BERLIN, February 11. /TASS/. Ukraine is in the severest military crisis since the beginning of Russia’s special military operation in February 2022, Bild Deputy Editor-in-Chief Paul Ronzheimer said after visiting the frontline near Artyomovsk (known as Bakhmut in Ukraine).
"Uncertainty and disappointment in these cold winter days are high," he noted, adding that he, as reporter in Ukraine, has not seen such moods since early 2022. "The question is whether Washington, Berlin and Paris understand this drama," he stressed.
According to Ronzheimer, Ukraine’s former Commander-in-Chief Valery Zaluzhny understood it long ago that in the current conditions the goal set by Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky "to win back all the regions <…> cannot be attained and this must be said publicly." Ukraine is lacking "weapons, soldiers, technologies, and, what is most important, reliable support from the United States," he noted.
"A trip from Kiev to Slavyansk in eastern Ukraine is like a journey to another country," he recalled. In his words, the situation is in Russia’s favor. He cited a Ukrainian solder as saying that Ukrainian forces are hard up for weapons and manpower. "We badly need mobilization. People seem not to understand how dramatic the situation is," the soldier told the journalist.
The Ukrainian army has been making futile attempts to stage an offensive since the beginning of June, 2023. The Russian side has repeatedly stressed that despite big losses, Kiev has been failing to achieve any significant results. In a bid to justify the lack of any progress in the zone of combat operations, Ukraine’s authorities have been blaming NATO for insufficient supplies while NATO officials claim that they have shared with Ukraine everything it needs. On December 1, Zelensky acknowledged that Ukraine’s counteroffensive had failed.
Meanwhile, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said on December 19, 2023 that during the so-called counteroffensive Ukraine had lost 159,000 troops who were either killed or wounded. On January 16, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated a complete and absolute failure of Ukraine’s counteroffensive.