The news rushes by, and, if you’re like me, you glance at headlines, only occasionally reading an article through. You get the gist. There are only so many hours in a day. And when it comes to Ukraine, what is there to know? Bombardment, murder, displacement, horror. It all blends together. You may get a little numb.
Yesterday, I read a dispatch from the Associated Press, by Adam Schreck and Mystyslav Chernov. As I was reading it, I told myself, “Don’t get numb.” The dispatch is headlined “Ukrainian defenders in Mariupol defy surrender-or-die demand.” In the rush of news, I would like to pause and dwell on this a little.
Ukrainian fighters who were holed up in a massive steel plant in the last known pocket of resistance inside the shattered city of Mariupol ignored a surrender-or-die ultimatum from Russia on Sunday and held out against the capture of the strategically vital port.
That is the first paragraph of the report. Is it not gripping? I mean, ought it not to be gripping?
The article continues,
The fall of Mariupol, the site of a merciless 7-week-old siege that has reduced much of the city to a smoking ruin, would be Moscow’s biggest victory of the war and free up troops to take part in a potentially climactic battle for control of Ukraine’s industrial east.
Here are some more details:
As its missiles and rockets slammed into other parts of the country, Russia estimated that 2,500 Ukrainian troops and about 400 foreign mercenaries were dug in at the sprawling Azovstal steel mill, which covers more than 11 square kilometers (4 square miles) and is laced with tunnels.
Many Mariupol civilians, including children, are also sheltering at the Azovstal plant, Mikhail Vershinin, head of the city’s patrol police, told Mariupol television on Sunday. He said they are hiding from Russian shelling, and from any occupying Russian soldiers.
Moscow had given the defenders a midday deadline to surrender and “keep their lives,” but the Ukrainians rejected it, as they’ve done with previous ultimatums.
If they surrendered, would they be able to “keep their lives”? Another question: Are these brave, besieged people doomed?
As for besieged Mariupol, there appeared to be little hope Sunday of military rescue by Ukrainian forces anytime soon. Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba told CBS’ “Face the Nation” that the remaining Ukrainian troops and civilians in Mariupol are basically encircled. He said they “continue their struggle,” but that the city effectively doesn’t exist anymore because of massive destruction.
Basically encircled. The city effectively doesn’t exist anymore. Think of those things. Don’t get numb.
A little more:
The relentless bombardment and street fighting in Mariupol have killed at least 21,000 people, by the Ukrainians’ estimate. A maternity hospital was hit by a lethal Russian airstrike in the opening weeks of the war, and about 300 people were reported killed in the bombing of a theater where civilians were taking shelter.
An estimated 100,000 remained in the city out of a prewar population of 450,000, trapped without food, water, heat or electricity in a siege that has made Mariupol the scene of some of the worst suffering of the war.
And what does the Russian leadership have to say about all this?
“All those who will continue resistance will be destroyed,” Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, the Russian Defense Ministry’s spokesman, said in announcing the latest ultimatum.
In Mariupol, the Ukrainians are taking a heroic stand. Are the rest of us capable of being moved? The world ought to notice these people, as they die, or live.
A lot of people are uncomfortable with the idea of good and evil. It seems childish — the stuff of cartoons and fairy tales. But where are the two sides in the Ukraine war? What is there to say for Russian forces, who are trying to obliterate the Ukrainian nation, and the Ukrainians along with it?
Ukrainians threaten Russians not at all — certainly not Russian civilians. Not a hair on the head of anyone in Russia is being touched. Not a hair on the head of anyone from St. Petersburg to Vladivostok. (Of course, many Russian oppositionists are in prison.) Meanwhile, Ukrainians every day face murder, maiming, rape, and other horror.
To many people, the idea of heroism seems quaint. Cynics snort at it. But if you look, you can find it on display in Ukraine. And in Russia — think of protesters against the government and the war, risking their neck, knowing the consequences of their opposition.
Don’t get numb, I say, if you can help it. Don’t get numb.