The Press : The war in Ukraine started a year ago. Are you surprised by the resistance of the Ukrainian army?
I don’t see anything surprising in that. The level of corruption and decay in the Russian army had been underestimated. And I’m not even talking about the poor logistics, the way it was all organised. The way this war was started was very stupid. In the first days, 100,000 men entered Ukraine. No more. Without back lines, with a bad supply system. With a force like that, how do you want to take control of a country of 40 million people?
You quickly doubted the foundations of this invasion. Was this feeling generalized around you, in your regiment?
I was far from alone. When we realized that we were invading Ukraine, we asked ourselves a lot of questions about the necessity and the acceptability of this war. On the morality of shooting a country with which we have much in common. But the army functioned as it was supposed to function, that is to say, like a machine. The soldiers did not ask any questions. They received the order, they went.
In your book, you talk a lot about the unpreparedness of the Russian army. For you, that’s a big part of the problem…
Yes, but be careful not to draw the wrong conclusions, as many Western observers do. Just because the Russian military is in trouble doesn’t mean it’s a bunch of incompetents. In 1940 she was very poorly equipped, but at the cost of millions of sacrificed lives she managed to win. Its capacity should not be underestimated.
Did your leaders measure the degree of this unpreparedness?
I have a very bad opinion of the Russian political sphere and of our leaders. I have the impression that they are the enemies of the people! This campaign shows us their level of incompetence. I’ve tried to figure out why things happened this way, but incompetence and corruption aren’t the whole story. I’m starting to feel like it’s not a matter of intelligence. That all this chaos was a bit deliberate.
After two months in the field, an eye injury allowed you to leave the front line. When did you decide to denounce and tell your story?
When I was on the front, I already had this idea that I wanted to change things. But it was once in the hospital that I decided to write the book. I gathered the notes I had taken on my phone. I pasted them into a single file and created a PDF which was uploaded in July, first on VKontakte [le Facebook russe] and then copied and reposted on other platforms.
Were you aware of the risks?
100% right from the start. Sometimes I felt like I was doing something suicidal, but I kept going, even though I knew I could be in serious trouble. I knew I could go to jail for discrediting the Russian military, getting quietly murdered. But I had a small hope of causing a reaction in society and that’s why I stayed a few more weeks in Russia after the publication. I had received support in my personal discussions, but very few wanted to support me publicly. I finally understood that I had to prepare to flee.
You were one of the few in Russia to publicly denounce the absurdity of this war. How do you explain it?
In Russian society in general, there are more and more mechanisms of repression, more sophisticated, more effective, and there is more and more control over the various spheres of life in society, while respect citizens’ rights is gradually deteriorating. I think for a lot of people it has become a habit. This is why there are fewer people who are ready to act or react.
A new offensive by the Russian army is announced with 300,000 or 350,000 recruits mobilized in September. Is it, in your opinion, that the Russian victory depends on numbers?
I don’t think they intend to win by numbers. Of those 350,000, I think 150,000 were taken to plug holes in existing “regular” units. The others were distributed in the second and third line. At least 100,000 of those 150,000 never saw combat. If they are trained, it is perhaps the only force that can effectively join the front and be useful. But is it enough? It is not the number that can change the situation in favor of Russia. It should not be forgotten that the Ukrainian army is now comparable in size to the Russian army. They have reservations. I don’t see the logic of attacking in a foreign country with forces that are one-to-one. Yes, the Russian army can recover a village here, a pocket there. But that will not radically change the course of the war. What can radically change the course of the war is if Russia uses nuclear weapons or if other countries go to war alongside Ukraine, which would change the balance of power in a significant way. .
That is for the future of the conflict. And your future, how do you foresee it?
I try not to think about it too much. It’s so indefinite it’s hard to say. I submitted my asylum application file to France. But I know we can wait years for an answer. But I don’t think that by moving here, I did anything useful for myself. I suffered more than gained. I did not derive any material benefits. It’s only my moral compass telling me that I probably made the right choice. I have no documents, no possibility of working. I don’t speak the language. Even the rights to my book are suspended because a crook tried to take it. I am in a rather precarious situation. I’m wearing a nice white shirt today, but I’m actually having a lot of trouble…