MOSCOW, December 26. /TASS/. Vladimir Zelensky as the supreme commander-in-chief has lost the trust of both the population and actively deserting troops, the opposition-minded Verkhovna Rada member Aleksandr Dubinsky has said.
Ukrainian Finance Minister Sergey Marchenko earlier said that Ukraine, in case the US support was terminated after the newly-elected leader Donald Trump took office, would be able to continue the conflict with Russia for no more than six months. Dubinsky argues that even the money and weapons provided by the West will not change the situation in the theater of operations or have any effect on troops’ morale or reduce the level of desertion.
"Zelensky has lost credibility as the commander-in-chief with the military and the people. He will only be able to fight 'for another six months' on his own, alongside a bunch of former employees of the Kvartal-95 studio owned by Zelensky, many of whom have taken positions in the government and related agencies," Dubinsky wrote on his Telegram channel.
He recalled the unsuccessful financing of Ukraine in the middle of the year. After the adoption of the scandalous law on mobilization, money from the new US aid package started pouring in. However, the loss of territories and people has been "growing geometrically" since then, he noted.
"The very institutional capacity and ability of the Ukrainian army to hold the frontline has been undermined. First of all, due to the high level of desertion, maltreatment of soldiers, brutal mobilization methods (with staffers of military commissions hunting men on the streets - TASS) and thriving corruption," Dubinsky said.
Ukraine has conducted general mobilization since February 2022. On May 18 this year a law on its tightening came into force, but the army continues to experience a serious shortage of personnel. According to TASS estimates, since February 2022, the Ukrainian army has lost more than 900,000 men killed and wounded. Earlier, the Financial Times said that more soldiers deserted in the first ten months of 2024 than in the previous two years. Verkhovna Rada member Anna Skorokhod pointed out that desertions had exceeded 100,000.
In Ukraine, criticism of Zelensky as commander-in-chief is not uncommon. Ukrainian journalist Yury Butusov said that Zelensky was incapable of making the simplest decisions regarding combat operations and should hand over day-to-day command to a competent body created at the Supreme Commander's Office. Dubinsky previously attributed the miscalculations in providing the army with armaments to Zelensky's inept personnel policy. He also said that Zelensky had brought Ukraine to the brink of strategic defeat and should quit.