November 13, 2024: On August 2nd, Ukrainian forces made an unexpected raid into Russia’s Kursk area, Russian security forces were exposed as inept and unprepared. The agency most at fault was the FSB. This is the 1990s successor to the Soviet era KGB. The FSB is not as large or as aggressive and competent as the KGB border guard forces. This was evident when Ukrainian troops rolled into Kursk province. It took the Russians over a month to show up and oppose, but not dispose of, the invaders. As of early November Ukraine still occupies over a thousand square kilometers of Russian territory and the Russians apparently are still unprepared to try and oust the Ukrainians.

Despite this apparent failure, the FSB was doing its job. In this case it was spying on other Russian intelligence and combat organizations. Russia has always had multiple intelligence agencies which gather information on foreign nations and their armed forces as well as rival Russian intelligence organizations. The FSB failure in opposing the Ukrainian incursion was caused by FSB preoccupation with investigating internal enemies and those suspected of opposing Vladimir Putin.

Everyone in Russian intelligence and the military works for Putin and protecting him from real or imagined threats takes priority over everything else. The Ukrainian incursion was largely ignored by Russian intelligence and military commanders who were concentrating on internal struggles. None of the Russian intel agencies appear to have noticed the Ukrainian incursion.

Russian civilians in the Ukrainian occupation zone noticed the absence of Russian forces. When the Ukrainians invaded, they captured several hundred soldiers as well as civilians working for the military. Most of these were subsequently used to get Ukrainian prisoners released. While the Russians responded to the prisoner swap offer, they are still not in a fighting mood regarding the Ukrainian troops occupying Russian territory. A Russian official did show up and blamed the local municipal authorities for the Ukrainian success. At the same time he said Russian military assistance was on the way. After three months the local civilians doubt help is on the way. The Ukrainian occupiers have been friendly and not blocked local civilians from leaving the occupied zone.

Previous to the August incursion, Ukrainian forces had advanced into Russia several times, but withdrew before any Russian troops could show up. In most of those cases, there were no Russian soldiers present to oppose the incursions. The dwindling, from casualties and desertions, Russian forces are barely able to cover the thousand kilometer front line. Most of the fighting is going on in eastern Ukraine, where Russian forces continue to gain ground in Luhansk and Donetsk provinces where the war began in 2014.

Heavy Russian losses in Ukraine since 2022 are one of the reasons Russia was unable to move many troops and armored vehicles towards the Kursk incursion.

Russian President Vladimir Putin did not expect such a bold Ukrainian attack into Russia and had little to say publicly. Instead he went off on a planned visit to another part of Russia while a few troops were sent to block the Ukrainian advance. Russian media were ordered to report little or nothing about the incursion. The media did publish vague reports of something happening in Kursk province, and most Russians were more afraid of their own government than they were of Ukrainian troops inside Russia. Putin enacted laws that punished critics of his policies in Ukraine. A few Russians were sent to prison and that was sufficient to frighten any other Russian critics of Putin’s policies.

Meanwhile Putin has his own problems dealing with the invading Ukrainians. Over two years of fighting in Ukraine have severely depleted the Russian armed forces. There were not enough troops available to block the Ukrainian advance. This was what the Ukrainians expected because Ukrainian military intelligence has monitored Russian soldiers using cellphones and interviewed Russia prisoners. Ukraine knew that there were not many Russian troops left in Ukraine and Russian morale was low.

Russia has not resorted to extreme measures to motivate their soldiers. In World War II methods were used to motivate reluctant troops that Russian does not believe will work 80 years after World War II. During World War II Russia resorted to ancient traditions when deadly force was necessary to encourage reluctant Russian soldiers. In 2022 Russian officers were expected to use deadly force on their own troops in order to ensure obedience. This was often used during World War II. During some major offensives NKVD personnel would be brought in to operate machine-guns behind the troops who were taking part in a major offensive. The NKVD machine-gunners fired on any Russian troops leaving the front-line forces. Many nations consider desertion in the face of the enemy to be treason, but they don’t usually execute the traitorous deserters on sight.

After 2022, Russians in Ukraine found that they could not get away with using NKVD methods. This meant there was no motivation to get reluctant Russian troops to move forwards. After more than two years fighting in Ukraine, Russian troops are often unable to motivate themselves into attacking. Even defending Russian troops will flee. The Ukrainians in Kursk are taking advantage of that and Vladimir Putin is receiving bad news he does not want to hear or deal with.

Until some overdue reforms are made, these flaws will not go away. The fighting in Ukraine reminded Russian military and political leaders that the long delay is already working on needed reforms so, they hope, that the next time Russian troops are in combat they perform better and perhaps even win. There have been several rounds of unsuccessful military reforms since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. One of the major causes of that collapse was their unaffordable and largely ineffective armed forces. In post-Soviet Russia there are far fewer restrictions on criticizing the military. Most Russians have a very negative attitude towards conscription and the reforms underway because of the Ukraine War disaster are typical of several previous efforts to remedy problems that continue to resist any fundamental change.