Putin Admits Mistakes After He Calls Up Old, Sick People
Putin decided to exempt college youth from the draft, which was the first indication that mistakes – miscalculations – were made. But it wasn’t only college kids. He also called up old, sick people.
Reports suggest people who are too old or disabled are being called to help fight in Ukraine.
In a Russian-state media outlet, RT clip, host Vladimir Solovyov, and editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan are discussing some as old as 60 being summoned. Ms. Simonyan said: “Something needs to be done about it, and we shouldn’t be upsetting people.” The two allies criticized low-level recruitment officers, not Putin. The Kremlin admitted mistakes were made, saying, “there are cases when the decree is violated.”
“She angrily recounted numerous instances where the new recruits included students, those outside the age limit, people with serious illnesses, barbers, teachers, musicians, and a single mother of two young children. Among the people swept up in the mobilization efforts, Solovyov and Simonyan recounted seeing information about draftees as old as 62 and 59 years of age.”
Allegedly, over 194,000 have fled Russia to avoid the draft. They better not plan on returning.
Protests Made an Impression
Recently, young people were marching in the streets of Russia. They protested despite the severe sentences they could receive. Over 1100 were arrested in one event.
WATCH: Large protests in Russia against Putin’s attempt to call up 300,000 more soldiers for his failing invasion of Ukraine.
They’re chanting “no to war.”
— Tristan Snell (@TristanSnell) September 21, 2022
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Only Combat Ready?
When Putin announced the draft last week, he said that only men with combat experience and needed skills would be called up. “The draft turned out to be much larger, with residents of small towns and villages reporting that draft offices were scooping up large portions of their able-bodied men,” The Times wrote.
Russia mobilized minority groups from Siberia and the Caucusus to fight in Ukraine, leading to violent protests. That’s why Ukraine President Zelensky encourages them to rise up.
The NY Times reports President Vladimir V. Putin admitted “mistakes” made on Thursday in how the Russian government has been carrying out his draft. As the Times says it’s a “sign of the Kremlin’s scramble to keep public discontent in check over Mr. Putin’s effort to escalate the war in Ukraine.”
Putin took to television to answer the “many questions” about the draft. He added that “all mistakes must be corrected and prevented from happening in the future.” He described cases of people entitled to deferments being wrongly drafted, such as fathers of three or more children, men with chronic diseases or those above military age.
“We must correct mistakes and not allow them going forward,” he says, and everyone who doesn’t meet the criteria “must be sent home.”
“If a mistake is made, I repeat, it must be corrected,” he said in a videoconference with his Security Council. “Those who were called up without proper reason should be returned home.”
“You need to figure all this out,” Mr. Putin said. “Without fuss, calmly, but quickly, in detail and thoroughly.”
Max Seddon is the bureau chief of FT in Moscow:
Putin the good tsar has a go at the bad boyars for mobilizing the wrong people into the army.
“We must correct mistakes and not allow them going forward,” he says, and everyone who doesn’t meet the criteria “must be sent home.”
Shows the Kremlin is anxious about the backlash pic.twitter.com/nyVWHgqLsF
— max seddon (@maxseddon) September 29, 2022
Putin rarely admits mistakes, although he shifted the blame for his bad policy to his underlings, the Times says.
OPINION
It looks to us like Putin didn’t plan very well.
He isn’t polling well over the draft. A Levada Center poll shows 56% of Russians are “worried” about the war in Ukraine – as opposed to 37% last month. Nearly as many said they wanted to end the war.
From the poll: Concerns about Ukrainian events have also grown and reached peak levels. In September, 88% of respondents said this: 56% said they were “very worried” about current events (in August – 37%), another 32% – “rather worried” (in August – 37%).
On the same day, Putin announced the annexation of two Republics in Donbas, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia, he softened the draft.
Their ports link up like a chain to Crimea. It’s about 15% of Ukraine and includes cities and valuable ports. Max Seddon reports that according to Russia’s latest constitution, once annexed, and the land can no longer be ceded. He will annex today.
If Ukrainian President Zelensky agreed to negotiate for their independence, Putin said he would have agreed to that. We don’t know if that’s true, Putin lies, and he’s crazy, but it was agreed to in Minsk 2. All hope of negotiation is now gone. We’re in it now. We don’t want World War III.
The EU is responding with more sanctions.
WORLD WAR III
During an appearance on 77 WABC radio, Trump was asked by host John Catsimatidis what things “keep you up at night,” the New York Post reports.
“I think more than anything else, I think we could end up in World War III and it could be all of the horrible things that took place in Ukraine,” he said.
“Looks like it’s going to happen in China with Taiwan, as you know, and you see what’s going on over there.”
Trump also alluded to Putin’s speech last week in which he vowed to “use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people.”
“I think we’re at the most dangerous time maybe in, in many, many years — maybe ever — because of the power of nuclear,” Trump said.
“For a major nation that’s equal with us on nuclear power to be throwing around the word cavalierly, like nuclear, is, is a very bad time. A very bad time for this country and a very bad and a very dangerous time for the world.”
Trump also agreed with Catsimatidis’ suggestion that if he were still president, Putin wouldn’t have invaded Ukraine earlier this year.
Update: This article was published earlier today, but we added the information about Putin calling up old, sick people to be drafted.
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