Russian army offensive in eastern Ukraine “will be very violent, because the Russian army can no longer retreat”, said Wednesday April 6 on franceinfo General Dominique Trinquand, former head of the French military mission to the UN, while the bombardments continue in eastern Ukraine. The Ukrainian authorities have asked the populations to evacuate these regions. According to General Dominique Trinquand, we entered “the third stage” of the war. But he does not believe that Vladimir Putin wants to invade the whole country. The Russian Army “does not have the means to conquer Ukraine.”
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franceinfo: There is talk of an imminent major offensive in the east of the country. Does this worry you? What to expect?
Dominique Trinquand: The first thing is that it was predictable. Ten days ago, the Russian general staff specified that it was going to concentrate its efforts on the Donbass. That’s what he did. He withdrew troops, especially from the north, so that he could concentrate all efforts on Donbass. So expect a major attack. The Ukrainian government is right to evacuate the population immediately because this is going to be an old world war with artillery and gunfire everywhere.
Can we speak of a change of tactics on the Russian side?
Yes, completely. We are in the third phase. The first phase was the surprise take by kyiv, which didn’t work. After two days we noticed it. Then it was the attack on four different fronts: the North, Kharkiv, Donbass and the South. And the only place where it has progressed is towards the South and the Donbass. It is the reinforcement of what was considered a success by the Russians. So that seems like a normal strategy to me. This does not mean that the bombardments will stop elsewhere, but it does mean that all Russian forces will be concentrated on this part so that President Putin can declare a victory after the capture of Mariupol and perhaps a reconquest of a part of the Donbass.
According to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, Russian President Vladimir Putin has not given up on his desire to take over all of Ukraine. And the war is likely to last for months, even years. Is that your opinion?
Maybe President Putin can think about it. But he absolutely does not have the means to take over Ukraine and he knows it. So that means that if he wins a victory by conquering the territories between Crimea and Donbass, he will be able to claim victory, perhaps provisionally, to start negotiations and perhaps to wage another war in five years, as has been the case in Donbass. I remember that eight years ago, there was a first war. We are on the second.
The NATO secretary general also says that there is no indication that Vladimir Putin has changed his goal of controlling all of Ukraine.
I don’t know what indication the Secretary General of NATO has. You only have to see the attrition of the Russian army and the few reserves it has to realize that it does not have the means to conquer and even less to occupy Ukraine.
“Russia mustered about 200,000 men, a considerable force, to invade Ukraine. They lost 20% of them in three weeks.”
Dominique Trinquandat franceinfo
And today, when we see the forces that it is concentrating for its major offensive in the Donbass, it is obliged to go and find forces that have already been engaged for five weeks, which have lost 20% of their potential, to get reservists, to get Syrian fighters, Wagner fighters from Libya, to get forces that are currently in the Pacific. So, we can see that all this is a bit of a DIY to get there. This does not mean that today, the objective he has set himself, ie the Donbass, he cannot conquer. But the conquest of the Ukraine seems totally illusory to me.
Does this offensive promise to be more violent than what the Ukrainians have experienced since the start of the war?
Yes, it’s going to be very, very violent, because there, the Russian army can’t back down any longer. We have seen that in kyiv, she realized her limits and she left, saying that in the end, that was not her goal. But that is clearly his goal. So she can’t go back. So no matter what, by hammering every inch of Donbass terrain, it will conquer ruins, but it will conquer Donbass. And the Ukrainian army has two major risks. The first is that the forces which are in contact on the Donbass can be turned by forces which come from the North. The second is simply to get destroyed on the spot. This is going to be an extremely violent fight.