Russian State TV Analyst Gives Stunningly Frank Assessment Of Russia’s Prospects in Ukraine: The Situation ‘Will Frankly Get Worse’ for Us

Russian State TV analyst Mikhail Khodaryonok gave a damning assessment on Monday of Russia’s operations in Ukraine, saying that it “will frankly get worse.”

The analysis was translated by the BBC’s Francis Scarr.

On Rossiya-1, Khodaryonok said, per Scarr’s translation:

Every matter should be viewed as a whole from the overall strategic position and desirably taking into account the near term strategic outlook. First of all, I must say that we shouldn’t take information from tranquilizers. Because sometimes information is spread about some moral and psychological breakdown in the Ukrainian armed forces, which are allegedly on the verge of some kind of crisis in morale and so on. All of that, to put it mildly, is false. Of course there are particular cases, prisoners of war, certain units, but they’re individual cases. But as we’ve just said, we should always look at the matter as a whole. And as a whole, the situation is this…

Commentator Olga Skabeyeva, known as “The Iron Doll of Putin TV,” interrupted and said, according to the translation, “But they are individual cases which determine what’s happening on the whole. And if several units already have said that they lack financing and arms, that’s also significant. You can’t leave out that factor.”

“Certainly,” replied Khodaryonok. “But the situation from the overall strategic position is that the Ukrainian armed forces are able to arm a million people. They’re saying it themselves. That ‘for us, there’s no difficulty in mobilizing a million people.’ The issue is to what extent they’re able to supply this army of modern weapons and military hardware.

“On their own of course, they wouldn’t have done anything, but considering that the Lend-Lease program is about to start functioning, and the resistance of a single senator [Rand Paul] will be overcome quite quickly, also about to start functioning is the European…”

Skabeyeva interjected and said, “I can tell you that it will overcome on Wednesday evening.”

“To the roll of snare drums,” said Khodaryonok. “And without any, so to speak, unnecessary gunfire. And considering that there is European aid will fully come into effect, so a million armed Ukrainian soldiers needs to be viewed as a reality of the very near future. And we need to take that into account in our operational and strategic calculations, that the situation in this regard for us will frankly get worse.”

Khodaryonok suggested that Russia’s military does not have the professionalism, morale and readiness to fight in Ukraine and that the number of people in a country’s army doesn’t determine those qualifications.

Khodaryonok lamented Russia’s isolation from the international community.

“After all, the main deficiency of our military-political position is that, in a way, we are in full geopolitical isolation, and that, however much we would hate to admit this, virtually the entire world is against us,” he said. “And it’s that situation that we need to get out of.”

Watch above, via Rossiya-1.

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