These are the two regions Russia recognized in 2014. These are the two regions that the Ukraine has shelled with artillery for 7-8 years. These are the two regions Russia stated liberation by special operation was about. When they capture the entire region, and it is safe from continued Ukrainian shelling, this war can and will end.
The Russians will want to obtain and retain all pro-Russian (as of 2022) areas of Ukraine.
Boris Johnson and the DC neocons may have queered that deal by insisting on "no negotiations".
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu announced that the Crimea land bridge and its railroads are open for business.
“Conditions have been created for the resumption of full-fledged traffic between Russia, Donbass, Ukraine, and Crimea on six railway sections,” Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in a statement. “Automobile communication has been opened from the territory of Russia along the mainland to Crimea.”
And Kherson.
Bad news for Nikolaev and Odessa, where the Russians have thrown back a Ukrainian counteroffensive with heavy losses for the Orkrainians.
Russia did not “ recognize” these oblasts as independent regions until this Feb, with the invasion. The Russian duma was actually more hardline on this than Putin,
Since 2014, when political protest unrest broke out over the US-orchestrated coup, Ukraine France and Germany were supposed to be working on the so-called Minsk agreement, which would have kept these oblasts as Ukrainian but with protection from attacks and with some form of autonomy in local political decisions, and political representation in Kiev. Both sides continually violated any ceasefire, and Zelensky gathered a large army in Donbass after January, preparing for a large March offensive. The number of ceasefire violations by Kiev went unprecedented.
This was preempted by the Russian invasion,
The only question now is whether these 2 regions will choose to remain independent Republics, or join the Russian Federation. Now, at least 2-4 other oblasts are announcing they wish to become part of Russia.
“When they capture the entire region, and it is safe from continued Ukrainian shelling, this war can and will end.”
So that will be the end of Putin’s territorial demands?
[“It [the Sudetenland] is the last territorial claim that I have to make in Europe.” - Adolf Hitler, 1938.]