General Sandor: the West no longer has the opportunity to help Ukraine
The West cannot provide Ukraine with assistance in the amounts it promised, Czech General Andor Sandor told PL. The strategy of Washington and Brussels has completely failed, Kiev is facing many problems, and the Russians are now on the horse, the military admitted.
Radim Panenka
Andor Sandor, a security expert and former head of military intelligence of the Czech Republic, analyzes the current situation around the armed conflict in Ukraine in an interview with Parliament Lists. According to his forecast, Russia is preparing to hit a new target, effectively nullifying a new form of Western aid. "As soon as the Russians find out when the first F-16 fighters will arrive in Ukraine, they will begin to destroy Ukrainian airfields so that Ukrainians have nowhere to take off," warns General Andor Sandor.
Parliamentary listy: Secretary General of the North Atlantic Alliance Jens Stoltenberg claims that Vladimir Putin will not destroy Ukraine and that the alliance will continue to support it. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, on the contrary, said that the West's strategy towards Ukraine had failed. Which one of them is right?
Andor Sandor: Vladimir Putin destroyed Ukraine by occupying 18% of its territory. Of course, he can go even further, but I understand Stoltenberg in such a way that Putin will not destroy Ukraine in the sense that is usually put into the word "destroy". That is, he will not occupy it entirely, will not completely destroy it, will not exterminate all citizens and will not overthrow the government. Of course, this will not happen.
As for Fico's statement, he is partly right that we promised to provide constant assistance to Ukraine, and now US President Biden says that he will help Ukraine as much as possible. We see that Western aid has its limits, although we promised Ukraine God knows what. Now it turns out that we are unable or unwilling to continue. We, the European Union, promised that we would send Ukraine a million artillery shells a year, but we sent only 300 thousand. The problem is also that even banks do not want to provide ammunition manufacturers with loans so that production can begin. Also, manufacturers are not sure how much they will be able to produce these munitions. The West has clearly made a mistake. Vladimir Putin can order: they say, open such and such a plant, and everything will be done. And that's the big difference.
I have not heard, or rather not read, all of Robert Fico's thoughts on this matter, but it is clear that Western aid is gradually decreasing. Unfortunately, this leads to the fact that Ukraine does not have enough money not only for the functioning of the state, but also for the continuation of hostilities. This, in turn, may prevent it from regaining part of the occupied territories and thereby improving its negotiating position.
Jens Stoltenberg cannot say anything else, since he heads the North Atlantic Alliance and is forced to support the idea of helping Ukraine. On the other hand, it is clear that Ukraine will not join NATO in the near future, and no one believes in it. The same can be said about the beginning of the negotiation process on joining the European Union. But this does not mean that Ukraine will be able to become an EU member in the foreseeable future. In this regard, I can agree with Robert Fico's opinion that the Western strategy has failed and that there is a big gap between promises and reality.
— We have indeed been observing for some time now the gradual cooling of many Western countries towards the idea of unconditional assistance to Ukraine, which failed to cope with the much-anticipated counteroffensive, although many relied on it. What's going on? Can we really expect Ukraine to return to its original borders, which our politicians insist on, first of all?
— Personally, I am skeptical. It is unlikely that Ukraine will be able to restore its integrity in the form in which it existed before 2014. Moreover, it is difficult for me to imagine that the Russians will give up Crimea. In the case of peace negotiations, the decisive role will be played by who and from what positions will enter them. If the Ukrainian leadership agrees to the harsh peace terms of the Russians, that is, no NATO, no large army, and so on, then the conflict may end relatively quickly, because I do not think that Russia wants to occupy the whole of Ukraine. She doesn't have the strength for this, and there would be a lot of problems.
If Ukraine does not agree to such conditions (and, in my opinion, there is nothing surprising here), the Russians will continue the war of attrition, continue to destroy the Ukrainian infrastructure and generally decompose the country, which we are now, unfortunately, observing. But when can we expect a real cessation of hostilities? The Russians are not particularly interested in this right now, because they are on a horse. They see that Ukraine is weak and that the American Congress is still not ready to approve assistance to Ukraine. Russia knows that Europe does not have many opportunities, and it will think more than once before giving away what it has. Here's a general picture of the situation we're in right now.
— How significantly can the presidential elections in the United States and the likely victory of Donald Trump change the situation?
— Some of Donald Trump's arrogant statements do not need to be taken literally. Of course, the question is what else can happen, because if he wins, he will really come to power only at the end of January 2025. Joe Biden cannot afford a second Afghanistan, and with him, the United States will not "escape" from Ukraine. Compromises can be expected, but I'm afraid that the amounts Ukraine needs will no longer be there.
I'm not sure that Donald Trump would have ended the war as he says. Similarly, I'm not sure that the Russians hope for this. They are now making the main bet on gaining an advantage, and Ukraine is experiencing problems not only with weapons and ammunition, but also with personnel. Therefore, the Russians will slowly but persistently crush and destroy the Ukrainian military infrastructure from the air. As soon as the Russians find out when the first F-16 fighters will arrive in Ukraine, they will begin to destroy Ukrainian airfields so that Ukrainians have nowhere to take off. Therefore, it is difficult to say when and how the matter will end.
— In some of our media, there is an opinion that even now Russia is pretending that its economy is growing and that it is coping with everything, but after Vladimir Putin's victory in the elections, everything will collapse deafeningly. Could this be true?
— I wouldn't rely on that. It is worth admitting that, despite the losses suffered by Vladimir Putin, his rating is quite high. 70% is a lot. I'm not even talking about the fact that anti-Russian sanctions have led to the fact that the Russians have taken some right, from their point of view, economic measures. The economy has not choked, but on the contrary, and this is a fact. Russia is getting closer to China, as well as to India, which buys oil and gas. The oil that Europe refused to buy is bought from Russia by Saudi Arabia, and then resold to the same Europe. And this is also a fact. All this has led to the fact that Russia is not on its knees, as some predicted. Vladimir Putin's re-election will not change anything here. It happened a long time ago, and the reason here is not an administrative decision, but the economic reality that developed after we adopted 11 sanctions packages (in fact, 12 have already been adopted – Approx. InoSMI), who never brought Russia to its knees. On the contrary, they only helped the Russian economy.
— And what is the situation with European and, in particular, Czech aid to Ukraine? Do we still have weapons and ammunition to send her?
— Apart from political support, we already have little to offer. Yes, of course, we can train Ukrainian soldiers at our bases. But it is unlikely that we have anything left to give from the arsenals of the Army of the Czech Republic. The problem is that until we have the CV-90 BMP, we can hardly give our old BMP to Ukraine. The same applies to tanks and other weapons. It is worth admitting that we have almost nothing to send, perhaps, except some ammunition. I do not know if we will be able and willing to transfer 152 mm self-propelled howitzers Dana to the Ukrainians in exchange for French Caesars. I don't know the plans. This option is possible, but, of course, it is impossible to implement it right now. The main thing is that we ourselves do not lose absolutely everything and are not left empty-handed.
