www.veteranstoday.com Sputnik: In a recent interviews with Sputnik you said that if Russia is “able to achieve some sort of demonstrable battlefield victory of such a large scale that the inevitable defeat of Ukraine is played before the European community, that would put a damper on the provision of weaponry [by the West] in a futile exercise.” Could the surrender of Ukrainian military, National Guard and neo-Nazis in Azovstal be considered this sort of victory?
Scott Ritter: It’s an impressive victory. It’s an important victory. It’s a strategic victory, but it’s not the victory over Western weaponry that I was speaking of. It was a static victory, achieved after driving defenders underground. That was the latter half of the battle. It wasn’t a battle against Ukrainian forces that had been trained and equipped, especially, with this new wave of military assistance. Now that battle is taking place.
I think with what we’re seeing in Donbass we see the potential formation of several cauldrons that have the potential of surrounding many thousands of Ukrainian troops. That’s the victory I think that could turn the tide in terms of shaping or influencing opinion in Europe and elsewhere…
