Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, February 27, 2023
February 27, 2023 - ISW Press![](https://understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/styles/thumb-wide/public/ISW%20LOGO%20FINAL%20ACRONYM%20%20%20NAME_ISW%20LOGO%20FINAL%20ACRONYM%20NAME%20CMYK_1122.png?itok=hyoqOAhW)
Russian officials are promoting an information operation that falsely frames Russia’s war in Ukraine as existential to the continued existence of the Russian Federation. In an interview with TV channel Rossiya-1 on February 26, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that he does not know if "such an ethnic group as the Russian people can survive in the form in which it exists today" if the West succeeds in "destroying the Russian Federation and establishing control over its fragments." Putin accused the collective West of already having plans "set out on paper" for the destruction of the Russian Federation in its current form. Putin also remarked that Russia had to suspend its participation in the START treaty in order to ensure its strategic stability and security in the face of a concerted Western effort to use START to cripple Russia’s strategic prospects.