Scott Ritter unpacked the motives that culminated in Ukraine's counter-offensive plan while reacting to a Victoria Nuland's speech on the subject during the 15th Annual Kiev Security Forum for Our and Your Freedom/Fighting for NATO held on May 25-26. He criticized Nuland's posturing as "not to achieve the Ukrainian goal and objective," but clearly disguised as "the ultimate American goal of destroying Russia."
"You know, if the United States cared about the future of Ukraine, it would have started early. They would have started avoidance of this conflict to begin with, because there is no one, no sane person, no rational person who would have thought that Ukraine would prevail in a struggle or an armed struggle against Russia. It is physically impossible for that to happen," Ritter told Sputnik.
Before the end of the summer of 2023, Scott Ritter believes there will be nothing left of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. This is against the backdrop of steady flows of military and financial support from the US, NATO, and other partners in the West. In the meantime, Ukrainian forces launched a large-scale offensive on June 4, 2023, but they were handed heavy losses - a predictable fate that the ex-intelligence officer foresaw.
"You would not commit the best forces you have into a battle that isn't your primary focus of effort. [...] Well, the brigades that Ukraine is preparing to throw into the battle are 9 to 12 brigades that have been created. These brigades have been being formed since October and November of last year. There's no other brigades and there's nothing being prepared to replace them. [...] It's not as though, you know, when these 12 brigades get destroyed and they're getting destroyed as we speak, it's not like we got another 12 out there ready to go," Ritter opined.
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