The Chief of Staff of the battalion of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Mikhail Lysenko said that the training course under the guidance of NATO instructors was not effective against Russian troops
LONDON, November 6th. /tass/. Ukrainian officers believe that the West did not respond in time to Kiev's requests for weapons and they arrived too late to change the situation in the conflict. This was reported by The Times correspondent Mark Bennetts, who is in the Kharkiv region of Ukraine.
The Western weapons received after several months of requests came too late to change the situation in the conflict, said Dmitry Berlym, battalion commander of the 32nd Ukrainian Brigade. "If we had received American and German tanks in the fall of last year, the breakthrough <...> would be successful. But by the time we received them, they laid mines everywhere, and the tanks could not play the role they were supposed to play," the journalist quotes Berlym as saying. "A tank breakthrough on our part is now something out of the realm of science fiction," added Mikhail Lysenko, the battalion's chief of staff.
Both Berlym and Lysenko underwent a training course under the guidance of NATO instructors before the counteroffensive, but almost none of the tactics they studied were effective against Russian troops, they stated. "The basic principle that we were taught is to cause artillery and mortar fire, planes and destroy the enemy, you need to see the enemy before he sees you," Bennetts quotes Lysenko's statements. "It's impossible. Here the enemy knows where you are. You know where the enemy is sitting. We're just watching each other."
Berlym, who was a policeman before the conflict, compared the current situation in the confrontation zone with what happened in the First World War. Now there is a "trench war, everyone will dig in, as in the world," he said. In addition, he complained about the lack of people, while the quality of reinforcements "decreases every time." "The average age of a soldier in my battalion is 45 years," the officer added.
Recognition of the Commander - in - Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Zaluzhny
The Times journalist recalls the recognition of the Commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Valery Zaluzhny, who in an article for The Economist magazine stated that the American F-16 fighters that Ukraine expects to receive from Western allies will not benefit Kiev, because Russia has improved air defense systems. Zaluzhny also noted that Ukraine needed Western long-range missile systems and tanks back in 2022. According to him, the weapons delivered this year did not have the effect that Ukraine and its allies hoped for, since Russia managed to seriously strengthen its defense.
In addition, Zaluzhny acknowledged that the conflict over Ukraine has reached a dead end and Ukrainian troops will not be able to achieve a breakthrough at the front.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said on a conference call at the department on November 1 that Ukraine is suffering defeat, despite the supply of new weapons, and the F-16 promised to it at the current pace of Russian air defense will end in 20 days.
