Ukrainian Military Intel Chief Says Putin Will ‘Attempt to Create North and South Korea in Ukraine’ to Save Face

Photo by ALEXEY NIKOLSKY/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images.

The invasion of Ukraine is not going as Vladimir Putin had hoped, that much is clear. Now the Russian dictator is looking for a way to save face — and, according to Ukraine’s military intelligence chief, that could include attempting to carve the country in two like North and South Korea.

The Russian army’s attempts to take the capital city of Kyiv stalled and lately the Ukrainians have been pushing them back.

CNN reported Sunday that Brig. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Agency, had assessed that it would be impossible for Russia to actually overthrow the Ukrainian government, and as a result, Putin was focusing his efforts on the south and east.

“There is reason to believe that he is considering a ‘Korean’ scenario for Ukraine,” said Budanov. “That is, [Russian forces] will try to impose a dividing line between the unoccupied and occupied regions of our country. In fact, it is an attempt to create North and South Korea in Ukraine.”

The Russians wanted to have a land corridor from the Russian border to Crimea, and had been trying to “create ‘parallel’ authorities in the occupied territories,” Budanov continued, including attempting to force people to give up using Ukrainian currency.

CNN Newsroom host Jim Acosta interviewed Garry Kasparov about this news, asking the chess champion and activist what he thought about “this theory coming from the Ukrainians that the Russians may try to split Ukraine into two and claim that as a victory — does that sound plausible to you?”

Kasparov agreed that the operation had now shifted to “trying to salvage what they can and to give Putin at least some political cover to claim victory.” The generals had “somehow convinced Putin that his plans to take the entire Ukraine” was a “fantasy,” so he thought the Russians were “trying to fortify their positions near Kyiv and they’ll try to cut most of the east Ukraine from Kharkiv all the way down south to Kherson and to claim victory.”

This was a “far more realistic plan” from the Russians’ perspective, said Kasparov, but he still thought they would fail.

“Do you think the Ukrainians would stand for something like that?” Acosta followed up. “What should be the international response to something like this? To give Russia this face-saving gesture to split the country into two? I mean that seems to me to be an unacceptable option?”

“Absolutely it’s unacceptable,” Kasparov responded emphatically.

“I believe that the free world should recognize that Ukraine should be given every means possible to win the war…that’s most important now,” he continued. The West should continue to supply Ukraine “with weapons they need, like surface-to-air missiles, and anti-warship missiles, and other heavy equipment that would help them turn the tide and protect” their country, he argued, and also declare that “the sanctions crippling the Russian economy will stay until Russia clears the entire Ukrainian territory, Crimea included.”

This message would “be the most important weapon in the hands of the free world,” he concluded, urging President Joe Biden and other Western leaders to “make it absolutely clear to Putin, to his cronies, and to Russian people, that the sanctions will not go away the day Putin decides to declare a cease fire.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.