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Topics: Ukraine, Russia, Vladimir Putin
Poppy Bilderbeck
An ex-Russian minister has warned that President Vladimir Putin is either on his way to 'retirement' or 'to the grave'.
Since the invasion of Ukraine began on Thursday, February 24, the capabilities of the Russian military have been reported as being 'overestimated' by Putin. Soldiers have been stated as disobeying orders, and those who have been captured have alleged that they face death if they are sent back to the Kremlin regarded as failures.
Andrei Kozyrev, who was the leading diplomat to Russia's former president Boris Yeltsin and Russia's former foreign affairs minister, has since claimed that the impact of the heavy loss of Russian troops – which is reported as more than 11,000 – low morale, and hefty sanctions that have been imposed by the West, will lead to Putin being led by 'an armed escort either to the grave or to retirement'.
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Kozyrev explained that he thinks 'resistance' against Putin is growing, even from within the Kremlin, The Express reports.
He said: 'Many Russian tsars were killed. Many were dismissed one way or the other. Even in the Soviet Union, there were ways; Stalin was said to have been poisoned, Khrushchev was just escorted out of the Kremlin.
'With Putin, I very much expect there to be resistance growing and discontent growing that will be resolved one way or another.
'I don’t know which way, but Russian history is full of unexpected outcomes.'
Kozyrev's words follow a former British soldier's theory that a meme – which shows Putin sat far away from other political figures – does not demonstrate the Russian president's wariness of coronavirus, but his fear of assassination.
Similarly to the soldier, who explained that Putin's actions are not that of a madman but someone who is 'rational', Kozyrev echoed the same sentiment.
The forming Russian MP stated: 'It’s horrific but it’s not irrational. To understand why the invasion was rational for Putin, we have to step into his shoes.'
While it has been reported that Putin massively 'overestimated' the capabilities of his forces, Kozyrev told The Times that this still 'doesn't make [Putin] insane. Simply wrong and immoral'.
Addressing fears that have been growing around Putin's potential use of nuclear weaponry, Kozyrev asserted: 'He’s just a kind of guy able to be brazen and he has more risk tolerance and that’s the problem with the West.'
Kozyrev thinks that the invasion of Ukraine will end similarly to how the Soviet-Afghan war did.
He said: 'It also started with an invasion and looked like the Soviets were winning. But after that, the West provided assets like Stinger missiles and then it became evident that the ground war started to fall apart [...] the Soviet Union had to evacuate its forces and was defeated.
'My prediction is the same for Russia now... the probably very dramatic outcome, like the Soviet Union, of collapse.'
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