The Duran Podcast
Zelensky trapped in Kursk
All right, Alex, let's talk about what is going on in Ukraine and let's focus on what is going on in Kursk and the latest explanation from Ukraine from the Zelensky government as to what they are doing in Kursk, what is going on in this Kursk operation is that they are consolidating their gains. They are blowing up bridges, three bridges to be exact. And the purpose of blowing up these bridges is to create a buffer zone and a place where Ukraine can actually hold territory, hold Russian territory to create an area where they can hold Russian territory and then use the capture of this Russian territory in order to force Russia to negotiate, to capitulate something like that. Actually, let me read what Zelensky said. It is now our primary task in defense, in defense of operations overall to destroy as much Russian war potential as possible in the maximum counter-offensive actions. This includes creating a buffer zone on the aggressor's territory. - Yes, so this is the new rationale. Now, just to repeat a point that I made before, this is the latest in a succession of explanations about what the Ukrainians are trying to do in Kursk. The first claim, which is made by Michaela Podoliak, Zelensky's advisor was that this was intended to seize Russian territory that would put Ukraine in a stronger position in negotiations. There would be a land swap, Ukraine would get much or all of its land back, and in return, the Russians would be given back this territory in Kursk. This was the original rationale that Podoliak gave, and he gave it twice, by the way, in two separate interviews. We're not hearing much about that anymore, because of course Putin has to have rejected outright any idea of negotiations. So that was one explanation. The second explanation was that they were doing this in order to get the Russians to divert their troops from Don Bass, where the Russians, as we discussed in another video, are engaged in a massive offensive. They're approaching Prokrosk, they're storming dorets. There's doubt, as we make this program, further news that they're moving hard in the Kupiansk area and making big inroads there as well. So, get the Russians to transfer their troops from one part of the battlefronts, the part where Ukraine is losing to try to hold off the Ukrainians in Kursk. Well, that hasn't happened. There's no sign, no evidence at all, that the Russians have moved so much as a single man. I want to say this, because, in fact, one of the Ukrainian officers, one of the Russian officers, I correct that, in the area, of course, who is Upti Al-Audina, who's a church in office. He's actually just given us a rundown of what are the Russian military units that are currently engaging the Ukrainians in Kursk. And the only unit that was actively participating in the fighting in Don Bass was his own, the half-matte special forces. And they were taken out of the front line some weeks ago, apparently. And also, a Marine Brigade, the 810th Marine Brigade, was also withdrawn from the front lines. But this happened before the Ukrainian offensive and Kursk was launched. So both of these forces were withdrawn back to Russia, perhaps a refit, perhaps for any kind of other reasons, you can speculate about the reasons. But anyway, since the Kursk operation began, there is not no evidence that the Russians have moved a single soldier from Don Bass to Kursk. The other explanation, the new explanation that we're now getting is that this is all to create a buffer zone. This is a ridiculous idea. It is a buffer zone controlling a few villages, the Ukrainians say 80, the Russians say 40, the Russians say the Ukrainians control 450 square kilometers of territory, the Ukrainians say it's 1,000 square kilometers of territory. Where you look, if you looked at where it is, this is a forested area, small dispersed villages, many of them very, very, very small, very, very difficult as it happens to defend. Now, on Sunday, there was an article which appeared in the Sunday Times, the London newspaper of the Sunday Times, which by the way, I think a lot of people have been quoting and quoting it as evidence that the British had planned and prepared this operation in Kursk region. That may be true, but actually I don't think, in fact, I don't see that this is what that article says, but the article says something else, which people are overlooking, which is that this territory is undefendable, that what Ukraine holds cannot be defended. The British also assess, and this is also in this article, that there is going to be a Russian counter-offensive in this area, presumably with troops who are being brought back, brought to this area from inside Russia. It at the beginning or end of October. And the point is that a lot of Russian troops were sent on furlough during the summer. They're going to start rejoining their regiments in September, October, 200,000 of them supposedly, so that they will be coming back onto the attack in October. This is what the British think, that's in the London Times. Now, Ukraine cannot hold these positions, so what it is trying to do is expand its bridgehead, take under control certain villages, which it can then fortify, in order to try to create a more powerful position on Russian territory, which it can actually defend, because what it controls, even according to the British, is basically undefendable. There was a very interesting discussion of all of this in Radovka, which is a Russian newspaper, that they need to sort of harden this bubble by getting some important places. And this is what these attacks on these bridges are all about, and what the talk about another Russian, a Ukrainian push, sorry, in another area, of course, region is all about. It's expanding the bridgehead, capturing certain important locations, which the Ukrainian's going to hope to fortify, so when the Russian beat, counter-blow comes in the autumn, the Ukrainians can have some hope of holding it back. Why would the Ukrainians even want to do that? It's not a buffer zone, it's not preventing the Russians, launching missile and bombing strikes, all across Ukraine. The Russians can bomb a sumi, which is the big Ukrainian city nearest to this place. It's not affecting Russian military operations at all. The point is that having seized this territory, Zelensky cannot face the enormous prestige loss of withdrawing from it. And so, since he cannot withdraw from it, he has to spend more equipment, more people, he has to invest further trying to enlarge it in order to try to make it a bit more defendable and to try to secure it. In the meantime, there are further reports that where was the Russians are not withdrawing troops from Don Pass, the Ukrainians are continuing to do so. And I read a report this morning. Admittedly, it was from a Russian source, but this report said that the Ukrainians have just transferred even more troops, veteran troops from the Pakroft direction, where they're having a massive crisis to cusque, because that is now becoming the priority place. Everything else is being sacrificed to trying to maintain this bridgehead on Russian territory, even though the rationale for it has gone. - Politico had an article the other day where they talked about how Ukraine is using the Kursk operation in order to push a type of negotiation, which was based on the grain deal, the Black Sea model with the grain deal that was negotiated a year and a half ago, which they consider to be a huge success. And basically what they're saying is that in this type of format, they won't have to negotiate directly with Russia. They can avoid negotiating face to face with Russia. As in the grain deal, Ukraine can negotiate with a mediator, with the UN, and then Russia can negotiate with another party and the same mediator, and then they can come to some sort of an agreement based on Alensky's peace plan, the 10-point plan. And the Kursk operation is meant as the leverage to convince Russia to agree to this type of format and to get the West to agree to this type of format actually. So is that something that's possible? I mean, is this something that you see Ukraine trying to sell the West on and maybe even sell bricks on so that they can put pressure on Russia? Because I think if there's one weak point that we've identified with Russia in the entire Ukraine conflict or one pressure point, it's that China and the bricks, they can actually exert a lot of influence. Over Russia and they can get Putin to slow things down, to change his plans. I think this is clear now that there is a type of China bricks leverage that has been working, or that Ukraine has been working towards their advantage. And it looks like the Russian government has been accommodating of China's bricks. - To their disadvantage, I would say. - No, absolutely, I would agree with that. I think that's all been short to pieces actually. And Lavrov, who was the Russian Foreign Minister, just has given an interview in which he's been discussing this very thing. And he said that there's not going to be any talks at all. And in fact, he discussed these very ideas about using mediating parties to try to get negotiations going in that kind of format. He linked it to the three working parties that were created at the time of the, you remember the Swiss Peace Conference, which none of the important countries attended. He said Russia completely rejects that entire format. It is not prepared to engage the Ukrainians in any sort of negotiations. At the present time, this whole issue, as far as the Russians are concerned, is dead. And I think the Russians have gone out of their way to make it clear to their friends, to China, especially, whose Prime Minister, by the way, is in Moscow as we speak. The Chinese Prime Minister, this is a trip that was organized a long time ago. It's about economic matters, about securing supply chains and that kind of thing. And the Chinese Prime Minister is also going to minsk, by the way, after he's finished in Moscow. But I think the Russians will be making it very clear to all of their friends, look, we tried, or we can, we bent over backwards to be as accommodating with these people, as you wanted us to be. We've now reached the point of exhaustion. We're not prepared to negotiate any further. And it has to be this way, because these people in Ukraine are not people that you can negotiate with. You wanted us to talk with them. They've been talking about peace over the last few weeks. They're clearly not since they're about it. And the moment talk of peace started to emerge, what they pulled off this thing in course. And I think that's, I think that's going to stick. I don't think it's going to change. I think that is the Russian position. I think their allies understand it. - Do they, Modi's going to Kyiv and there's talk that what Modi is going to be doing in Kyiv. I don't know if this is true, is that he's also going to be trying to mediate some sort of a ceasefire. He's going to be delivering messages on behalf of both parties acting as a mediator. I might just wonder if the BRICS nations have come to the realization that they are being strummed along by Ukraine and by the collective West. I'm not so confident that they've realized that. - Yeah, I think the Chinese have. And I mean, it didn't be very clear, China is a far more important player in this game. Then India is, India has some influence and Modi is somebody who has a good, strong personal relationship with Putin. But ultimately, the country that matters for the Russians is China, it is not India. Now, Modi is going to go to Kyiv. The reason he's going to Kyiv, in my opinion, is really very, very simple. He's under an awful lot of pressure from the Americans. There's been the coup in Bangladesh. There've been charges that he's been involved in having Sikh activists in Canada assassinated. There's been criticism of him. There was a lot of criticism of him during the election, the recent election in India. And all that criticism swelled to huge volume when directly after his election, he went to Moscow. And at a meeting with Putin, and Katie, all kinds of agreements with the Russians at that time. So I think what Modi is scrambling for is some degree of diplomatic cover. The Americans, the Ukrainians, all sorts of people said that India is aligning itself with Russia against Ukraine. He's been trying right from the start of this conflict to avoid the appearance of that. So he's decided that he has to balance this by going to Kyiv. He noticed that he's not only going to Kyiv. He's also going to Poland as well. He's going to these two countries. He'll be no doubt be talking about peace proposals and things of this kind. But I don't think that the Russians are interested and I don't think they're going to take any mediation proposals in the Indian series if they're even so much as a peer. How does the dynamic of Ukraine knocking out these bridges and maybe holding on to this sliver of territory inside of Russia? How is that going to affect Putin and the administration? - Well, there's been a really good article about this actually by a former top CIA analyst, had the director of Russian affairs at the CIA, George B. And his point is he's going to strengthen the Russian government and make it even more determined to see this thing through. And I think that's exactly what it's going to do. I don't think it's going to weaken Moscow. Moscow's resolve, it's going to harden it. The Russians, I don't think have ever been keen about negotiations anyway. And I think at the moment, they are probably saying to themselves, this course cooperation actually plays to our advantage because it takes some of the pressure off on us to engage the Ukrainians in negotiations. So I think that is probably the major mood in Moscow. There's been two very interesting articles in the US media. One is the one in responsible statecraft by George B. Another one is an article in the Hill and both of them essentially make the same point that the Kyiv that the course cooperation is a mistake, is a strategic blunder. And far from helping Ukraine, it's actually making Ukraine's problems worse. And I know that there is even a view that it actually suits Putin for the Ukrainians to be in the course at the moment. The Ukrainians are by all accounts, including accounts in forms, you know, forms magazine. David Axe, we all probably know him. He's enthusiastic supporter of Ukraine. He's admitting that Ukrainian armored vehicle losses have been extremely high in course. So the Ukrainians committing attrition on themselves and some of their best men and reserves, even as the Russians advance in other places. There's a famous quote from Napoleon, never interfere with your adversary when he is making a mistake. Probably that is what Putin is saying to himself at the moment. - A Pavel of the Czech Republic, he said that Ukraine can enter NATO, even if it has some sort of conflict of territorial dispute, given there is a clear demarcation, a clear boundary where the dispute is frozen and where it kind of ends. I wonder if one of the goals now for Kursk, Zelensky saying that our goal now is to, we're gonna blow up bridges, we're gonna hold a piece of territory at Kursk. I wonder if for Zelensky, this is about showing the collective West, showing NATO. Look, we're gonna lose Donbas, we've lost Donbas, that's obvious, so we're gonna cut our losses in Donbas. We can hold territory in Russia. We are capable of some sort of an operation into Russian territory. So it's time for NATO to consolidate whatever is left of Ukraine and then to push Ukraine into NATO and just keep this thing frozen and Russia's occupied with Kursk. They've taken Donbas, but at least we can now say, okay, we've got everything west of the Deep Red. - And I think that, I think that it is inconceivable that the United States, even the Biden administration would agree to Ukraine joining NATO whilst it is in the occupation of any part of Russia's pre-2014 territory. - Just to say, I think that's not going to happen. So in fact-- - I could be one of the negotiations. Maybe the big thing. - Yeah, I know. I understand that. - I understand that. But then that comes back to the question of the Russians have to agree to this and the Russians have made it absolutely clear that they're not going to agree with this, that for them, Ukraine's entry into NATO in any form is an absolute red line. And this incursion in Kursk is going to make that even stronger. And from Putin's point of view, again, Havill's comment actually is helpful because he could come back to his friends in Beijing and Delhi. And he could say, look, these people, not only are they not serious, they're actually about negotiations. You could see that their ultimate objective has not changed. For us, this was never initially a war about territory. It was a war about security, about our security, the security of our people in Donbas, but also the security of our Western border. They still want to expand NATO eastwards, which is what this whole war ultimately was all about. And I think that's what Putin is going to say. And Putin, Havill, has just given him a whole text confirming as much. - Not the sharpest knife in the draw, powerful. - No, he's not, actually. - I mean, we saw that with the artillery shells. Affair, which is something you notice that nobody talks about anymore. - Yeah, they've memory-holed the whole artillery thing. Yeah, they don't seem to care that much about the whole weapons issue anymore, which is why I think, no, it seems like they're trying to figure out a way to create a demarcation, and to create an exit with some sort of Ukrainian victory. And they don't talk about the artillery, the shell production, none of that stuff. - If you go back to that article in The Sunday Times, which has attracted a lot of discussion in, but I think people are reading wrongly, actually. I think it's about the course cooperation very much. It's all in the end. It's all about the British trying to persuade their allies to allow the Ukrainians to use storm shadows to attack Russian air bases. This is what it's principally about. But again, if you read it carefully, you can see that there is there, again, a grudging understanding that the ability of the West to continue to provide Ukraine with military equipment is all but exhausted. And by the way, again, this morning, I saw a report, it comes from Ukraine's sources, so you might not want to take it completely seriously. But they're now saying again, that unless they continue to get more help from the West, they will run out of pretty much everything within 60 days. Now, you know, probably don't want to take that too seriously, but you can see that they are having problems and they're flashing warning signs to their friends in the West that things are not going well at all and that they're losing equipment very fast, which of course they accelerated the rate of their equipment loss with this course corporation. And in the meantime, things are not going as they wanted them to go. And if they continue like this, well, everything will start to collapse in two months time. - All right, we will end the video there, the duran.lux.com, we are on Rumble Odyssey, bit your Telegram, Rob Finn and Twitter X, and go to the Duran shop, pick up some merchant-like t-shirts we are wearing today. The link is in the description box down below. Take care. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)