Putin fears Russian military commanders will get too much power – diplomat Bryza

This was stated by the US diplomat Matthew Bryza in an interview on Espreso TV.

He noted that the Armed Forces of Ukraine drove the Russian Federation into a dead end in Bakhmut and forced them to give in. The Russian Federation is in disarray at the highest level: Yevgeny Prigozhin threatens to withdraw mercenaries from the city, offers to tell the Ukrainian Armed Forces about the location of the Russians, according to the Washington Post.

"That is an act of treason that ordinarily could be punished by death. Putin is letting this happen or either he's letting it happen because maybe he's afraid of his military commanders getting too much power or he can't control Prigozhin. In either case it looks like there's massive disarray around Putin and that then leaves me to believe that he just doesn't know what to do. Putin is stuck in Ukraine. He cannot win. All he can do is send more Russian men to their deaths as cannon fodder in the hope that the United States and its European allies are going to run out of their own will to keep supporting Ukraine's brave soldiers by providing so much military assistance," said Matthew Bryza.

The diplomat added that Russia has no strategy, but only Vladimir Putin's desire to continue fighting against Ukraine.

"Now of course, we know the war is quite popular in Russia, but then how free are people to express their views? And when will the economic pain that Russia is experiencing change perceptions across Russia's Society? Russians are famous for being able to suffer a lot but the elites of Russia have grown used to a certain standard of living and that's gone and maybe forever, and at some point there's a threshold at which the brittle regime of Vladimir Putin breaks," he emphasized.

• On May 19, Ukraine's Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said that Russian forces had lost about 70,000 killed and wounded in their attempts to capture Bakhmut.