Ukraine War Day #368: Transnistria the next front?

Dear Readers:

Today I have this piece by reporter Alexander Grishin. Who reminds us that we need to keep our eyes on that slice of territory wedged between Ukraine and Moldavia (=Moldova). Nobody can predict the future, but it is very possible that a new front will open there, in the current war. Hence, if you are a worrier, like me, then here is something else to worry about.

First recall that, like Russian dolls, there are several levels here: Transnistria is a break-away region from Moldavia; which, in turn, is a break-away from Romania (well, at least according to the Romanians). In the end, Romania would like to have all of these lands under its belt. Problem: Romania = NATO. Meanwhile, poor old Moldavia is squeezed from all sides: Russians in its break-away, Ukrainians to the East, Romanians to the West. Trying to be all things to all people, trying to please everybody, and just stay out of trouble. But staying out of trouble is impossible!

Exhibit A: In this piece from Gazeta, we see our old friend, Alexei Arestovich assuring the odious blogger Mark Feigin that Ukraine will be able to seize Transnistria in “three days max, no problem.” Arestovich lays out the casus belli trick very clearly: The Moldavian government (which claims this territory) has the right, as a sovereign nation, to ask Ukrainian troops for assistance in clearing out the Russian garrison that is stationed there. (Which the Russians call a “peacekeeping” contingent.) Then Ukrainian troops move in, and all hell breaks loose. The Russian government, for its part, has warned that any attack against Russian peacekeepers in Transnistria, will be regarded as an attack against the Russian Federation. But the Russian army is far away, still bogged down in the Donbass.

Why does a dragon guard the hoard? Because somebody has to…

Those not in the know, may ask the logical question: Why are 1,500 Russian peacekeepers stationed in Transnistria? Well, ever since 1992 these soldiers have been guarding a cache of weapons left over from World War II. Not since the dragon Fafner spent his multi-centuries life guarding the Nibelung hoard, has so much time and effort been spent guarding a single cache. But, in this case, not Gold, nor an invisibility cap, nor a magic Ring; just lots of artillery shells. Some weapons experts estimate, that if the cache were to be blown up, it would be like Nagasaki…

Moldavian Prime Minister Dorin_Recean is pro-West, pro-NATO. He has stated that he wants to see the 1,500 strong Russian garrison leave Transnistria. And he would like them to take all their weapons and cache with them.

At the same time, the Moldavian authorities have been calling for calm and rejecting the idea of an armed conflict in their region. However, Russian authorities are worried that the Ukrainians will attempt some kind of provocation or false flag attack, in order to open this second front in the war.

On The Brink?

Dorin Recean

The Russian word for this region is Pridniestrovie (=”near the Dniester River”), but I’ll stick with the Latin version Transnistria, it’s all the same thing. The capital city is Tiraspol. In shape, this autonomous region looks sort of like a broken and battered snake or worm (or sick dragon), with its mouth open, tongue hanging out, and a hunched back.

Grishin: The Russian Ministry of Defense (MOD) has observed a significant accumulation of Ukrainian personnel and equipment building up near the Ukraine-Transnistria border. Even more worrisome: Ukrainian artillery positions being set up on the border; not to mention frequent fly-overs by Ukrainian drones. In conjunction with this, the MOD issued a statement, warning NATO and its Ukrainian vassals to not even think about launching an adventure in this direction.

The situation is quite serious. The crisis began around 3 months ago. Let us recall that on February 8 Zelensky arrived in London with his entourage, spoke before Parliament, met with the King, and, according to certain reports, went with his sidekick Andrei Yermak, for a rendezvous at MI-6 HQ.

The very next day, after returning to Ukraine, he declared the Ukrainian Intelligence had purportedly captured some documents, to the effect that “Russian terrorists”, more specifically Chechen Spetznaz, were preparing a coup in Kishinev; and that he had reported all of this to Moldavian President Maia Sandu. It goes without saying that Zelensky was making all of this up, out of whole cloth.

Moldavian President Maia Sandu

Since nobody was buying this nonsense, Kiev came up with another story. In this one, the Russians were allegedly going to seize the Kishinev airport. [Kishinev being the capital of Moldavia.]

Next, the Russians put out their own conspiracy theory, this one intended to warn the Ukrainians not to try this one: In this version, Ukrainian Spetznaz would dress up in Russian uniforms and perform an act of aggression against Moldavia, thus repeating one of Hitler’s old tricks and drawing Moldavia into the war against Russia. The plan was a good one, but Moscow found out just in time and published it to the world, thus averting it. The plausibility of this theory being contained in the proven fact that Ukrainian forces truly are building up on the Moldavian border, in significant quantities.

Unfortunately for Russia, all these shenanigans led to some internal changes in the Moldavian government. In which, the pragmatic economically-minded Prime Minister Natalia Gavrilitsa was replaced by a person with a defense background and more hawkish views. Namely, Dorin Recean. Whose first act was to announce that Kishinev will seek the “de-militarization” of Transnistria and the removal of Russian peacekeepers from this strip of territory.

Next Grishin points out an interesting discrepancy between the “wish-lists” of the various sides. The Moldavian government clearly wants the Russians to just leave, and to take with them (or destroy) this enormous cache of WWII-era weapons. They don’t want the weapons, they just want this land back (along with whatever people still live there).

The Ukrainians, on the other hand, would like to get their hands on the weapons. And Grishin believes that this subplot was clearly spun “in the land where gentlemen observe their 5:00 o’clock while wearing perfectly groomed suits, and not worn-out khaki tee-shirts, as was worn by their recent guest.”

Who Needs Kolbasna?

Grishin: Kiev does not even bother to hide its desire to seize the giant Soviet weapons cache stored in the town of Kolbasna. [yalensis: In all Slavic languages, Kolbasa means sausage, just FYI.] Experts have varying opinions. Some believe that all the weapons and ammo have gone way past their expiration dates and are simply not usable. But others believe that the Ukrainians could still make some use of the Soviet 122 and 152 mm shells for artillery. These are precisely the calibers for which the Ukrainian army is experienced a hunger. Not to mention 82 and 120 mm shells for grenade-launchers. Doing the math, if even 10-15% of this old ammo is still in working order, then it could get the Ukrainian army through another 6 months, possibly even a whole year, of fighting.

[yalensis: Doing the math, I think the Ukrainians might have a good plan here. Soviet stuff, however old, was built to last. Who wants to bet that Boris Johnson came up with this lunatic idea? But even lunatic ideas are sometimes good. A broken clock is right twice a day.]

Grishin: Ukraine’s secondary goal, in undertaking this scheme, would be to capture the Russian garrison in Transnistria. As POW’s they would beef up Ukraine’s cache of “exchangeable” prisoners. Killing or capturing these 1,500 Russian soldiers would also give the Ukrainian Nationalists a huge morale boost, of which they are sorely in need. Their last big victory was Kherson, but nothing since then.

Russian peacekeepers in Transnistria: Their job is to guard the hoard.

And the third goal — this one is really sinister — is to drag NATO into the war in a much bigger way, than it is already. Here is how it works:

After whatever Ukrainian false-flag operation, then Moldavia, rudely aggressed upon by the Russian army, will formally request assistance, either from Romania, or Ukraine, or both.

Recall that Romania is already a NATO country. Dragging Romania into this conflict would already constitute a huge escalation. But escalation is precisely what Zelensky and his London curators want to see. Zelensky’s only chance for survival is if NATO joins the war directly, with its own forces and equipment.

Returning to Moldavia: Recall that Sandu herself, the President of Moldavia, is actually a Romanian citizen. The enigma here, is whether or not she has decided, or will decide, to take the plunge into such an adventure. Factors include her low popularity rating and serious problems with the economy. Here, an “external enemy” and a quick victorious war might serve to bring her ratings up. On the other hand, there is no guarantee that the war would be victorious. Because she doesn’t know what Russia will do. If she tries, and loses, then she might have to flee back to Romania.

Which raises the all-important question: What will Russia do? In the face of such a provocation?

[to be continued]

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