In yet another spectacular rant, Wagner Chief Yevgeny Prigozhin has reignited his ongoing feud with the Kremlin, saying Putin’s efforts to “demilitarize” and “denazify” Ukraine have completely backfired and achieved exactly the opposite.
In an interview with pro-Kremlin political strategist, Konstantin Dolgov, Prigozhin complained that Ukraine was now “a nation which everybody knows around the entire world” that resembled “Greeks during the era of Greece’s prosperity.”
“Ukraine has been legitimized,” he said. “Ukraine has become a country which is known absolutely everywhere.”
Speaking specifically about Putin’s stated intention at the outset of Russia’s full-scale invasion, to “demilitarize” Ukraine, Prigozhin became even more scathing, saying: “If at the start of the special operation they had 500 tanks, hypothetically speaking, now they have 5,000 tanks. If 20,000 men were able to fight, now it’s 400,000.
“How have we demilitarized it? It turns out we’ve done the opposite.
“F**k knows how, but we’ve militarized Ukraine.”
Yevgeny Prigozhin says that Russia’s objectives of "denazifying" and "demilitarising" Ukraine have failed miserably
— Francis Scarr (@francis_scarr) May 24, 2023
"F*ck knows how, but we’ve militarised Ukraine!" pic.twitter.com/ZBIyo0Vd3A
Prigozhin’s wide-ranging interview covered a number of other topics with numerous parts worth highlighting:
His pessimistic view of the future of the war:
“The Ukrainians are given rockets, they are preparing troops, of course they will continue the offensive, try to counterattack. Perhaps the counteroffensive will be successful somewhere, they will restore the borders of 2014 and this can easily happen. They will attack the Crimea, they will try to blow up the Crimean bridge, cut off the supply lines. Therefore, we need to prepare for a hard war.”
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His view of the Ukrainian army:
“Today PMC Wagner is the best army in the world. Of course, I must say out of correctness that the next one is the Russian army, but I think that the Ukrainians today are one of the strongest armies. They have a high level of organization, a high level of training, a high level of intelligence, they have various weapons. They work on any systems - Soviet, NATO - equally successfully. With them, everything goes for the sake of achieving the supreme goal, as we did in the Great Patriotic War.”
The future of Russia:
“Russia needs to live in the image of North Korea for a certain number of years, close all borders, stop being silly, take all its youths from abroad and work hard. Then we will come to some result.”
Prigozhin also said that around 10,000 prisoners he recruited to fight in Ukraine have been killed on the battlefield.
Last year, Prigozhin toured Russian prisons in a bid to convince inmates to fight with Wagner in Ukraine, in exchange for a promised amnesty upon their return should they survive.
Convicts are believed to have been used as cannon fodder in Ukraine, accounting for most of Wagner's losses in the pro-Western country.
"I took 50,000 prisoners of which around 20 percent were killed," Prigozhin said, adding a similar percentage were killed among those who had signed a contract with Wagner, but did not give a precise figure.
Prigozhin’s latest interview comes after he claimed the capture of Bakhmut after months of brutal fighting, insisting there were no Ukrainian troops left there at all.
“There is not a single Ukrainian soldier in Bakhmut as we have stopped taking prisoners,” he said in a post on Telegram earlier this week. “There are a huge number of corpses of Ukrainian soldiers.”
Kyiv has contested the claims and insists the fight for the ruined city is not over.
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Comments (9)
I mean what did he expect knowing the history out of his mind bonkers
The man is definitely shellshocked and in denial. I cannot predict the outcome, but II am impressed by the spirit and courage of Ukraine. It would be aa tallordder o cappturure and hold Crimea, but wee will see, a ew jF 16s would help a lot.
Slava Ukraini
Yah sure did
What are you up to you slimy troll. I hope Ukraine can surround you and blast you to hell.But you are not there . So a sniper would do they should place a bounty on your head maybe one of your mercy needs the cash.
He is right about some things but be like north Korea are you crazy. The end will be in the Ukrainians favor not Russia.
I say this because, although I’m almost 70 years old, I spent 40 years as a Russian area specialist у військовій розвідці Сполучених Штатів проти Радянського Союзу, а потім Росії.. I know what’s happening just by watching news reports over the past six months. Here’s what happened, and Russia wouldn’t believe me even if they read this because they don’t believe it’s possible. Here’s the hint for anyone with a single day of study of military history. Overall this is the template of how Russia lost the Winter War (which they deny ever happened), and the most elegant deception operation in modern history. The past six months are based on the Battle of Thermopylae and the end will follow the true reason for how the US defeated the Germans in the Battle of the Bulge during World War Two. God has given Ukraine the privilege to be the representative of the world to каструвати російського ведмедя.
Prigozhin is correct about everything except one thing. He just accurately described the situation but was incorrect about who will win. The end will be a Ukrainian victory and it is now inevitable. Russia made its last and fatal mistake last week. Your own government told the truth that Бахмут is a mouse trap and Бахмут was the trap. Once combat starts any day now, I will be surprised if Russia lasts 5 days before every Russian in the occupied territories and Crimea are either dead or prisoners of war. Any Russian left in Ukraine when this starts will die. It’s over and Russia can’t do anything about it. Any day now, the only thing my beloved Ukrainian friends will hear will be слава україні, героям слава і далі слава богу, що війна закінчилась. Mark my words.
Prigozhin has no idea of what an unleashed super power can do, he's living in a fairy tale world. Iraq with its fifth largest army in the world was shutdown and eliminated in 29 days with little to no loses. The only threat from Russia is a nuclear one, its conventional abilities are that of WWII, and Prigozhin's army dies at the rate of WWI soldiers rushing the trenches, he's a legend in his own mind.
Prigozhin throws criminals in front of machine guns and artillery and claims it makes his forces strong. It just makes his forces expendible. Munitions come from the russian military, or not at all. That is not strength it is dependency and as his suppliers are weak and in disarray, so no amount of barbarity on his part can achieve success.
He is right that russia needs to close it's borders to indoctrinate and terrorise its population ifg it is to mount any future challenge beyond its borders in the future. That 'period' will need to be one or two generations - at least 50 years. By that time they will be as 'advanced' as Iran, N Korea or Syria is now. Or to put it another way, poor, degraded and irrelevant.
He has played his game to achive relevance in his country. Now he needs to recognised that his country is a failure and has no path to relevance until it steps back from the causes of its pariah status. He is as relevant as his country. He makes his country irrelevant. Get real.