Ukraine, General Chiapperini: ” Russia does not overwhelm but almost achieved minimum military objectives ”

” Russia is winning but not overwhelming as it imagined. First, the failure of the Ukrainian government to fall, an objective that the Russians believed they could achieve by pressing their units on Kiev. This effort proved to be ineffective even if not completely useless considering that it has drained Ukrainian departments from the other southern directions and I am referring to the one north of Crimea and the Donbass. The heavy losses and failure to breakthrough in the areas of Kharkiv and Kherson must also be taken into account, all situations that must be seen as a partial failure ”. This was stated to Adnkronos by General Luigi Chiapperini, former commander of the multinational NATO contingent in Afghanistan, who was also involved in the Kfor mission in Kosovo and is a member of the Army Research Center, speaking of the state of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. Furthermore, the recent sinking of the missile cruiser Moskva, flagship of the Russian Navy in the Black Sea, is another blow not only to the image of the Russian Armed Forces but also to their future real ability to strike the southwest of Ukraine in the Odessa area – he explains – But be careful, all this does not mean that Russia is weak. We are talking about an armed confrontation where we must also take into account the effectiveness of those who oppose force, in this case the Ukrainian army which is doing very well, even with Western help ”. ” Moreover, the aviation and the armored component of Ukraine have been almost completely neutralized – he adds – It should also be noted that Russia has actually almost completely achieved what seemed to be the minimum military objectives: to secure Crimea for make it then recognized as an integral part of Russia, acquire control of southeastern Ukraine which, with the conquest of Mariupol, will ensure a territorial continuum between Donbass and Crimea, and eliminate the Azov Battalion which symbolically represents the element defined as Nazi – he continues – Now for Russia it remains to conquer the entire Donbass and with the units recovered from the northern front, reorganized, fed and redeployed to the south, it will be easier than what has been done so far. ” Born in the east and the encirclement of Russia, it would have been useful not to sink, or almost, as has happened in recent years, the NATO-Ru ssia Council, the consultation and cooperation mechanism created in 2002 precisely in Italy in Pratica di Mare – underlines General Chiapperini – After the cold war, a real alliance was also thought in perspective, which instead failed. Since 2014, although there have been some meetings, the last of which last January, mutual distrust has led to a cooling of relations that has reached levels not seen since the fall of the Berlin Wall. The alignment of some nations on one side or the other is to be considered a practice that cannot be avoided except by rebuilding mutual trust ”. ” Moreover, those who ask to join NATO, as has happened in the last 20 years with many countries of the former Warsaw Pact and which could happen in the coming months with Finland and Sweden, or those who continue to host exercises of the Armed Forces and to land armaments transported by Chinese planes on their own territory as Serbia has been doing for years now, it does so freely by choosing which side to side – concludes the officer – Of course all this undeniably does not help to lower the tension ” .