Ben Hodges, former Commanding General of US Army Europe

Retired General Ben Hodges attends international forums carrying a briefcase with a map of southern Ukraine, where he marks positions and draws arrows around Crimea. He brought it with him to Prague for the GLOBSEC security forum, and Ukrinform began its conversation with the retired General by discussing Crimea.

CRIMEA IS THE MOST IMPORTANT PLACE, THE KEY POINT OF THIS WAR

– Ukraine has been actively taking out Russian air defense systems in Crimea and striking important military targets across the peninsula. Is this preparation?

– I still believe that Crimea is the most important terrain or geography for this war. And that the side which controls Crimea is going to win the war. And I cannot imagine the war ending with Russia in control of Crimea and that being a long-term sustainable peace. Because as long as Russia controls Crimea, Ukraine will never be able to get up in the Azov Sea or do the rebuild of Mariupol or Berdiansk. And then of course Russia could still disrupt shipping coming out of Odesa or Mykolaiv, for example. So, Crimea has to be sorted.

Now, to me, this is going to be a little bit simplistic, but there is kind of the first phase or the first step to the liberation of Crimea is to isolate it. To cut that road that goes to Dzhankoi, to destroy the bridge. So, isolate it.

And then number two, and this goes to the point of your good question, is make it untenable, unusable for the Russians. I mean, Ukraine now has the capability to hit every square meter of Crimea. You have precision strikes that can reach everywhere. And there is no mystery about where the Russians are, where the airfields are, where the navy is, whatever they still have, logistics. It is all there. So, you just keep pounding that so that the Russians realize they cannot stay there. There is no use in Crimea for the Russians there.

The longer, harder part is how do you get them to leave and then get Ukrainian troops onto it. And I think this will come as part of the overall effort using long-range precision capabilities to destroy Russia's oil and gas infrastructure. As that becomes increasingly degraded, it becomes increasingly difficult for Russia to even continue the war.

– At the beginning of the full-scale war, we dreamed of destroying the Kerch Bridge. Now that Russia has a land corridor, how important does this illegal structure remain? Would its destruction now be more symbolic in nature?”

– Well, the land corridor we are talking about is that road that connects to Dzhankoi. And now, I mean I just watched a video this morning of a drone flying up and down, so already Ukrainian forces are able to begin to disrupt or target anything using that road. For the bridge, this is where I would absolutely trust the Ukrainian General Staff to have a solution for the when and the how. That Kerch bridge is already damaged and weakened in some way. That is a vulnerability, but it also has this enormous psychological impact. And as long as that bridge is there, it is like a... even after a peace is finally agreed somehow, that is an obstacle to Ukraine being able to go up in and out of Azov.

RUSSIAN OIL REFINERIES MUST BE ATTACKED AGAIN AND AGAIN

– Deep strikes. Ukraine is demonstrating impressive results, hitting targets beyond the Urals. And this is with its own production. Does Ukraine need Western, in particular American, weapons in such a situation? And what can we hope for? The Tomahawk topic seems to have been completely removed from the agenda.

- Well, first of all, even Ukraine does not have enough. I mean look, the United States, we are running out of weapons against Iran. So, you do not want enough, you want more than enough. And you know, every commander always has to prioritize what targets do you want to hit because nobody has enough to hit everything.

So, I would say that is there something that the West could be doing? Yes. Invest in Ukraine's defense industry. While Ukraine has developed very good capability, there is not enough. I mean these refineries that you know we see on fire every week, that is important, but you have to re-attack over and over, because otherwise, the Russians eventually repair the refinery and get it going again. So, I would say any investment that increases the scale.

– European countries are already investing, but the Americans are not very active yet. Why? Why is America somehow reluctant to engage in any deep cooperation?

– I do not know. This has been very frustrating that the Trump administration, a Republican administration, does not see Russia as the enemy, as the bad guy. How can that be? I mean after decades of Republicans always being the strong defense, anti-Soviet, anti-Russian, now we have a United States administration that is... seems to be pro-Kremlin. I cannot explain it, except that this is the mindset of Trump and his... President Trump and his enablers. And they have persuaded a lot of other people. But I cannot explain why.

And this is why I think it is important that your government, your leadership seems to have said, "Okay, well we are going to do this without the United States then. We have to do it without the United States." And Europe increasingly seems to understand and appreciate that Europe's security comes from Ukrainian success. So, why this is not such an obvious opportunity for the United States to help ensure European security for generations by helping Ukraine defeat Russia...

– The State Department just a few days ago approved the sale of $100 million worth of ammunition and HAWK systems to Ukraine. So some assistance is still ongoing…

– Yeah, well you know, I think... of course, I do not know all the thinking behind that, but you know, this is a business transaction. And I can imagine... I mean, I think there is a business component to that, but I can also imagine that the administration can see, even if they do not admit it yet, they can see that the tide has changed in the war. And they are going to want to begin to... when it is all said and done and Ukraine has won this war, the United States, this administration, would like to be, "Hey, we helped too. Part of the victory."

RUSSIA MADE A MISTAKE BY GOING AGAINST THE UKRAINIAN PEOPLE

– If we talk about weapons, is there anything that could be sort of game-changer, like, for example, the HIMARS afore?

– Two capabilities that I think are super important are the long-range precision. So, I do not like to talk about specific weapons, I prefer to talk about capability. Long range. Alright, so long-range precision, so more than one thousand kilometers in lots of quantity. And then the second thing, of course, is the air and missile defense to protect innocent Ukrainians who are getting killed every night from Russian drones and missiles. So, long range and air defense.

– Russia announced a successful test of the Sarmat missile. And at their "pedestrian" parade they showed a film about laser weapons. Do you believe it?

– Generally speaking, I do not believe anything that comes out of the Kremlin or their Ministry of Defense. But I mean, of course, the Russians still have capability. They so far do not have the capability to defeat Ukraine, but they still are capable of developing weapon systems that are dangerous, they are a problem.

But you know their approach, this focusing so much energy and capability on bombing civilians, is not going to achieve a decisive outcome. It never in World War Two, bombing of civilian populations did not achieve... we did it to the Germans and the Japanese, the Germans did it to the British, that does not win the war. They did it to the North Vietnamese, bombed the hell out of them, did not... we still lost. So, I think Russia has made a mistake going after Ukrainian population and even going after the power grid did not achieve a decisive effect.

THERE IS NO BENEFIT FOR RUSSIA TO USE A NUCLEAR WEAPON

– We see that Putin has been escalating lately. Do you think it's because he feels cornered?

– Well, he has... I do not think he has any incentive to stop. I mean there is no retirement plan for a dictator like Vladimir Putin. He cannot say, "You know, I am tired, I want to go to Sochi and just spend the rest of my time with grandchildren or you know hanging out with friends." No, because he knows he is going to get killed.

So, he has no incentive to just go into retirement. He needs this war to keep going until... to stay in power. And he has ruined Russia, he has ruined Russia's reputation, he has ruined his own military. And he has driven off most of Russia's customers for oil and gas, and so he has got to somehow keep it going to stay in power.

So, no, I do not think he feels in a corner yet. And we... we should quit worrying about that. We, the West... I hear people say, "Oh, he needs an off-ramp." No, he has an off-ramp. He can pull out. He has an off-ramp. It is not the job of the West to give him a way to get out of this mess he has created and which has caused so much damage. I think now the West should be committed to helping Ukraine defeat Russia, which means, you know, back to the 1991 borders.

– If he senses that this is a stalemate, could he resort to nuclear weapons in desperation? The Russians and the Belarusians have just conducted maneuvers. Is this cause for concern?

– Look, I think this is all part of the information operations. You know, this is not the first time they have done something with Belarus, so they have announced you know these things because they see that most of us or most governments are terrified of the idea of a nuclear war. And you cannot dismiss it because Russia clearly has thousands of nuclear warheads and they clearly do not care how many innocent people get killed, even their own. So, it would not be a moral decision for them.

But there is no benefit for Russia to use a nuclear weapon for Russians, the only benefit is the threat. Because they see that we, the Biden administration for example, hesitated, would never say we want Ukraine to win because they were worried about a nuclear war. And so that is why I think when they say they do a big exercise, it is just to remind everybody, "Hey, we have nuclear weapons."

And what is interesting is the countries that would be most affected by a nuclear are the least worried about it. The ones that are further away seem to be the ones that worry the most about it.

NO WAR CRIMINAL SHOULD BE ABLE TO REST AND ENJOY THEIR RETIREMENT

– The Commander of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, General Syrsky, said that we are moving to an asymmetric war strategy. How do you interpret this?

– Well, by going after Russia's oil and gas infrastructure, to me that is an aspect of it that you know it is... they are not just out there hammering each other on the battlefield, although that is obviously a part of it. But the fact that Ukraine has destroyed the Black Sea Fleet or made it almost irrelevant. The fact that Ukraine has stopped Russian ground operations with this famous kill zone. And the fact that Ukraine has increased its ability and quality of its weapons production of all types.

You have... it looks to me as an outsider that Ukraine has now developed a theory of victory, which is destruction of Russia's oil and gas export capability. Which I think makes it very, very difficult for Russia to sustain the war. So, that is the asymmetric part, one aspect of it.

Now, of course, the Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR) is... has proven to be so good. And what they have been able to do to go after... let me say it differently: every Russian general that is anywhere in the chain of command responsible for war crimes or any of these other things that they have been doing for the rest of their life is going to be looking over their shoulder and checking under their car because they know that the Main Intelligence Directorate is out there. Just like the Mossad goes after Palestinian leadership or terrorist leadership, Hezbollah, or the way that they went after the Nazis that tried to escape after the war. That is what the Intelligence Directorate is doing. And I think that is powerful. None of these people should ever be able to rest and enjoy their retirement for the war crimes they committed.

– You meet a lot of people, politicians, experts. Is there any discussion about pressure from the West, from the United States, from Europe on Ukraine to stop destroying Russian oil facilities in order to somehow stabilize energy prices?

– I have heard some bits and pieces of that, but I do not see it as a big... as a big thing. I mean, the Trump administration of course has been kind of weak on easing sanctions on Russia's oil and gas exports. But I think that Ukraine has to do what is best for itself. What is the best way to defeat Russia is making it so that Russia cannot export oil and gas to China, India, Türkiye or anywhere else.

Olha Tanasiichuk, Prague

Photos provided by the author