurement activity was stopped years ago. Just like we said it had been.”
“So why not let my team in and close the door on this chapter? Why delay and harass us?”
General Sa’adi turned to me and smiled. “There is a saying among the Bedouin tribes. ‘If the camel once gets his nose in the tent, his body will soon follow.’ This,” Sa’adi said, gesturing at the Mukhabarat compound, “is our tent. We cannot allow you to put your nose under the tent flap. If we do, you won’t stop until you’re inside. And once inside, you will never leave.”
“But I did get inside,” I said.
“Yes, but we made it as inconvenient for you as possible. And now you are leaving. And if you come back, we will make it even more inconvenient.”
He paused, staring at me. “We do not want the UNSCOM camel in the Iraqi tent. Because with UNSCOM comes America. And with America comes death and destruction.”
I have often reflected on General Sa’adi’s words that day, and their prescience—UNSCOM did, eventually, get our nose under the Iraqi tent.
And with us came America.
And death followed.
The expression “don’t let the camel’s nose under the tent” became part of my personal lexicon, to be uttered anytime I thought an unwelcome presence was trying to winnow its way into my universe.
This past week, French President Emmanuel Macron declared that there we no “red lines” when it came to the prospects of French troops being deployed to Ukraine. Initial reports indicated that the French military was preparing to accelerate the reinforcement of a battalion-sized task force (some 700 men) currently deployed in Romania to a brigade (around 2,000 men). France had been preparing to take this action sometime in 2025, but the precipitous collapse of the Ukrainian army on the frontlines of its ongoing war with Russia compelled Macron to accelerate the operation in anticipation of dispatching this brigade into Ukraine.
In the grand scheme of things, a 2,000-strong French military contingent will not, in and of itself, alter the strategic balance of power on the ground in Ukraine. At best, the French battlegroup would be able to relieve a similarly sized Ukrainian unit serving in a security capacity so that the Ukrainians could be redeployed to the front, where it could be expected to be ground up in a matter of days.
The French have tried to muddy the waters further by stating that a French contingent, if deployed to Ukraine, would do so in the status of “neutral” troops.
The question is to what extent Russia would allow such a deployment of foreign forces onto the soil of Ukraine, even if these troops were not directly engaged in combat.
The answer?
Russia would not allow such a deployment. First, the idea of France assuming a “neutral” posture in a conflict in which they have already labeled the Russians as their “adversary” is laughable. Adversaries, by definition, cannot be neutral.
But the main reason Russia cannot allow even a limited French military deployment in Ukraine is this: “If the camel once gets his nose in the tent, his body will soon follow.”
These 2,000 troops are just the nose of a larger NATO camel. France has already stated that it is prepared to deploy up to 20,000 troops to Ukraine, the vanguard of a coalition of forces drawn from NATO nations that could total up to 60,000 strong.
And once 60,000 troops are deployed to Ukraine, then NATO will inevitably use Article 4 of the NATO Charter to define a situation of grave national security importance to the NATO collective and convert those 60,000 troops into a NATO force backed by the full power of NATO.
The camel will be fully ensconced inside the Ukrainian tent.
And for Russia to remove the camel, it would need to go to war against NATO.
Not a proxy war, such as is currently being waged using Ukraine as a tool of the collective West, but rather a full-scale conflict which will inevitably lead to the use of nuclear weapons, at first on European soil, and then later as part of a general nuclear conflict between Russia and the collective West.
In short, the end of the world as we know it.
The extent to which the United States is involved in the plans of France and its European partners is not fully known. The Biden administration has consistently articulated against any escalation which could result in American “boots on the ground” out of fear of allowing the situation to escalate out of control, resulting in a third world war that would rapidly devolve into nuclear war.
Russia, however, doesn’t differentiate between French boots and American boots—they are all NATO boots.
If Russia lets the French nose of the camel into the Ukrainian tent, then the NATO neck will come next, accompanied by the American body.
Russia just wrapped up three days of electoral processes which will define the internal direction of that nation for the next six years and, in doing so, serve as the driving force of global transformation for decades to come. Russia has some 112.3 million registered voters. From March 15 through March 17, a little more than 77% of them came out and cast their vote for who would be their president for the next six years. An overwhelming percentage—over 88%—cast their vote for the incumbent, Vladimir Putin.
Let there be no doubt—there was no question as to what the outcome would be in this election: Vladimir Putin was always going to win reelection.
Let there also be no doubt—the 2024 presidential election in Russia is the most important political event of the post-Cold War era, the byproduct of one of the greatest expressions of democratic will that the world will see in modern times.
The election was far more than a vote of confidence in an individual—Vladimir Putin has been the dominant political force in Russia since the turn of the century, a man who has, through sheer force of will, led Russia out of the dark catastrophe of the 1990’s, positioning Russia as one of the most powerful and influential nations of the modern era.
The election was not a mandate on the war in Ukraine—that issue had been decided in the fall of 2022, when Russia was compelled to mobilize its manpower and military industrial capacity as what had been envisioned as a short military campaign against Ukraine transformed into a larger, longer military struggle against the collective West.
Simply put, the Ukraine conflict was not on the ballot in 2024.
What was on the ballot was the future of Russia.
Vladimir Putin is 71 years old. His victory secures him another six-year term in office. When this term ends, in 2030, Putin will be 77 years old.
Russians are students of history, and they know too well the sad legacy of the period of Soviet stagnation, which began in the mid-1960’s under the leadership of Leonid Brezhnev. Brezhnev was 75 years old when he died in office, a mentally and physically feeble man. He was replaced by Yuri Andropov, who died two years later at the age of 69, only to be replaced by Konstantin Chernenko, who died in 1985 at the age of 73.
There is no reason to believe that Vladimir Putin will not maintain his current level of physical health and mental acuity for the remainder of his new term in office. But all men are, in the end, created equal, and the ravages of time weigh heavily on everyone, even someone as exceptional as Vladimir Putin.
For the past quarter of a century, Vladimir Putin has relied upon a core team of advisors and officials to help him lead Russia on its path of recovery. While this team has proven to be very capable, it, too, is subject to the same laws of nature that govern human existence as everyone else—ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
No man can live forever.
Russia, however, is in the minds of the people who constitute the Russian nation, eternal.
Having saved Russia from the deprivations of the 1990’s, when the collective West, led by the United States, conspired to keep Russia down by tearing it apart, Vladimir Putin is cognizant of the lessons of history which saw what happens when a ruling elite holds on to power for too long without any thought as to who will take their place.
Mikhail Gorbachev tried to lead Russia (the Soviet Union) out of the period of Soviet stagnation. He did so in a reactive fashion, without a well-thought-out plan, and the result was the collapse of the Soviet Union and the horrible decade of the 1990’s.
If Vladimir Putin were to approach the next six years as merely a continuation of his impressive tenure in office, he would be leading Russia down a path where it would collide with the harsh mistress that is historical precedent—an aging man, at the head of an aging system of government, with no clear plan on how to proceed when the inevitable appointment with destiny arrives.
In short, should the situation arise where Vladimir Putin feels compelled to seek an additional six-year term as Russia’s president in 2030, then Russia would more than likely find itself in danger of sinking into a new period of stagnation where the gains that have been made over the course of three decades of Putin rule will be squandered, and the potential of a societal collapse on par with the 1990’s a distinct reality.
This is why the important statistic to emerge from the 2024 Russian presidential election is not the 88% of the voters who marked their ballots in support of Vladimir Putin, but instead the 77% of the eligible voters who came out to express their support for the Russian state. Voter participation levels have always been seen as a reflection of the confidence a particular electorate had that the system of government they were sustaining through their vote best reflected the vision they themselves had of the nation they lived in.
By way of comparison, the 2020 presidential election in the United States saw a record-level 66% participation rate by eligible voters.
The 2024 presidential election in Russia beat that mark by 11 percentage points.
This means that the Russian people are confident that the 71-year-old Vladimir Putin will not be leading them down a path of historical inevitability where they are destined to repeat the mistakes of the past. Rather, the Russian people, confident in where Vladimir Putin has taken them to date, believe that he is the man who will best position Russia to be able to sustain these gains, and continue to prosper, in an eventual post-Putin Russia.
The 2024 Russian presidential election was a not a vote to maintain the status quo.
It was a vote for change.
The man that will oversee this change is Vladimir Putin.
In the coming months, one can expect to see the beginning of a changing of the guard. The Russian leaders who helped Putin get Russia to where it is today will be set aside, to be replaced by a younger generation of Russian leaders who will, under the guidance and leadership of Vladmir Putin, prepare Russia for whatever challenges that await it once Vladimir Putin is no longer president.
How this change will manifest itself—perhaps a transition from a Moscow-centric political elite to one derived from the various regions of Russia—is as yet unknown. But there will be change, because there must be change.
And this change was on the ballot.
The West derided the 2024 Russian presidential election as a sham.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The 2024 Russian presidential election was the manifestation of a thriving democracy, but a democracy defined by Russians.
The West focuses on the 88% of the Russians who voted for Vladimir Putin and derides the result as little more than a foregone conclusion in a system that offered the people only one real choice.
Russian democracy, however, is defined by the 77% level of electoral participation, and reflects the confidence of the people in the Russian state’s ability to take them from the strong position that Vladimir Putin has brought them and sustain this strength in a post-Putin era.
It was not a vote defined by recertifying the past, but rather a vote which empowered the government to undertake the critical changes needed for the future of the Russian nation.
It was the perfect expression of democracy, Russian style.
Please note the venue change. Scott will be speaking at the Carrboro Century Center, 100 N. Greensboro Street, in Carrboro, NC. Click here for more info.
No episode of Ask the Inspector tonight. The next episode is this Friday night, March 22 at 8 PM ET.
Watch the first hour live on Rumble, X, Facebook, Twitch or Locals. The second hour (starting at 9 PM ET) will stream only on Rumble, X and Locals, and will feature the music of Bob Dylan, and a recap of Scott’s trip to North Carolina and the Dylan concert we attended. Our special guest Friday night is Malcolm Burn, host of The Long Way Around, who recorded and mixed Dylan’s Oh Mercy album.
Pre-Dylan concert drinks and eats with my favorite weapons inspector.
Scott Ritter Extra is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
In my recent trip to Russia, I visited the “New Territories” of the Russian Federation and witnessed firsthand their struggle for identity and survival.
Tucker Carlson’s confused exasperation over Russian President Vladmir Putin’s extemporaneous history lesson at the start of their landmark interview, which was aired on February 9, 2024 (and which has since been seen by more than a billion people worldwide), underscored the reality that, for a western audience, the question of the historical bona fides of Russia’s claim of sovereign interest in territories located on the left bank of the Dnieper River, and which are currently claimed by Ukraine, is confusing to the point of incomprehension (for the cartographically challenged, the determination of what constitutes the “left” and “right” banks of a river is determined by the direction of flow of the river; the Dnieper River flows from the north to the south, and as such the “left” bank is the land located to the east of the Dnieper River).
Vladimir Putin, however, did not manufacture his history lesson from thin air. Anyone who followed the speeches and writings of the Russian President over the years would have found his comments to Mr. Carlson quite familiar, echoing both in tone and content previous statements made concerning both the viability of the Ukrainian state from a historic perspective, and the historical ties between what Putin has called Novorossiya (New Russia) and the Russian nation.
For example, on March 18, 2014, during his announcement regarding the annexation of Crimea, the Russian President observed that “After the [Russian] Revolution [of 1917], for a number of reasons the Bolsheviks—let God judge them—added historical sections of the south of Russia to the Republic of Ukraine. This was done with no consideration for the ethnic composition of the population, and these regions today form the south-east of Ukraine.”
Later during a televised question and answer session, Putin declared that “what was called Novorossiya back in tsarist days—Kharkov, Lugansk, Donetsk, Kherson, Nikolayev and Odessa—were not part of Ukraine then. These territories were given to Ukraine in the 1920s by the Soviet Government. Why? Who knows? They were won by Potemkin and Catherine the Great in a series of well-known wars. The center of that territory was Novorossiysk, so the region is called Novorossiya. Russia lost these territories for various reasons, but the people remained.”
Novorossiya wasn’t just a construct of Vladimir Putin’s psyche, but rather a notion drawn from historic fact that resonated with the people who populated the territories so encompassed. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was an abortive effort by pro-Russian citizens of the new Ukrainian state to restore Novorossiya as an independent region which would initially encompass Odessa, Mykolaiv, Kherson, and Crimea, with the possibility of later expanding into other regions, such as Zaporizhia, Dnipropetrovsk, and Kharkov.
While this effort failed, the concept of a greater Novorossiya confederation was revived in May 2014 by the newly proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics. But this effort, too, was short lived, being put on ice in 2015. This, however, did not mean the death of the idea of Novorossiya. On February 21, 2022, Vladimir Putin delivered a lengthy address to the Russian nation on the eve of his decision to send Russian troops into Ukraine as part of what he termed a Special Military Operation. Those who watched Tucker Carlson’s February 9, 2024 interview with Putin would have been struck by the similarity between the two presentations.
While Putin did not make a direct reference to Novorossiya, he did outline fundamental historic and cultural linkages which serve as the foundation for any discussion about the viability and legitimacy of Novorossiya in the context of Russian-Ukrainian relations. “I would like to emphasize,” Putin said, “once again that Ukraine is not just a neighboring country for us. It is an integral part of our own history, culture, and spiritual space. It is our friends, our relatives, not only colleagues, friends, and former work colleagues, but also our relatives and close family members. Since the oldest times,” Putin continued, “the inhabitants of the south-western historical territories of ancient Russia have called themselves Russians and Orthodox Christians. It was the same in the 17th century, when a part of these territories [i.e., Novorossiya] was reunited with the Russian state, and even after that.”
The Russian President set forth his contention that the modern state of Ukraine was an invention of Vladimir Lenin, the founding father of the Soviet Union. “As a result of Bolshevik policy,” Putin stated, “Soviet Ukraine arose, which even today can with good reason be called ‘Vladimir Ilyich Lenin’s Ukraine.’ He is its author and architect. This is fully confirmed by archive documents.”
Putin went on to issue a threat which, when seen in the context of the present, proved ominously prescient. “And now grateful descendants have demolished monuments to Lenin in Ukraine. This is what they call decommunization. Do you want decommunization? Well, that suits us just fine. But it is unnecessary, as they say, to stop halfway. We are ready to show you what real decommunization means for Ukraine.”
In September 2022 Putin followed through on this threat, ordering referenda in four territories (Kherson and Zaporizhia, and the newly independent Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics) to determine whether the populations residing there wished to join the Russian Federation. All four did so. Putin has since then referred to these new Russian territories as Novorossiya, perhaps nowhere more poignantly that in June 2023, when he praised the Russian soldiers “who fought and gave their lives to Novorossiya and for the unity of the Russian world.”
The story of those who fought and gave their lives to Novorossiya is one that I have wanted to tell for some time now. I bore witness to the extremely one-sided coverage of the military aspects of Russia’s Special Military Operation here in the United States. Like many of my fellow analysts, I had to undertake the extremely difficult task of trying to parse out fact from an overwhelmingly fictional narrative. Nor was I helped in any way in this regard by the Russian side, which was parsimonious in the release of a narrative that reflected their version of reality.
In preparing for my December 2024 visit to Russia, I had hoped to be able to visit the four new Russian territories to see for myself what the ground truth was when it came to the fighting between Russia and Ukraine. I also wanted to interview Russian military and civilian leadership to get a broader perspective of the conflict. I had reached out to the Russian Foreign and Defense ministries through the Russian Embassy in the United States, bending the ear of both the Ambassador, Anatoly Antonov, and the Defense Attache, Major-General Evgeny Bobkin, about my plans.
While both men supported my project and wrote recommendations back to their respective ministries in this regard, the Russian Defense Ministry, which had the final say over what happened in the four new territories, vetoed the idea. This veto was not because they didn’t like the idea of me writing an in-depth analysis of the conflict from the Russian perspective, but rather that the project as I outlined it, which would have required sustained access to frontline units and personnel, was deemed too dangerous. In short, the Russian Defense Ministry did not relish the idea of me being killed on their watch.
Under normal circumstances, I would have backed off. I had no desire to create any difficulty with the Russian government, and I was always cognizant of the reality that I was a guest in their country.
The last thing I wanted to be was a “war tourist,” where I put myself and others at risk for purely personal reasons. But I also felt strongly that if I were going to continue to provide so-called “expert analysis” about the Special Military Operation and the geopolitical realities of Novorossiya and Crimea, I needed to see these places firsthand. I strongly believed that I had a professional obligation to see the new territories. Fortunately for me, Alexander Ziryanov agreed.
It wasn’t going to be easy.
We first tried to enter the new territories via Donetsk, driving west out of Rostov-on-Don. However, when we arrived at the checkpoint, we were told that the Ministry of Defense had not cleared us for entry. Not willing to take no for an answer, Alexander drove south, towards Krasnodar, and then—after making some phone calls—across the Crimean Bridge into Crimea. Once it became clear that we were planning on entering the new territories from Crimea, the Ministry of Defense yielded, granting permission for me to visit the four new Russian territories under one non-negotiable condition—I was not to go anywhere near the frontlines.
We left Feodosia early on the morning of January 15, 2024. At Dzhankoy, in northern Crimea, we took highway 18 north toward the Tup-Dzhankoi Peninsula and the Chonhar Strait, which separates the Syvash lagoon system that forms the border between Crimea and the mainland into eastern and western portions. It was here that Red Army forces, on the night of November 12, 1920, broke through the defenses of the White Army of General Wrangel, leading to the capture of the Crimean Peninsula by Soviet forces. And it was also here that the Russian Army, on February 24, 2022, crossed into the Kherson region from Crimea, beginning the Special Military Operation.
The Chonhar Bridge is one of three highway crossings that connect Crimea with Kherson. It has been struck twice by Ukrainian forces to disrupt Russian supply lines, once on June 22, 2023, when it was struck by British-made Storm Shadow missiles, and once again on August 6, 2023, when it was hit by French-made SCALP missiles (a variant of the Storm Shadow). In both instances, the bridge was temporarily shut down for repairs, evidence of which was clearly visible as we made our way across the bridge, and on to the Chonhar checkpoint, where we were cleared by Russian soldiers for entry into Kherson.
At the checkpoint we picked up a vehicle carrying a bodyguard detachment from the reconnaissance company of the Sparta Battalion, a veteran military formation whose roots date back to the very beginning of the Donbas revolt against the Ukrainian nationalists who seized power in Kiev during the February 2014 Maidan coup. They would be our escort through Kherson and Zaporizhia—even though we were going to give the frontlines a wide berth, Ukrainian “deep reconnaissance groups,” or DRGs, were known to target traffic along the M18 highway. Alexander was driving an armored Chevrolet Suburban, and the Sparta detachment had their own armored SUV. If we were to come under attack, our response would be to try and drive through the ambush. If that failed, then the Sparta boys would have to go to work.
Our first destination was the city of Genichesk, a port city along the Sea of Azov. Genichesk is the capital of the Genichesk District of Kherson and, since November 9, 2022, when Russian forces withdrew from the city of Kherson, it has served as the temporary capital of the Kherson Region. Alexander had been on his phone since morning, and his efforts had paid off—I was scheduled to meet with Vladimir Saldo, the Governor of the Kherson Region.
Genichesk is—literally—off the beaten path. When we reached the town of Novoalekseyevka, we got off the M18 highway and headed east along a two-lane road that took us toward the Sea of Azov. There were armed checkpoints all along the route, but the Sparta bodyguards were able to get us waived through without any issues. But the effect of these checkpoints was chilling—there was no doubt that one was in a region at war.
To call Genichesk a ghost town would be misleading—it was populated, and the evidence of civilian life was everywhere you looked. The problem was, there didn’t seem to be enough people present. The city, like the region, was in a general state of decay, a holdover from the neglect it had suffered at the hands of a Ukrainian government that largely ignored territories that had, since 2004, voted in favor of the Party of Regions, the pro-Russian party of former President Viktor Yanukovich, who was ousted from office because of the February 2014 Maidan coup. Nearly two years of war had likewise contributed to the atmosphere of societal neglect, an impression which was magnified by the weather—overcast, cold, with a light sleet blowing in off the water.
As we made our way into the government building where the government of the Kherson Region had established its temporary offices, I couldn’t help but notice a statue of Lenin in the courtyard. Ukrainian nationalists had taken it down on July 16, 2015, but the citizens of Genichesk had reinstalled it in April 2022, once the Russians had taken control of the city. Given President Putin’s feeling about the role Lenin played in creating Ukraine, I found both the presence of this monument, and the role of the Russian citizens of Genichesk in restoring it, curiously ironic.
Vladimir Saldo was a beacon of brightness, a man imbued with enthusiasm for his work. A civil engineer by profession, with a PhD in economics, Saldo had served in senior management positions in the “Khersonbud” Project and Construction Company before moving into politics, serving in the Kherson City Council, the Kherson Regional Administration, and two terms as the mayor of the city of Kherson. Saldo, as a member of the Party of Regions, was cast into political exile following the Maidan coup of 2014, when the Ukrainian nationalists who had seized power banned the party.
Alexander Ziryanov and I had the pleasure of meeting with Vladimir Saldo in his office in the governmental building in downtown Genichesk. We talked about a wide range of issues and topics, including Saldo’s own path from a Ukrainian construction specialist to his current position as the Governor of Kherson Oblast.
We talked about the war.
But Saldo’s passion was the economy, and how he could help revive the civilian economy of Kherson in a manner that best served the interests of its diminished population—on the eve of the initiation of the Special Military Operation, back in early 2022, the population of Kherson Oblast stood at just over a million persons, most of whom resided in the city of Kherson, which some 280,000 people called home. By November 2022, following the withdrawal of Russian forces from the right bank of the Dnieper River—including the city of Kherson—the population of Kherson Oblast had fallen to under 400,000, and with dismal economic prospects, the numbers kept falling. Most of those who left were Ukrainians who did not want to live under Russian rule. But many others were Russians and Ukrainians who felt that they had no future in war-torn Kherson, and as such sought their fortunes elsewhere in Russia.
“My job is to give the people of Kherson hope for a better future,” Saldo told me. “And the time for this to happen is now, not when the war ends.”
Restoration of Kherson’s once vibrant agricultural sector was a top priority, and Saldo had personally taken the lead in signing agreements for the provision of Kherson produce to Moscow supermarkets. Saldo had also turned Kherson into a special economic zone, where potential investors and entrepreneurs could receive preferential loans and financial support, as well as organizational and legal assistance for businesses willing to open shop in Kherson.
The man responsible for making Vladimir Saldo’s vision into reality is Mikhail Panchenko, the Director of the Kherson Region Industry Development Fund. I met Mikhail in a restaurant located across the street from the governmental building which Saldo called home. Mikhail had come to Kherson in the summer of 2022, leaving a prominent position in Moscow in the process. “The Russian government was interested in rebuilding Kherson,” Mikhail told me, “and established the Industry Development Fund as a way of attracting businesses to the region.” Mikhail, who was born in 1968, was too old to enlist in the military. “When the opportunity came to direct the Industry Development Fund came, I jumped at it as a way to do my patriotic duty.”
The first year of the fund’s operation saw Mikhail hand out 300 million rubles in loans and grants (some of which was used to open the very restaurant where we were meeting). The second year saw the allotment grow to some 700 million rubles. One of the biggest projects was the opening of a concrete production line capable of producing 60 square meters of concrete per hour. Mikhail took Alexander and I on a tour of the plant, which had grown to three production lines generating some 180 square meters of concrete an hour. Mikhail had just approved funding for an additional four production lines, for a total concrete production rate of 420 square meters per hour.
“That’s a lot of concrete,” I remarked to Mikhail.
“We are making good use of it,” he replied. “We are rebuilding schools, hospitals, and government buildings that had been neglected over the years. Revitalizing the basic infrastructure a society needs if it is to nurture and growing population.”
The problem Mikhail faced, however, is that most of the population growth being experienced in Kherson today came from the military. The war couldn’t last forever, Mikhail noted. “Someday the army will leave, and we will need civilians. Right now, the people who left are not returning, and we’re having a hard time attracting newcomers. But we will keep building in anticipation of a time when the population of Kherson Oblast will grow from an impetus other than war. And for that,” he said, a twinkle in his eye, “we need concrete!”
I thought long and hard about the words of both Vladimir Saldo and Mikhail Panchenko as Alexander drove back onto the M18 highway, heading northeast, toward Donetsk. The reconstruction efforts being undertaken were impressive. But the number that kept coming to mind was the precipitous decline in the population—more than 60% of the prewar population had left the Kherson Region since the Russian military operation had begun.
According to statistics provided by the Russian Central Election Commission, some 571,000 voters took part in the referendum of joining Russia that was held in late September 2022. A little over 497,000, or some 87%, voted in favor, while a bit more than 68,800, or 12%, voted against.
These numbers, if accurate, implied that there was a population of over 760,000 eligible voters at the time of the election. While the loss of the city of Kherson in November 2022 could account for a significant source of the population drop that took place between September 2022 and the time of my visit in January 2024, it could not account for all of it.
The Russian population of Kherson in 2022 stood at approximately 20%, or around 200,000. One can safely say that the number of Russians who fled west to Kiev following the initiation of the Special Military Operation amounts to a negligible figure. If one assumes that the Russian population of Kherson Region remained relatively stable, then most of the population decline came from the Ukrainian population.
While Vladimir Saldo did not admit to such, the Governor of neighboring Zaporizhia Region, Yevgeny Balitsky, has acknowledged that many Ukrainian families deemed by the authorities to be anti-Russian were forcibly deported from the Zaporizhia Region following the initiation of the Special Military Operation (Russians accounted for a little more than 25% of the pre-conflict Zaporizhian population). Many others fled to Russia to escape the deprivations of war.
Evidence of the war was everywhere to be seen. While the conflict in Kherson had stabilized along a line defined by the Dnieper River, Zaporizhia was very much a frontline region. Indeed, the main direction of attack of the Ukrainian 2023 Summer counteroffensive was from the Zaporizhian village of Robotine, toward the town of Tokmak, and on towards the temporary regional capital of Melitopol (the city of Zaporizhia remained under Ukrainian control throughout the conflict to date).
I had petitioned to visit the frontlines near Robotine but had been denied by the Russian Ministry of Defense. So, too, had my request to visit units deployed in the vicinity of Tokmak—too close to the front. The closest I would get would be the city of Melitopol, the ultimate objective of the Ukrainian counterattack. We drove past fields filled with the concrete “dragon’s teeth” and antitank ditches that marked the final layer of defenses that constituted the “Surovikin Line,” named after the famed Russian General Sergey Surovikin, who had commanded the Special Military Operation when the defenses were put in place.
The Ukrainians had hoped to reach the city of Melitopol in a matter of days once their attack began; they never penetrated past the first line of defense situated to the southeast of Robotine.
Melitopol, however, was not immune to the horror of war, with Ukrainian artillery and rockets targeting it often to disrupt Russian military logistics. I kept this in mind as we drove through the streets of the city, past military checkpoints, and roving patrols. I was struck by the fact that the civilians I saw were going about their business, seemingly oblivious to the everyday reality of war that existed around them.
As was the case in Kherson, the entirety of the Zaporizhia Region seemed strangely depopulated, as if one were driving through the French capital of Paris in August, when half the city was away on vacation. I had hoped to be able to talk with Yevgeny Balitsky about Zaporizhia’s reduced population and other questions I had about life in Zaporizhia during wartime, but this time Alexander’s phone could not produce the desired result—Balitsky was away from the region and unavailable.
If he had been available, I would have asked him the same question I had put to Vladimir Saldo earlier in the day: given that Vladimir Putin was apparently willing to return the Kherson and Zaporizhia regions to Ukraine as part of the peace deal negotiated in March 2022, how does the population of Zaporizhia feel about being part of Russia today? Are they convinced that Russia is, in fact, there to stay? Do they feel like they are a genuine part of the Novorossiya that Vladimir Putin speaks about?
Vladimir Saldo had talked in depth about the transition from being occupied by Russian forces, which lasted until April-May 2022 (about the time that Ukraine backed out of the agreed upon ceasefire agreement), to being administered by Russia. “There never was a doubt in my mind, or anyone else, that Kherson was historically a part of Russia,” Saldo said, “or that, once Russian troops arrived, that we would forever be Russian again.”
But the declining populations, and the admission of forced deportations on the part of Balitsky, suggested that there was a significant part of the population that had, in fact, taken umbrage at such a future.
I would have liked to hear what Yevgeny Balitsky had to say about this question.
Reality, however, doesn’t deal with hypotheticals, and the present reality is that both Kherson and Zaporizhia are today part of the Russian Federation, and that both regions are populated by people who had made the decision to remain there as citizens of Russia. We will never know what the fate of these two territories would have been had the Ukrainian government honored the ceasefire agreement negotiated in March 2022. What we do know is that today both Kherson and Zaporizhia are part of the “New Territories”—Novorossiya.
Russia will for some time find its acquisition of the “new territories” challenged by nations who question the legitimacy of Russia’s military occupation and subsequent absorption of Kherson and Zaporizhia into the Russian Federation. The reticence of foreigners to recognize these regions as being part of Russia, however, is the least of Russia’s problems—as was the case with Crimea, the Russian government will proceed irrespective of any international opposition.
The real challenge facing Russia is to convince Russians that the new territories are as integral to the Russian motherland as Crimea, a region absorbed by Russia in 2014 which has seen its economic fortunes and its population grow over the past decade. The diminished demographics of Kherson and Zaporizhia represent a litmus test of sorts for the Russian government, and for the governments of both Kherson and Zaporizhia. If the populations of these regions cannot regenerate, then these regions will wither on the vine. If, however, these new Russian lands can be transformed into places where Russians can envision themselves raising families in an environment free from want and fear, then Novorossiya will flourish.
Novorossiya is a reality, and the people who live there are citizens by choice more than circumstance. They are well-served by men like Vladimir Saldo and Yevgeny Balitsky, who are dedicated to the giant task of making these regions part of the Russian Motherland in actuality, not just in name.
Behind Saldo and Balitsky are men like Mikhail Panchenko, people who left an easy life in Moscow or some other Russian city to come to the “New Territories” not for the purpose of seeking their fortunes, but rather to improve the lives of the new Russian citizens of Novorossiya.
For this to happen, Russia must emerge victorious in its struggle against the Ukrainian nationalists ensconced in Kiev, and their western allies. Thanks to the sacrifices of the Russian military, this victory is in the process of being accomplished.
Then the real test begins—turning Novorossiya into a place Russians will want to call home.
Note: This article was first published on the RT website, on March 9, 2024. It is part of a four-part series. It is republished here because censorship undertaken by various online platforms has limited the audience for such a far-ranging and important subject.