Russian TV Pundit Questions How All Aims of Ukraine Invasion Have Failed
Story by Brendan Cole • 6h ago
Apundit on Russian state television has questioned the official Kremlin line that the invasion of Ukraine "is going according to plan."
Ukrainian artillerymen fire an L119 howitzer towards Russian positions at a front line in the Lugansk region on January 16, 2023, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine.© ANATOLII STEPANOV/Getty Images
On the program
Pravo Znat (
Right to Know), journalist and commentator
Maxim Yusin compared the stated goals of President
Vladimir Putin for invading Ukraine with the situation Russia faces almost 11 months later.
Putin said he had sent his forces into his neighbor to "demilitarize" and "denazify" Ukraine, goals whose veracity was rejected by Kyiv and the international community. Russia has also portrayed the war as essential for its own safety and to curb the encroachment of
NATO on its borders.
Yusin referred to these aims point by point, noting that "the Ukrainian army in the opinion of many is now more combat-ready than 10 months ago," having received "western weapons they had not even dreamt of."
"Clearly it's not working out yet with demilitarization," he told the program, which is broadcast on the TV Center channel that has the fourth largest coverage area in Russia.
Regarding "denazification," Yusin said that commanders from the Azov battalion, whose far-right elements the Kremlin has repeatedly touted as just cause for its invasion, have not appeared in court following their capture in Mariupol.
"They were exchanged and in general the popularity of their ideas in Ukraine is as popular as ever," Yusin said. In September, more than 200 Ukrainian and foreign citizens
were released from Russian captivity, including fighters who led the defense of the
Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol, following a prisoner swap.
Yusin also noted that the war had not made Russia any safer, and with Sweden and
Finland joining NATO, the alliance "will get very close to St Petersburg." Russian regions like Voronezh, Belgorod, Kursk regions and Crimea, "are under constant shelling and we couldn't imagine that a year ago."
Yusin described how he had heard more than 1,100 people in the Donbas region had been killed since the start of the war, comparing it with the pre-war fatalities from one year of only "seven civilians."
https://www.msn.com/en-us/video/new...ks-on-kyiv-continue/vi-AA15taJa?ocid=msedgntp
"So is everything really going to plan or is it time to acknowledge that not all is and correct it a little and at least the official rhetoric?" Yusin concluded in the segment, a clip of which was tweeted on Tuesday by Ukrainian internal affairs adviser, Anton Gerashchenko.
"All declared goals of the 'special military operation' are achieved to the exact opposite—propagandist Maxim Yusin,"
Gerashchenko wrote. "Are they beginning to suspect something?"
On the same show in November,
Yusin criticized an overly optimistic narrative pushed by Moscow about Russia's military capabilities following the withdrawal of its troops from parts of Kherson. He described how "unfounded confidence" was expressed on Russian TV about Moscow's forces, which, given the imbalance of forces were part of a "fairy tale."
Russian state television pushes the Kremlin's narrative so it is difficult to tell if Yusin's latest comments, in which he appeared to read out statistics, were pre-planned. In any case, they could signal a justification in the information space for Russia to be put on a full war footing, which some Russian military bloggers have been calling for.
In an article for
Kommersant published on Tuesday, Yusin said that NATO members may not come to an agreement on how many weapons to provide Kyiv when they meet on January 20 at the Ramstein Summit.
Yusin has previously expressed his unease with the war,
writing on his
Facebook page on February 24 that the first day of the Russian invasion was "probably the scariest most horrible morning of my life." In a message seemingly to his Ukrainian friends he added, "I want to say 'I stand with you all... you are not my enemies—and you will never be."
