"Putin is trying to pull the current situation on his strategic goal." Military expert Oleg Zhdanov expressed this idea in an interview with Obozrevatel.
"He acts according to the situation. He is trying to pull the current situation on his strategic goal. He has a strategic goal of liquidating Ukraine as a state, liquidating us as a nation, because they believe that we are the same Russians as they are, only a little lost and confused in history.
But realizing the limitations of his military capabilities, he chose the military, not the diplomatic path. He adjusts his ambitions and tries to pull them up to the realities of today as much as possible.
So far, they have stopped at a minimum - the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, plus the retention of part of the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions in order to break through the land corridor to the Crimea, to provide these regions with energy and supply water to the Crimea."
Oleg Zhdanov believes that the Putin's strategic goal has not disappeared.
"If the second wave of mobilization is successful and Putin collects half a million, then I think that then the talk about Putin's autumn offensive campaign will be justified," said Zhdanov.
