In an interview with RFE/RL’s Georgian Service, Richard Dannatt, a former general who led the British Army from 2006 to 2009 and became an independent member of the UK Parliament’s upper house in 2011, says the West’s hesitation in promptly supplying Kyiv with weapons gave Russia time to build defensive lines in occupied areas, which likely leads to a protracted war. He also believes it is “legitimate” for Ukraine to strike deep inside Russia, partly to “degrade” its military capabilities.
According to Richard Dannatt, the Western countries were slow to provide Ukraine with the weapons needed for its summer counteroffensive, like tanks and armored vehicles. This delay allowed Russia time to build up strong defensive positions that are hard for Ukraine to penetrate. So, the war is likely to drag on much longer than hoped.
“I think it’s fair to say the West was fairly slow to decide to give Ukraine the necessary weapons that it required to launch this [summer] counteroffensive. […] [Russians] spent the same period of time preparing very comprehensive defensive positions – up to three lines of defense in many parts of the 1,000-kilometer front line, which has proved very difficult for the Ukrainian forces to penetrate,” Dannatt said.
Further, he reiterated that gifting Western weapons to Ukraine has been slow and “valuable time was lost. And during that valuable time being lost to Ukraine, the Russians made good use of that time in preparing these comprehensive defensive positions.”
Dannatt says currently the same position is in discussion about the availability of Western fighter jets such as the F-16s for Ukraine “almost as if the West is trying to control the capability and capacity of Ukraine to really carry out its mission of freeing its sovereign soil from the Russian occupier.”
The former British commander believes it’s legitimate for Ukraine to strike targets deep inside Russia, just as Russia strikes Ukrainian cities.
“It is perfectly legitimate – in exactly the same way that Russia is hitting Ukrainian cities, factories, infrastructure, and the like, and have been doing that for months ever since the war began – [for Ukraine to] strike targets deep into Russia. That is perfectly reasonable in order to degrade the Russian military capability. I mean, that is a facet of modern war,” says Richard Dannatt.
He notes that the Russo-Ukrainian War could be ascribed as being a classic limited war – limited in aims and in geography – but it is not limited in means, and “there shouldn’t be limits imposed on Ukraine to try to prevent [it] attacking targets in Russia. This is legitimate.“
Dannatt also says Ukraine has all rights to strike targets deep into Russia with long-range weapons such as British-donated Storm Shadow cruise missiles and US-supplied ATACMS, because “Russia has started a war, and it must accept the consequences of the conduct of that war.”
Western support for Ukraine may wane over time, but time is on Russia’s side, so the West should keep supporting Ukraine, Dannatt says.
“There is a concern that time is not on [Ukraine’s] side, time is on Russia’s side. Western support and enthusiasm to support Ukraine will diminish, and that will increasingly put Putin in a stronger position,“ he added.
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