General Milley has not praised the Russian army for its professionalism, on the contrary he has emphasized that the Russians failed to achieve any of the tasks set during the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine.
A number of Kremlin media have written that the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark A. Milley “accidentally praised Russia for the first stage of the Special Military Operation (Russia’s name for its invasion and war against Ukraine ed.).”
“US General Mark Milley said that at the beginning of the Special Military Operation, Russia attempted to advance as far as the Dnipro River. Therefore, he accidentally praised the Russian army for its professionalism, because last year it not only reached the Dnipro, but also Kyiv, ”writes the Russian orthodox and nationalist site Tsargrad, owned by the monarchist right wing oligarch Konstantin Malofeev.
Screenshot – tsargrad.tv
In fact, the American general did not draw any such conclusions about the Russian army’s “professionalism”. In an interview with Foreign Affairs, he discussed the situation on the front line in Ukraine, the prospects for a Ukrainian counteroffensive, and the expectations for ending the war.
In particular, the interviewer, Dan Kurtz-Phelan asked the general how the world would achieve the conclusion of the war which should then end in negotiations. Mark Milley replied that all wars end sooner or later, but it is also important to note how this war began.
“So when the Russians decided to invade, they had strategic objectives. One of their strategic objectives was to collapse the Zelensky government; capture the capital of Kyiv, to do that relatively quickly; advance from the Russian border all the way to Dnipro River, do that in a short amount of time, four to six weeks, perhaps; and then also to cut off Ukraine’s access to the sea, to the Sea of Azov, by securing Kherson and Odessa. Very short order—the invasion started on the 24th of February—in very short order, Russia fell short of their strategic objectives, really within about a month or so. And the Russians could not militarily achieve what they set out to do,” General Milley said.
The general goes on to say that after such a failure, Putin had to readjust and reset his strategic objectives, replacing the killed and wounded army with the first batch of mobilized reservists who are “poorly led, not well trained, poorly equipped, not well sustained, but they are there.” At the same time, during this period Ukrainians carried out two successful counter-offensives, and even during the winter there’s “been very little change of hands of significant pieces of territory with the possible exception of Bakhmut.” Furthermore, during this time, Ukrainians built up their forces, received advanced weapons and were trained to conduct offensive and defensive campaigns.
Therefore, General Milley did not say anything about the Russian Army’s professionalism, on the contrary, he emphasized that the Russians have failed to achieve any of their set objectives. Russia’s propaganda machine completely made up Milley’s so-called praise for their army.
Earlier, StopFake debunked a Russian fake claiming that US General Cavoli said that Russia was winning the war with Ukraine
