Despite claims of de-escalation, Russian forces turned their fury on Chernihiv and the suburbs of Kyiv. U.S. officials say they believe Vladimir Putin’s aides are misleading him about the war.
Belying its claims of de-escalation, Russia increased bomb and artillery attacks in Ukraine on Wednesday and sent conflicting signals about the prospects for peace, suggesting new tensions in the Kremlin hierarchy about the course of the war. The contradictory messaging came as a newly declassified U.S. intelligence assessment suggested that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had been misinformed about the war’s trajectory by subordinates, who were fearful of his reaction to the Russian military’s struggles and setbacks. The intelligence, according to multiple American officials, showed Mr. Putin’s isolation and what appeared to be growing tension between him and the Ministry of Defense, including with his defense minister, Sergei K. Shoigu, who was once among the most trusted members of the Kremlin inner circle and had been rumored to be a possible successor one day to Mr. Putin. It was not clear whether the release of the declassified intelligence was intended to sow anxiety within Mr. Putin’s circle as part of a broader information battle between the United States and Russia over Ukraine, the source of the worst tensions between the two nuclear powers since the Cold War. Nor was it clear if the intelligence was accurate. But American intelligence officials have proved right so far in their assessments of Mr. Putin’s intentions toward Ukraine, beginning with the Russian troop buildup along its borders last year that culminated in the Feb.24 invasion. White House officials said that they had released the intelligence to share what they said was a “full understanding” of how Mr. Putin had miscalculated. “We believe he’s being misinformed by his advisers about how badly the Russian military is performing and how the Russian economy is being crippled by sanctions,” Kate Bedingfield, the White House communications director, told reporters. Asked about the declassified assessment during a trip to Algiers, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said it was not surprising that Mr. Putin was ill-informed. “One of the Achilles’ heels of autocracies,” he said, “is that you don’t have people in those systems who speak truth to power or who have the ability to speak truth to power. And I think that is something that we’re seeing in Russia.” The latest assessment also appeared to track with the mixed messages from the Kremlin on Wednesday about peace talks with Ukraine this week in Istanbul. The chief Russian negotiator described them as promising, but was basically contradicted by the Kremlin’s top spokesman. New Russian attacks in Ukraine, on the northern city of Chernihiv and the suburbs of Kyiv, also appeared to reflect disarray in Kremlin messaging, coming one day after the Russian military said it was de-escalating in those areas.
