Oleksiy Danilov, Secretary of the National Defense and Security Council of Ukraine has a twelve-point plan for Crimea. In this document, published Sunday, April 2, and which describes how to "de-occupy" (term officially used in the English text) the peninsula, he goes so far as to rename Sevastopol, the main Russian military port in the Black Sea for 200 years, in "object number 6".

For the rest, Oleksiy Danilov also promises to be merciless with the Ukrainians who have "cooperated with the Russian occupier" and provides for criminal prosecution and sanctions such as the deprivation of civil rights for these "collaborators".

Published on Facebook by this senior Ukrainian leader, this plan also provides for the demolition of the Kerch Strait bridge (which connects the peninsula to the mainland on the Russian side), the expulsion of all Russian citizens who settled in Crimea after 2014, and the cancellation of all real estate transactions carried out under the Russian regime.

Crimea and Donbass, same fight

It is an unprecedented document that foresees for the first time in detail what Crimea could look like after the Ukrainian reconquest. A projection into the future that may seem disconnected from the realities on the ground and the state of the front. The Ukrainian army is still trying to repel Russian assaults on the city of Bakhmut. The hypothesis of a victorious push of Ukrainian forces into the outskirts of Sevastopol can hardly be on the immediate agenda of the General Staff in Kiev.

In fact, Oleksiy Danilov's statements serve primarily domestic political purposes. "These twelve points include many elements of the plans developed for the Donbass regions. These are all programs that allow the government to reiterate its commitment to maintain or restore the territorial integrity of all Ukraine to reassure public opinion," said Huseyn Aliyev, an expert on the Ukrainian-Russian conflict at the University of Glasgow.

More than a year after the start of the major Russian offensive, Kiev is also assuming more responsibility for placing Crimea at the top of the list of its war objectives. "At the beginning of the war, it was a taboo subject. It was mainly a question of defending the country," said Huseyn Aliyev.

But "since the failure of the Russian attack on Kiev, and the first successes of the Ukrainian counter-offensives, the idea of a reconquest of Crimea has gradually imposed itself in the official discourse," says Jeff Hawn, a specialist in Russian security issues and external consultant for the New Lines Institute, an American geopolitical research center.

Washington to the rescue?

Thus, at the end of August, Volodymyr Zelenski said that "everything started with Crimea [in 2014], and everything will end with Crimea". Six months later at the Davos summit in Switzerland, the Ukrainian president asked for more Western weapons to, in particular, "take back all of our territories, including Crimea".

It is a way for the Ukrainian leader to show his people "that the Ukrainian army, strengthened by its successes on the ground, is in a conquering perspective," said Nicolo Fasola, a specialist in Russian military issues at the University of Bologna.

Kiev feels all the more free to flaunt its ambitions in broad daylight as the idea is also making its way in Western capitals. Starting with Washington. In December 2022, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken did not want to hear about Crimea and assured that US support should only allow Ukraine to "regain the territories lost since February 24, 2022 [beginning of the Russian War of Invasion, NLDR]". Three months later, Victoria Nuland, number 3 of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and nicknamed Joe Biden's "Madame Ukraine", stressed that Kiev "would only be safe if Crimea was, at the very least, demilitarized".

Easier said than done? A Ukrainian offensive against Crimea would represent an unprecedented military challenge for Kiev. "So far, the Ukrainian army has only launched an assault on unfortified Russian positions. It will be completely different in Crimea, where Russia has installed a whole defence system for almost eight years," Fasola said.

"Ukraine lacks one element to have a chance: long-range missiles," says the Politico website. This is why Kiev has been demanding since the end of 2022 American ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) missiles whose range exceeds 300 km. "The Ukrainian army will hardly be able to approach the border with Crimea without destroying part of the Russian defenses with long-range missiles," Hawn said.

Washington is reluctant to supply Kiev with such weapons. First, "because the United States fears that Ukraine will use it to strike elsewhere in Russian territory, and a missile of American origin falling on Russian soil could lead to a serious escalation of the conflict," said Nicolo Fasola.

The U.S. also believes "it doesn't have enough ATACMS to afford to send them to Ukraine," said Glen Grant, a senior analyst at the Baltic Security Foundation and an expert on the conflict in Ukraine. Indeed, "it would probably take hundreds of ATACMS missiles to break through Russian air defenses in Crimea," confirms Nicolo Fasola.

Threat of nuclear escalation?

However, calls to reconquer Crimea are not just political bluster. "There will definitely be a battle for control of Crimea before the war is over," Grant said. A confrontation that is not expected to occur immediately. "Ukraine will first want to liberate the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts and the army will need all its forces to achieve this, so Crimea will have to wait," Aliyev said. For him, the fighting will not reach the peninsula for at least a year.

The great unknown for these experts remains the reaction of the Kremlin. "There is a risk that Vladimir Putin will decide to use nuclear strikes to counter an offensive in Crimea. And that's why some Western countries are reluctant to openly support the recovery of Crimea," Fasola said. Especially if to achieve this Kiev uses missiles made in the USA.

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