 It's been one month since the war in Ukraine broke out. A war many had hoped would not happen, but took place nonetheless. And it's no exaggeration to say that the world has drastically changed in this one month, and the implications for the future could be even more dire, could be even more transformative in so many ways. We'll be talking about some of these issues in this episode of Mapping Fortlines. We are joined by Prabir Pulkaj sir. Prabir, so like we see one month since the Russian operation, the Russian attack was launched. Of course, it's been on the one hand, there's been military incursions from various sides of Ukraine, as we've talked about in various episodes in the past. There's been an air attack, there's been the use of missiles. And we've seen that there's been a lot of confusion as well when it comes to reportage about it, a lot of speculation often driven by intelligent sources regarding what Russia's actual aims are. Are they actually being met at all? Of course, one side saying that Russia is crashing to an ignominious defeat is one narrative that is very common. But if we take stock based on what we see on the map, what we see on the kind of operations that are actually taking place on the ground, where would you put the situation right now, 30 days after the war has started? It depends on what you think, the objectives of the Russian military intervention was all about. If you take what the West claims, and let's face it, the West controls the information war, whatever information we are getting on our newspaper, in our newspapers, television, a lot of it is really based on Western sources because the Russians have been virtually removed from the global information map. RT News is not available in most countries. Even the internet doesn't really give access to Russian sites very easily. Russian, whatever their sources are, whatever they're saying on Twitter, they've been virtually removed. So we are getting completely one-sided picture of what's happening in Ukraine, except for the maps which do show that significant progress has been made in terms of encirclement of Kiev, encirclement of some of the major population centers like Kharkiv, Mariupol war is going on, which it seems that Russia has almost broken through the defenses over there. And if we look at Eastern Ukraine, you will see that there's significant now areas under Russia's military control. The real key issue is what are Russia's military objectives? Now if you take the two things that we know Russia has been saying from the beginning, it's essentially demilitarizing Ukraine. Or in other words, breaking Ukraine's military. That is obviously a key objective. Other is denazification, which of course would mean Ukraine would have to agree to certain things, leaving that out because that could happen only in a peace negotiations or a final negotiations that both sides come to. If you look at the military scenario, as you said, there are two kinds of scenarios, one, Russia doing very badly, not being able to take over cities. Kiev has been encircled, but it's not been taken over, etc., etc., etc. That is one part of it. And really stories about how Russians are falling like nine pins, generals are continuously dying, aircraft, tanks, everything are being blown up, etc., again. But if you look at how Russians look at war, there are two really detailed reports on this. One is what now appears to be a defense department leak in the United States to Newsweek, certainly not a pro-Russian organization, news organization by any means. That has said that this is a defense department analyst who's saying it. And it's obviously being leaked because they are worried that if the picture is given in such a one-sided way, then there is a possibility that it might spin over or spin out of control and you will get really a nuclear war. So given that, people should at least have a clear idea of what's happening. Otherwise, their expectations are that Russia is collapsing. So why doesn't NATO declare a no-war zone as it did over Libya, for instance? And treat Russia as if it's a Libya. So that is the way things are being built up. And I think the caution was that this should not happen. And their analysis, as I said, the Newsweek is no pro-Russian mouthpiece. It's very clear that Russia has not treated the war as, for instance, the US did Iraq, that in the first day, the number of sorties that the US had made on Iraq, Russia in 24 days, that was at that time 24 days. That 24 days, it had not made that many number of sorties. It had been very limited in its use of air against particularly civilian areas. And it acts only to complement the land forces. This is one way to look at it. But they have taken out military installations all over Ukraine. And that seems to have been their target. But the civilian attacks or attacks over civilian facilities, we've seen in Kharkiv and Mariupol relatively much more restricted than any other part because these were military objectives. And as we know, if you want to take over military areas, if you want to take over urban areas, there's a huge loss of life that takes place on both sides. And they didn't want to do that, as we can see, or destroy large urban areas. So Mariupol is a very clear target because it's the head of the Nazi forces over there as of battalion, which is according to them the ones who did also the Odessa massacres. So they have been clearly targeted. And I think the way it's going down, Mariupol is going to be taken over the Russian forces completely. So given all of that, I don't think the objective was really marching into Kiev. But keeping the military tight down in Kiev in other urban areas, while they do what the real target was, if you look at the eastern Ukraine, the major concentration of Ukrainian army, a significant part of the Ukrainian army, seems to be present on the borders of the Donetsk, Lugansk, independent or self-declared republics, whichever way you want to call it. And that seems to be something which they have been able to slowly grind down, surround whatever you say. And it seems the cauldrons forming there will see perhaps the major part of those forces being either withdrawn or being crushed over there. So that is the time it appears to me that you will see realistic discussions between Ukraine and Russia takes place, unless we get various jokers in the pack who then say, no, no, we can put as a Polish government seems to be saying, we'll put NATO peacekeepers in Ukraine. That's as stupid in terms of war as saying a no-fly zone over Ukraine, because if NATO peace troopers in the clash with Russian troops, then you are in the beginning of a war between NATO and Russia. And let's face it, a war like this will spin out of control very quickly, possibly. And we have the threat of a nuclear arm again. So given that, it doesn't seem that there is still a realistic way of understanding the war through Western eyes. And it seems the Western leaders still believe, are starting to believe their own propaganda, as we saw in the prank call made by Lexus, somebody who rang up the Defense Secretary of the United Kingdom. And if you see what he's saying, the important part of it is not that he was tricked into saying all of this, but the complete contempt he seems to have for Russia and whatever Russia can do. And here is United Kingdom, a bloated, ex-colonial power, a little island, as Stalin called it once, a little bit of disturbance in the Atlantic. So they sort of dictating that we have the sanctions around Russia's neck, that this is, I think, the key misconception that the West has vis-a-vis Russia, and what amount of military power they have vis-a-vis Russia. Right. So Praveen, the other, of course, key aspect of the past one month really has been the economic war, the kind of sanctions that have been imposed, the implications it will have. Countries across the world, we talked about this last time, responding in their own ways to the war based on the economic impact this crisis might have on them. We know oil supplies, oil prices have been jumping up and down. Natural gas supplies, fertilizer, chemical supplies as well. So a lot of questions at stake for the future of the entire world's economy. Now one of the most recent developments on this front has been Russia's Vladimir Putin statement that he will ask non-friendly countries to pay for oil and gas supplies in rubles. Now this is really sort of upended the card because it's not very clear what this means, what kind of implications it has. So could you talk a bit about this? Well, if I understood it, I'd really be able to talk about it more clearly. I am looking at all the experts, and I'm good to call them so-called experts because this is a completely new scenario. Therefore, there are no experts in this. That this is the first time Russia has said, we will accept payment only rubles. So what does it mean? How do countries which are non-friendly, unfriendly countries, that's what he has said, if unfriendly countries have to buy rubles to pay Russia, how do they do it? So according to some of the financial experts, that means that they will have to in turn lift sanctions on Russia. The Russian central bank or on Russian sanctioned banks allow German or other European banks to transfer money to Russia so that they can buy the rubles. So it's in fact, it is not a sanction, it's a counter sanction move. That's the argument that, for instance, naked capitalism you've Smith is giving in her website. But as I said, not many people are clear about it. But one thing is very clear, let's ask the other question. If Russia, for instance, sells to Germany or any of the European countries, gas or oil, accepts euros in return, which is what they were doing earlier, what happens to those euros? Do they still stay within the European Union's financial system? Are they still inaccessible to Russia? Because those euro accounts will actually be also considered frozen. So all of this means that you're asking for gas, but you will pay in a currency which Russia will not have access to, to those accounts. So effectively you're still expropriating, if you will, either euros or Russian gas. So if you can't pay for commodities, then why would I supply you commodities? That's a question that comes up. And here Russia is, I think, making a move which says, if you are willing to take over my money, which I get by trading goods with you and I'm giving you goods for which you are, you should give me the money, which you are holding. Now you're expropriating it. Why should I then transfer money, gas to you when whatever money that you're supposed to be giving me as is still going to be held by you is not going to come to me or I cannot use it? So this is the fundamental issue. And therefore when European leaders, including very senior professionals of the European Union, have said, this is a breach of contract, this is actually laughable. Because how can you talk of a breach of contract when you have seized $300 billion of Russian reserves and a significant part of it is in euros? So the European Union has seized it after having seized my money, if I'm Russia. And then you are telling me, I am breaking the contract. So the contract stands broken by European Union seizing euros that Russia had. And I think that if it is not modified, if what Putin is saying buy rubles from us and that is enabled, if that doesn't happen, then we are going to see a seizing completely of the oil and gas markets. And that is irrespective of the amount of noise coming from Western countries. The reality is there is not enough gas, there is not enough LNG, there is not enough oil to be able to quickly fill the gap. And it is because of that countries like India and a lot of other countries are saying, okay, we need to think about not trading in our goods when you are having a bushy buying Russian oil. Then we cannot pay them in dollars or euros because then we will also come under sanctions. How do we do it? So I think the world has two problems. How to pay for Russian oil and gas for those countries who are not a part of the sanctions? For those who are the ones who have imposed the sanctions on Russia, how do they then think they can get oil and gas? And do they have shortage? If they do, they have supplies they can tap into? I think we are looking into a situation where we will see the oil market sees up and also the long-term LNG gas is not going to be sufficient. You're going to take, see, Western Europe take a huge hit. And that is what I think the Western Europeans or the EU is not calculating that they really cannot, really they cannot handle such a large oil and gas shock as they seem to be plunging into. And if you see the price of electricity, the price of heating, the price of what the user has to pay has gone up hugely, whether it's in the United Kingdom or it's in European Union countries. This has gone up by three to four times. Now if that is the hit the common man takes, also you can see the gas price, oil price rising in the United States as well. If the common man takes that part of hit, how long can the war euphoria be supported? That's a question that I think we have to start asking. And what do countries like India and other countries do when we, we have a large foreign exchange reserve? We thought that's good for us. Now we find that with this hostage that the US and the European Union hold. So how long can this system last is also the other question. Thank you so much Praveen. That's all we have time for today. We'll be tracking many of these issues in future episodes of Mapping Fault Lines as well. Until then, keep watching NewsClick.