0:07

Hello

0:10

and welcome to another episode of Geopolitics

0:12

Decanted. I'm Patrick Gray. Dmitry

0:15

Olparovich, the chairman of the Silverado Policy

0:17

Accelerator and the regular host of this podcast

0:20

has just arrived back from a

0:22

trip to Ukraine where he met with defense

0:24

and intelligence leaders. He joins me now. Hello,

0:27

Dmitry. Hey, Patrick. Thank

0:29

you for sending in as host again. No problem

0:31

at all. And yeah, in this podcast, we'll be hearing

0:33

an interview that you did with military analysts

0:36

Michael Koffman and Rob Lee. You

0:38

did that interview on the train on your way to Kiev.

0:41

But first up, I guess it would make sense for you

0:43

to explain to the listeners how you wound

0:45

up taking this trip in the first place.

0:47

And then maybe we can hear a little bit about what you learned while

0:49

you were there.

0:50

Yeah. So as some of my

0:52

listeners may know, Mike Koffman has gone on a

0:54

couple of trips to Ukraine in the past.

0:57

And he and I have been talking for a few months about

0:59

arranging a trip jointly together to really

1:02

get a perspective on how this counteroffensive

1:04

was going. So we delayed it specifically until

1:07

the counteroffensive had begun. And

1:09

now that it's been a month in, it was a perfect time for

1:11

us to go there to talk to senior leaders

1:14

from really across the Ukrainian

1:16

government. We talked to Ministry

1:19

of Defense. We talked to general staff. We talked

1:21

to the intelligence agencies. And

1:24

we talked even to members of parliament. So

1:26

a huge cross-section of leaders

1:29

as well as regular grunts that are

1:31

fighting this war and regular citizens

1:34

to get a pretty good perspective and

1:36

I think very candid perspective on how things

1:38

are truly going.

1:40

And things, you know, and this isn't saying anything

1:42

controversial. President

1:44

Zelensky, Ukraine's President Zelensky has said

1:46

as much, but the offensive is not

1:49

going to plan at this stage. It

1:51

is definitely slower than they had hoped it would be.

1:54

Yeah. And the way they admitted that to us,

1:56

it's really, really tough. They certainly

1:58

had hopes that the... the Russians would not be

2:01

as deeply entrenched as they are. Suravikin,

2:05

we were briefed, had developed this defensive

2:07

plan that includes not just really,

2:09

really extensive minefields, anti-tank

2:12

mines, anti-personal mines, pre-arranged

2:14

artillery, anti-tank traps

2:17

and extensive fortifications,

2:20

but also an entire command structure

2:22

specifically designed to defend

2:24

this huge swath of the front line, and

2:27

it's highly effective. The Ukrainians

2:30

are having to dismount now to

2:33

leave their Western-provided vehicles,

2:35

the Bradleys, the leopard tanks and what have

2:37

you, and get into the minefields

2:40

under the fire from Russian UAVs,

2:43

artillery, helicopters on

2:45

foot and try to demine and

2:48

make progress. Really, really tough going.

2:50

They're taking enormous casualties. One

2:52

of the things that happened

2:54

on our way out of Kiev is we

2:56

arrived at the train station to board

2:58

the train, and then suddenly

3:01

we started to see

3:03

dozens upon dozens, probably over 50

3:05

or 60 ambulances just start arriving

3:08

and parking themselves next to the train station,

3:11

and they were waiting for the daily arrival

3:14

of casualties from the front line. In

3:17

fact, the people told me that today

3:19

was actually a good day because the relative

3:21

number of the ambulances was small. And

3:24

trust me, it was just a never-ending

3:26

line of ambulances that we were seeing. So it really

3:28

brings this reality

3:31

home when you see the

3:33

casualties, when you see a lot of people

3:35

maimed walking around Kiev. This

3:37

has been a terrible war for Ukraine. Obviously,

3:40

a lot of infrastructure destroyed, a lot of people dead,

3:42

but the psychological effect on

3:44

everyone really, from the leaders to

3:47

the regular people, is devastating.

3:49

Yeah, yeah. And I know that for you, this

3:51

was big. Seeing

3:54

that, I mean, it really reminds you that I

3:56

think a lot of people, particularly on social

3:59

media, who are following

3:59

this conflict, they treat it a little bit like

4:02

it's some sort of sports contest. And

4:05

it's worth remembering that these are real people,

4:07

mostly young men, who don't

4:09

have a great deal of choice in the matter on both sides

4:11

being sent into this conflict. And it is not

4:14

a sports game.

4:15

Definitely not. Worth's help. I'll give you

4:17

one more anecdote, Patrick. We had a driver

4:20

that brought us back to the train station, very

4:22

young guy, he has a newborn, which is

4:24

why he's back from the front now at home.

4:26

And as we were leaving, he

4:29

told me, God, I hope that

4:31

this thing is over before my son grows

4:33

up. And, you know, his son is a

4:36

newborn right now. So he's talking about, you know,

4:38

potentially 18 years later, he hopes this thing

4:40

is going to be over. People are tired, people

4:42

are exhausted. And

4:46

obviously, they want to continue fighting. I don't want anyone to

4:48

get an impression that they are given up. That's

4:50

definitely not the case. But the toll of this

4:52

war on Ukraine and

4:54

on Ukrainian people is enormous.

4:56

Yeah. And look, we should point out too, that,

4:59

you know, what we're discussing right now are your impressions

5:02

from visiting Ukraine. We don't really know

5:04

what the situation on the Russian side

5:06

looks like either. And I imagine it would be

5:08

much the same, which is

5:10

high casualties, a lot of people being,

5:12

you know, maimed and killed and just,

5:15

you know, generally awful. So we wouldn't

5:17

want people to get the impression that this is,

5:19

you know, this is something that is only happening

5:21

in Ukraine.

5:22

No, that's exactly right. I think there's a desperation

5:25

that really transcends the borders

5:27

here. And in Russia, they feel helpless

5:30

and hopeless that they have no say in the

5:32

matter in the in this awful war

5:34

that Putin had launched. And on the Ukrainian

5:37

side, they feel like they have no choice but to continue

5:39

fighting these invaders.

5:41

Yeah. Now, look, all of this

5:44

has fed into a policy environment

5:46

in Kyiv, where leaders

5:49

there are not just thinking about this offensive.

5:52

They are thinking about

5:53

the long game. They're thinking about how

5:56

to secure their

5:58

country. And

5:59

against,

6:01

you know, future Russian offensives.

6:03

They're trying to think long term. Like, how is that

6:05

shaping up? What what is the thinking

6:07

right now in Ukraine and

6:10

in those policy and military circles

6:12

on how they might best secure their

6:15

country in the long term?

6:17

You know, that's such a great question because so

6:19

often you hear the debate in Western

6:22

capitals and Washington, D.C., and European

6:24

capitals that is often

6:26

framed in the context of land.

6:29

How much land is Ukraine going to take back?

6:31

Are they gonna take Crimea and

6:33

the areas that Russia took since 2014? And

6:37

the debate in Ukraine is actually very different.

6:39

The fundamental issue that they're

6:42

focused on, at least from what they've

6:44

told us, is how do

6:46

we end this war in a way where we have durable

6:49

security? Whatever we managed

6:51

to take back.

6:53

Obviously, that's important, and it's important,

6:55

first and foremost, for the people that

6:58

live in those occupied areas that

7:00

they want to liberate. But beyond that,

7:03

what matters is how do we make sure that we're

7:06

not attacked three years from now, five years

7:08

from now, 10 years from now, because they

7:10

certainly appreciate the Russian imperialist

7:13

desires on Ukraine, transcend

7:16

Putin, that plenty of people across

7:18

the Russian elites don't think that Ukraine

7:20

is an independent state and are likely

7:23

to continue this policy as

7:25

long as they can, and particularly if Russia is

7:27

allowed to rebuild in the future. So

7:29

that's why when we were there, it

7:32

was actually during the NATO summit in Vilnius,

7:34

and the focus was so much on, can

7:36

Ukraine get some guarantees of NATO

7:39

membership, which they ultimately did not

7:41

get concrete guarantees, of course, at least with

7:43

a date certain. And that

7:45

was really a very powerful

7:48

depressant signal for them, because they certainly

7:51

thought that NATO was

7:53

their only long-term solution in

7:55

terms of protecting themselves from future Russian

7:57

invasions. Unfortunately,

8:00

I think they're starting to realize that the only

8:03

country and the only people that are able

8:05

to protect Ukraine from future invasions

8:08

are Ukraine and Ukrainian people. Yeah.

8:11

It was an emotional trip, I'll tell you this. And again,

8:14

I don't want people to think that the Ukrainians

8:16

are giving up nothing of the sort.

8:19

But it's not an understatement

8:21

to say that a lot of people are quite depressed

8:24

about the future.

8:25

Yeah. So I mean, what you've just described

8:27

there, you know, would probably fall into the bucket of possible

8:30

diplomatic solutions to the long

8:32

term security of Ukraine. There may be some

8:34

military options there as well in terms of

8:36

perhaps doing to

8:39

their side of the lines what Russia has

8:41

done to theirs. I mean, is that something that is

8:43

under active discussion?

8:45

Yeah, I mean, I personally think that

8:47

at some point that you start thinking about deterrence,

8:50

and particularly regardless of where the

8:52

war ends in terms of where the front line

8:55

is, you need to start thinking about

8:57

how do you deter Russian strikes, ongoing

8:59

strikes on Ukrainian territory. When

9:01

we were in Kiev, there were constant air sirens

9:04

every day. There was sound on you across the capital,

9:07

you can't really have foreigners

9:09

come in and invest money in

9:11

a country that is under constant strikes.

9:14

And for that to end,

9:17

assuming that you don't have a negotiated

9:19

end, because I don't think that one

9:21

is likely with Putin, at least, you

9:24

need some sort of deterrent where you

9:26

may think about situations where

9:28

for every strike on Kiev, there's a strike on

9:30

Moscow, right? For that, of course,

9:32

they need long range capabilities, they're unlikely

9:34

to get them from the West. That's been a red

9:36

line certainly for the Biden administration in terms

9:38

of providing long range missiles to Ukraine, they

9:40

construct strike Russian territory. But

9:43

the Ukrainians are highly capable. They

9:45

have their own indigenous missile production,

9:47

they have the Neptune missile that was used to sink

9:49

the Muscogee cruiser, of course, in the early

9:52

days of the war, they have the ground

9:54

missiles that they've developed indigenously.

9:57

You can you can certainly think of ways in

9:59

which they could

9:59

extend the production of those missiles,

10:02

extend their range, increase the numbers so

10:05

that they have their own deterrent capabilities

10:07

to strike Russia in response to strikes on

10:09

them. I mean if North Korea has figured it out I

10:12

can assure you that Ukraine can as well and

10:15

I think that needs to be part of the considerations

10:17

for the future.

10:18

I mean there is also the option I would imagine

10:21

to just invest extremely heavily

10:23

in air defense.

10:25

Air defense as well although that's highly complicated

10:28

then of course advanced air defense systems

10:30

that the West has or even Russia has which are

10:33

really really good require numerous

10:36

funds and a lot of R&D

10:38

that will take a long time to provide so

10:40

I think at least for the near future Ukraine

10:43

is likely to have significant reliance

10:45

on Western air defenses.

10:47

I should clarify too earlier when I said

10:49

that Ukraine may consider doing to its lines what

10:51

Russia has done to its side I meant building fortifications

10:54

and minefields and what not just

10:56

to sort of calcify the lines.

10:58

Yeah you know this is really interesting

11:00

we're seeing of course what really

11:02

really good defensive fortifications look like

11:05

thanks to General Surovikin who was responsible

11:08

for implementing this defensive

11:10

line that is causing so much problems for the

11:12

Ukrainians and you

11:15

might think of an alternative reality in which

11:17

those types of fortifications had been built

11:20

across the Ukrainian border with Russia and

11:22

that could have prevented the Russians from taking so

11:24

much territory in the early days of the war

11:27

and in fact some of those fortifications do exist

11:30

in the Donbass region for example

11:32

the small village of Avdivka that

11:34

has been part of the Russian assaults

11:36

really since 2014 it's right next

11:39

to Donutsk City that the Russians of course

11:41

took early on in the conflict

11:43

in 2014 and the

11:45

Russians have been trying to take that that little

11:47

village literally for many years now

11:50

completely unsuccessfully because of the amount of Mayans

11:52

and extensive fortifications that the Ukrainians

11:55

had built up so you can imagine

11:57

a scenario where Ukraine is not

11:59

just heavily armed armed and not only has long

12:01

range deterrent, conventional deterrent,

12:04

but also has significant

12:06

fortifications and mines built

12:08

across its border with Russia or whatever

12:11

the line of control might be to prevent

12:13

future Russian assaults.

12:15

Yeah, yeah. Now look, let's talk about equipment.

12:18

What is the latest with the, the F-16s

12:20

that are apparently destined for Ukraine?

12:22

Well, first of all, I'll tell you a quick anecdote.

12:25

We're meeting with someone very senior in MOD and

12:27

we asked them, what are your needs? And this

12:29

person said, I have just five needs

12:32

and they're shells, shells, shells, shells

12:34

and shells. So this has been

12:37

a war as we've talked many times on this podcast

12:39

of artillery and artillery

12:41

remains a critical need for Ukraine, 155 millimeter

12:45

shells as well as other calibers, but 155 millimeter in

12:48

particular. And that is the reason, by the

12:50

way, why we're providing cluster munitions to Ukraine

12:52

today is because we're running out of artillery shells

12:54

to send. So this is a stopgap

12:56

measure in terms of these depicts

12:58

that we can provide to them to compensate

13:01

for lack of regular shells. But when

13:03

it comes to F-16s, so certainly

13:05

one of the things that this offensive is highlighting

13:07

is that the lack of air superiority is

13:10

a major issue for the Ukrainians in

13:13

this counter offensive. And I can tell

13:15

you that we,

13:17

with Rob and Mike, we sort of brainstormed

13:20

on the train ride to Kiev

13:23

how the US military would do if it was

13:25

facing the same constraints as the Ukrainians

13:27

are facing. No air power, limited

13:31

numbers of armored vehicles,

13:33

very few mine clearing equipment.

13:37

And the answer is probably somewhat

13:39

better, but not a whole lot better because

13:42

there's no magic here. You have to get through the

13:44

minefields. You're going to take a lot of casualties

13:46

and you're going to have to push through regardless.

13:49

And of course we would never fight this way.

13:52

We would, you know, carpet bomb the entire

13:54

minefields and trench lines long

13:56

before we would send a single soldier in and

13:59

the Ukrainians don't have the that option. So they're acutely

14:01

focused on air power and how they can replace

14:04

their aging MiG fleet and

14:07

SU fleet with modern aircraft. And

14:09

we talk about F-16s and I'll

14:12

tell you Patrick with Justin Brunk of course

14:14

we've covered on a number of occasions

14:16

the challenges with using F-16s and

14:19

we got it exactly right. The Ukrainians are

14:22

well aware of those challenges. They're significant.

14:24

They're going to have to upgrade their airfields to

14:27

operate F-16s. They know that it's

14:30

going to be expensive and it's going to take time.

14:32

They know about the challenges with AIM-120

14:35

missiles and acquiring those

14:37

that have long enough range to outrange

14:40

Russian jets that will be major SU-516s.

14:43

And you know on this podcast Justin has been a big

14:46

fan of Swedish grip-ins and I can tell

14:48

you that the Ukrainians are too. In

14:50

fact they told me that they've been eyeing them for

14:53

over a decade and in fact they're

14:55

quite hopeful that you know they

14:57

may be able to get at least some of

14:59

them

15:00

soon even as they're pursuing

15:02

the F-16s. So they're perfectly happy with getting

15:05

grip-ins and F-16s over

15:07

time and they acknowledge that the grip-ins

15:10

present a really unique opportunity for them to

15:12

showcase how those planes are

15:15

used in combat. They highlight an

15:17

interesting situation where several

15:19

countries in recent years have canceled

15:21

their grip-in contracts because grip-in

15:24

does not have any combat experience unlike

15:26

the F-16s and part of

15:28

their pitch to Sweden is to say look we

15:30

can show you combat experience. We

15:32

can do the marking for your grip-ins. Just give them

15:35

to us and we'll show you how they do against Russian

15:37

Air Force. They'll be great

15:39

for future marking of your aircraft.

15:42

So the point here is that at

15:44

least in the numbers that they're considering initially grip-ins

15:46

do present an interesting

15:49

alternative or at least in combination

15:52

with F-16s can deliver a great

15:54

deal of effects for the Ukrainian

15:56

Air Force and I hope that Sweden

15:59

as well as Czech that has a

16:01

number of those jets as well considered donating

16:03

at least some of them to Ukraine soon.

16:06

And I believe too that they're not actually

16:08

asking for all that many aircraft right like

16:10

there might be this perception out there that they want hundreds

16:12

of these things but that's really not the case.

16:14

No I'm not going to get into specific

16:16

numbers we don't want to reveal those

16:19

details but the numbers that they're

16:21

asking for are eminently doable and

16:23

would not substantially decrease

16:26

the capabilities of Swedish Air Force for example

16:28

so I think that

16:31

they can certainly be provided at

16:33

least in the near term. Over time of course Ukraine

16:35

is going to need more over time they probably will need

16:37

to be on F-16s but at least in

16:39

the short term in order to help

16:42

them with fighting back the

16:44

Russians I think the Gripen's are a great

16:46

option.

16:47

Now look staying on the topic of equipment

16:50

the Ukrainians are

16:52

you know they have some challenges around maintenance

16:54

because they're operating such a you know such

16:56

an amazing array of equipment from different

16:58

manufacturers and different models and things like that and

17:01

I believe they have been having some issues

17:03

even tracking down the manuals

17:06

for some of this equipment which is a pretty

17:08

serious issue for them and one that you would imagine

17:10

is easily solved.

17:11

This is a huge problem that we've heard about

17:14

over and over again and a great deal of frustration

17:16

for them because they don't even have

17:18

regular maintenance passports for a lot of these

17:21

vehicles right they're getting Bradley's they have no idea

17:23

how many miles are on them for howitzers

17:25

how many shells were fired through them so

17:27

they don't know how often they need to maintain

17:29

them replace barrels and what have

17:32

you. They've gotten really really good at doing

17:34

maintenance for a lot of the Soviet equipment they're

17:36

doing even things I don't want to get into the specifics

17:39

but things that would make your hair stand up

17:41

in terms of the entrepreneurial and

17:43

sometimes highly risky nature of their

17:45

maintenance operations but the challenge

17:47

is enormous because they literally have the nose arc

17:50

of weapon systems just on howitzers alone 155

17:52

millimeter howitzers they have eight

17:54

different types that require of course

17:57

different maintenance procedures different

17:59

barrels and so forth and

18:02

one of the things that they are very

18:05

insistent on is that they want detailed

18:07

manuals, maintenance manuals for

18:09

those systems so that they can maintain them

18:12

to large extent themselves. Just on

18:14

Leopard 1s they'll probably be the

18:16

largest operator of Leopard 1 tanks

18:19

in the world when this thing is over. So they're

18:21

making a very compelling case. Why do we need

18:23

to ship them back to Poland or Germany

18:26

for maintenance? Teach us how to maintain

18:28

them. We'll figure it out. You know we can

18:30

resolve the IP issues. Just help

18:32

us help ourselves and

18:34

I think that's a very compelling case and

18:37

I understand that these companies have their IP to protect

18:39

but I'm sure something can be worked

18:42

out license wise to resolve this

18:44

and this seems like a critical critical need.

18:47

Do we know that this information is being withheld

18:49

on IP grounds or is that just an educated guess?

18:53

That's my sense. I mean some of it would require licensing.

18:56

I'm not sure it's been a priority for

18:59

countries. That's why I asked. I wonder

19:01

if perhaps it's just an oversight because they

19:03

happen.

19:05

Yeah could be. I'm

19:07

not aware but that's

19:09

something that I'm certainly gonna be pursuing as I have discussions

19:12

with officials here back here in DC.

19:14

Now look let's talk about Russia now

19:17

and the Russian side of this. Dimitri last time

19:19

you and I spoke we were talking about Pragotians

19:23

March for Justice to

19:25

Moscow and

19:27

it has got a whole lot weirder since

19:29

then and it is very difficult

19:31

to understand what on earth is

19:33

happening. What the aftermath of this is. It is

19:36

extremely confusing. Do you have any insight

19:39

to share with us here or are you

19:41

as confused as the rest of us?

19:43

Well one we've heard some things from the Ukrainian

19:45

side about how they view this but let

19:47

me talk to you about my personal take first

19:49

and then I'll share some tips that we've learned. One

19:52

I think it's pretty clear is that Pragotian

19:55

is desperate to apologize

19:57

to Putin to basically say that

20:00

But this was no big deal. He just overreacted

20:02

a little bit. He actually apparently said to one

20:04

of his underlings who had asked him what this whole episode

20:07

was about that he just kind of lost

20:09

his s***. Went a little mad. The

20:11

being on the front lines. He woke up on the wrong

20:13

side of bed. Yes, exactly. Seems to be

20:15

his line of defense. I don't know how that's going to go for

20:17

him. Yeah. Went a little crazy,

20:19

overreacted, and this was not directed

20:21

at Putin. Putin is not in a

20:24

forgiving mood and he still doesn't

20:26

look like he's thinking fondly of Przegorzyn,

20:28

but at least for now he's letting him stay in

20:30

Russia. There's plenty of evidence that he's

20:32

not only been to Moscow, but he's been

20:35

all over St. Petersburg. The Ukrainians,

20:37

by the way, don't think at all that Wagner

20:39

is in Belarus. They think that maybe a

20:41

few dozen people have gone into Belarus.

20:43

Some of them have come out since then. They don't

20:45

think that Przegorzyn is based in Belarus,

20:48

and there's evidence to indicate that would

20:50

be the case. So I think that Belarus, saying it's just a

20:52

sideshow and Wagner

20:54

still exists. There's some evidence

20:57

that they're now giving up some of their heavy arms

20:59

in Ukraine, and the

21:01

Ukrainians believe that they are being given an option

21:04

to either stay in Ukraine and fight under

21:07

the MOD leadership, i.e.

21:09

sign contracts with the MOD, or

21:12

leave and continue working for

21:14

Wagner elsewhere in Africa

21:17

and Syria and so forth,

21:18

and the Ukrainians believe that not

21:20

many people are signing the MOD contracts.

21:22

So Wagner, at least for now, seems to be out

21:25

of the Ukrainian business. But the interesting

21:27

thing is- Well, they're certainly still in the Central African Republic

21:30

business, and there's all sorts

21:32

of strange stuff going on there as well.

21:34

And you really do get the sense that

21:37

Wagner's presence there is about keeping

21:39

a stream of illicit funds flowing

21:41

to Moscow and to the right people, right?

21:43

Well, and that may be key, because the other

21:45

thing that the Ukrainians told me is that

21:48

they don't think that MOD is paying salaries

21:50

for Wagner anymore. Of course, MOD has been the big

21:52

funder of Wagner and

21:54

trying not just weapons, but funding the

21:57

personnel, and Putin admitted that they paid

21:59

over a billion dollars. over last year to Wagner. So

22:01

the Ukrainians believe that those payments have now stopped.

22:04

So in the absence of that, you're going to need other

22:06

ways to pay those people and

22:09

resources that they're extracting from Africa

22:12

could be a great substitute for it.

22:14

The other thing that was interesting is that they

22:16

don't believe that sort of VKEN is

22:18

in jail. There's some reporting in the US media

22:20

that he's been detained and the Ukrainians

22:23

agree that there's been an investigation of that, of

22:25

him. They actually believe that he's been investigated

22:27

back in January for ironically

22:30

attacks on Ukraine infrastructure that

22:33

he had launched in October. Remember, all those

22:35

missile strikes and Iranian had drone

22:37

strikes began in October under Sir Vekin's

22:39

command. And because he

22:42

has expended so many

22:44

missiles against Ukrainian targets, there

22:46

was a case against him. The Ukrainians believe

22:49

that basically accused them of depleting

22:51

Russian stockpiles, but that eventually

22:54

got closed out. He was sidelined.

22:56

Gerasimo was promoted to take overall command

22:59

of the Ukrainian forces. And

23:02

they believe that Sir Vekin was detained once

23:04

again after the Progosion mutiny,

23:06

but they believe he is now out free.

23:09

I mean, one thing this episode has done, and you tell

23:11

me because you're the expert, but it does seem like

23:14

the episode at the very least has revealed

23:16

some

23:16

cracks, right? In the

23:19

way power is distributed within that country.

23:21

I mean, maybe not revealed cracks,

23:24

but certainly revealed some tensions. Do you think

23:26

that that's a fair statement? I mean, I'm not going to say,

23:29

Oh, you know, and there's a lot of wishful thinking

23:31

out there on social media and whatnot that a

23:33

coup in Russia is imminent. I certainly

23:35

wouldn't suggest that. But

23:37

I think if anything, this whole episode

23:39

has revealed that

23:42

Putin's grip is not absolute. Let's

23:44

just put it that way. No. And in

23:46

fact, the Ukrainians believe that there were some

23:48

Russian pilots that ignored their

23:50

orders to strike the Wagner column

23:53

as it was on its way to Moscow, that

23:55

many in the Russian military in Roskvaardia

23:57

did not want to shoot at Wagner.

23:59

And that's clearly a problem for Putin,

24:02

that he has at least somewhat

24:05

lost control of his military. At

24:07

least in that particular sense. Well, and I'm just making this suggestion

24:09

here, perhaps the issue isn't just with the rank

24:11

and file. There are certainly a bunch

24:14

of different silos of power with

24:16

competing views on how things should be. Let's

24:18

put it that way. That's right. But

24:21

you're right to caution Patrick, because the

24:23

one thing that Putin has going for him is there is no

24:25

other alternative. And the elites don't

24:27

have an alternative. And Gorgia has certainly no alternative.

24:29

So as long as that remains, I

24:32

think that he is quite safe in power,

24:35

even though he's in a much weaker state. I do

24:37

agree with that.

24:38

Yeah. Now, I also

24:40

understand you've learned a little bit, at least about

24:42

the Ukrainian view of

24:45

which

24:47

organizations within Russia were behind

24:50

the war, which ones weren't. There are some interesting

24:52

theories among Ukrainian officials

24:54

on who was on board for the

24:57

invasion of Ukraine and who wasn't. Why don't you

24:59

tell us a little bit about that? Yeah, this

25:01

was really fascinating. They claimed

25:03

to have had insights about how

25:06

the lead up to the war was taking place

25:09

and which Russian security

25:11

forces were for or against it. So for example,

25:13

they believe that the GRU was dead against it, that

25:16

the general staff

25:17

leadership, i.e. Gerasimov,

25:20

was for it, because Putin

25:22

obviously was for it. But the operational

25:24

leaders in the general staff definitely

25:26

did not think that this was a good idea. We

25:29

know that the SVR was not fond of this invasion.

25:31

In fact, the dressing down of head

25:33

of SVR in Irishkin at the Security

25:36

Council meeting that was televised

25:38

four days before the war was quite insightful.

25:40

But the one thing that they said that was really fascinating

25:43

is that they claimed that the FSB

25:46

right in the lead up to the war was quite lukewarm

25:48

on this. They weren't coming out against

25:50

a four, but they were sort of saying, well, you

25:52

could do this, but maybe it's not a greatest idea.

25:55

And at one point, they say that in their

25:58

briefings to Putin, Putin unloaded. them

26:00

and said, what do you mean it's not a great idea? What

26:02

do you mean that there might be challenges? I spent

26:05

hundreds of millions of dollars on developing,

26:08

on giving you hundreds

26:10

of millions of dollars on developing assets inside

26:13

Ukraine to help take over the government.

26:15

Where did this money go? And then in

26:17

the next meeting, lo and behold, the FSB

26:19

suddenly comes out strongly for the war saying

26:22

that all is good, their asset network

26:24

is ready and they're looking forward to a great invasion.

26:27

Well perhaps that meeting is more survivable

26:29

when you say good plans instead

26:31

of sorry we embezzled that money.

26:34

That's right. The other thing that we've learned

26:36

that was really interesting is the

26:38

effects on the Ukrainian economy

26:41

are really significant. Obviously we know about the destruction

26:44

that's been taking place with Russian

26:46

bombing campaigns, missile campaigns against

26:49

Ukrainian critical infrastructure, but

26:51

the Kakhovka Dam incidents, one

26:53

of the things we've learned is that it's had a significant

26:55

impact on the Ukrainian metallurgy industry

26:59

in the Krivyriq region and that's

27:01

quite significant. I'm not sure that's well

27:03

known that those plans were heavily affected

27:05

because of the dam destruction. And

27:09

we also heard some theories about the Zaporizhian

27:12

nuclear power plants that's been in the news

27:14

of course since the beginning of this war. The Russians are

27:16

occupying it. There's been fears that they

27:18

might detonate it. There's definitely some evidence

27:21

that it's been quite heavily mined by the Russians

27:24

and what the Ukrainians believe is

27:26

that they do want to cause at some point

27:29

some sort of explosion potentially

27:32

in the cooling pool where nuclear

27:35

fuel rods are stored. In order not

27:37

to necessarily spread radiation, an explosion

27:39

like that is unlikely to spread

27:41

radiation beyond just

27:44

the immediate area of the plant, but

27:46

in order to sort of use it as a nuclear

27:48

blackmail to threaten Europe, to threaten

27:51

the West with spikes in radiation,

27:53

at least in the area, and to show them

27:56

that Russia may indeed be crazy enough to pollute

27:58

a larger area of Europe. And,

28:00

you know, I don't know how real that

28:03

is or how true, but it's certainly an

28:05

interesting theory and could be quite plausible.

28:08

And on the Russian side of this, you know,

28:10

the Russian economy is also facing

28:12

a bunch of challenges due to sanctions. But

28:15

you know, with inflation rolling over in the United States,

28:17

that sent oil prices higher and that

28:19

picture is all quite uncertain. But

28:22

another thing that we've discovered, or that you've

28:24

learned from your trip is that Russia's

28:26

mobilization, you know, most

28:29

people out there think that that was a point in time thing.

28:32

What you have learned is that that mobilization is actually ongoing

28:34

and that Russia is still pulling people into its

28:37

ranks to fight in

28:38

Ukraine. I mean,

28:40

you know, obviously there's a military effect there, but there's also

28:42

an economic effect on that. I mean, this is costing

28:44

everyone a lot. That's right.

28:47

So the Ukrainians believe that about 20,000 new recruits

28:49

are being pulled every single month. So

28:52

that's providing replacement troops after

28:54

training to be used in Ukraine. So

28:56

that was very significant. And the Ukrainians believe

28:59

that that may give them at least some options

29:01

to delay the more general mobilization

29:03

wave that everyone sort of believes needs

29:05

to come if Russia is going to continue to go

29:07

on the offensive in the future. But

29:09

the other thing we've learned is that their production

29:12

capacity is increasing. Both of artillery

29:14

shells, of missiles, they're

29:17

believed to be producing at least a million

29:19

artillery shells a year and targeting

29:22

significantly more, targeting

29:24

over two million, but the Ukrainians don't believe they'll

29:26

get there. So this is

29:29

an economy that's been mobilized

29:31

for war and is still able

29:33

to sustain a great rate of

29:35

production, at least on munitions, if not

29:37

on weapons systems themselves.

29:39

Okay, Dmitry, that's it

29:41

for you and me today, but we're going to play an

29:43

interview now that you recorded on the train on

29:45

your way to Kiev from Poland. Now this is with Mike Kaufman

29:48

and Robley, right? That's right. So

29:50

we were all going up to Kiev and we were talking

29:52

about the latest update on the counter offensive.

29:55

So I hope everyone enjoys the listen.

29:58

All right, we're here on the train to Kiev.

30:00

with Mike Kaufman and Rob Leath.

30:03

So Rob, let me start with you. We're obviously

30:06

gonna learn a lot this week talking to folks

30:09

running this counter offensive, but what is your perspective

30:11

on how things are going now? Where do we

30:14

stand a month into

30:16

this offensive? Sure, so I think

30:18

as Ukraine officials have noted, I think they're not

30:21

where they want to be. It's

30:23

still early. You know,

30:25

we know that Ukraine has not committed most

30:27

of its reserves so far. That means

30:29

that there's a lot of the fighting that is yet to be done.

30:32

I suspect this offensive is gonna

30:34

go on for at least another month or more. So

30:37

you know, it's still early and

30:39

Ukraine's obviously made progress. They're making more

30:41

progress south of Bakhmout recently. They

30:43

continue to advance slowly in the south

30:46

towards Tukbuk and you know,

30:49

ultimately what's difficult to

30:52

assess is that we often look

30:54

for most of kind of observable

30:56

signs to talk about how an offensive

30:58

is going. The most kind of observable thing you can look

31:01

for is territorial gains. Well,

31:03

Ukraine has not made as much territorial gains as they would

31:05

want it, but we think that it's

31:07

quite significant. We can't really measure very well

31:09

as attrition and there's clearly a lot of attrition

31:11

going on. It's not very clear how the

31:14

relative attrition is playing out. It's not fully

31:16

clear at what effect

31:18

that will have and you know. You mean it's

31:20

not clear how much they're causing pain

31:22

to the Russians and how much they're taking? Right, so both

31:25

sides are taking attrition right now. That's obvious,

31:27

but the videos don't only give us a good indication of

31:29

how much relative

31:29

attrition there is and necessarily which side can

31:32

sustain it better. So on the Russian

31:34

side, if they take enough losses, if Ukraine

31:36

can isolate parts of the front, they may be

31:38

able to achieve a breakthrough. So even though it's been slow

31:40

so far, they could have you know more significant

31:42

gains in the future. On the flip side, if

31:45

Ukraine keeps taking losses and more attrition,

31:47

the offensive might culminate too soon before

31:49

they make it to the main defensive line in the south. It's

31:51

another 10 or 15 kilometers in some parts.

31:53

So it's kind of too soon to say essentially.

31:56

I'm neither optimistic or pessimistic.

31:59

There's a lot of things.

31:59

things we can't kind of can't see. And so I think

32:02

it's useful to say, you know, Ukraine clearly

32:04

would have liked to progress farther than they have

32:06

so far, but they still

32:08

might make serious gains here and

32:11

it's we can't really determine a lot of the kind of factors

32:13

that are going to go into that. Can we figure

32:15

out at this point where the main line of effort

32:17

is? And there's a lot of commentators

32:20

out there in the Twitter sphere and whatnot

32:22

saying that these are still probing attacks,

32:24

this is not the main offensive. You

32:26

don't agree with that, right? No, and I

32:29

think, you know, the

32:29

first week of the

32:32

counter offensive run June 4th, so,

32:34

you know, it was it was noticeable look

32:36

for a certain brigade in Ukraine to see which ones they

32:38

committed and what kind of assets they committed.

32:41

And one of the ones we were all looking for was the

32:43

47th Mechanized Brigade. It was one of the priority

32:45

brigades. It received Bradleys, I think

32:47

you probably received Leopard 2 tanks. And

32:50

we saw early on, so

32:52

the photos is that we saw a lot of

32:54

Bradleys Leopard 2 tanks as well

32:56

as Leopard 2 R minecraft vehicles

32:58

that were either damaged or abandoned

33:01

on the O'Reechiff axis going

33:03

towards Tockmock. That

33:05

quote is a sign, but this is an important direction

33:09

of attack. It was probably the main effort for Ukraine. And

33:12

so again, it's an important brigade because

33:14

they had these really important kind of capabilities,

33:16

weapon systems employed, that tell you something

33:19

about how important it was. And because it wasn't just one

33:21

attempt where they made multiple attempts to

33:23

progress, it is really indicators probing,

33:25

it indicates it was more of a kind of serious attempts.

33:29

But again, it's important to qualify it by saying Ukraine

33:32

still has not committed a number of the brigades,

33:34

including the 82nd brigade, which

33:36

I think is a striker vehicles, also

33:39

priority brigade. And so, you know,

33:41

just because they've had some

33:44

difficulty so far, it doesn't really tell us necessarily

33:46

how the rest of the offensive would go. One thing

33:48

I think it's important to keep in mind, though, is that, you know,

33:51

if people thought Russian forces would simply collapse,

33:54

right, that has not happened. I think we can,

33:56

you know, honestly say that Russia forces are

33:58

defending in a pretty competent manner. They're

34:00

fitting in a relatively doctrinal manner. So

34:02

we're seeing a kind of traditional maneuver defense

34:04

being employed where Russian forces, at least

34:07

in the south, they are trading

34:10

space for time. They're trying to create

34:12

forces. They're trying to not get decisively

34:14

engaged or encircled because

34:16

they still have that main defensive line to fall back to. And

34:19

they're doing some counterattacks too, right? That's

34:21

right. They're doing counterattacks and I

34:23

think they're in a pretty competent

34:25

way. Russia has some really significant

34:27

force quality problems. So you have

34:30

a big force, a lot of it is mobilized, a lot

34:32

of the quality is not great. But they also

34:34

have some more elite units and they're using those in

34:37

a relatively effective way where even though much

34:39

of the front line is held by, he's got a StormZ, Convex

34:42

units, so he's mobilized units, they also have

34:44

almost all the naval infantry brigades down in the south. They're

34:47

also using the Svetlana units. Svetlana is the 45th Svetlana Brigade

34:49

and 22nd are both playing a role too. And

34:51

it's a way of kind of mitigating the weaknesses

34:53

of a lot of these Russian forces. And

34:56

they've been, thus far they've been quite effective. And

34:58

so again, the question we were talking about before,

35:01

we talk about attrition. Russia can sustain

35:03

attrition in those Convex units pretty

35:05

easily because they can replace them. If

35:07

the naval infantry units or the Svetlana brigades take chemicalities,

35:10

right, that could be a problem for their ability to defend

35:12

going forward. But it's really hard to,

35:14

from open sources, determine

35:17

whether or not those units are taking attrition, how that

35:19

will go and so on. So that's why

35:21

we have to kind of have a bit of a hedging

35:23

right now and say without making too short

35:25

a prediction of exactly how things will go. All

35:29

right, Mike,

35:29

we know that it's contingent. But

35:32

what else, what are the thoughts do you have on this offensive?

35:35

I mean, I think the main question is where does Ukraine

35:38

go from here? What should we expect and

35:40

how do we assess it, right? And

35:42

my view is that first few plans

35:45

survive first contact with enemy enemy typically

35:47

gets a big vote and in the course

35:49

of any major operation. I

35:52

agree very much with what Rob said. That should come as no surprise

35:54

since we often talk work together

35:56

on these subjects. I

35:59

think that

35:59

Maybe much did not go to plan but

36:02

Ukraine still retains a lot of options that said

36:05

Ukraine faces some dilemmas as well It

36:07

looks like Ukraine's effort was intended

36:10

to present Problem to the Russian

36:12

military to attack on three different axes to

36:15

force them to commit reserves to reveal

36:17

vulnerabilities and opportunities For Ukrainian

36:20

forces and what are the three axis with

36:22

three axes are Bach mood the

36:25

vehicle of a silky axis pushing south in

36:28

southern Donetsk and The Tokomaka

36:30

axis pushing in two directions south

36:32

from or E. Okay, right? What about Vukla Dara

36:35

and Camina? so there's

36:37

a Wide

36:39

arc of pressure across the front and includes

36:41

Vukla Dara in Crimea But those are not sort

36:43

of main Ukrainian efforts that makes sense If

36:46

you look at the concentrations of forces

36:48

and where the offensive is really taking place Okay,

36:52

I think the challenge Ukrainian military has had is

36:54

that that approach has also spread

36:57

their effort as well To some extent

36:59

and has made difficult for them to mass forces

37:02

Secondarily advancing on a broad front

37:05

in places like the Likonov a silka allowed

37:07

them to gain Let's

37:10

say gain several kilometers of territory

37:13

in a fairly broad strip but it exacerbates

37:15

challenges they have with a shortage of ear

37:18

defense to cover the force and A

37:20

shortage of clearing or breaching equipment

37:22

as well What we were looking last

37:25

night at some pictures of three

37:27

mine clearing Vehicles at

37:29

least

37:29

we don't know if they're totally destroyed But

37:32

at least out of action because of probably

37:34

mine and artillery and that's a significant

37:36

portion of their mine clearing Vehicles that

37:38

they've had from the West right, right? I mean We don't

37:40

know how much we got in in the run-up to the war Rob and I

37:42

were saying that the thing that's going to Determine this more

37:45

is going to be the enablers and the supporting equipment

37:48

not you know What's going on with the

37:50

leopard and which version of the leopard they got

37:52

or how much better than Bradley is yes? It's important.

37:54

So the defense of us revealed the

37:56

Western equipment is much more survivable and most

37:59

importantly protect

37:59

The troops much better than

38:02

Soviet generations of equipment. And

38:04

yes, they give nighttime capabilities

38:07

for those types of operations. So these vehicles have

38:09

these advantages. But at the end of the day, a

38:11

minefield is a minefield facing ATGMs,

38:14

facing Russian rotary aviation,

38:16

which is a major problem whenever a formation is breaking

38:18

through. These alligator helicopters are called

38:20

the YM. That's right. Well, they usually work... I mean, typically

38:23

Russian helicopter units work in pairs

38:27

with a search rescue backup. So

38:29

it's typically

38:29

a K-52 alligator and an

38:32

MI-28 with it and an MI-8

38:34

that comes up behind them in case one of them gets

38:36

shot down. So usually it's a mix of three

38:38

lock optics that are working as a team. And

38:41

they're often operating at night and Ukrainians

38:43

are lacking thermal vision to take

38:45

them down. They know Ukrainians have not

38:48

just a short time of nighttime capability, but particularly

38:50

a deficit of

38:52

all weather nighttime capable short range air defense.

38:55

We heard it when we were in Bakhmout on

38:58

the last visit to Ukraine, and it's very visible

39:00

as a problem. And you see that the Russian aerospace forces are

39:02

aware of it and are taking advantage of it. So

39:05

these are the challenges.

39:06

Ukrainian military is taking very visibly an attrition approach.

39:09

This is what happened in Karsun too.

39:11

If you remember the initial Karsun offense of the initial push

39:13

stalled out very quickly. Then we saw almost

39:16

a month of attrition, then a secondary

39:18

push that made some progress alongside

39:21

the river bank, right?

39:23

The right side of the river. And then

39:26

the lines kind of re-stabilized again, but it

39:29

made it clear to the Russian military that that stage you need

39:31

to withdraw. But this is not Karsun.

39:34

The Russian military is not on the wrong side of a river. There's

39:36

a much higher density of forces. There's a much more

39:38

extensive line of defenses and entrenchments

39:41

that have reserves. And so

39:43

it's a much more difficult proposition

39:45

than what was taking place in Karsun at the time last

39:47

fall. I

39:50

think from the Ukrainian military's point of view,

39:52

they can continue

39:53

to try to degrade the Russian military, try to

39:55

establish fire superiority, and then push

39:57

again.

39:59

Military strategy is fundamentally

40:02

about choices, right? I often say strategy reveals itself

40:04

in choices. If Ukrainian forces

40:07

push in with the reserves

40:09

that they have available, let's say typically

40:12

we think of it as the 10th Corps, that they have,

40:14

and maybe other units that they're generating, if

40:16

they push in now and use them to break

40:18

the main Russian lines, they will not have

40:21

additional forces to exploit that breach. They

40:23

will not be able to sustain momentum necessarily, so

40:25

they may successfully break the Russian line, but

40:28

not advance into Russian

40:29

occupied territory, or the

40:32

offensive will run on momentum at some point.

40:34

They can proceed with a traditional approach, but that is

40:36

very tasking and ammunition, right? And

40:40

they were given some amount of ammunition for this offensive, that's

40:42

why the D-PICCUM decision is very significant,

40:45

because... Those are the cluster munitions

40:47

that we just authorized. That's right. And

40:49

I'll just be clear, not because of their effectiveness. I'm

40:51

not a person who believes in silver bullets or game

40:53

changers. Miracle weapons systems.

40:56

The latest five-accordant alphabet soup is

40:58

going to solve the problem, right? We're just

41:00

one capability away from fixing it. The

41:03

main difference that they're going to make

41:05

is that the great offensive is going to end whenever they

41:07

run out of artillery ammunition. That's the reality. That's

41:10

going to culminate at that point. So

41:12

that's going to create time pressure, because we're over a month

41:15

into it, and to

41:17

eliminate that time pressure, the best the

41:19

United States could do was come up with

41:21

a trench of artillery ammunition,

41:24

and the United States has D-PICCUMs as a sizable

41:26

stockpile that's available there, and it's

41:29

not like you can find somebody else who's sitting on... Well,

41:31

it's not easy to find somebody else who's sitting on half a million

41:34

artillery shells, let's say,

41:34

that can easily contribute

41:37

them. So, I

41:39

think the Ukrainian military right now is probably... And by

41:41

the way, they're force multiplier because they're cluster

41:43

munitions, so you need to use a lot less

41:45

of them. That's true, but they come with major

41:48

drawbacks, okay, because they... The

41:51

non-exported ordnance creates significant

41:53

challenges if you're going to then

41:55

roll over that territory, right? If your troops are going

41:57

to seize that territory, you're going to have to walk over. They're

41:59

basically...

41:59

flying mines. Well

42:03

you know here's truth I these

42:05

are nasty weapons with lasting effects if

42:08

you believe the 2.5%

42:11

official dud rate make sure to keep those receipts okay

42:13

because I am confident a few things

42:16

but I highly doubt that that's what's gonna end up that's what

42:18

it's going to end up being but

42:21

these weapons are also effective to some

42:23

extent and most importantly it's a numbers

42:25

game Ukraine needs hundreds of

42:27

thousands of artillery shells

42:29

we might have been in a better place if Europeans

42:32

did not wait 13 months into the war to invest

42:34

in their own artillery production not everybody

42:36

by the way same for us sound like we were that

42:38

fast well we invested in our to reproduction

42:40

last summer okay so and

42:43

we spent a lot of effort along

42:45

with the Brits to scrounge the earth for artillery

42:47

ammo from anywhere and everywhere they could get I think

42:49

it's it's known publicly that a lot of ammunition for the suspense

42:52

was borrowed from South Korea in practice okay

42:54

but it doesn't look like as best I

42:56

can tell it doesn't look like that's an easy option to replicate

42:58

so

42:59

I think where they create a fence of us right now

43:02

is they've likely adjusted wait their options

43:05

and there's a good chance we'll try again but we don't know on what

43:07

access we don't know if they're going

43:09

to try to use up the rest of the force and keep their

43:11

reserves available to exploit or if they're

43:13

gonna throw them into breach we don't know if

43:15

they're gonna generate additional reserves based

43:17

on how this is going because the impacts probably significant

43:20

in the Ukrainian forces well most

43:24

like typically an offensive operations you expect

43:26

that you're gonna end up using more to learn

43:28

the munition than you plan

43:29

right and I think that's what's happening with the Ukraine military

43:32

as well that's why we're talking about the pegging no surprise

43:35

you always eat more ammo than whatever it is you budget usually

43:38

it's this is pretty commonplace

43:41

and last point the Russian side so

43:44

I think the the one thing that the

43:47

the Ukrainian plan can try to establish

43:49

or try to hope for is that over

43:51

time this pressure will lead to

43:53

a significant weakening of Russian positions on

43:55

one of these fronts

43:58

and I will force them to shift reserves over And

44:01

that will then create an opportunity

44:03

where if Ukrainian forces break through a line, the

44:05

Russian military will not have a mobile reserve available there

44:08

to counter them. I don't know if that's going to

44:10

happen, but I think that's when there are better shots at

44:12

it. So this is kind

44:14

of where we are. And the question is like how

44:16

do you assess the offensive at this point?

44:18

The initial attacks I think were

44:21

not as successful and didn't set up what the Ukrainian military

44:23

wanted. But the offensive wasn't failed

44:25

either.

44:26

If we looked at your son offensive a month, then we

44:28

will declare a failed offensive. Just

44:31

looking back, right? As

44:33

a recent historical analogy. So

44:35

folks have to be patient and understand

44:38

that this is going to run the course of several months. I

44:40

think it will be much easier to judge either

44:43

after we see another major Ukrainian

44:45

attempt to break Russian lines. Or

44:48

let's say I'll make an arbitrary

44:51

line or later in August

44:53

it will also be clear as well. Once Ukraine

44:55

has expended

44:56

the bulk of ammunition available and

44:58

a lot of resources for this operation. So since

45:01

you love miracle weapons so much, there's

45:03

been a lot of focus on storm shadows.

45:06

What effect, if any, have they had so far

45:09

on degrading Russian logistics? Well,

45:12

I mean they're an effective weapon. They're difficult to intercept.

45:15

And it gives Ukraine to

45:17

put it crudely, a much longer stick. They've

45:20

gone after command and control early on. They

45:24

hit a couple ammunition storage

45:26

sites. Although I noticed that on the internet

45:28

every ammunition

45:31

storage site or point that blows up

45:33

is a large ammunition depot

45:35

by definition. And people are able

45:37

to assess this by seeing a fireball at night and

45:40

they just know for a fact that that's exactly what everything

45:42

is. And

45:45

they've gone after ground lines of communications,

45:47

right? It actually surprisingly went after quite

45:49

late, right? But Chiangar bridge, for example,

45:51

coming out Crimea. But it does look like it only hit

45:53

it once. And the Russian military

45:56

also

45:56

appears to be prepared to recover from that

45:58

pretty quickly.

45:59

Seeing with the bridges over Gershon,

46:02

it's really, really hard to take down bridges, right?

46:05

It takes a lot of explosive power. They don't have

46:07

that many storm shadows to

46:09

actually bring this bridges down and significant

46:12

numbers. Yeah, and it's

46:14

not easy to have the effect you want. In Gershon, the Russian

46:16

military was sustained and ultimately withdrawn

46:19

based on one bridge and a

46:21

ferry system that they had running. That's it. They

46:24

were using the bridge over Kakaevka Dam the whole time and

46:26

a bunch of ferries. So you'd be surprised how

46:28

many forces can be sustained

46:29

with a fairly narrow pipeline when

46:34

it comes to ground lines of communication. But

46:37

I think in general, storm shadows

46:39

have been effective, but they

46:41

also do demonstrate that

46:44

if Wunderwaffe

46:46

and Atacums was introduced, it wasn't going to resolve

46:48

this war in a span of a month, month and a half,

46:50

because it's a very similar capability with very

46:52

similar payload used very much against the targets that

46:54

Atacums would have been used against. And

46:57

it certainly had an impact, but we've seen

46:59

well over a month, I think month and a half of

47:01

their employment so far. And we've not seen

47:03

tremendous impact on the Russian

47:05

force. And part of the reason for that is the

47:07

adaptations in the Russian military that were

47:09

caused by introduction of Highmars last June. And

47:11

I kept saying it's not just going to be about bringing

47:14

a longer stick to the fight. There

47:16

are a lot of changes to Russian

47:18

military and how they do logistics. They're going

47:20

to be vulnerable in some case. It's not possible on a large

47:22

front like that for a military to not have

47:24

ammo stored anywhere or to not have vulnerabilities

47:27

in command and control or to not have to use bridges.

47:30

But you're not seeing nearly the amount of

47:34

critical infrastructure strikes that

47:37

or strikes against the logistics command and control

47:40

network that you saw when Highmars was first

47:42

introduced last summer. So

47:44

it just shows that it's going to be more difficult. Volume

47:47

probably plays a role into that. If you don't have that many,

47:49

you're going to be very selective about your targets. That's

47:52

true. And we don't know what

47:54

they're prioritizing as targets, but it

47:56

looked initially like they were going after command and control,

47:59

then logistics.

47:59

and ground lines of communication, which is like

48:02

a guess, based on what's

48:04

been hit. But the other challenge

48:06

is that you don't

48:08

know if the limit is that they don't have enough missiles or

48:10

that the targets they're looking for are much harder to find.

48:13

Right, but presumably

48:15

they have the help of some

48:17

friends of the US intelligence community

48:20

helping them. Yeah, well, I mean, when I say finding targets,

48:22

no one can see us

48:24

talking about this. But sort of the look at my face

48:26

that indicates that Ukraine clearly isn't doing this by

48:29

itself, right? It's

48:31

rather well established who helps

48:33

Ukraine with a lot of target

48:35

identification and also battle damage assessment,

48:38

yeah. I think a lot of the war effort is overly,

48:43

it's overly portrayed as

48:47

just a Ukrainian-run operation, but we

48:49

know it isn't. Yeah.

48:50

So let's talk, guys, a little

48:52

bit about Progosion and Wagner,

48:55

our favorite topic. So now that we've

48:57

had some weeks since this mutiny

48:59

began, and we

49:01

can start drawing at least some conclusions

49:04

from it, Progosion appears

49:06

to be still alive and well, walking

49:09

around St. Petersburg, maybe even Moscow. Some

49:11

of his empire is getting shut down, so

49:14

notably his troll operations

49:16

and quote unquote media propaganda

49:19

channels are getting

49:20

shut down and the people getting

49:22

laid off. But there's some indication

49:25

that Wagner may be continuing to recruit, which

49:27

means that maybe they're still receiving funds.

49:30

Rob, give us your

49:32

situational awareness on what's happening

49:34

right now with Wagner itself.

49:38

Sure, the short answer is I don't know. It's

49:41

pretty unclear right now, and so I think we

49:44

may have to wait for another week or two before we really

49:46

know what's going on. We've

49:49

got a little more information about what went

49:52

on during the mutiny or coup. It

49:54

seems though Progosion had more ambitious

49:56

goals than what I initially suspected, and

49:59

that it disappeared.

49:59

He wanted to potentially capture

50:02

Shoyu Gogorazimov or at least to pose

50:04

him as part of this. So it was more ambitious

50:06

than what I initially thought it was the case. But this

50:08

was still not a coup against Putin in

50:11

any way. Right, right. So

50:14

I don't think this was designed to try and replace Putin.

50:16

I don't think Prigogin had that power. But

50:21

once he started this, once it became this public

50:23

challenge of Putin, it became

50:25

a challenge to him. It was

50:28

an unprecedented kind of situation any time in

50:30

your history, a recent history, even

50:32

though I think the attempt was mostly kind of focused

50:35

at Grasshoven Shoyu. But

50:37

again, it was a power play. And it was

50:39

Prigogin trying to change

50:41

who was in charge of the Russian military.

50:44

And it could only be seen as a challenge to Putin

50:47

himself once you do that, even if it wasn't designed

50:49

as such. So Mike, we were

50:51

talking last night how both Putin

50:53

and Prigogin

50:54

probably lost here. Obviously, Prigogin

50:57

has had his wings clipped

50:59

at a minimum, even if he's still alive

51:01

and well. We'll see if that remains.

51:03

Putin has been majorly embarrassed, perhaps weakened

51:06

by this mutiny. But the big winner

51:08

to me seems like Shoyu. This is the

51:10

ultimate survivor. The guy has been in government since 1991

51:13

under numerous prime ministers, under Yeltsin, under

51:16

Putin, and clearly

51:18

not the most capable defense minister

51:20

that you could have in Russia elsewhere.

51:23

But now it's going to be next to impossible to replace him,

51:24

right? Yeah, Shoyu is a political

51:27

animal. I think Prigogin inadvertently

51:29

ensured that Shoyu and Garasim would end up staying

51:31

in there because, confident or not,

51:34

now Putin cannot replace him and fire them because

51:36

it looks like he's giving in to Prigogin's demand and

51:38

Prigogin actually gives something. So

51:40

literally, the exact opposite of

51:42

what he was trying to do is what he accomplished. Absolutely,

51:45

and the exact opposite, I think, of what people behind

51:47

him were trying to do because I'm very skeptical that this

51:50

mutiny was just Prigogin's idea,

51:52

right? I think that there's a larger palace

51:54

game at work here. He had backers,

51:57

he had cover in the Kremlin, and folks commonly

51:59

see him as some kind of

51:59

sort of independent operator, which she really

52:02

wasn't. And it's

52:04

not clear what's going to happen to those individuals

52:06

and how this game is still going to unfold, because I think

52:09

the Kremlin now is likely

52:11

looking through who supported

52:13

the mutiny, who knew about it, to what

52:15

extent they supported it actively or passively.

52:18

Why were pre-Gosians men allowed such

52:21

easy access to the rest of headquarters and

52:23

allowed to essentially

52:26

travel relatively on molested all

52:28

the way to Voronius and up from Voronius on the

52:30

M4 highway? And is that

52:34

confusion and stupidity at work? Or is that

52:37

the military just letting them through? Why

52:39

was there a lack of orders? And what have you? So

52:41

that's, I think, what's probably happening behind

52:43

the scenes. And most people don't appreciate

52:46

when you say Kremlin. Most people

52:48

tend to think Putin. But the reality is that

52:50

there are numerous clicks inside the Kremlin. And

52:53

there's a lot of infighting. They're all trying to get the

52:55

czar's attention

52:56

and power. And

52:58

there are people that are supporting Progosion, but there

53:00

are people that clearly hate him. Not

53:02

just Shorygu and Gerasimov, most prominently,

53:04

but the FSB is clearly

53:06

going against him. They've been doing all these raids. They've

53:08

been doing all this discrediting of him

53:10

by putting out these interesting photos

53:13

of him and Borat-style disguises

53:15

and what have you. And

53:18

we know from hacks into his system

53:20

by Dacia Center, that were published

53:22

a few months ago, that he was always very,

53:24

very concerned about the FSB. He

53:27

had given polygraphs to his employees

53:29

who were joining his companies. And one of the questions

53:32

was, are you in any way affiliated with the FSB?

53:34

So FSB is clearly the enemy. GRU

53:37

has obviously been a Russian military

53:39

intelligence, been the supporter of him. Who else do you think

53:41

is supporting him?

53:43

Yeah, well, on the FSB, that

53:45

was quite logical, because FSB was always opposed

53:47

to legalization of PMCs

53:50

in Russia, mainly because they

53:53

want to have a monopoly on violence. And they

53:55

thought this was going to be a problem down

53:57

the line. And they this was. They

54:00

were right. They were right. This

54:02

was meant to be GRU's pet, right? GRU's the person that's

54:04

largely been running Coordinating Wagner activities abroad,

54:07

and FSB probably

54:10

sent a long note saying, with

54:12

a blank shaped paper, saying, I told you so to Putin

54:14

after this mutiny. I suspect that's all that's said on

54:16

it. That look, look, look, I told you this was

54:18

going to get out of hand, and here we are. I

54:21

think that ultimately there's a contest in

54:23

the regime, which is my own guess, looking at it.

54:26

And I'll broadly characterize it between

54:28

the mobilization and the demobilization element

54:30

of it, right? This regime was largely built as a demobilization

54:33

regime, and there are many people in it that are arguing

54:35

that, no, they don't need Wagner, they

54:37

don't need ideological mobilization. They

54:40

don't need to involve

54:42

the society they can handle the war,

54:45

and that there are a lot of dangers to mobilizing society

54:47

to the system, right? It's difficult to

54:49

control, and who knows where it will lead

54:51

them. That's likely to show you position along

54:53

with others. But the other people, and

54:56

here

54:56

I'll bring up individuals like Kowalcuk, who were influential,

54:58

particularly influential, I think, in the run of the war. This is one

55:00

of the oligarchs that's very close to Putin from 10 years'

55:03

birth. Yeah, and remember, Russia's a system where

55:05

it's not the position that matters as much as the person

55:07

and their patronage network and the clan that they represent,

55:10

right? People's official

55:12

position is not the determinant necessarily

55:14

of their access and power. So

55:17

there's others who very much were on the

55:19

mobilization side, meaning they believed in ideological

55:22

mobilization. They wanted to have volunteer battalions.

55:24

They wanted to expand the effort to society. And Wagner

55:26

was like one of the expressions of

55:30

the expansion of Wagner, the use of convicts,

55:34

was the sort of thing that they pushed. And

55:36

I think eventually it led to a contest and a

55:38

competition. And

55:41

it was done in partnership with MOD, but

55:43

it was not sustainable as a partnership, right?

55:46

The compromise of how Wagner would be run by

55:48

the MOD was not sustainable. And

55:50

when the MOD went out and said, no, Wagner's going

55:52

to have to sign contracts with us, you're

55:55

going to have to be subordinate,

55:56

the progression was clearly going to lose

55:58

out. That was one

56:00

of the crisis points that

56:02

led to this fight. Hey guys,

56:05

sorry about the noise you're hearing. We're on the train. Some

56:07

of the issues with doing field

56:09

podcasting, but hopefully you can still

56:12

hear us okay. Rob, Rob,

56:14

what is your view on where things

56:17

are headed now

56:18

with regards to PMCs and

56:20

frankly, even Wagner's overseas

56:23

role right there, Africa,

56:25

Libya, Syria operations. What's

56:27

gonna happen to that now? Obviously a little bit of speculation

56:29

here. Yeah, so there's been

56:31

reporting about the Russian

56:34

government trying to,

56:35

allegedly in Syria and elsewhere,

56:38

potentially pushing back on Wagner and

56:40

trying to kind of take over, kind of control their

56:42

operations. Not fully clear what's

56:44

gonna happen. I think one of the issues

56:46

when this mutiny or coup, when it

56:48

happens, was that it's not easy for

56:51

the Russian government to extricate itself from Wagner,

56:53

because Wagner's not a private organization, it's a public organization.

56:56

It works for the Russian government and works on behalf

56:58

of Russian government's interests. And so the initial

57:01

terms, the agreement that Pascov

57:03

announced that, allegedly, Prigolashin agreed to

57:06

with Lukashenko, that didn't

57:08

really

57:08

make sense. So it left a lot of unresolved

57:10

kind of issues here. And the idea that Wagner

57:12

would be able to operate in Belarus, but

57:15

would still be able to operate across

57:17

Africa, still playing this role that kind

57:19

of furthers Russian government interests

57:22

and also operates with the Russian

57:24

government support, that dynamic

57:26

didn't make much sense. And so clearly that's gonna

57:28

have to just at some point. I

57:31

think potentially what the Russian government

57:33

would like, is they'd like to maybe push out Prigolashin

57:35

and put something else, maybe another oligarch in charge,

57:38

so you wouldn't have to completely disrupt the organization.

57:42

But the center of gravity of Wagner

57:44

is really the assault attachment commander.

57:46

So he's kind of guys like Radobor, Lotus,

57:49

zombies, other kind of figures who've become

57:52

better known in this war. But a lot of those guys have

57:54

been around since 2014, were fighting in the Gulf

57:56

of Belarus. They're probably loyal to Prigolashin. Yeah,

57:59

so I mean, That's a question of the questions, right? And one of the

58:01

questions also is with the Utkin-Prigozhian

58:04

dynamic, right? Where Utkin

58:06

is really the founder of Wagner, the guy who

58:08

named it. Exactly. And so, I mean,

58:10

so Wagner is his call sign. And so then it became

58:13

basically the name of the group based

58:16

on that. So Utkin is the kind of key player

58:19

he's almost never seen. I don't think there's been a recent

58:21

photo of him in maybe five or six years. And

58:24

obviously, I can contrast very, very closely with Prigozhian,

58:27

who's had extremely public roles as swore,

58:29

which created a lot of the problems. So a

58:31

big question going forward is, will

58:34

the Utkin, right aboard these other kind of figures,

58:37

with a lot of combat experience and more combat experience

58:39

than the Russian military, will they

58:41

go along with the

58:44

organization if Prigozhian is pushed out? And

58:46

if they won't go along with it, it won't be Wagner

58:48

anymore. It'll be something different because they're the

58:50

kind of connective tissue that keeps the kind of culture

58:53

of what Wagner is. So a lot of questions

58:55

there. There are other PMCs that Russia

58:57

has created during this war where Duke put

59:00

a key role in the beginning of the war, not clear how

59:02

desperately effective they were. Gazprom

59:04

has their own PMC. There's some other kind of private group

59:06

as well with kind of some amorphous ties.

59:09

Seems that most of them are associated in some way

59:11

or other with a Russian

59:14

company or with a kind of oligarch.

59:16

So it's awfully clear. But I think clearly

59:18

Putin would probably prefer a more loyal

59:20

figure being put in charge of this organization. There's

59:23

other questions also, because Wagner relies

59:27

so much on Russian government support, the

59:30

operations in Libya elsewhere, can

59:33

Wagner operate without Russian government support? If it can't,

59:35

is there an issue that the Russian

59:38

government and its inefficiencies and bureaucratic problems

59:40

we've seen with the Russian military, if they

59:42

take over Wagner, would that make

59:45

Wagner less effective organization?

59:46

So there's some kind of questions about

59:48

how they'll adapt to this. Clearly,

59:51

the most pressing kind of media concern is

59:54

A, the kind of threat that's posed to Putin, and

59:56

also the warning you crave. So that's what matters most.

59:58

I think everything else is kind of a bit of a side show so

1:00:01

you know we're probably seeing coming weeks exactly

1:00:03

how this dynamic plays out but

1:00:05

you know clearly the MOD is still pushing forward with making

1:00:08

PMC signed contracts with the MOD

1:00:11

I assume that will continue even more after this event

1:00:14

and you know I think it's pretty good the MOD is going

1:00:16

to be the kind of main organization

1:00:18

playing the role in this war and it's not going to be the same

1:00:20

kind of maybe you need command problem we saw earlier

1:00:22

this war and especially in BAKMUT where

1:00:24

you had these you know kind of ridiculous

1:00:27

videos from Bregosian you know yelling at Shoyu

1:00:29

Gung-gurasimov

1:00:29

while this kind of fight is going on so

1:00:32

the main question Mike that a lot of people

1:00:34

probably have right now is why is Bregosian

1:00:37

free why is he walking around St. Petersburg

1:00:39

why is he not in exile why is he not dead

1:00:42

you know my view on this is that through

1:00:45

some of those intermediaries that you've mentioned

1:00:47

that have been supporting him and who

1:00:50

are still probably on his side

1:00:52

he is probably begging Putin for

1:00:54

forgiveness basically saying look

1:00:56

you know maybe I drank a little too much got overly excited

1:00:59

you know has spent last year at the front

1:01:02

wasn't thinking clearly this was never

1:01:04

meant against you my

1:01:06

bad can we all be friends

1:01:09

is that your take as well yeah I mean who hasn't

1:01:11

had a late-nighter and then ended up driving

1:01:13

with several thousand men to the capital and attempted

1:01:16

mutiny slash coup it's happened to the best of

1:01:18

us really so my

1:01:20

sense of it is that

1:01:22

first Bregosian he's

1:01:24

probably begging for forgiveness but the problem is

1:01:26

that that Putin doesn't forgive betrayal

1:01:29

he forgives incompetence easily but he does not forgive

1:01:31

betrayal but but he may be convinced

1:01:34

that this was not a betrayal that the

1:01:36

guy kind of got overly excited he's

1:01:38

still loyal he's done a lot of work for Putin

1:01:40

in the past you know we don't know obviously

1:01:42

but that's the pitch I'm sure he can

1:01:45

be sold that this is less than what it seems things

1:01:47

got a hand in the contest with Shoyu but

1:01:49

here's the problem here's a problem for the story

1:01:52

Putin came out and made a televised

1:01:54

address okay during

1:01:56

progression of mutiny when progression at C's rust

1:01:58

off HQ

1:01:59

and to Typically in the Russian system, the last 20 plus

1:02:01

years, when Putin had done that, the matter had been decided.

1:02:04

People understood how things were going to go. He

1:02:06

had arbitrated and issued a public decision.

1:02:09

But Putin did not stop and did not turn his men

1:02:11

around when Putin made that televised statement. And

1:02:14

that was something very different. When Putin made the statement. Yeah,

1:02:16

sorry. When Putin made that statement.

1:02:19

And so that was a

1:02:21

clear mark of rebellion, right? That

1:02:24

he did,

1:02:24

not only did he disobey him, but he continued

1:02:27

to march on the Capitol. I think Putin

1:02:29

agreed this from a relative position of weakness

1:02:32

because he himself was uncertain as to what the coup was,

1:02:34

who was involved and what was going to happen when

1:02:37

negotiations men got to the Capitol. But

1:02:39

this typically happens from my point of view with Putin.

1:02:41

And folks usually look at it as like, look, he was challenged

1:02:44

and he didn't escalate. He bagged down. That's

1:02:47

not really, that's not as much the case. Putin will often

1:02:49

make a deal simply to buy time.

1:02:51

And the purpose of that deal is not to resolve the

1:02:53

matter, but

1:02:54

to get him out of a relatively disinventitious

1:02:57

position. And then he's going to go back

1:02:59

and deal

1:03:02

with Prigozhin. So I'm not sure how this all

1:03:04

ends for him down the line. I think that they're

1:03:06

going to try to slowly take apart Wagner infrastructure

1:03:09

in Africa in the Middle East. They don't have an easy

1:03:11

replacement for Wagner. They

1:03:14

obviously needed an answer to the thousands

1:03:16

of troops that Wagner had. And

1:03:19

it would have been highly disruptive to the war effort to

1:03:21

have that fight right now in the middle of the Ukraine offensive

1:03:23

as well. You have to understand that the

1:03:26

offensive had not been going badly from the Russian perspective.

1:03:29

But what would have been a disaster is if Wagner

1:03:31

had occupied the entire military HQ and logistical

1:03:33

support pipeline in the middle of all

1:03:35

of this, right, that

1:03:37

it would have made a whole mess. So

1:03:40

Putin, in some respects Prigozhin had Putin

1:03:42

in an unenviable position for

1:03:45

a brief period of time, which is where the deal came from.

1:03:47

But I don't think that the deal solves this

1:03:50

matter at all. And like I said,

1:03:52

it's clear again

1:03:54

from the fact Prigozhin is not in jail.

1:03:56

He's been allowed to fire sail his assets.

1:03:59

He's flying back and forth. he's given money,

1:04:01

that he has significant cover in the Kremlin. There's no

1:04:03

other way to interpret this, right? I

1:04:06

think that's one of the many points of evidence pointing

1:04:08

to it. Or at least people are convinced

1:04:10

in Putin that the Pragotian

1:04:11

is still needed, maybe in Ukraine,

1:04:14

maybe elsewhere,

1:04:15

or that he's got enough power

1:04:18

with both Wagner troops and maybe others across

1:04:21

Russia that taking him out

1:04:23

or imprisoning him would be a major

1:04:25

inconvenience to say the least. Yeah,

1:04:28

or that it would be a major ruling against

1:04:30

whoever was backing him as well. You know, in the Russian

1:04:32

system you rarely attack, like,

1:04:34

if you saw the first face who's in charge, you

1:04:37

normally attack whoever is second or third down

1:04:39

the line below them and who represents

1:04:41

him. So, honestly,

1:04:44

I think a lot of this is yet to shake out. So

1:04:46

I was very skeptical of the early narratives of who

1:04:49

won, who lost, or that, you know, 12

1:04:51

hours in some folks wrote that this, you know, Russian

1:04:53

civil war is taken off and it's 1917. And

1:04:56

it's, again, a cautionary

1:04:57

note. I

1:04:59

think my answer was disappointing early on, all this, because

1:05:01

I didn't know what was going on. You know, the short answer is

1:05:03

we don't know what's going on. And the longer answer

1:05:06

is we have... We still don't know what's going to happen.

1:05:08

That's the longer answer, looking at all this.

1:05:11

And in some cases, this is kind of tearing

1:05:14

Cognita in terms of we haven't seen something like

1:05:16

this in the Russian system over the last 20

1:05:18

plus years. Alright, we're pulling into

1:05:20

Kiev to be continued. Thank you, guys.