Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
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$45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes each detail. Hello and welcome back to another episode of Battleground Ukraine with me, Patrick Bishop, and Saul David. A grim landmark this week, one year since the war began. It's time to take stock, remind ourselves of just how momentous this event is in 21st century history. We'll be discussing how the war is reshaping the world
and what to expect as the conflict enters its second year. To help us, we've also been talking to an old friend of the podcast, Colonel Pavlo Kazan, the ecological scientist turned warrior who now commands a 4C unit that's command, control, communications and computer activities on the Eastern Front. He's got some fascinating insights into those questions, as well as giving us a feel for the latest developments on the battlefield.
But to start off, the world really is a very different place to where it was 12 months ago, isn't it, Patrick? I think it's good to remind ourselves of the enormity of the situation. 200,000 dead on both sides.
Ukrainian cities bombarded from the air, homes, schools, hospitals flattened, many innocent men, women and children killed, invading troops, murdering, raping, torturing civilians, a totalitarian regime on one side pitched against a democracy on the other. I mean, we all thought just over a year ago, didn't we, that such a scenario belonged to history and that with the conclusion of the Second World War,
We were never going to see anything like it on European soil again. Yet here we are. I think it would be useful to look back over the fundamentals of the situation and examine what we thought would happen, what the big issues that would decide events would be and how things actually play out.
played out in reality. Yes, indeed. Well, the first big thing, obviously, was that the Russians didn't win in the way they expected to. And what was meant to be a decapitation operation turned into a protracted war, one that shows no sign of ending soon.
But let's leave that aside and dig into the factors that we determined quite quickly were crucial in setting the course of the war. And the first, I would say, is the level and depth of Western support. That's been absolutely essential, hasn't it? Because simply without it, Ukraine couldn't have stayed in the fight. Yeah, that's absolutely right. And we've seen so much signaling in the last couple of days around the anniversary to show that Ukraine
but is as resolute and strong as before, led by Joe Biden's visit to Ukraine and to Poland. When, you know, good old Joe, I mean, there's a lot of kind of mockery that goes on around him, but when he's on form, he really is outstanding, isn't he? And he couldn't really have been more convincing in delivering this message that America is right behind Ukraine, it's going to stay behind Ukraine forever.
The basic structure of their support and of how they see the war hasn't changed at all and is not going to change. So I think this was a really convincing display and one that Ukraine will take seriously.
Yeah, I mean, it's... We like to think, and we've been mentioning on the podcast in recent weeks, that actually...
Western nations are pretty much coming into line. But it's only going so far, isn't it? Because we also know that public opinion in places like France and Germany is also a bit twitchy. It's not absolutely on board. The good news is that the politicians, by and large, are all saying the same message. And that is that the Ukrainians need to be given the kit they need to win this war.
Now, other elements, of course, are also important, which are sanctions. And apparently we're about to hear another round of sanctions. And of course, we would like to have thought that the sanctions would have bit even more deeply into the Russian economy and the Russian ability to wage war than it has. I think it
probably has had quite an effect, Patrick. It's not just a question, as we've mentioned before, about looking at GDP and the shrinking of the Russian economy, which hasn't been anything like as big as it could have been. It's also about their ability to build new effective weapons. We've spoken before about the
that they need. They undoubtedly aren't getting as many as they require. Putin, in his speech, and I think we'll come on to that in a minute, is talking about a kind of rejigging of the Russian economy so it doesn't have to rely on the West. But you can't do that overnight. And so the options for Russia, frankly, when the West is lined up as firmly as it is, I would say are very limited indeed. Yes, I think in the medium term, they're probably actually patching things together pretty quickly.
but the long-term picture is not good. And really, it depends on them. Their kind of medium-long-term survival depends on having big, powerful friends beyond their borders. And so far, even though a lot of people aren't actually going along with the sanctions regime, the only two non-abiders, if you like, that matter are India and, above all, China. Now, there's been quite a lot of noise around China, hasn't there, in the last decade?
couple of days, the last week. We've got a strange thing going on in South Africa with this bizarre decision to hold naval exercises with Russia and China. What do you make of that? Well, it's weird, isn't it? My brother lives in South Africa, so I've been getting a little bit of feedback from him about this. But we have to remember that South Africa, or at least the ANC, has a long connection with Russia, going back to the Soviet Union support of the ANC,
when there was, of course, white rule in South Africa. So these are historical traditions that are also present among the left in the UK, that means that there's a kind of natural sympathy and alignment alongside Russia, even when you get the absolutely bizarre scenario that we have at the moment where Russia's launched an aggressive war and South Africa's agreed to continue to hold a
naval exercises with both Russia and China. I mean, it's a very bad look, frankly, and there may be consequences for South Africa as a result of this. But the China situation is much more serious. We're hoping to get people to talk on the pod in future episodes with more detail about China. But Patrick, what do you think of this statement by Blinken, the Secretary of State in the U.S.?
who is at least alleged that China is planning to send weapons to Russia. On the surface, it sounds quite alarming, but are you alarmed? I don't think so. No, it's a bit of an odd one, isn't it? I mean, it sort of came out of left field and it's been hotly denied by China.
Just a fun fact about Antony Blinken before we go on. Apparently, he's a keen guitar player and performs under the name Abe Blinken. Get it? And he's got a couple of tunes on Spotify if you're very bored one day, so...
But to get back to the point, I don't know where that came from. Blinken seems to be misinformed, I think, on that one. And I think if anything, China sees itself as a peace broker and all this. It would like to assert itself and insert itself into the story as being the emerging major diplomatic player in big world events like this and would like to be able to claim credit for finally doing
bringing an end to the conflict. I think that probably won't be very good news for Ukraine because their attitude will be very much that there will have to be concessions on both sides and probably more from Ukraine and from Russia. And the US has sort of knocked that back, saying that it's very much necessary
Not the case that they are putting pressure or will be putting pressure on Ukraine to come to some sort of territorial deal with the Russians. So they're not going to be leaning on Zelensky to trade land for peace. I think we can conclude from all this, Saul, that Ukraine is in a pretty good place on this front of international solidarity or the big players that count. And although, you know, they'll carry on clamoring for arms, you know,
and we'll continue to give them, but it'll never be quite enough. But I think that fundamentally that support is there. And the other thing that people have been worrying about war weariness among electorates is,
is not as far as I can see a factor at the moment. Of course, that could change. Yes, well, the second big element in all of this is how domestic politics and public opinion in Russia have been impacted by the war. And it's, of course, very hard to read because we're not getting that much reliable information out of Russia. We expected the war to have had much more effect on the ordinary people than it seems to have had. There was a fascinating documentary on the BBC this week, Patrick, that actually looked into some of the
bolder characters in Russia who've actually said no. One legislator or a local town official who went on the record, I think this was reported at the time, publicly saying, no, it's an absolute disgrace what Russia was doing. There was no justification for the war, but she has since left Russia. We know, of course, of the number of refuseniks, people who refused the mobilization. Another of those was featured in the film. And there were some anarchists from Siberia. Well, I say anarchists. There were some
activists from Siberia who are, you know, risking their freedom and possibly their lives by daubing various anti-war slogans in and around the town. And interestingly, it was the town, of course, that's gone down in history as the death place of the Tsar and his family. So where am I talking about, Patrick? In Katerinaberg. Yeah, Katerinaberg. It was a great film. It was a wonderful film. And it did give you some hope. But I
You know, unfortunately, we have to come to the conclusion from what we've heard from other sources that those sort of attitudes are incredibly moving and laudable and brave as they are, are still in a minority. Yeah, it's great, great film. I urge you, urge everyone to watch it on iPlayers called Inside Russia, Traitors and Heroes.
And it really does provide a glimpse of what's going on. I mean, you're absolutely right about the fantastic courage that was shown by these individuals. But what I think one got from it was that there's a lot of
basic despair, I would say, among people who know the war isn't a good thing, but they just feel powerless. There's nothing they can do. They raise their voices. If they go out in the streets, they're just going to be thrown into prison. And repression is very finely tuned now, isn't it, in Russia. So they don't have to actually murder people and torture people in large numbers.
just the threat of a jail sentence, which is probably going to ruin your employment prospects and all the rest of it. It's really going to mess up your life if you go to jail for a couple of months. You know, that's all they need to do, really, to cow the population. But like you say, there is still evidence from this film of a large measure of self-delusion among ordinary people. I mean, this lady you referred to, Nina, the counsellor from Boronej,
In her speech to the council, she sort of basically says, how stupid can you be? How can you really believe that so-called neo-Nazis in Ukraine would elect a Jew as their leader? And, you know, the answer is that
I suppose that they've been conditioned by years and years and years, not just in the Putin regime, but in many decades before that, to believe the unbelievable. For this to work, Saul, don't you think there's got to be, for government propaganda to be as effective as it is, there has to be a sort of base mechanism.
of kind of lies that you build on that are already there. Yeah, and you could say this, you know, as you point out, Patrick, this is a long time in the making. The Soviet Union was very adept at building on this type of anti-Western propaganda. It's been going on for an awful long time now.
And the parallels are obvious because the preparation for getting the German people to support a war of aggression in the Second World War, the Nazis, of course, doing that was a long time in the making. And it built on a lot of anti-Semitism and anti-Slavic feeling that there was in the German nation anyway. So you pick up on these long tropes, you misuse history. And before you know it, you've got a whole...
nation, or if not a whole nation, as we've been pointing out, the documentary showed us that there were still some right thinking people in Russia, but an awful lot of people in Russia, we gather are still basically in support of the war. And the war has its
We talk about body bags and the fact that 15,000 dead came back from Afghanistan, and this was a big game changer. This eventually led to the withdrawal from Afghanistan. But what's different about Ukraine is that they can frame it as an existential threat.
war against the West, but also, you know, the cradle of Russian civilization. And they certainly wouldn't have felt that against Afghanistan. So it's much easier to spin this war as a war of necessity. And of course, you know, freedom of information simply isn't there in Russia. So
Putin's got a lot of advantages. And what was fascinating about his speech, and we don't want to give it too much airtime because he just banged on about the usual tropes, you know, the Nazis, the West had basically provoked the war, nothing to do with us. This is a war of self-defense. I mean, you know, this is a complete inversion, as we know, of the truth. But what is scary about his speech is that it made no attempt to sort of suggest war.
strategic goals and where the war may be going next. It was really just, you know, we need to dig in for the long haul. And that, frankly, Patrick, is his only hope. His only hope is if the West's support for Ukraine fractures, which is why I feel instinctively the weapons issue is crucial. We need to get as many weapons to Ukraine as possible so that can win this war in the foreseeable future. And we don't allow that.
even if it was unlikely to happen, we don't allow Western support to dissipate. Just going back to that issue of casualties, one of the characters in the film was a father who'd lost his son, I think, in the fighting around Mariupol.
And he was just refusing to accept that maybe his son had died in vain. And I think this is a big issue, which is going to actually, in a funny way, at least in the medium term, help Putin that, you know, people who've lost a child in this war want to make some sense of it. And instead of saying the war was wrong,
They want to give some meaning to their loss and say, well, maybe the war was right. And they're in a way more inclined to believe the lies they're being told. So I think in the case of Afghanistan, this was a faraway country of which many Russians, most Russians knew little and probably cared less. So in a funny way, the pointlessness of that struggle meant that the casualties had much more of a political effect than they're having now in Ukraine, which, as you say, can be framed better.
no matter how distorted that interpretation may be as some kind of existential struggle. Now to go into the, to the speech, um, you know, it was the same old, same old really, wasn't it? And, uh,
Apparently, you know, the big threat was, OK, we're going to withdraw from the S.T.A.R.T. nuclear arms limitation or rather reduction treaty that I don't think that caused many ripples, did it? And the foreign ministry went on very quickly to say, well, this is this any suspension and it is reversible, reversible like the missile launch. Did you hear about this?
there was meant to be another test launch of the Satan 2 missile just before the speech. But apparently this took off from their testing site up near Archangel and got a few thousand feet in the air and then reversed track and sort of went up in a path of smoke. So there's a bit of a metaphor there for the speech, I think. Yeah.
Yeah. And the other element, of course, is, you know, again, we've been speculating long and hard on this, Patrick, is that the extent to which Putin might be overthrown from pressure from below. I mean, it's interesting, even more chat from the Wagner group this week, Grigozhin, of course, the leader of the Wagner group, that they're not getting the kit they need. He's kind of hinting at sort of traitorous behavior by the Russian senior command. So it's interesting. We thought that there'd been an attempt to put Grigozhin back in his box, but he's definitely out of his box again.
And also at the same time, mill bloggers, of course, who tend to be far right, heavily nationalist in their views, are saying, where was all the chat in Putin's speech about where we're going next and how we're going to win this war? So there is trouble afoot, Patrick. And it is possible, of course, that there will be moves made. I mean, what's your feeling about that?
Well, I've been talking to a friend of mine who's got a way into Moscow. I'll say no more than that. And he's in the past. We often have these conversations. And he said, oh, well, we don't.
There's no real sign of any movement in the inner circle against Putin, but he says he's now picking up that that is changing and there is more and more kind of outspoken mention of the dissatisfaction. Not with the war. They're not really complaining about the war. They're complaining about how the war has been led, how the war has been conducted. So it's really the beginning to challenge Putin's competence in a very serious way. And of course, it always comes back to their own self-interest.
So how that will play out, he's not says that no one really knows, you know, that when it happens, if it happens, we'll only know about it after the event. It won't be sort of flagged up in any way. But he was taking heart from the fact that for the first time, this long discussed palace coup may actually be turning political.
into a real thing. Now, the third element of the war that we need to discuss, of course, is events on the battlefield. The big surprise of last year was the stunning Ukrainian successes of the autumn in the Kharkiv blast and the retaking of Kherson. But that...
Seems a long time ago now, doesn't it? However, the fundamental fact remains that Russia can't win in any meaningful sense. That's our interpretation. Even with all the hyped up mobilizations, it hasn't got the trained troops or weaponry to achieve anything like their original aims. And this view, of course, is coming to us from US and British intelligence. Yeah, so short of escalating to a nuclear war.
conflict. They can't really take the war to a better place from their perspective. I mean, there's just been another report from the Institute of the Study of War in DC, which says that Russia's lost half its armor. So it simply hasn't got the capability for a strategic breakthrough. Another thing I noticed in the Putin speech, so there was no mention of any more mobilizations or call-ups or anything like that,
That struck me as being quite significant, potentially. Perhaps Putin's made the calculation that politically he just can't do that, or militarily, that even if he did do it, it wouldn't actually make much of a difference.
Now, on the actual battlefield, we barely touched on that this week, and maybe this is not the week to do, as there's not a huge amount going on. But we all agree now that the offensive has started, and we've seen this massing of fighter jets and helicopters. Well, later on, we'll be hearing from Colonel Kazan that the Ukrainians aren't actually quaking in their boots at the moment, at the prospect of what the Russians are going to do next. And they really expect...
more of the same. So let's hear from him now. He's speaking to us from his headquarters in the east of Ukraine on the Zaporizhia section of the front, a very, very important part of the battlefield. And this is what he said. Good morning. It's a big pleasure having me at your podcast. And the situation, you know, is stable. We are on the task force Zaporizhia.
And we are looking a little bit moving of Russian troops, but now it's stable and it's not the very strategic territories which was conquered by Russia.
But in general, the situation is stable on our territory. But you're not expecting it to stay that way. All the talk is of a big Russian offensive coming soon. How do you see that playing out? You know that the Russian offensive is going now. And talking if this offensive will be higher,
or they will be increasing activities on some direction. I'm not sure that they will do the same what they did last year, because we have a lot of information, our information, the information from our partners about the activities of them,
Also, my unit also works very much with the radio intelligence. And yes, we are looking at some increasing of quantity of personnel, but I don't think that it will be like a critical increase to have the big offensive campaign from different directions.
Colonel, we last spoke to you in October. Can you tell us what you and your 4C unit have been doing since then and what challenges you face now? First of all, what we did and what we're doing is artillery fire correction. And we are working with close collaboration with our artillery brigades
And we have pilots, very good pilots, which are doing this kind of service for artillery brigades.
And also, because we are C4SR, we have our intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance component. So we're receiving information. It's science intelligence and it's RTR, so-called RTR. And we're receiving information from our radio complexes on the zero line.
So there is no something very much changed. So we're doing our work and I have the part of my unit as I talk on Zaporozhye direction. And also maybe our next missions will be on other directions because we already walked
on Kharkiv direction, we've been working on Kherson direction, on artillery fire correction and reconnaissance. You say, Colonel, that you don't expect another multi-pronged Russian offensive. So how do you see it developing? Do you think it's just going to come from one direction? And what do you think the aims of the offensive will actually be from the Russian side?
First of all, I think that they will try to do more offensive activities on the Zaporizhzhia direction. And of course, they will do on Vuhledar and Bakhmut direction. They are our enemies now.
a lot of resources, enormous resources on Donetsk region, in Donetsk region, on Bakhmut and Vuhledar. And I think, I believe that they will continue to do it because I think it is very principal for them, especially for their leaders, because they
declared and they wanted very much to go on the administrative borders of the Netsk region.
And they spent enormous amount of resources to do it and maybe to prove their citizens that they have success in Donetsk region. Because I think that for them, Donetsk region as well as Lugansk region, it's like a political issue and very important to have offensive campaign there.
Nevertheless, I think they will try to do on Kharkiv direction as well and on Zaporizhia and Kherson direction. But for them, I think for them, it will be more difficult to do.
It's very interesting what you're saying, Colonel. You seem to be confirming our suspicion that we mentioned in the podcast last week. One, that the so-called big Russian offensive is already underway. And secondly, that its main intention is to try and get Putin and the leaders out of this war with what they might be able to sell to the Russian people as some kind of victory, which would mean, as you put it, securing some of their territory in the east of Ukraine. In other words, that they've drawn well back
from their initial aim of taking over the whole of Ukraine. Is that sort of a fair assessment?
You know, I think there is no real correlation between their successes, but not successes, in fact, not successes in the war, and what they are messaging to their citizens in Russia. Because it's unfortunately, it's absolutely unreal world of Russian mass media.
And this is indeed a very good material for scientists to
how Russian propaganda and how Russian government can so much influence on Russian people, but actually not only on Russian people, because Russian propaganda is everywhere. It's in Western countries, it's in Ukraine, and this is actually very, I think it's very important and very dangerous, like different YouTube channels,
Like Ukrainian YouTube channels, speaking Ukrainian with the Ukrainian journalists, but sometimes using Russian rhetorics or they are using some Russian messages. And, you know, in this condition for Russian government, I think for them it doesn't matter what the results in the war against Ukraine are.
because they will do their propaganda as they did. And we can see in Russia the continuum of support of their government. Well, that was fascinating. Do join us after the break to hear the rest of the interview. Welcome back to the second half of our talk with Colonel Kazan. We wanted to know what he thought about the reaction of the Russian population to the war. And this is what he said.
That's what I was going to come on to, Colonel, because at the beginning of this conflict, a year ago now, as it progressed, we were thinking once the Russians failed to gain a swift victory, there were three things that were likely to happen to bring a quick end to the war. One was that there'd be public unrest in Russia against the war.
Secondly, there might be a battlefield collapse where the soldiers just simply decided they didn't want to carry on fighting. And thirdly, that there might be some sort of palace coup in the Kremlin against Putin. None of those things today seem any more likely than they were back then. Is that how you see it? We would like to have some protests in Russia, but I'm not sure that this is really possible in modern Russia.
And we cannot see any protests. It's very few people which protested and mostly people who have been against Russian policy and against this barbaric war against Ukraine. They tried to leave Russia.
And some, you know, some scientists or some public actors, they leave Russia. And...
I think the only way to have a victory is the way to win this war with military tools, of course, because we need to go on our administrative borders. We need to release all our territories with weapons. And I'm not sure that we'll be able
any protests and some kind, maybe when there will be very huge Ukrainian offensive, Russian government and people around Putin will understand that the end will be very, very soon. It could be some different movements in Russia, but nevertheless, we understand that they have
a lot of resources and they have many people. They have many, many people which are mobilizing
And the process of mobilization is continuing now. They're not stopped. They're mobilizing and mobilizing new and new soldiers. Just to follow up on that, Colonel, are you surprised, given the huge losses that the Russians have been suffering, particularly in recent weeks, that we haven't seen more sign of unrest from Russian soldiers, particularly from these mobniks, these barely trained men who've just been called up?
Yes, but you know, I'm completely not surprised because for Russians, soldiers like a resource, but very cheap. This is like an ammunition, but the ammunition for tanks or for cannon cost much higher than the lives of their soldiers. So they looked on soldiers like ammunition, but cheaper than ammunition for the weapon.
Colonel, can we move to the Ukrainian side for a second? We, of course, have been following very closely the announcements in the West. We've been encouraging on the podcast for many, many weeks that Ukraine needs to be given all the weapons that it asked for, that it needs to win an overall victory.
More weapons are coming through. We've had the battle tank announcements recently. It's possible fighter jets will be coming through soon. Without you giving us any specific details, can you assure us that a lot of this material is being built up for a counterpunch that might take place in the spring and that might be decisive in this war? I'm absolutely sure that this is important and this is the only way what we can together do
And fortunately, our Western partners understood that this is the only way to give Ukraine the all available weapon. And there is no room for discussion. And there is no room to have these balances or contrabalances in Europe.
to discuss if Ukrainians will use this weapon not only for defensive purpose, but maybe for offensive. But it's necessary to understand that even offensive activity of Ukraine in general, as on the strategic level, all defensive.
Because we are on our territory and we have to go further to have our territory out of enemy territory.
And this is very important for us to... It's still some discussion. I understand it's still some discussion. There is not only technical issues, how we will use this weapon, but I absolutely believe that our tank troops or our artillery...
Very effectively, it's proved that, for example, if we're talking about 777, I'm very much familiar because we have been walking with the artillery with 777 and how our artillerists easily learned everything.
Everything, how to use it, how to maintain it, how to support it. And I believe that it will be with the other weapon, like tanks or jets or other weapon we're receiving from NATO countries.
And I remember, you know, it's a very good word from a book. I like this book very much by Timothy Snyder. And this is his new book called On Tyranny. Just read it. And what Timothy Snyder said, if none of us is prepared to die for freedom, then all of us will die under tyranny.
And this sentence, we feel it and we very much understand it because we are in the war. And I like to have this sentence like a motto for our Western partners. Because there is only one way, there is only way we
will fight against tyranny. Because this is not just a war against Ukraine.
But this is the war against the old civilized world. This is the war of terroristic states. And this is our war against tyranny. And this is our common war with other partners. That is why it's absolutely crucial. And in my understanding, that all possible weapon which is available in NATO countries should be used to fight this enemy.
Colonel, is there a feeling amongst your fellow soldiers that things are approaching a climax and that we might see a decision in this war sooner rather than later? You know, it's not a very easy question indeed, because on different parts of the war, we have a different situation. We have absolutely difficult situation on the Mahmud and Vuhledar,
And this is enormous resources of our soldiers. And they are, I don't, even I don't know exactly how it's possible to be in this situation for so long time. We have other part of the war, which is a bit easier, if it's possible to say. But the general mood of soldiers, we have to fight.
And even we have, we're very much tired from the war. Indeed, everybody who is involved in the war, everybody who participates in the war. But everybody understands that this is the only way for us.
Because this is the war. If Ukraine will not fight now, Ukraine will not exist. And this is the very strong and very deep understanding of all soldiers fighting now.
It's taken a long time, Colonel, for I think Western leaders to come to the same conclusion. But there are indications from our own Prime Minister, Richie Sunak, and even from the German Defence Minister recently, and certainly from the head of NATO, that actually, that is the point that Ukraine does need to get all the weapons it needs. And so we hope that in the weeks and months to come, it will make a decisive difference on the battlefield. But your point is, we will never know, we have to wait and see. But the
There are indications, finally, that the West has woken up to this existential problem in the East of Europe. As I see, the rhetorics of Western politicians very much changed from last February. Actually, it's not very much changed from the British and American government, because they are both...
are very much stable and sustainable in their vision that we have to fight this enemy. But talking about other Western politicians, yes, and I can compare, especially it's a very bright example, the messages which was on Munich Security Conference last year. I've been participated there.
And I looked on outputs and also I've been looking on some videos from the Munich Security Conference this year. And this is absolutely different messages. It's absolutely different rhetorics of Western leaders that everybody knows.
been talking that this is not the war between Ukraine and Russia, and we have not only support to Ukraine, but we have to...
to optimize all our sources and to run all possible solutions with military industry and to produce much more weapons and to push all leaders to spend much more percentage of the national budget for weapons and for ammunition and to send it to Ukraine as soon as possible.
And of course, I'm very glad the situation changed very much. But nevertheless, it's still some talking not just about Ukraine and about that Ukraine should win in this war and civilized society should fight this enemy. But it's also been talking about some balances.
and about that Ukraine will decide how Ukraine will fight in this war. It's also a little bit dangerous that on the one hand, we have this very huge support from our partners, but on the other hand, Ukraine should decide and Ukraine will fight in this war.
And I understand, of course, that the NATO rules, because we are on the territory with the war conflict, it is impossible to Ukraine to join in NATO. But in my understanding, it's necessary to change procedures. And this is absolutely crucial for Ukraine to join in NATO as soon as possible and to change these procedures, NATO procedures, to welcome Ukraine to NATO.
Okay, Colonel, a real privilege, as I say, to talk to you and very best of luck. We're all right behind you and let's hope things improve for the better in the next couple of weeks and months.
Thanks so much, Colonel. It's great to be able to talk to you every two or three months. And let's hope that before the next time, as Patrick says, things work very much in Ukraine's favour. But whether they do or not, good luck. We're right behind you. And we'd love to talk to you again at some point. Thank you very much indeed, Patrick. Thank you very much, Saul. It's a big pleasure to talk to you in a podcast. And you know that your podcasts, they're fantastic.
most interesting podcast about this war and listening every episodes and sharing to my colleagues and my soldiers and officers also listening your episodes every Friday. Oh, that's really good to hear. We're going to share that information with our listeners because they, you know, it's really interesting, isn't it? To think that we can play a tiny little, very tiny little part in this. But anyway, it's very nice to hear that. Thank you.
Well, that was great stuff from the Colonel once again. And, you know, very kind of emotive language from him. It's so fascinating, isn't it, to talk to people, Patrick, who are active in this war. I think it's so important for us in the West to get a sense of what it all means to the Ukrainians. But he said a number of really interesting things. And one of them was the limited nature of Russian war aims. I mean, he's really coming out with the same
feeling that I, you know, I've been arguing for weeks, which is that the offensive has already begun. And the aims of the Russians are now because they simply don't have the capability are relatively limited. And they are chiefly to take Donetsk and Luhansk, the other territories that they've annexed if they can, but that's probably way beyond their capability. So those two regions to start off with, and, you know, they can then present that to their people as a limited victory.
Yeah. And it's interesting that even after all this time, he's still kind of rather shocked by the preparedness of the Russians to squander lives, which he described as meaning no more to the commanders, really, than just shells. You know, he said they're a cheaper resource than ammunition, rather kind of chilling observation to make. Also, we'd forgotten about the old triple sevens, hadn't we? Which we used to talk about quite a lot in the
in the middle of the conflict, but interesting to hear that they're really still proving very effective and presumably will become even more so
if we get more of these mass attacks, as had been seen around places like Volodars. A bit of British kit, of course, we should remember, made by BAE in Barrow-in-Furness. Yes, Patrick, and he's got no more faith than we have that the Russian people can play a role in bringing the war to an end. It has to be decided on the battlefield. And it underlines, of course, you know, he made it absolutely clear that the...
while he's delighted with the way things have gone and the very different sort of tone coming from the West than from the beginning of the war, we have to keep it up and we have to keep supplies of all the weapons the Ukrainians need. They're going to get them sooner or later. So why not give them to them now? Yeah. And he was reassured by the rhetoric of Western leaders and that the message has got across that this is not just about Ukraine and Russia. It's a battle
for civilization, but he did make the point that NATO rules should be changed in order to allow Ukraine to join at present if there's any kind of territorial dispute on a candidate country's territory, then that kind of rules out their membership claim. But he says that's going to have to change. And I think a lot of people would probably agree with that now.
Okay, well, that's enough from us. On to listeners' questions. Once again, we've got a big post bag. We'll start off with one from Nick from California, who asks, how is it that all foreign aid has been able to enter Ukraine seemingly so easily? Well, the answer to that is it's got sort of friendly borders around it. But he goes on to say, with all this high-tech armament coming in, why aren't we hearing more about disruption from the Russians' attempts to destroy Ukraine?
convoys before they actually get into the country. Well, I think the answer to that is very, very quickly. You know, Russia has set its own limits in the war. For example, people have been surprised at the limited cyber activity that's been going on. But it's also obviously wary of sparking a conflict with NATO by any operations inside NATO territory.
Having said that, it has actually tried to hit convoys inside Ukraine. There was an incident the other day, they fired off some rockets, which were meant to be aimed at convoys bringing in military aid. I don't think they actually hit the convoys, I think they hit some other targets. But the fact is that they feel...
free to do that and are trying to do so. I think it's more question of capability than anything else, to be truthful, Patrick. I mean, talking of cyber, we've had an update from our cyber advisor, David Alexander, who came on the pod a little while ago. And he's made the point among a number of interesting points he made to us. We don't have time to go through all of them. But one point was that there definitely has been an uptick in Russian cyber attempts
and not least on the German airlines. I mean, recently, a number of planes were grounded in Germany, as indeed, of course, they were in America. Now, the American groundings apparently due to genuine glitches on their part rather than Russian interference, but it does look like the Russians were involved. These are hackers, of course, who were working for the Russian government, as was explained to us by David, you know, that very sort of dodgy connection between
these guys and the Russian state. And so they are attempting things. It's just that they're not proving to be that effective. As far as targeting the incoming supplies, yes, as you say, Patrick, they'd love to do more of that. It's just that I just don't think they have the capability and the
key element in capability is intelligence, having the ability to see what's coming and when, and then target your munitions. And this is where Ukraine has a massive advantage because it can see not just the battlefield, but behind the battlefield in real time because of Western intelligence capabilities. And those, of course, are chiefly the ability to look down from satellites and see pinpoint things on the ground.
Okay, on to Kevin from Plymouth in Minnesota. He basically asks about how the civilian population of Ukraine is dealing with all the trauma that it's having to face. Well, we're not going to answer that this week, Kevin, but we have got an expert on reconstruction lined up to talk to us in the next couple of weeks. So you'll be hearing a very detailed response to your question then. Well,
Well, actually, Patrick, interesting enough, there's a BBC Newsnight investigation that's just looked into that very question. Now, it hasn't been broadcast yet, so we don't know specifically what it says, but I've heard some clips from it that are really talking about the effect the war is having on children in Ukraine. And you can imagine, can't you? You know, just think back to the Second World War, the air raids that were going on, the disruption to education, the sort of psychological damage that is being done to children. Uh,
Without question, a whole generation are being affected by this. And let's not also forget this is not happening to Russian schoolchildren at the same time for the very good reason that the fighting is taking place in Ukraine and the West is determined that Russia is not going to suffer. There aren't air raids over Moscow, which would be a sort of reciprocal Second World War situation.
type arrangement. This is very one-sided and never anyone has any doubts about the justification of Ukraine fighting to defend its borders. It should look at the consequences for civilians. They are severe. They are long lasting. It's a brilliant question, Kevin. And please have a look at that Newsnight report because it'll give you some of the answers you're looking for.
Okay, here's an interesting one from Nick in Singapore. He asked, can you speak more about the role of women in active duty combat on the Ukrainian side? Is this another revolutionary aspect of war in Ukraine's adaptability? Or in reality, are women taking more traditional rearguard or logistics roles? Well, we spoke about the spy handler, of course, on the film a few weeks ago, you know, the People's War.
fascinating chat with Oli. But actually, there's been an interesting interview with another friend of the podcast, Anthony Lloyd, who was speaking to a female drone operator who literally was in the front line, incredibly dangerous.
She was an IT expert who, of course, has converted to operating drones. Fascinating work that she's doing. Incredibly dangerous. So the answer is, yes, it is revolutionizing the way women are operating in combat zones. And they are, in the case of this drone operator, in some cases operating right at the front. Now, does every combat unit have a large number of female fighters? Probably not. But they are doing their bit, Nick, without question.
Okay, there's a couple here about POWs, which is an interesting aspect of the war. One is from someone who just calls himself JP, and he asks, would Ukraine be using biometric ID database kits, the same ones that the US troops used in Afghanistan to identify terrorists?
and distinguish them from locals? Will they be using those on Russian prisoners of war to find out whether they were potentially involved in any war crimes? And there's another one, I'll roll it in with another one from a lady called Claire, who says, I wonder what we know about how many Russian soldiers the Ukrainians have captured and where and how they're being managed. Well, on that first question of the biometric idealism,
I don't see why they shouldn't be doing that or wouldn't be doing that. There's nothing in the Geneva Conventions against it. And on the question of war crimes, they've reached amazing proportions. An EU report the other day said that the number of documented reports of war crimes has climbed to 65,000. That's the highest number.
ever recorded. On the question of numbers, on the Ukrainian side, Ukrainians, as always, are being pretty tight-lipped about how many they've actually captured. There are a lot of facilities, mostly in western Ukraine, how they're being treated. The UN has been trying to keep track of all this sort of stuff. A report came out back in November, which said there'd been beatings and mistreatment on both sides, so heavily weighted treatment.
the blame really on the Russian side. There have been reports of mishandling of prisoners by the Ukrainians, but usually in the kind of initial stages when, you know, to be frank, in wartime, you kind of expect that kind of thing. Subsequently, once they go on to proper custody, then it's much more regulated and
The other day, the Ukrainians allowed the cameras of a Belgian TV company in to one of the big camps, and it looked pretty sort of civilized. And they've got to maintain this narrative, haven't they, Saul? I mean, something that we've heard recently from when Melania was on last week was, you know, the information aspect of the war requires the Ukrainians to convincingly portray themselves as the civilized warriors in this conflict.
And I think they take that extremely seriously. Yeah, and not just for the short term. They're looking for the long term. They're looking for membership of the EU and NATO. And they need to be spotless in this regard if that's going to go well for them. I mean, an interesting question, also a POW question asked by Charles, who's in France, who says, have Ukrainian criminals been given a chance to fight similar to the way that Russian criminals have been thrown into combat?
Well, we don't know for sure, but almost certainly not for the reasons you've just given, Patrick. This is not a, you know, there's a kind of desperate attempt by Wagner and other groups to get cannon fodder. That's not how the Ukrainians fight. I mean, really chilling passage actually also came out of the Anthony Lloyd report when he was talking to the drone operator. And she said she could see from her drone that they'd knocked out, you know, a position in which five Russians had been killed in a deserted house.
a new group came through and literally just walked past that position. No one went in to see if anyone was wounded, if anyone was still alive. They just ignored it. They were totally expendable. They had their own little mission and they weren't interested. Now, if you think that an army can fight on that sort of attitude, you are very wrong. Morale is absolutely key, as we know from our study of military history, Patrick, and you can't have good morale in an army if you're not looking after your own. It was
utterly shocking to read about that. And of course, from the drone operator's perspective, it's like, you know, this is same old, same old. She didn't seem to be that surprised. There's also a Wagner-related question here from George in Canberra, who says, how are Wagner soldiers identified on the battlefield? Do they wear or use different kit and operate under different operations?
like the Wehrmacht and the SS in World War II. That strikes me as quite an apposite comparison there. Well, you know the answer to this one, don't you, Saul?
Yeah, well, I did a quick bit of digging as to insignia, the sort of insignia they're wearing on the battlefield, where they've got their official insignia, which is basically cross daggers with what very much looks like the old Soviet red star in the center, which probably says more than it should. That's the official one.
uh, is PMC Wagner group. It's basically a skull with a sniper's kind of cross hairs over the top of it. Now these bad, both these badges will be being worn by Wagner fighters. And there doesn't seem to be any doubt as to who they are and also the way they're fighting. And that, that description I just gave you of the drone operator, that was almost certainly a Wagner fighting in and around Buckmoot, uh,
And that is their sort of modus operandi. The trouble they've got is they're running out of fighters. And they're also, as we know from Rick Gosian's recent comments, running out of supplies too.
That's all we've got time for. So do keep sending your questions into our email. The address is battlegroundukraine at gmail.com. And do join us next week when we're going to be doing a deep dive into Russia and Putin with historian Simon Sebag Montefiore and bringing you the latest news. Goodbye.