I’ve been following some interesting story lines that really popped out since last week, after having been present below the surface for months. The reason is simple: the sudden Russian successes in Soledar, Klesheevka, the opening of a 50-60 km wide front in the Zaporizhzhia region, movement around Slovyanks and Lyman, pointing at the start of the long-awaited Russian offensive, prepared for since the partial mobilization end of September last year, and the absolutely massive casualties the Ukrainian Army has been suffering in the meat grinder of Soledar and Bakhmut. More about that later.
There is bad blood between president Zelensky and commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian army Zaluzhny. Zelensky sees Zaluzhny as a rival who might overthrow his presidency, and Zaluzhny sees Zelensky as a lightweight who has no idea of military tactics and needs, and who is sending thousands of valuable troops to certain death just for PR reasons, seriously endangering the security of Ukraine.
Zelensky himself is a puppet, and he knows it, yet the sudden limelight of the war has pushed him to a new popularity and importance, that he is fully exploiting.
The division is deep, and reaches well beyond Ukraine. Pro-Russian channel Slavyangrad reported on May 18: “Our source in Zelensky’s administration said that a meeting was held in the Office of the President regarding the operational encirclement of Severodonetsk and the possible encirclement of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Zaluzhny again asked for an order to withdraw troops to Slavyansk and Kramatorsk, so as not to repeat the situation with Azovstal. The political leadership insists on keeping the city, which should become a new symbol of resistance and displace the surrender of Azovstal fighters in the information field.
we previously wrote that a group of advisers from NATO responsible for planning military operations has for a long time been operating in the Ukrainian General Staff. Recently, a strong confrontation has begun, due to the attitude of US generals towards our troops as cannon fodder, which is sent to slaughter on the eastern front. On this issue Zaluzhny disagreed with the political leadership of the country, which supports the opinion of NATO advisers.”
This gives very keen insight. It shows Zelensky, beholden to NATO and the US, versus Zaluzhny, who thinks less politically, and more with his troops and military goals in mind. What is stated about the ‘attitude of US generals’ is not propaganda, either, nor conjecture. Former Virginia State Senator and Vietnam USMC veteran Col. Richard Hayden Black made the following statement in late April 2022: "We don’t care! The United States and NATO, we do not care how many Ukrainians die. Not civilians, not women, not children, not soldiers. We do not care. […] I don't think Ukraine has anything to do with the decision about peace or war. I think the decision about peace and war is made in Washington DC. And as long as we want the war to continue, we will fight that war using Ukrainians as proxies, and we will fight to the last Ukrainian death."
Belgian veteran war correspondent Elijah Magnier echoes that, and wrote this observation: “#Russia injects 100s of its T-90M in the battle against NATO in #Ukraine. NATO members have decided to send also dozens of tanks, enough to keep the war ongoing for as long as possible & for more Ukrainians to be killed. The west is providing #Ukraine with small doses of weapons.”
Contradiction messages are being sent. On one hand, we read from Slavyangrad, posted on June 9th: “Our source in Zelensky’s administration informed us that Zaluzhny reported to Zelensky about a 50% increase in combat losses among the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the eastern front in the last month, due to the inefficient use of the military. The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine proposes to withdraw troops to the Slavyansk / Kramatorsk line, which will shorten the front line and reduce losses by half.” (Which was denied)
Yet a few days later, on June 14 2022, Telegram channel Levi reported: “The dispute between Commander in Chief Zaluzhny and Zelensky is growing. Zelensky in his address today shifted the emphasis that Zaluzhny, who allegedly only gives “beautiful” reports, is to blame for the dire situation at the front.” Now Zaluzhny is not pointing out the bad news, but is hiding the truth under ‘beautiful reports’? You see the war for our minds in full swing. Not ‘ours’, primarily, but those of the Ukrainian people.
On August 29 we read this, again from Slavyangrad: “Our source in the OP told us that Zelensky set Zaluzhny as a condition-counter-attack or resignation. Bankova [note by ArnGrimr: this refers to the seat of the Presidency in Kiev, compare to ‘the White House’, or ‘Downing Street’] is not satisfied with the position of the AFU commander-in-chief, who has started to make decisions on his own frequently while hiding behind US support. After Johnson's visit, we were given two months for the #Beat_for_Kherson operation, after which support from the West will begin to change. Zaluzhny is forced to move reserves from the eastern front and withdraw troops near the border with Belarus to form strike groups by 15 September.”
There are different demands, not from Zelensky, but from the Western powers, who demand certain results from Ukraine (whether or not those are their true goals is of course in question). This only stokes the division even further, as exemplified by this observation by the channel Eurasia & Multipolarity (from Aug 7): “And Zelensky's gang is trying with all its might to prove its usefulness and necessity to the moderators of the armed conflict in Ukraine, represented by the US and Britain, fearing that it will be replaced by more effective middle managers, such as the Zaluzhny gang, the head of the AFU.”
When Ukrainian channels openly spoke about an outbreak of tuberculosis within the ranks of the Ukrainian army, caused by the virtual absence of military medical care and call-up of experienced medical personal during the mobilization.
Slavyangrad reported on this on Jan 7: “Ukrainian volunteers have voiced criticism of Zaluzhnyy, commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, over his order "not to let fighters go for treatment," which leaves Ukrainian soldiers "rotting and waiting" for the weather. One of the volunteers reports that the AFU now has at least four brigades with tuberculosis, as soldiers are constantly being transferred from different units to be re-staffed.
Of course, the post (screenshot below) caused a flurry of outrage in the comments. People started telling similar stories, as well as adding about army fatigue and blaming Zaluzhny and the generals for everything. Also, as an example, one Ukrainian soldier shared his "sad story" of how he had been waiting for a rotation from Bakhmut but was simply manned by another unit of the 54th AFU brigade.
It must be said that their efforts do not pass without leaving a trace the authority of the "Butcher of Bakhmut" (a nickname coined by Bankova and successfully spread among the masses) is rapidly declining in the Ukrainian armed formations. Ze-Office probably does not understand what the consequences of this fact might be. By the way, Zelensky's credibility is not growing either.”
That last paragraph is really important. The Zelensky camp seems desperate to smear Zaluzhny, willing to even report on this news, and betraying the massive casualties that the Ukrainian army is suffering, the constant reshuffling of troops in ‘consolidating’ of units that got smashed by the Russian army or Wagner, and the lack of weight given to the lives and wellbeing of their soldiers, under the pressure of the Russian attacks.
Just last week, on Jan 19, Slavyangrad reported how a Ukrainian journalist, Roman Revedzhuk, spoke with the deputy commander of the battalion of the 2nd brigade of the National Guard (Ruslan Drebot) (a video is available on reddit here). In that interview, the men discuss the losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, citing a number of 140 thousand, well over the official numbers. They further talk about how many families are not given the bodies, to prevent panic and low moral. Named as one of the main people responsible, general Zaluzhny is advised to be relieved of his command. The fact that such news is being spread openly now, is a very dangerous gamble by Zelensky, showing desperation.
The friction with Zelensky in the West has been open. On July 23, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said the following in a speech at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado, as reported by FoxNews: “"It’s not something to make light of because President Zelenskyy's personal safety is something that that concerns us," Jake Sullivan, the White House National Security Advisor, said Friday during the Aspen Security Forum.
"This is a leader in wartime dealing with an opponent, an adversary, an enemy in Russia that is ruthless, brutal and capable of just about anything, so it is a concern," he continued. "President Zelenskyy takes the precautions you would expect to protect himself, to protect continuity of government in Ukraine, and we are trying to help and facilitate that in any way that we can."”
Pro-Russian channel ‘Lord of War’ added this thought: "Not a very good signal is being sent to Zelensky from Washington. Especially against the backdrop of contradictions with Minister of Defense Reznikov (Zelensky’s successor, who obviously suits the United States), Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Zaluzhny and a bunch of dissatisfied people in the SBU”
In September, Newsweek published this critical article on Zelensky.
Ukrainian channels are welcoming and amplifying this negative news, to smear Zelensky and push up Zaluzhny:
This is not insignificant, that such is circulating within Ukraine, given the tight control the Zelensky regime is trying to maintain within her borders.
Others notice this as well, and on Dec 25 a western pro-Russian blogger wrote the following in a longer post on Zelensky’s visit to DC: “The motives for the visit of Volodymyr Zelensky are obvious. He came to be blessed and continue to be Washington's beloved wife. It is not for nothing that in the Western press, a few weeks before Zelensky's arrival, they wrote about a possible coup d'etat in Ukraine and prophesied the post of the head of the country either to General Syrsky or General Zaluzhny.”
The last weeks this simmering discontent has really surfaced, reaching boiling point.
First, Arestovich. He is, according to his wiki, ‘Ukrainian intelligence officer, blogger, actor, political and military columnist, and propagandist. […] He worked as a Strategic Communications Advisor of the Office of the President of Ukraine’. But in the last week or two, he came under relentless attack, and forced to resign as advisor to the President, leaving Zelensky with one trusted advisor less.
The whole attack is just insane and so arbitrary, it likely was orchestrated or capitalized on by enemies of Zelensky. During a missile attack, a Ukrainian battery had hit a Russian missile, but both crashed down, and hit apartment buildings in Dnepropetrovsk, Central Ukraine. The Ukrainian propaganda wanted to use that as proof of a deliberate attack on innocent civilians by Russia, but Arestovich admitted it was Ukrainian air defenses that skewed the Russian missile off its trajectory, causing it to fall on the apartment complex, killing 25 people. Video material supports this, showing 2 different adjacent crash sites, consistent with the AA rocket and the Russian missile coming down at two close locations. This is nothing shocking, but Arestovich was pummeled for this ‘betrayal’. Let’s ignore that in attempts by the media to attack Arestovich, they managed to contradict their own claims on downed Russian missiles from earlier this year, but who keeps track of any such inconsistencies? Fact is, Arestovich was forced out.
He is, of course, placed on the ‘kill list’ Myrotvorets… The revolution is yet again eating their own. The description says: "Professional provocateur. Implementation of public information sabotage in favor of the Russian invaders. Participation in acts of humanitarian aggression against Ukraine. Conscious participation in activities that undermine the defense capability of Ukraine by demoralizing the armed forces of Ukraine. Discrediting State bodies of power and administration."
(And he is now speaking out very frankly, about how Ukraine has little chance or hope of winning, citing that ‘now he is cut loose, he can say what he wants’. ”I am already an unofficial person, I can say what I want. If everyone thinks that we are guaranteed to win the war, then it is very unlikely. What do you think, the assessment from the President of Poland, Duda, is that it is generally unknown whether Ukraine will survive. And not only he said about the decisive months. Was it just said that way, or was he talking about it on the basis of some information?” This whole charade forces us to take into account that Arestovich, also positioning to take over the position of his former boss, Zelensky, wanted to come out ahead of the impending breakthrough of Russia and collapse of the Ukrainian army, and create an aura of insight and ‘maverick’, to distinguish himself from those who are ‘responsible’ for this debacle.)
Oleg Soskin, an expert from Ukraine, defended Arestovich, and stated “The Ukrainian air defense system is not able to withstand a new type of attack from the Russian Federation. This manifested itself in the fact that strikes were carried out with new missiles, but they calmly made it to Kiev, Lviv and others.” He made a great point, that Arestovich was simply following his orders, to distract the people from the really bad news, that Russia was targeting and hitting critical energy infrastructure, with near impunity, and the failure of the defense forces, as well as the SBU and GUR in openly informing the people of what was going on.
Next, remember how Monastyrsky, Minister of the Interior and the Armed Forces of Ukraine, crashed in his helicopter? Yeah. That was not ‘bad weather’ nor ‘some technical issues’ that lead to that crash, sadly killing several young children.
Reports are in about how the helicopter was hit by a MANPADS or other such weapon, and was on fire while still in the air. The trajectory seemed that of an aircraft shot down, not that of an accidental crash. A video purports to show a slight smoke trail.
Several rumors are being spread, as to the reason for this. First, corruption. Monastyrsky was exposing Arsen Avakov, his predecessor, who was covering up Eastern European drug trafficking, and the shooting down was apparently done with knowledge of Budanov, head of the GUR. This is being spread by a high-ranking member of the Ukrainian army, Mikhail Maiman. Not without baggage, he kept busy as a narcotics dealer and an arms broker in name of his government, but acted as a traitor by speaking out about it, in search for money, selling videos of other officials he worked with. He sold western humanitarian aid (we keep hearing stories about that), as well as weapons, and was involved in drugs production (linking him to the investigation that, according to this set of statements and rumors, lead to the shooting down of that helicopter).
According to Slavyangrad, “The second version of the investigation points out the fact that Zelensky himself was involved in this, and he did this to punish the minister for switching over to the side of the American lobby led by Zaluzhny. A source in the SBU believes that this is a signal from the office of the Ukrainian president to Valery Zaluzhny personally, that there are no untouchables.” The day before, Zaluzhny had his top-level meeting with Gen. Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, as well. Something Zelensky did not like, having the lime-light stolen like that…
And to top all that off, Slavyangrad reported yesterday, Jan 23: “Breaking news: Ukranian media, such as Strana (https://t.me/stranaua/87151), reports that the deputy head of the President's Office, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, offered to resign from his post.
In his place, they plan to appoint the head of the military administration of the Kiev region, Alexei Kuleba, to the post.
In addition, the heads of administrations of Sumy, Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, which are associated with Kyrylo Tymoshenko, may resign.
There is no official confirmation of this information yet. This would be a major purge/split in the government. We shall remind you that there was a serious confrontation between the various departments of Ukraine's non-government agencies, including sweeping accusations of corruption, the conflict between Zaluzhnyy and Zelenskyy, as well as the war between the GUR and the State Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).”
This is confirmed by this article from the Kyiv Independent, late last night, titled “Media: Zelensky's deputy chief of staff Tymoshenko reportedly submits his resignation.”
The article describes a whole new layer of corruption and nepotism, including the SBU firmly in the camp of Zelensky.
This leaves Zelensky without any of his former trusted advisors at the top levels, isolating him. The coming days will be very interesting, and important. In a very new video, Zelensky addressed the resignations, and decreed, among other things “Ban officials from traveling abroad for "non-state purposes" (e.g., holidays). This also applies to law enforcers, prosecutors, and all those who are supposed to work for the state;”. This all looks like a coup that was brewing, and averted (Perhaps? The knives are out, can he really keep averting them?) by Zelensky, in this major reshuffle, that now also includes 3 other ministers from Zelensky’s administration: Energy Minister Galushchenko, Sports Minister Gutzeit and Strategic Industry Minister Ryabikin. Rumors about the resignation of Prime Minister Shmygal are unconfirmed as of this writing.
As an interesting thought, a writer on Slavyangrad added this line, in his attempt to analyze the latest spate of resignations:
“It is a fact that there are serious contradictions between SBU and SDU, so serious that the heads of these bodies had to deny them publicly (!) the other day. It is related to the fact that the SBU is closely supervised by the US, while the SDU is more independent (despite the fact that the Pentagon shares information with the SDU).
👉 One could argue that the deeper reason is the contradictions between the CIA and the Pentagon, which are also reflected in Ukrainian politics, but that would be a conspiracy theory.”
He continues, and talks about how the shuffling of even lower level regional heads shows how the military, likely under instigation of the GUR, is preparing a military administration ahead of the new Russian offensive that is expected, as the new appointees will apparently be much firmer and hard-line, supporting the stances of Zaluzhny.
On the infighting between the SBU and GUR, this last month the GUR admitted that they know who was behind the kidnapping and murder of Denis Kireev, a banker and high-ranking negotiator for a cease-fire in the early days of the Russian Special Military Operation. He was credited by the GUR of having saved Kiev, as his job was to stall for time and delay the process, to give the Ukrainian army more time to get defenses ready. Budanov even revealed that Kireev was a full-time employee of the GUR, and confirmed that Kireev was murdered by a unit of the SBU. (For a bit more info on Kireev, see this article.)
But to deny the rumors of this infighting between both branches (and both factions!), the heads of both agencies released a joint statement to deny the ‘misunderstanding’.
“The heads of the two departments coordinate their actions and together plan and carry out the most complex operations to neutralize the enemy. In particular, today the head of the GUR of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine Kyrylo Budanov and the head of the SBU Vasyl Malyuk held a joint working meeting. Its results will be seen by the Ukrainians and felt by the enemy in the near future. Rumors about the alleged misunderstanding between the heads of the GUR of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine and the SBU are hostile narratives that are refuted by the daily joint work to neutralize the enemy. All Ukrainians are united in their desire to defeat the enemy and liberate the occupied territories forever. Therefore, let’s work together for Victory.”
Read into that what you will.
A last few facts:
The SBU is the Security Service of Ukraine, and is very much aligned with NATO.
The GUR is the Ukrainian intelligence service, and is aligned or at least favorable to Zaluzhny.
The unit Kraken, founded by former Azov fighters, is part of GUR (spetsnaz/special forces). Any claim of Kraken being ‘neo-Nazi’ is dismissed as ‘Russian propaganda’: “Commanders in the unit acknowledged that it is possible that far-right individuals are members in the regiment, but said such people are outnumbered by a diverse group with the intent to defend Ukraine.”
The head of the Main Intelligence Directorate, Kirill Budanov, enjoys almost unanimous support in the President's Office, but not in the Ukrainian security apparatus, which considers him too young and too bold. Zelensky still trusts him as before and gives him almost free rein under the leadership of Yermak and Defense Minister Alexei Reznikov.
To end, Russian Journalist @Sashakots wrote last week: “At the same time, of course, there are no fools in Kiev. And they understand that by throwing reserves into the fight, they risk a Russian offensive in other weakened directions. We'll see who wins: Zelensky's PR or Zaluzhny's military thinking. Their rivalry is already palpable.”
The very important gains of the Russian forces in Soledar and Bakhmut (essentially signaling the end of the 3rd and pen-ultimate line of defense the Ukrainian army has, where the 4th and last one is much more weak), and the sudden increase in movement and territorial gains all over the front, coupled with the devastating toll the Russians are taking on the Ukrainian units, have shaken the Ukrainian leadership. They see the writing on the wall, is my impression, and this latest spate of ‘long knives’ seems to confirm a level of panic and posturing to be ready for the next phase.
Something to keep an eye on!
Brilliant 👍
Thank you for giving us all this background of the NATO involvement, and the disputes within the Ukraine regime. I for one hope Russia finishes the job soon, before more Ukrainians are needlessly sacrificed to the corrupt war machine. This would have been over long ago if not for the lies and propaganda, and the billions of tax dollars stolen from America to fund these globalist nazis.