A retired Russian military commander has re-appeared on state television warning Ukrainian officials not to underestimate Russia’s military and economic might, despite having disparaged his nation’s war efforts live on air just days ago.
Mikhail Khodaryonok, a former air defence commander and graduate of some of the Soviet Union’s top military schools, took to the stage yesterday where he waxed lyrical about the quality of Russian weapons and boasted about the strength of the military.
‘The Russian Federation has not yet committed even a tenth of its military and economic potential.. so be careful what you wish for, gentlemen!’ the colonel quipped.
‘When a country buys Western-made equipment, it sometimes stops working or malfunctions right in the heat of battle…. our arms are different in their reliability – you get exactly the weapons described,’ he declared.
But his comments directly contradicted his interview broadcast just days ago, when he appeared on the same show and gave a distinctly bleak prognosis for Russia’s war.
The retired commander last weekend told viewers that Ukraine ‘intends to fight to the last man’ and has mobilised a million-strong army of Western-trained fighters equipped with an endless stream of modern weaponry – much to the display of Kremlin propagandists stood alongside him.
Russia’s position on the world stage is no better, Khodaryonok added, pointing out ‘we are in full geopolitical isolation, and that, however much we would hate to admit this, virtually the entire world is against us. And it’s that situation that we need to get out of.’
The sudden U-turn has stoked suspicions Khodaryonok was subject to a stern talking-to from Vladimir Putin behind the scenes.
Though the colonel has seemingly reversed his publicly negative perception of Russia’s invasion, he continued to refer to the conflict as a ‘war’, rather than a ‘special military operation’ or ‘demilitarisation operation’ as Putin prefers.
Mikhail Khodaryonok, a former air defence commander and graduate of some of the Soviet Union’s top military schools, took to the stage yesterday where he waxed lyrical about the quality of Russian weapons and boasted about the strength of the military
But his comments directly contradicted his interview broadcast just days ago, when he appeared on the same show and gave a distinctly bleak prognosis for Russia’s war, stoking suspicions Khodaryonok was subject to a stern talking-to from Vladimir Putin (Khodaryonok speaks on Russia One yesterday)
‘The situation… is that the Ukrainian armed forces are able to arm a million people,’ Khodaryonok said last week, arguing such a force will be equipped with western weapons and trained how to use them by armies that are part of NATO (Ukrainian soldiers conduct a patrol and monitoring operation on the outskirts of the separatist region of Donetsk, May 17, 2022)
Even before the war started, Khodaryonok wrote that Ukrainians would fight like hell to defend their country and that Russia was walking into a longer, bloodier, and far more costly conflict than it was preparing for (local residents scavenge pieces of aluminum from destroyed Russian tanks on May 16, 2022 in Biskvitne, Ukraine)
Last week, Khodaryonok declared that Russia’s tried and tested policy of nuclear sabre-rattling will do little to deter Russia’s enemies and in fact ‘actually looks quite amusing’ when the whole world is arrayed against the Kremlin
Speaking last week on the talk show of Olga Skabeyeva – who is known as the iron doll’ of Putin TV for her strict adherence to the party line – Khodaryonok let loose on the situation in Ukraine and shocked the Kremlin propagandists sharing the stage with him.
First of all, he said that rumours of a ‘moral and psychological breakdown in the Ukrainian armed forces’ were ‘to put it mildly, false’.
‘The situation… is that the Ukrainian armed forces are able to arm a million people,’ he added, arguing such a force will be equipped with western weapons and trained how to use them by armies that are part of NATO.
‘So a million armed Ukrainian soldiers needs to be viewed as a reality of the very near future,’ he insisted.
Batting aside objections from Skabeyeva that most of those men will be conscripts, he insisted that what really matters isn’t how an army is recruited, but its willingness to fight.
‘A desire to protect one’s homeland, in the sense that it exists in Ukraine – and it really does exist there – they intend to fight to the last man,’ he said.
‘Ultimately victory on the battlefield is determined by a high level of morale among personnel, who shed blood for their ideals.’
On the world stage, Khodaryonok said, things hardly look better.
‘We are in full geopolitical isolation,’ he said, adding: ‘However much we would hate to admit this, virtually the entire world is against us.’
Khodaryonok declared that Russia’s tried and tested policy of nuclear sabre-rattling will do little to deter Russia’s enemies and in fact ‘actually looks quite amusing’ when the whole world is arrayed against the Kremlin.
A local resident looks at a destroyed Russian tank next to a residential house in the village of Mala Rogan, east of Kharkiv
Ukrainian solders examine the wreck of a Russian tank in an image released earlier this week
Urging those around him to ‘maintain a sense of realism’, he warned that ‘sooner or later the reality of history will hit you so hard that you’ll regret it.’
The shockingly frank series of declarations was hardly the first time that Khodaryonok has voiced concerns over Russia’s lack of success in Ukraine.
Even before the war started, he wrote that Ukrainians would fight like hell to defend their country and that Russia was walking into a longer, bloodier, and far more costly conflict than it was preparing for.
It is not even the first time he has spoken out on state TV – ahead of Putin’s Victory Day speech on May 9, he warned that a rumoured mass mobilisation of troops would not solve the problems Russia’s military is facing.
The former commander’s U-turn yesterday came as Bulgarian journalist and Russia expert Christo Grozev said he believes Russia’s security service officials know the war has already been lost and could mount a coup on the Kremlin.
Grozev, a lead investigative reporter with Bellingcat, said elites in Russia’s GRU and FSB secret services are the most likely to try and topple Putin, because they know the truth of what is happening on the ground.
And those elites are already looking for ways to move their money and families out of the country in anticipation of Putin falling, he claims.
FSB and GRU elites are most-likely to try and topple Putin because they know the truth of what is happening in Ukraine (pictured, Putin with his elites before the war)
Speaking to Radio Liberty about what may spark the coup, Grozev said the moment could come if or when Putin orders his generals to carry out a nuclear strike.
‘If Putin decides to give an order to use nuclear weapons, he must be sure that everyone along the chain will carry out this order,’ he said.
‘If one does not comply, then this will be a signal of insubordination. And perhaps even the physical death of Putin.
‘Until he is sure that everyone will comply, he will not give this order.’
Grozev believes similar fears are preventing Putin from giving the order for a general mobilisation of the Russian armed forces and population.
Such an order would allow him to massively boost troop numbers in Ukraine, perhaps shifting the tide of the war in his favour.
But the order would also cause a ‘social explosion’ among ordinary Russians, Grozev says, because it would mean admitting the ‘special military operation’ – which until now Putin has presented as a resounding success – has failed.
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