The Duran Podcast
Ukraine blame game begins
All right, Alexander, let's talk about what is going on in Ukraine. And let's start off with the situation on the front lines in Dombas. We have the storming, the assault on Ugladar. If we can call it the storming of Ugladar, you'll let us know if that's indeed what's going on. We have a worsening situation for the Ukraine military in Bakhros. We have Chasov-Yard. We have the Ukraine military that appears that they're trying to move brigades and to move soldiers in Tupacatovsk and into different areas in order to plug up some holes. And they have those holes because of the Kursk incursion. And it looks like everyone is starting to acknowledge that the Kursk incursion, invasion, whatever you want to call it, was a really bad idea. You even have built Julian Rupkip putting out an article the other day saying that this was a bad idea. And that is why we are seeing the front line in Dombas collapse. Anyway, let's discuss what is happening in Ukraine. You said that everybody's now acknowledging that the Kursk incursion was everybody. I don't know, everybody. I think pretty much all the people who matter are. It's always interesting to me how people come round about four weeks late to the position that we took at the beginning. Just say, we haven't had a caveat about how Russia is losing. And then they'll admit, like, you'll see their time a little be something like the successful Kursk incursion is coming at a cost of losing a higher war or something like that. Yes, they always have to add that caveat about how badly Russia is doing. But anyhow, again, I apologize to people that, you know, if we don't mention that there's nobody else will just go back and watch our videos of about three or four weeks ago when we were predicting this outcome because it was completely predictable and it is where we are now. The situation is rapidly becoming catastrophic. We're looking at the complete collapse of Ukrainian defences and the entire Ukrainian military position in southern Dombas. Now, let's start with Uglada, which is the place that you mentioned. There were reports about two or three days ago that Ukraine, which is now desperately short of troops to try to plug the holes that are appearing in many different places along the front lines, was shifting the 72nd Brigade, which is the Brigade, which has been defending Uglada. Uglada, strong, very strong, fortified position. It's a small, it's a town of about 14,000 people, but it's very dense. If you look at the landscape, it's a series of very high-rise buildings built in the Soviet area, basically for coal miners. And, you know, it loom over the landscape. It's like a kind of castle in the middle of the open step. It brought a very difficult position for the Russians to capture. They've made repeated attempts to do it. They've always failed up to now, and it's been defended by the 72nd Brigade, which is one of Ukraine's best. Anyway, reports were that the situation elsewhere on the front lines has now become so bad that the Ukrainian general staff, the military leadership, had decided to withdraw the 72nd Brigade from Uglada to redeploy it somewhere else. Perhaps in Korsk region, some were saying more probably, I think, in Pakrovsk region, where we're now looking at a major collapse. So what then happened is within hours of that information coming out, the Russians then begin a major assault, not just on Ugladaa itself, but all the places, all the 45 positions around Ugladaa, which were the responsibility of the 72nd Brigade to protect, and without the control of which Ukraine will lose Ugladaa. If you look at the various places, there's villages to the west, there's a coal mine to the north, there's various supply roads. If all of these places are lost, Ugladaa itself is encircled, and either the Ukrainians withdraw, or they get caught in a trap, and everybody is either forced to fight to the last man, or they surrender on mass, as we've seen happen in one or two places in the war before. So that's what the Russians do. The moment this news comes out that the 72nd Brigade is being withdrawn. Now, it may be that the Russians planned this attack on Ugladaa and prepared for it over a long time, that almost certainly is true up to a point, but it could be that the timing is related to information about the 72nd Brigade. It could be that the Russians are taking advantage of the withdrawal of the 72nd Brigade from Ugladaa, or there is another possibility, which is that the Russians are attacking Ugladaa at this time, precisely in order to prevent the 2nd, 72nd Brigade being redeployed to other places where it is urgently needed. That tells you how bad the overall situation for Ukraine now has become. Now, Pakrovsk is obviously the place, the area around Pakrovsk is the place where everybody is talking about how bad the critical the situation is. We've discussed in various programs how important Pakrovsk itself is. The Daily Telegraph did a mammoth article, Daily Telegraph newspaper, which cheers on the Ukrainians every single opportunity. The same journalist who wrote this mammoth article talking about the enormous crisis in Pakrovsk three weeks ago was publishing another article talking about the failure of Russia's summer offensive. So you can see how drastically even the Daily Telegraph is now having to shift its position. They are reporting that Ukrainian soldiers are absolutely bewildered by the speed of events, by the extent to which the collapse is happening in the area around Pakrovsk. So the Russians are currently storming two towns. One of them is Cilidova. The Ukrainians apparently tried to throw everything that they had to try to stabilize the situation in Cilidova. Some counter-tax apparently took place. The counter-tax failed. Yesterday we got news that the Russians are on the offensive in Cilidova. Again, Cilidova bigish place around 24,000 people before the war. Important logistical hub, place that's located south of Pakrovsk, if it falls. Pakrovsk itself starts to look very vulnerable. If Cilidova also falls, it creates problems, I mean, massive problems for the Ukrainians further south also. So it's a sort of linchpin, a place one which holds together various parts of the Ukrainian front lines. So Cilidova is in crisis. Then yesterday we got news that another town called Ukransk is currently being stored by the Russians. And we just had this morning film from Ukransk. It shows Russian troops inside Ukransk. They are in fact advancing through Ukransk, a town of around 10,000 people. Now, once not so long ago, it took months for the Russians to capture towns and settlements like this. Now they're storming them one by one or sometimes in parallel with each other along the front lines. And we have comments from Ukrainian soldiers. They say that they can't hold back the Russians. There are too many of them, they're too well equipped. They've got control of the air, they've got control of the electronic warfare systems so that Ukrainian drones don't work very well. Obviously the Russians can bomb positions at will. Their air force completely dominates the landscape. So this entire area, this entire place, not just Prokrosk, but all the forces, all the Ukrainian forces nearby are now in massive jeopardy. And there are reports coming from Ukransk that there are now even discussions in Ukraine about the need to prepare for a complete ballback of all Ukrainian forces in this area to the river, to withdraw to the Nipa because of all of these places, they cannot be held for very long. And well, we focused on Prokrosk because that's the place which is getting all this attention. But everywhere else now, the Ukrainians have been pushed back. They are retreating in a town called Toritzk, which was a major fortified position, that they're losing control of Toritzk, they're losing control of Chassafjard, another fortified position near Kramatorsk and Slavyansk. In the north, the Korskov offensive is now in going to reverse. We're getting, it doesn't get much reporting in the West, but the Russians are now advancing in Korsk region. They're regaining ground every day, maybe not a huge amount of ground. But remember, it is a sideshow ultimately. So the Russians have not committed huge forces there, but the Ukrainians are already being pushed back in Korsk and everywhere, right across the front line, the Ukrainians take losses, their losses, according to the Russians are now running at more than 2,000 men dead and wounded every day. Ukraine has no hope of replacing these. So what we're looking at is a collapse all across the front lines and more Russian missile strikes and we're getting reports about them this morning. Russians able to launch missiles right across Ukraine, anywhere they wish, pretty much at will, Ukrainian air defenses in a state of apparent collapse. We are starting to look at the disintegration of the military resistance that has been put up by Ukraine. I think it's very difficult to argue otherwise we're not perhaps quite at the end game yet, but we are getting very close. And if the Russians take Korsk and reach the river, the deeper, then I think militarily we are in the end game. I'm going to ask you a question that you're probably not expecting. But I go through as do you a lot of the pro-Ukrainian accounts as well as pro Ukraine mainstream media publications like Kevin dependent or Kim post. And then I go through social media and I try to get a feel as to what they're saying in Ukraine about what's happening on the front lines and just the general situation. And I was kind of taken aback at a lot of commentary about Sullivan, Jake Sullivan, saying that he is the, a lot of accounts are saying he is the second most hated man right now in Ukraine. And they were saying that because their, their argument is that he's, he's holding Ukraine back from long range missile strikes. He's telling us that there are no attack comes left. He's telling us that that whatever targets we're providing to the US in order to to strike pre 2014 Russian territory, they're out of range of US long range missiles. So it's not going to make any difference. A lot of talk about how they're very upset with Jake Sullivan because the United States, Jake Sullivan, they appear to be holding Ukraine back for victory by not green lighting the long range missile attacks. And the, the argument, the cope, I call it a cope, is that Sullivan and his, his, his NSA is afraid of a Putin collapse. You know, it's not about regime change. They're, they're starting to run the narrative that they believe he's afraid of, of the Russian government actually collapsing if Ukraine begins to, to launch missiles into Russia and move towards victory. What are your thoughts on, on all of this? Because I do know that, that, uh, in watching your videos, the over, over the past couple of days, that Yarmak and Umedov, the Defense Minister of Ukraine, were in, uh, in the United States, they were in D.C. and they did hold meetings with, uh, with Sullivan and his team. And we've often said on the Duran, that's, that Sullivan is indeed the foreign policy president of the United States. I don't think that's, that's a shock or, or secret anymore that he is the person that really does run foreign policy in the United States, especially Project Ukraine. Anyway, what are your thoughts on, on what I just said? Right. Is it accurate? Is it accurate or is it accurate? It is absolutely accurate is exactly what is pouring out of Ukraine at the moment. I mean, there's another, another narrative, for example, that they're currently pumping out, which is that the reason that the CUSC operation is failing and going into reverse and that the Ukrainians are suffering, all these losses there and why they haven't been able to advance in CUSC and capture CUSC itself and press on to Moscow is because Sullivan is preventing them from launching long-range missile strikes into Russia. That this is apparently a supposedly all that, you know, if only he took the break off, he took the break off and pressed on the, you know, gave Ukraine the option to put down the accelerator. The Ukrainians, of course, would win. And of course, we've had Zelensky talking about his plan for victory that he's going to show to, uh, to, uh, well, obviously Sullivan, but also Biden himself, who, by the way, is apparently now mostly absent from all discussions, not just about Ukraine, but pretty much everything. You're getting articles appearing about that. There, we'll just go, we'll talk about that some other time. But, you know, there's the plan for victory that they're going to get showed to Biden and that they're going to come on. What this is, is narrative construction. They are creating the narrative of the stab in the back that you train would have won its war, but for the pews, a land, a mous cowardly behavior of the United States, of the Western powers of the Biden administration and of Jake Sullivan in particular. So nothing, nothing that Jake Sullivan or the United States at this point in time can do can reverse the situation. When Jake Sullivan says, which apparently he has, and not just Jake Sullivan, but Lloyd Austin, apparently, by the way, just to say that there were two meetings, well, Meroff met Lloyd Austin, apparently Yermack, who's Zelensky's chief of staff, and who Meroff met Jake Sullivan. And Jake Sullivan met them. And he was very interesting that he did this. He brought in the national security advisors of Britain, Germany and France. The top advisors of the president of France, the prime minister of Britain and the chancellor of Germany to sit in on this meeting. So that tells you, by the way, that he's becoming very nervous and he wants witnesses there so that, you know, the whole story isn't made up. But anyway, when Sullivan tells them, look, these attacks that you want, we don't have that many of them. We can't produce them in large quantities. Most of the Russian military assets are outside their range. All we're going to do, if we give them to you, is we're going to arrange the Russians by breaching your red lines, their red lines, sorry. And we're not going to change the realities of the war. Well, Sullivan and Lloyd Austin and all those people are telling the Ukrainians the truth. But the Ukrainians, of course, are spinning it differently. That is Sullivan being a coward, he's scared of Putin. Or if he's not scared of Putin, he's scared that if Russia collapses, if Putin falls, then the United States is going to have problems and they want them, they're actually propping up Putin, which tells you that this is pure and complete mythologizing a narrative construction. The people who we trusted to be our allies were really our enemies. They betrayed us. They were in league with Putin all along. You can see it. And that's what they're doing. Now, what Sullivan probably wants to the Ukrainian Institute is to start negotiating. I mean, he's probably still wants the Democrats to win in November, even though he's boss, Joe Biden is going. And apparently, Kamala says she doesn't want him. But he undoubtedly obviously still wants the Democrats to win. He wants something to happen, a ceasefire, free, something like that. Before November, or if not before November, at least he doesn't want a total collapse whilst he's still national security adviser and a Joe Biden is still president. So he wants the Ukrainians to move politically. The Ukrainians, it's absolutely clear to me now, are not interested in negotiations. They would, if anything, prefer a collapse, a military collapse. But they are going to blame him for it. It's not Ukraine. It's not the heroic people of Ukraine and the heroic leadership and, you know, Zelensky and Yamak, they're not, they're not to blame for anything that's gone wrong. It's the cowardly Americans and their fears and their fact that they're propping up Putin against Ukraine. And by the way, this stab in the back mythology that has already been manufactured is going to gain some traction in Ukraine. But it's also going to gain an awful lot of traction amongst some people in the West. The near cons will almost certainly seize on it to some extent, and probably in the United States. And you can already see it being peddled by all sorts of people in Britain as well. There is an editorial in the Guardian that basically ran with this bizarre big idea. And there was articles by Dominic Lawson in the times, the London times. So the stab in the back is going to become the accepted narrative for some people who want to just pretend that it was no part of their doing that Ukraine is going down in flames. It was all the fault of Biden, Sullivan, Floyd Austin, and those cowards in Washington or traitors in Washington. Unbelievable stuff. They were so close to victory. They invaded Russia and they were so close to marching on Moscow. But it turned out that Project Ukraine was not about regime change. It was actually about regime preservation. It's crazy stuff. It is absolutely... Oh, my God. What do the Europeans think about all of this? Do they understand... You know, Sullivan finally understands that it's game over. That's the way I'm seeing it. I think you said it well. He understands that if Harris were to win, he's not going to be part of her administration. Harris has said as much. Obviously, if Trump wins, he's not going to be part of that administration. So he understands that within three, four, five months, whatever, he's he's going to a think tank or something, right? So he wants to make sure that it doesn't collapse on his watch. But after that, he's out. He's done. So that's basically his thinking and he understands that this war is lost. So how do I keep this thing from collapsing on my watch? Even though I know that that Russia's won this thing. What about the Europeans? Because they're left holding the back. And I believe CNN reported after the Ummet of Austin meeting, they actually sat down with Ummet of the Defense Minister of Ukraine. And I believe CNN was reporting that basically it's Europe. You guys have to deal with this. At least that's what that's the Wall Street Journal was saying with the whole F-16 thing when Biden said we're not going to send made and its staff, American made and staff to airfields in Ukraine, Biden said the Europeans have to maintain the F-16s. Let them deal with it. I mean, it seems like it's Europe. You guys you guys have to have to handle Ukraine going forward, which was in which is included something that we were starting to see some months ago that the Americans are decanting responsibility. For the entire Ukraine war onto the Europeans. Now, the Europeans are completely at sea. They do not know what to do. Oh, you can see this from the fact that they're saying as little as they possibly can now about the Ukraine war. If you're talking about Ousil of Fontelayan, she's spending most of her time now. When she talks about Ukraine being rude about Orban. That's all she knows how to do at the moment. They have no plan, no strategy for this situation. When I say no plan, they have no plan about say how to deal with potential refugee flows from Ukraine, which we might see. They have no preparation for this. They have no plan how to deal with this politically. And of course, militarily and financially, they are played out. They have no more weapons to send. That's what Germany has been saying. It's the finance minister is telling everybody the Germany is, you know, exhausted in terms of what he can do financially for Ukraine as well. In Britain, the star administration, as we saw crazily at the very start. And its very inception went out of its way to reaffirm its undying support for Ukraine. They invited Zelensky to attend a British cabinet meeting. They lobbied on Ukraine's behalf for permission to launch missiles against Russia, Russia, deep into Russia. But in terms of practical help, they can't give any. The Polish, Poland, they're all the same. So, I mean, you know, they are they are literally being left hanging out to dry. Because they have no, well, they have no, they cannot they cannot do anything. There's they know perfectly well in this situation. If the United States cannot turn the situation round in Ukraine, which it can't, nor can the Europeans and they know it, but they can't come up with a plan on how to turn it round because the means to fulfill such a plan. Does not exist. I'm going to make a guess that before long we're going to start to see all sorts of mutterings starting to appear that, again, it was the fault of the Americans that the Americans weren't really in it, you know, Sullivan and people like him, you know, weren't really ready to take on Putin properly and that the Americans Biden and his team left Europe in the lurch. That I think is probably what they're going to start to say as well. It's going to be a pale version of the Ukrainian stab in the back myth, not quite the same because they can't go all out as the Ukrainians will. But they'll be saying something fairly similar. So how does that affect Russia's calculation of things? I mean, they're they're seeing everything that's happening. They're also reading Ukraine media. They're also reading Ukraine, social media as well. And they're seeing the narrative construction that they're trying to put together the cope, that they're trying to put together in order to explain all the bad things that are happening on the side of the Ukraine military. What does Russia do? Peskov gave an interesting interview the other day. And he said various things about the conflict in Ukraine and Moscow's position. Putin's position. What what does Russia do? Well, I think this is where the Russians now have to start thinking about the end game and what it means because I'm not myself convinced that there's at this moment in time any clear plan on how from a Russian point of view, the war ends. Now, August has been absolutely decisive. August 2024 was the decisive month in terms of the war. It was when Ukraine was broken militarily. I mean, it's it's the it's the point where the the Russian army rested decisively the initiative and we can see that the Ukrainian army is beginning to break down. It's also the month where it's clear that the West militarily speaking is also played out. They can't provide Ukraine with long-range missiles. The plan that was floated been floated around by Macron a couple of months ago about sending troops to Ukraine has proved so massively unpopular with the European public that it's not being entertained any longer. The polls, even the polls are starting to have cold feet. They're saying they won't involve themselves in shooting down Russian missiles. So the Russians now know that it is extremely unlikely to the point of complete implores ability that the Western powers will become directly involved in the war and they also know that they have Ukraine militarily in a corner. So and the other thing that happened over the course of August is that the Russians also found that by attacking in Kusk, the Ukrainians took the pressure off the Russians in terms of negotiating with Ukraine. We we we had all those signals from Zelensky that he wanted negotiations. Poliansky, the deputy ambassador of Russia to the UN confirmed in in a video that Iran that in fact the Russians were indeed exactly as we guessed on these programs coming under pressure for some of their allies to begin negotiations with the Ukrainians. The Russians weren't keen on that idea. Now that pressure has gone and that all happened in August. So August from a Russian point of view has been a decisive month. They know they're going to win the war militarily. There's no question about that anymore. If ever if there ever was, they know that victory is inside. They know the West isn't going to intervene militarily. And they also know that they have political space. They're not being pressured to begin negotiations. So the question is what do they do? How far do they go? Do they cross the NEPA? I mean, they will eventually get to the NEPA. Will do they cross the NEPA? Are they going to stick to just the four regions? Are they going to demand more than just the four regions? Do they go to Kiev? Do they carry out regime change in Kiev? Now, I think that by this stage in the war, I think it is all but inconceivable that the Russians will not want regime change in Kiev. At the very least, having exhausted all diplomatic options, having recognized that Zelensky is a completely impossible person to negotiate with, having recognized that even in this crisis, the Ukrainians are not really prepared to negotiate at all. The Russians understand that some kind of regime change in Kiev is necessary. But what does that mean? Does that mean that the Russians not only occupy Kiev and change the... But do they treat Kiev again as Russian territory as it was for hundreds of years until 1991? Or do they try to establish an alternative government there? What are the long-term plans for central and western Ukraine? Do they move to bring all these territories back within the Russian world, as they say? Or do they go for a more conservative solution, sticking perhaps to the four regions and perhaps some other territories on the East Bank of the Dnieper, maybe Harkov as well, and then see whether they can come up with some kind of longer-term arrangement of the central and western Ukraine, which they know that the global community will be happier with. So, those are the questions that I think the Russians have deferred up to now, but which I think they're going to start thinking about. And I'm going to make a guess that with every day that passes, with the Russian army moving further and further westwards, those people in Moscow who say, "Victory is within our grasp. Why should we settle for anything less than our maximalist objectives?" The position of those people, people like Medvedev, people like the people in the general staff, the military, the staff, the people that John Helmer was talking about in the programme with him recently on the Duran, the position of those people become stronger. So, we'll just have to see what the Russians do. Just a final thought, going back to Peskov's interview the other day, he seemed to hint at the fact that Moscow is very unhappy with Europe. You made some very bad decisions and they are going to pay a price for those bad decisions. Peskov said as much and they seem like they really do want to stick it to the Biden White House. I don't know, that's kind of the impression that I got. I know that the Russian government and Putin, they don't make decisions like that. But they did talk about Biden's rudeness towards Putin and to Russia and how that's not going to be forgotten. Just another thing to note, the Russian economy continues to grow. And energy gas, oil, is continuing to be bought by Europe from Russia, even more than what they're buying from the United States. So Russia's got a lot of cards to play. And well, absolutely, they're back apparently. Russia's back to providing 15% of Europe's gas. I mean, it's astonishing, they're going to end or depend on Russian gas. And Russian gas is once again forming an ever-growing part of the European energy mix. And we'll continue to do so. So there we go, I mean, it's from a Russian point of view, they hold all the strong cards, all the high cards. The point is that they've got to play those cards carefully and well. And emotion does play a part in Russian decision-making. No British should think that these people are just calculating machines and that they have no feelings. I mean, they are furious with Biden, they are furious with the Europeans. They will never forget what I think many of them see as Germany's betrayal, or at least the betrayal of the German political establishment. The fact that Russia worked so hard from all the way, all the way back to the 1960s to establish a strong relationship with Germany, even assisting in the late '80s and '90s in the process of German reunification, only to have Germany do this total flip, impose the most extreme sanctions on them, motorimobilise Europe against them, lead a political campaign against them in Europe. They will not forget that quickly. And obviously they're angry about it, they're angry about all of these things. But as you absolutely rightly say, at the end of the day, they will make their decisions, their long-term decisions based on their calculations of Russian national interest. Churchill said it really well. I mean, he said it right back in, there was 1939 that, you know, when people talk about Russian foreign policy being a riddle wrapped in a mystery, the key to the mystery is Russian national interest. It's a part of that comment that people always overlook. The Russians ultimately will always, what will ultimately make the decisions is what they calculate their long-term interests to be. It will be very difficult indeed, very difficult indeed for the Germans to re-establish a relationship with Russia of the kind that they had before the war began. All right, we will enter there the duran.locals.com. We are on Odyssey Bitch Shoot Rumble Telegram and Twitter X. And go to the Duran Shop Pickup some merch like the T-shirts that we are wearing today. We'll find a link in the description box down below. Take care. [Music]