Ukraine: For a former senior NATO official, “Putin has lost and does not know it yet”

A sinister premonition for Vladimir Putin? While the Russian military has been losing a series of defeats in Ukraine and has already lost several strategic cities taken by soldiers from Kyiv, more and more questions are being asked about Moscow’s ability to recover and successfully carry out its “military operation”. special”. which started on February 24.

“He is dying before our eyes”

Invited to the set of BFMTV this Wednesday, General Michel Yakovleff, former deputy chief of staff of the military command center of NATO forces, has a clear opinion on the matter.

Vladimir Putin “has lost and still does not know it, but the truth will eventually break through,” he launches, the verb always sharp.

“It can last a few days, in the sense of a collapse, as if it could last for months. But lost. His strongest army, the Western military group that was engaged in Ukraine, is dying before our eyes. We see the last spasms. , there is not much left,” explains the ex-soldier.

For Michel Yakovleff, in addition to the Ukrainian counteroffensive facilitated by the supply of weapons from the West, the Russian defeat can also be explained by the morale of the Russian troops.

“They are people exhausted by a year of absence and war,” he analyzes.

“Most of these soldiers started the stupid maneuvers in Belarus in September last year. They slept in camps, they did the so-called exercises, they crossed the border without knowing why on February 24, they were displaced, they have been there for a year. he continued.

The hypothesis of a defeat

General Yakovleff is not the only one betting on the defeat of the Russian army. Also on our antenna, the former French ambassador to the United States Gérard Araud estimated that the Russian president was “losing face” and “suffering a failure” in Ukraine.

On Wednesday night with BFMTV, the former President of the Republic in person, François Hollande, pointed out that the increasingly criticized Kremlin strongman “is in a weak position” and tries to “hide a defeat”.

Across the Atlantic, several high-ranking personalities have also mentioned this hypothesis. David Petraeus, director of the CIA between 2011 and 2012, ensures that Vladimir Putin is facing an “irreversible” situation.