Administrative chaos at front has not gone away, we need clear strategy for dispersed mobile defence, – Colonel Kupol. VIDEO
Anatolii (Kupol) Kozel, a reserve colonel in the Ukrainian Armed Forces, has stated that order must be restored within the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the state as a whole, that populism must be eliminated, and that the focus must be on saving the lives of soldiers, as territory can be regained, but people cannot.
He made these comments in his latest YouTube video, reports Censor.NET.
Responding to subscribers’ questions about how to end the war if the Kremlin shows no such desire, the military official emphasised that this is not about compromising national interests or surrendering territory.
"There is a huge demand in society and in the trenches for the war to end. But we cannot simply say: 'Let’s give up Donbas'. We must set aside all populism, all politics, and clearly move towards high-quality preparation, high-quality planning and, above all, the high-quality preservation of human lives. Territory can always be regained, but you can never bring back a human life," the military officer stated.
Mobile defence strategy
According to the colonel, Ukraine needs a clear strategy of dispersed mobile defence, where the main objective is to maximise the destruction of the enemy’s manpower and minimise its own losses.
Long-range "deep-strike" drones and missiles, which are currently not available on the front line in the promised quantities, must be part of this process, notes Kupol.
"The economy is about resources. We are leaving them (the Russians – ed.) without resources. And number two is manpower. We are leaving them without manpower. And in all my videos, I am trying to get through to the authorities that this is how we must act," said the military officer.
At the same time, Kupol notes that the effectiveness of the military and political leadership in this regard remains very low, and administrative chaos is still being observed on the front line.
Administrative chaos
"The administrative chaos on the front line hasn’t gone anywhere. What I mean is this: there is a brigade’s defence sector, there is a brigade commander. He has handed over his two or three battalions to someone, received five battalions from someone else — and so on across the entire front. We have only one or two corps that have their own full complement of troops. The rest do not. Excuses that this is impossible to do during combat operations do not hold water, because I personally did it and everything worked out," said the colonel.
Furthermore, Kupol called for an audit of the senior military command in light of criminal cases, as, in his words, "the headquarters are completely detached from the realities of combat operations."
"Take the General Staff, the Land Headquarters and so on — It's just one capsule, but combat is a whole different story. If a rigorous audit were carried out into the criminal cases involving all these generals and colonels, everything would change. But the fish rots from the head down, and that is the responsibility of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief. Unfortunately, none of this is being done," he said.
The military officer also read out a comment from a conscripted soldier who, in 2023, sustained an injury that led to an amputation and faced bureaucratic humiliation whilst processing his paperwork.
Kupol emphasised that in normal units with professional commanders, a wounded soldier should not have to worry about certificates at all.
"A soldier shouldn’t have to worry at all about any certificates, documents or paperwork. That’s what certain officials are there for. If the commander has organised everything properly, the issue won’t even arise. I recall in my own battalion: if there is a wounded soldier, all the certificates and documents will be sent to him, everything will be processed, and he will receive all the funds. Since 2022, we have had people responsible for supporting every wounded soldier. In normal units, such issues did not even arise," the military officer stated.
Kupol added that the Defence Forces need a comprehensive reform that will enable the creation of "Armed Forces 2.0".
"This is, you know, a continuation of my theme and my arguments that we need a comprehensive reform of the Defence Forces and also of the state. Just as we need 'Armed Forces 2.0', so too do we need 'Ukraine 2.0'," said the soldier.
- In the programme, the military officer also raises other topics, in particular, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s letter to Russian dictator Putin, the authorities’ promises regarding the reform of the Ukrainian army, which have not yet been fully implemented, and the risks of a new wave of mobilisation in the Russian Federation.
