Retired Estonian general: mass strikes unlikely to break Ukraine's will to resist

Russia's attack on a passenger train in the Ukrainian city of Dnipro was a war crime, but strikes of this kind seldom crush a population's will to resist. That was the assessment of Alar Laneman, a retired brigadier general of the Estonian Defense Forces, speaking on the Estonian public broadcaster ETV's programme "Ukraina stuudio."

Last week, on a Thursday morning, Russian forces hit a train standing at Dnipro Railway Station. According to Ukrainian authorities, at least 14 people were killed and at least as many were injured.

A calculated strategy

Laneman said Russia is following a deliberate strategy aimed at eroding Ukraine's will. Attacks are often preceded by disinformation campaigns that portray civilian infrastructure as legitimate military targets. Such campaigns may claim, for instance, that Ukraine is planning a provocation by striking one of its own cities or facilities, and after the attack they blame Ukraine.

Before the Dnipro strike, Russian messaging accused Ukraine of using its railways to move troops, equipment and weapons. Laneman stressed, however, that the target was clearly a passenger train. He called it a textbook war crime, intended to shock the population and wear it down mentally, in the hope that the public would press the government to surrender. He said this has been seen throughout the war.

Laneman also acknowledged that Ukraine lacks the resources to defend all civilian infrastructure against Russian missiles and attack drones. Railways and other civilian facilities are especially hard to protect because they are not normally expected to be deliberate targets. Even so, he said, history suggests such tactics rarely work and do not break a population's resolve.

The situation in Oleshky

Commenting on Oleshky, Laneman said it was positive that an agreed ceasefire there had held while residents were evacuated. At the same time, Russia may have used the pause to bring additional troops into the area. He noted that Russia is very resourceful at exploiting any opportunity and that it would be strange if it had not done so.