Zaluzhnyi tells what is needed to break deadlock in war with Russia

The general said this in an interview with the Economist.

Zaluzhnyi thought that the losses would force the Russian dictator to negotiate.

"That was my mistake. Russia has lost at least 150,000 dead. In any other country such casualties would have stopped the war," he said.

Zaluzhnyi expected the Ukrainian Armed Forces to reach Crimea in 4 months during the counteroffensive, but Russian troops were well prepared.

"If you look at NATO’s textbooks and at the maths which we did, four months should have been enough time for us to have reached Crimea," the general said.

Instead, Ukrainian troops ran into dense minefields, and their Western equipment was covered by artillery and drones.

"First I thought there was something wrong with our commanders, so I changed some of them. Then I thought maybe our soldiers are not fit for purpose, so I moved soldiers in some brigades," said Zaluzhnyi.

However, these changes did not help to gain an advantage on the battlefield, the general noted. According to him, the Ukrainian Armed Forces are burning enemy equipment and trying to catch up with the fleeing soldiers with drones. But the enemy is doing the same.

"The simple fact is that we see everything the enemy is doing and they see everything we are doing. In order for us to break this deadlock we need something new, like the gunpowder which the Chinese invented and which we are still using to kill each other," Zaluzhny said.

He emphasized that the decisive factor will be not one new invention, but the combination of all the technical solutions that are already available.

"We need to use the power inherent in new technologies," the general summarized.

Zaluzhnyi also noted that Russia's war against Ukraine could enter a new dangerous stage and pointed out the priority directions that would help to prevent this.