Friday, July 11, 2025

Polaris of Enlightenment

American Colonel: “Ukraine a collapsed state”

The war in Ukraine

  • The war in Ukraine has been catastrophic for the Ukrainian people in general and for the Ukrainian army in particular, says the decorated American Colonel Douglas Macgregor, former advisor to the Pentagon.
  • He estimates that as many as 400,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in the battles, while Russia, in comparison, has had minimal losses and has now mobilized up to a million soldiers at the front.
  • The responsibility for the war lies primarily with the US, he says, pointing out that the war could have been easily avoided if they had been willing to accept a neutral Ukraine.
Published 16 October 2023
– By Editorial Staff
Colonel Douglas Macgregor in an interview with Tucker Carlson.
7 minute read

Douglas Macgregor, educated at the prestigious West Point, is a highly decorated, now retired, colonel who among other things served as one of the leading commanders in the Gulf War and was one of the planners of NATO’s bombing campaign in Yugoslavia in 1999. His philosophy on modern warfare is said to have influenced the overarching American strategy during the invasion of Iraq in 2003, and he has also served as an advisor to the Pentagon. In relation to the Ukraine war, however, Macgregor has become widely known to the public for his detailed and candid analyses, which offer a different perspective on the proceedings and the situation than what is presented in mainstream media reports.

According to the colonel’s overall analysis, the conflict primarily stems from a reluctance on the part of the West to accept Ukraine’s neutrality. He has drawn parallels between Russia’s reactions to Ukraine’s approach to NATO and the American reactions during the transportation of Soviet missiles to Cuba during the Cuban Crisis. Initially, according to Macgregor, the Russian invasion forces consisted of a limited army of about 40,000 troops, a modest force by military standards intended to shock Ukraine and its Western allies in a final desperate attempt to get them back to the negotiating table. The demands were neutrality for Ukraine, autonomy for the Donbass republics, and recognition of Crimea’s annexation to Russia.

– From the very beginning, Putin and his advisors were never interested in a war with NATO or the U.S. That’s why you’ve had so much incrementalism, this slow grind of movement forward. Defensive operations for a long period of time to build up force, and then continued offensive operations, he says in an interview with Tucker Carlson.

Such a peace agreement, according to Israel’s then-Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, was very close to being reached during the negotiations in Istanbul in March 2022. However, after pressure from the US and UK, Ukraine withdrew from the negotiations at a late stage, prompting Russia to make a strategic retreat from the Kiev region and focus on taking control of most of the predominantly Russian-speaking areas in the southeast, where they established defensive lines.

– If they had made peace back in March or April, I think the Russians would have retained very little territory, probably Luhansk and Donetsk, the two so called breakaway provinces and I think there had been guarantees for neutrality of Ukraine, and guarantess of equal rights before the law for Russians. That’s what people don’t understand, most of this has to do with abuse meated out to Russians in Ukraine, by the Ukrainian government, summarizes Macgregor, pointing out that the government in question was essentially installed by the USA following the Maidan coup in the country in 2014.

“A disaster for Ukraine”

The sizeable Ukrainian army, which at the outset was estimated by some to be almost ten times the size of the Russian forces, has since then launched an offensive in a devastating manner, according to Macgregor, while Russia primarily operated from a favorable defensive position and in the meantime gradually mobilized up to a million soldiers.

Macgregor in conversation with senior Israeli military officers, March 2020. Photo: Share Alike 4.0 International.

Since the start of the war, NATO and the collective Western world, including Sweden, with the USA in the driver’s seat, have pumped in military aid amounting to trillions in Swedish kronor. Despite this, the Ukrainian army has never really had a chance, Macgregor argues. He estimates that as many as 400,000 Ukrainian soldiers have lost their lives in the battles, referring, among other things, to analyses of newly dug graves in satellite images. Meanwhile, he believes, Russian casualties can be estimated to be only a fraction of Ukraine’s – around 50,000 killed in action.

This inhumanity cannot be stressed enough, as the wounds Ukrainian soldiers sustain on the battlefield are injuries most of them will never recover from. We don’t know how many people have already been disabled, but we’re talking about tens of thousands. I’ve heard some say 70,000, others 60,000. It’s insane. They stand no chance of winning, he expresses.

The explanation for Russia’s extreme advantage despite its smaller force initially, according to the colonel, is not just that it’s a much larger country, but primarily that they have developed a modernized form of warfare that mainly relies on advanced space surveillance and extensive artillery support. In practice, the Ukrainian army has had very poor conditions to defend itself, even though it has closely cooperated with the USA. In contrast to the general media portrayal that’s still broadcast on many state channels, he believes the situation for Zelensky’s administration is overall desperate.

Even more money being thrown down a rat hole when he absolutely has no chance of winning – which he never did, and his government is really unpopular in Ukraine. They’re gathering people off the streets, going to the Carpathians, looking for any living person they can find there. They want NATO’s governments to round up Ukrainian men of draft age and send them back to Ukraine to die in the Russian meat grinder, says Macgregor.

“A collapsed state”

Macgregor has long been deeply critical of the US support for the Ukrainian leadership in Kiev and emphasizes that those who have suffered the most from the policy and the failing diplomacy in the end have been the Ukrainian people. He notes that Ukraine has effectively been shattered and that many millions have left the country, seeing it as unlikely that these will return to any significant extent.

Douglas Macgregor interviewed by Tucker Carlson. Photo: facsimile/X.

– The longer this goes on, the more people are senselessly slaughtered and the destruction of Ukraine becomes even greater. Ukraine is now effectively a collapsed state and may be completely erased from the map, he says.

According to Macgregor, Russia, in sharp contrast to the general media image, has made great efforts to minimize civilian casualties. This is partly because the population in the territories where they have operated is largely ethnically Russian and because they also view Ukrainians as a fraternal people. He also points to this as one of the reasons for reports that more and more Ukrainian soldiers have surrendered to the Russian army when they could no longer fight.

– The Soviet army was an exercise in barbarity and brutality, mass rapes and all that. That’s not Russia today. It’s a very different society and state, Macgregor argues.

Rather, according to the colonel, from the Western side, they have not at all had the best interests of the Ukrainian people in mind, where cynical geopolitical motives come into play. His support for Ukraine is largely based on a stubborn hostility towards Russia stemming from Vladimir Putin’s administration, unlike predecessor Boris Yeltsin, managing to establish the country as an independent state with a traditional Orthodox Christian culture. This is something the ruling oligarchy in the West disapproves of as it poses a barrier to accessing Russia’s vast natural resources and is also perceived as a growing threat to their power position in Europe.

It’s probably another reason why so many want to destroy Russia, for it’s the last European state that hasn’t been overrun by foreigners and turned into some sort of polyglot experiment, he adds.

From the American perspective, Ukraine has been seen as a strategic power base and battering ram that they’ve done everything to turn against Russia. Macgregor, for instance, points out that the US, according to recordings of Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, handpicked the Ukrainian government after the coup in connection with the Maidan revolution, when the neutrally oriented president Viktor Yanukovych was overthrown.

“We don’t need Ukraine in NATO”

Macgregor points out that the negotiating room has shrunk significantly for the US-led block and Ukraine since the outbreak of the war.

– The Russians have a series of demands – which at the beginning of the war were suggestions – and Ukraine and the West seem unwilling to consider any of them. Ukraine will not join NATO, period. So Ukraine can remain neutral.

We don’t need Ukraine in NATO. Ukraine as a neutral state is actually a wonderful idea. That’s almost 500 miles between us and the Russians. Is that a bad thing? Not at all.

As part of the effort to stop the war, Douglas Macgregor recently launched the civil rights movement Our Country Our Choice. An initiative across current party lines aimed at uniting the American population and strengthening public opinion against the war in general and the US’s involvement in particular.

 

– Whatever we have set out to achieve has failed, what we need to do now is stop this and come to a settlement that we might not like but it needs to happen and soon, before this thing is out of control, says the colonel, who, however, does not see any signs of interest in peace negotiations from the Western-Ukrainian side, despite the dire situation.

The people bathing in blood are in Kiev and Washington, not in Moscow. This sort of thing is gonna play well until it can’t. We’re gonna see this whole thing collaps and implode, it’s coming, Macgregor states.

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Ukraine reports record civilian casualties in June

The war in Ukraine

Published today 7:27
– By Editorial Staff
The number of civilian casualties continues to rise on both sides in the Ukraine war. The image shows victims of a Russian shelling attack against the Kharkiv region in northeastern Ukraine in June this year.
3 minute read

The number of civilian casualties in Ukraine reached its highest level since 2022 during June 2025, according to a new report from the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in the country. At least 232 civilians were killed and 1,343 injured during the month – figures that testify to a dramatic escalation in how the war affects the civilian population.

The UN report shows that Russia conducted 10 times more missile attacks during June 2025 compared to the same month the previous year. The attacks hit 16 regions in Ukraine, including the capital Kiev, and caused deaths and injuries far from the front lines.

“Civilians across Ukraine are facing levels of suffering we have not seen in over three years”, says Danielle Bell, head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine.

According to the report, almost half of all civilian casualties were caused by missiles and aerial bombs in densely populated areas. Meanwhile, short-range drone attacks continued to kill and injure civilians near the front lines.

Targets of the Russian attacks

Based on reports from the conflict, Russian attacks primarily target energy infrastructure such as power plants, gas storage facilities, and power lines. Russia has systematically attacked Ukraine’s energy supply in an attempt to paralyze the country, with over 2,400 attacks on energy facilities since February 2022.

Military recruitment centers and other strategic targets have also been subject to Russian attacks. The Russian Defense Ministry often justifies attacks on energy and fuel facilities by claiming they are used by the Ukrainian military.

Despite these facilities potentially having military significance, the civilian population is severely affected when they are attacked. Civilian casualties occur both from direct hits and from debris from downed missiles when Ukrainian air defenses respond.

Several of the civilian deaths have occurred in nighttime attacks on the capital Kiev, where attacks were previously uncommon. During massive attacks during the night against Thursday in the Kiev region that lasted almost ten hours, Russian forces used 397 Shahed drones and 18 missiles against Ukrainian targets. At least two people were killed and 22 injured in that attack on Kyiv.

Woman who became a victim of heavy Russian bombing in northeastern Ukraine on June 7 this year.

Sharp increase during 2025

The total number of civilian deaths and injuries during the first half of 2025 is 6,754 people, which is 54 percent more compared to the same period in 2024. During the first six months of 2025, the number of civilian deaths increased by 17 percent and injuries by 64 percent.

Since the war broke out on February 24, 2022, the UN monitoring mission has registered at least 13,580 civilian deaths, including 716 children. Additionally, 34,115 injured civilians were reported, including 2,173 children.

The UN monitoring mission warns that the actual figures for civilian casualties may be significantly higher than what is reported, given the challenges and time required for adequate verification of all deaths and injuries.

“No place in Ukraine is completely safe”

Danielle Bell from the UN monitoring mission has previously warned: “Almost half of the civilian casualties over the past three months have died far away from the front lines. We can conclude that no place in Ukraine is completely safe”.

No peace is yet in sight in the over three-year-long armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine that continues with Western involvement.

Russia now allows foreigners in the military

The war in Ukraine

Published yesterday 9:39
– By Editorial Staff
Vladimir Putin with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic.
1 minute read

Non-Russian citizens will now be allowed to enlist in the military, according to a law signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The state-run Russian news agency Tass reports that the new law enables stateless persons and foreigners to sign contracts and serve in the Russian military until the end of the mobilization period, the lifting of the state of emergency, or the end of martial law in Russia.

The law is said to have been expedited “in order to take urgent additional measures to restaff the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation” according to the explanation in the legal document.

Slovakia urges West to engage in dialogue with Russia

The new cold war

Published 2 July 2025
– By Editorial Staff
Slovak Deputy Prime Minister Juraj Blanar believes that Western leaders must use diplomacy and dialogue to end the war.
2 minute read

Slovakia’s Foreign Minister Juraj Blanar believes that the war in Ukraine cannot be decided on the battlefield. Instead, he urges the Western world to seek a peaceful solution through direct dialogue with Russia – and warns that continued tensions could lead to a catastrophic large-scale war between NATO and Moscow.

– We do not want a war between Russia and NATO to break out, because that would be the Third World War. We want the conflict to be settled peacefully, Blanar said during a discussion program on Slovak public broadcaster STVR last Sunday.

Blanar emphasized the importance of diplomacy and called for a return to “respect for international law”. He also suggested that the Western world should seek ways to renew contact with Moscow – “and perhaps even forgive everything that has happened”.

Slovakia, like Hungary, has consistently pushed for de-escalation of the conflict and opposed additional EU sanctions against Russia.

The country’s president Peter Pellegrini has also urged EU member states to resume direct talks with Moscow and has simultaneously rejected demands for rapid military buildup within NATO, arguing that defense spending should reflect each country’s own priorities – rather than concerns about Russia.

Russia demands Ukrainian neutrality

Russian officials have condemned the US-led bloc’s decision last week that member countries should raise their defense budgets to 5 percent of GDP – a measure that NATO says will deter the “long-term threat posed by Russia to Euro-Atlantic security”.

The Kremlin has repeatedly stated that it has no intentions of attacking any NATO country and has called the accusations “nonsense” – a scare tactic that, according to Moscow, is used by the West to legitimize increased defense spending.

Moscow states that it seeks a diplomatic solution to the Ukraine war, and Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that a lasting agreement must include recognition of the actual situation “on the ground”, as well as Ukrainian neutrality.

According to Putin, contacts between Moscow and Kyiv are being maintained regarding a possible third round of peace negotiations. Previous talks have been held in Turkey, where the parties have exchanged draft peace proposals and carried out several prisoner exchanges.

Majority of Ukrainians want peace through compromise

The war in Ukraine

Published 1 July 2025
– By Editorial Staff
It was previously often claimed that Russia would be defeated on the battlefield - today the picture is different, and more voices are advocating for peace through negotiations instead.
2 minute read

A majority of Ukraine’s population now indicates they are willing to accept compromises or make concessions to end the war with Russia.

This is shown in a new opinion poll conducted by the Ukrainian think tank Janus Institute for Strategic Studies and Forecasts, the polling institute SOCIS Centre for Social and Marketing Research, and the publication Barometer of Public Opinion, which compiles and disseminates opinion data.

According to the survey, 55.7 percent of respondents now support a solution through compromise with the involvement of international leaders. An additional 16.6 percent advocate for a temporary freezing of the war, with a ceasefire along the current line of contact.

Photo: facsimile/socis.kiev.ua

In total, this means that over 70 percent of respondents are open to some form of settlement or pause in the hostilities.

Meanwhile, 12.8 percent want to continue the war until Ukraine’s borders from 1991 are restored, while 8.6 percent indicate they prefer continued fighting until the borders from February 23, 2022 – the day before the Russian invasion began – are restored.

1.2 percent chose another option, and 5 percent of respondents refused to answer or could not take a position.

Photo: facsimile/socis.kiev.ua

The survey also shows that 57.6 percent believe elections should be held in Ukraine if peace negotiations with Russia lead to a temporary cessation of hostilities and an end to the state of war.

The opinion poll was conducted between June 6-11, 2025, and included 2,000 respondents aged 18 and older who were interviewed in person across Ukraine. The survey did not include residents in temporarily occupied areas or in areas where active fighting was ongoing at the time of data collection. The statistical margin of error is stated as ±2.6 percent.

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