Former CIA Analyst Says Zelensky Could Face Military Coup Soon

I’ve long been saying that it’s shocking that the Ukraine people are willing to continue dying in these numbers, and it’s shocking that there is not some kind of revolt.

It seems like if they were going to do it, they would have done it already.

RT:

Failures on the battlefield could push the Ukrainian military to move against President Vladimir Zelensky, retired CIA analyst Larry Johnson has said.

“Zelensky very well could be ousted in a coup within the next three to four weeks, because of the great disgruntlement among troops on the eastern front,” Johnson told Redacted host Clayton Morris in an interview posted over the weekend.

This seems ambitious.

So far, none of these predictions have come true – on either side.

Obviously, the left has made the more insane predictions, constantly saying “the Ukraine is on the verge of taking Crimea” and so on. But the right-wing predictions have not really been much better, constantly predicting the Ukraine will collapse.

In some ways, we’re already entering into a “frozen conflict” type situation. The line is static and no one is really doing anything.

Ukraine’s grand offensive in Zaporozhye, launched in early June with Western-trained troops and NATO-supplied tanks and armored vehicles, has failed to achieve a breakthrough anywhere. Additional brigades, intended to exploit the intended breach, have been deployed to continue the frontal attacks instead, to the point that the US and its allies are publicly airing their frustrations with Ukrainian tactics.

…

Johnson told Redacted that the way the conflict is going, Ukraine’s survival as a country was “in great doubt.” Kiev is already entirely dependent on the West, and its needs will only grow while its capabilities will continue to shrink, the former CIA official said.

The US strategy for the conflict was to trap Russia in an unwinnable war and induce regime change in Moscow, according to Johnson. Instead, “that’s going to happen to Ukraine,” and Washington will have to figure out how to “back away” from the conflict, because it has massively underestimated Russia’s economic and military strength.

Russian talk shows have consistently taken a favorable stance towards Valery Zaluzny, the head of the Ukraine military. I always assumed this was because they expected him to either lead a coup, or to be put in charge of the Ukraine post-war.

It’s sort of obvious at this point that the only way the Ukraine is going to be able to stay together as a rump state when this war is over is under military rule. Military governments tend to be practical, rather than ideological. They are less reliant on narratives.

It’s unclear what kind of narrative Zelensky could even have after surrendering in this war. He would eventually have to admit that hundreds of thousands of young (and, in fact, middle-aged) men were sent to die, and the whole country was destroyed, with tens of millions displaced, for literally no reason. So for Zelensky’s part, it now makes logical sense that he needs this to keep going.

That said, Zelensky has been looking incredibly exhausted. He is drunk/high all the time, he’s getting fat, he looks angry and confused as he slurs his speech. And he has untold billions of dollars in offshore accounts. So, I think if there was a real threat of a coup, he would probably flee to Israel.

It feels like something is going to have to happen. The lines have not changed at all since June, while the Ukraine has lost tens of thousands of troops and who knows how many billions in equipment. At some point, the Ukraine military is going to be depleted enough that Russia is going to be able to make a serious push, either on Odessa or Kharkov (probably the latter, it seems).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dMmbf5rD2U

For a long time, it’s felt like the Biden Administration – at least Jake Sullivan – had a plan to just keep this going until after the 2024 election, at which point they would turn it into a real war.

But then, if that was the plan, why would they do this suicidal “offensive” right now? They could do it a year from now, and then say “well, the Ukraine is losing, so we have to send in the troops.”

Despite the fact that it always feels like nothing is really happening with this war, I think when you’re talking about a year and a half in the future, something will have happened. Again, if they wouldn’t have done this offensive, the Ukraine could have just dug in like Russia is dug in, and it would effectively be a deadlock. But the Ukraine has burned through most of their population at this point.