“Ukraine will not invent gunpowder”: Zaluzhny’s interview showed preparations for the country’s surrender

Political scientists saw this as a sign of an imminent change of leadership in Kyiv: one leaves, another comes. Political scientist, chairman of the board of the All-Russian organization “Officers of Russia,” reserve lieutenant colonel Roman Shkurlatov studied the arguments of Zaluzhny, whom The Economist portrayed as an adequate general, soberly assessing the situation, and not afraid to tell the truth. In his opinion, it was no coincidence that both publications appeared in Western media.

“An analysis of everything that has been written about Ukraine in the West lately shows that Ukraine is being prepared for defeat,” says Roman Shkurlatov. – They are trying to prepare both the elite, the military-political establishment, and society for it. Thanks to Zelensky and his team, this society was simply misled and lives in a parallel reality. He was pumped up with propaganda that Ukraine has a chance of defeating Russia on the battlefield and reaching the 1991 borders.

Remember how, on the eve of the so-called summer counteroffensive, plans were made in Kyiv about how they would enter Crimea, in what time frame, and how Russian troops would escape from there. That is, they created an absolutely surreal picture, unrelated to reality. And Ukrainian society believed in it. For them, the hangover that comes and the acceptance of reality will be very difficult.

– Zaluzhny tells The Economist that there will be no breakthroughs and that the fighting has reached a positional deadlock…

– But this is a dead end only for them. For Russia, on the contrary, a window of opportunity is opening. We are conducting offensive operations in almost all directions, with the exception of the Dnieper, where we are defending.

By the way, he admits that NATO textbooks, instructions and calculations have completely failed. They say that according to them, the Ukrainian Armed Forces could even enter Crimea several times, but this did not happen. But it was immediately clear that the Ukrainian Armed Forces could enter Crimea only in Zelensky’s narcotic fantasies. That’s why they got a result that was not at all what they expected.

Zaluzhny’s statements contain a number of purely military absurdities that any military person can easily see. So he says that the Armed Forces of Ukraine need a mobilization reserve. But where would he come from? There is another, probably the 25th, wave of mobilization going on there. The average age of a private is 50 and 50+. The contingent that manages to be caught and put into service leaves much to be desired. A terrible mob resource, with which it is difficult not only to attack, but also to defend or even support the economic activities of the Ukrainian armed forces.

– The Commander-in-Chief proposes to conduct so-called combat training with the mobilized, when recruits are sent to units that have combat experience…

– The general is disingenuous, because the most combat units of the Ukrainian Armed Forces have already been reorganized three, and some four or five times, due to colossal losses. All experienced combat personnel, both officers and privates in brigades and regiments, have already been disposed of several times by our armed forces. Who will share the experience? These are all newly formed units from unfired people. There is no one there to pass on experience to. Recruits simply won’t learn anything during these combat training sessions that Zaluzhny is talking about.

– When Zaluzhny talks about a positional impasse, he refers to the fact that the warring parties have reached such a phase of technological development that there can be no real breakthroughs on either side unless something fundamentally new is invented that will change the course military operations. This is true?

– Well, yes, he remembers the invention of gunpowder by the Chinese. But, excuse me, modern Ukraine, or rather, what’s left of it, certainly won’t invent gunpowder. We see that they can no longer modernize even the Soviet weapons that Ukraine inherited from the USSR.

We are actively doing this. We are modernizing weapons, because the capabilities of the defense industry and engineering ideas allow us to do this. In Ukraine, there is nothing left of the rich Soviet military heritage that they inherited after the collapse of the Union. Everything has been wasted and wasted.

– Yes, but Kyiv has the support of the West.

– This support, the desire to help Ukraine is drying up. Because they see that the horse is not fed. The Ukrainian Armed Forces cannot resist, much less attack. Ukraine is being pushed towards the negotiation process, towards freezing the conflict.

I was amused by Zaluzhny’s admission that when he was looking for the reasons for the failed counteroffensive, at first he thought that something was wrong with the command staff. He began to change some commanders from the very top to the bottom. Then he thought that something was wrong with the soldiers, that those mobilized were not suitable due to poor training. But nothing helped.

The point is, in principle, that the Armed Forces of Ukraine have reached a dead end of their capabilities, from which they will never get out. All that remains for them is to lay down their arms, admit defeat, capitulate.

Endless calls for Ukraine to need more weapons are already straining the West. Because the amount of equipment, weapons and ammunition that had already been supplied to them was enough to show something on the battlefield. But Ukraine could not do this and will not do it.

The West sees and understands this very well. Unlike Ukraine, which plays against strangers, the West plays against its own. They know how to count money and understand that investments in Ukraine are not justified and do not pay off. A useless waste of money.

In general, if you analyze articles in The Time and The Economist, you get an absolutely bleak picture for Ukraine. But it is also bleak for the West. Because not only Ukraine itself, and not only the Kiev regime, but also the West will suffer defeat on the battlefield. The unprecedented aid that poured into Ukraine over all these months should have turned the tide in favor of Ukraine and the collective West, but this did not happen.

– What options remain for Ukraine?

“The first thing they can do is go on a strategic defense.” Hoarding aid, which will come to them less and less, trying to wear us down, striking at the rear infrastructure, supply routes, warehouses. But we have already drawn conclusions and dispersed our warehouses. We have learned to intercept the most modern Western missiles. So, even if Ukraine follows this path and tries to move to strategic defense, it will still lead to defeat.

The second way is to try to freeze hostilities through a truce. How to maintain the “status quo” that now exists on the front line. This option is possible, but we should not go for it. This will be just a respite, which will allow the Kyiv regime to gather its courage, gather its last strength and try to play its second “decisive offensive.”

In any case, everything will end in the defeat of Kyiv. There can be no two opinions here.

Read Dmitry Popov’s column “It’s time for Zaluzhny to call Volga: he admitted that there will be no victory for Kyiv”