From Bloomberg News and iHeartRadio. It's the big tag. I'm west Kosova today. A devastating year of war in Ukraine. February twenty fourth marks one year since Russia invaded Ukraine. In a televised speech at the time, President Vladimir Putin described the attack not as the start of a war, but what he called a special military operation. We're putting it to dust. Putin and his general's anticipated Ukraine's army would fold and Russia would quickly capture Kia of the capitol.
As we've all seen. Of course, that did not happen. Ukraine's military has fought back Russia's forces against all bolts and doom and gloom scenarios. Ukraine didn't fall. Ukraine is alive and keying in Europe. In the US have provided Ukraine with guns, ammunition, and drones, and advanced missiles and tanks may soon be on the way. We will not only support financially but also empower Ukraine to make the
most of its potential. And we've given Ukraine what they needed when they needed to defend themselves and since the invasion that has result at more than twenty billion dollars in terms of security assistance. But the war has taken a terrible toll. Thousands have died, cities and homes have been destroyed, and millions of Ukrainians who fled are now living as refugees in other countries Ukraine just into Poland, and that's just in the last twelve days. Those numbers
continue to grow. This is the biggest refugee crisis Europe has faced since World Well. Soon hey on the ground, as Ukraine braces for an expected next wave of Russian attacks. I ask my colleagues Darena Krasna Lutska and Mark Champion in Kiev and ros Matheson in London to take stock of all that has happened in the past year and
what lies ahead. Dasha, after a year, I suppose one of the most important things that's happened is what hasn't happened, which is that Russia has failed in its effort to take over Ukrainian that Ukraine still stands as a nation. You're in kievd right now. Can you describe what it's like there and in the country right now? It's quite loud now on the streets when the electricity is katout
and it still happens on a daily basis. You walk on the main street that you can hear that quite loud noise from generators and also the smell is not perfect. But shops are working, he addressers are working, business is working. So in that regard, Ukrainians are fighting in every possible way. How are the Ukrainian people feeling about the state of what's happening now. It's obviously been an enormously traumatic year. We see lots of funerals now because fighting is very
swee in the eastern part of the country. But still Ukrainians are not ready to lay down their weapons and the president himself feels this desire to fight further. Ukrainians main thought is that if we allow Russia to take at least part of our land in several years, it will rebuild its forces again and it will try to seize more of our land. We saw that back in two thousand and fourteen when there was a fragile peace secret with Russia that it just resulted in a full
scale war just several years later. So this time Ukrainians are determined to regain control on all the territory and try to keep push Russia back as much as possible, if I can just add just a little bit to what Dasha was saying, I come in and out. You know, Dasha lives here the whole time. So when I was last year in October, it's kind of noticeable to me at least, is that the mood I think is a
little more sober, a little more grim. You can tell that it's been a very hard winter for the reasons that Dasha was laying out, but also you know, in October you'd just come off these two very successful counter offensives. There was quite a bit of optimism, and the main question for people was, you know, well, the winter is coming in, it will slow down, But the question was when will our next offensive be? And now coming back, it's not that people are pessimistic or that they've given
up in any sense. It's just it's more sober, more grim. And the question now is, well, you know, when exactly will the Russian offensive begin? Any answer that is it's you know, if it has begun already, it will be soon, and you know we're going to need to survive that before we get our turn. So that's the main thing
that has struck me in recent months. Can you give a sense of right now, how much of Ukraine is occupied by Russian forces, how much of it is in the control of Russian forces, and how much is in Ukraine's firm hands. It's hard to estimate because obviously we need to rely on official data. What Ukraine regained. It seems to me that at least what the official information is, and that's what I also hear from people I know and who are battling now in the east and in
the south. The area that Ukraine regained, they managed to build some good defensive lines. So even if Russia starts counterfensive or another offensive, it won't be that easy for them to take again, for example, Hirson under their control, or move much further in the south of Ukraine. It's around Zapurisia region. But again Russia managed to build quite strong defense lines in the area in don Bus region.
So for Ukraine, if and when it starts its contrafensive, it's going to be very difficult to advance in any of those directions that people actually expected to advance. Razzi year ago of Vladimir Putin believed his military would quickly defeat Ukraine, that Kiev would practically fall overnight, obviously that hasn't happened. How do you put in these generals get this so wrong? Well, that's an interesting question. I'm sure
Mark has some views on this. Also, because there was a lot written in the run up to the war about the fact that Russia had spent an enormous amount of money over a period of years modernizing its military. It had a very large, learned army, It was considered
to be very well trained. There was the expectation, as you say, that that even though Ukraine had had previous experience in combat, that the Russian troops would simply be superior, better organized, better equipment and so on, and the sort of mystique that came around that, and what we really saw is in fact big questions now about where did all that money go to that big Russian modernization that we all wrote about and heard about for years, Because
it certainly didn't go into training and good equipment, going by what we've seen happened on the ground in Ukraine, so certainly a lot of it was probably funneled off in corruption. Perhaps there were lots of people who just simply told the Russian president, no, no, no, the military is terrific. This will be an easy walkover for unone was prepared to tell him the reality of the state
of his own military, which had degraded. But we've seen, you know, from the action on the ground, not just sort of questions about the capacity of the troops or the equipment, but really sort of fundamental questions about the way the military is organized or organized in this case, in terms of the leadership, structure, command and control. All of it is seemed to be pretty poor. And the question is why simply has Russia not done better for a phrase on the ground. But I'm sure Mark has
some observations about that too. Yeah, I think that's that's all right, you know, And if you had to prioritize, you know, because I mean a lot of people in a lot of militaries outside Russia and Ukraine have been, you know, working pretty hard to figure this out because it really matters, you know, it really matters whether the Russians just sort of messed up this time or whether there's something seriously wrong with the way that they fight
with the equipment they have, and that changes everybody's calculations. And I think for a lot of analysts and you know, sort of defense ministries and so on. The tendency is to say, well, the number one reason why they did so poorly was really down to Putin and his immediate entourage, who directed the plan and for action more or less without the generals because they wanted an element of surprise. They also didn't inform even quite senior commanders and certainly
not the troops until even the day of invasion. So they were extremely ill prepared. They made all the wrong assumptions, and they therefore went in in ways that really have nothing to do with warfare. It was like a parade. So and that the lasting problem there is that they lost a lot around Kiev, and in those early weeks they lost really very large numbers of their best troops.
They sent their best people in, their best trained people, their best equipped, you know, their airborne forces and so on, and they were decimated. And now these troops have to be backfilled and replaced. You know, the troops that come in. Now, the equipment that replaces the equipment that was destroyed huge amounts is not as good, it's not as well trained,
the equipments older and on. So they it's one of those things where you can't just try again because you don't have the same resources with which to try again. And that said, all of that said, there's a lot of caution in just dismissing the ability of the Russians
to learn. One big worry is that the dog that didn't bark in this fight has been the Russian air force, which is very large and does have very capable aircraft, very capable missiles and so on, and they failed to impose air superiority, which changed the whole nature of the war. I was going to say, Mark, there was one thing I was curious about with the air force that you mentioned, and it's come up a lot, is why did they not use their air force to greater effect in the
early stages of the war. Why did they not really deploy that to full effect and also potentially bombing more targets in the early stages of the war. Why did they seemingly rely so much on the ground. And that's a question that we hear a lot absolutely. I mean, I think there's a number of elements. One is that taking out air defenses is one of the hardest things to do, and they may just not have been very
well trained for it. It's not the task that they spent all their time training for they may not have had as many hours in training as they should have had and so on. But another factor is simply that because in the early stages, the early hours of the campaign, there was this complete misconception of what was going to happen. So in those first critical couple of days at the beginning,
the air force went in, it bombed various targets. It actually didn't have very good information, it was quite out of date, and immediately it became clear that the ground
forces were getting into trouble. So the air force was diverted into a support role for the ground forces, and there weren't spending all their time trying to take out the air defenses, the airfields and so on, And the Ukrainians had time to move their planes so that they wouldn't get destroyed, so that they weren't where they the Russians expected them to be. So, you know, there's sort of a number of elements in there that people are
sort of trying to pick apart. But obviously, you know, none of us were in the cockpits or in the you know, in the command structure and know exactly what happened. But that seems to have been a contributor Dasha, And it wasn't just Russia's poor planning and poor execution, but a remarkable response by Ukraine's military, which was everything that the Russian military has not been. It has been fast, it's been innovative, it's been efficient in the use of
its weapons. It's even when it was greatly outpowered, it made better use of what it had. How has Ukraine been able to essentially be so nimble in the face of superior firepower. Well, people say that, first of all, motivation means right, and here Ukrainians are fighting for their land. While when you ask a Russian what he is doing here, it's kind of hard to get an answer from him.
You know, there are lots of captured Russian soldiers and some people record interviews with them and they say that, oh, yeah, we just watched Russian propaganda saying that Ukraine turned into our enemy. But they couldn't really explain in a way why they would think that Ukraine might attack Russia at any point, because Ukraine is much much smaller than Russian and has much less resources than Russia has. For Ukrainians,
it's motivation. In the first days of the war, we had such a huge lines to military units as men were trying to register and join the army. That it just enormous lines, and it was called it was February, and people stayed at night to be registered and joined the army. So as a result, now the army is full of professionals starting from I don't know, from theater and bally ending with ten as players and IT specialists, etc.
But people are motivated, they want to learn. They are being trained not only in Ukraine but also by our western partners, and they proved themselves to be capable to learn, and this obviously makes a much difference as we see
during the war. So the other thing to remember is that, you know, the war began in twenty fourteen, not in twenty twenty two, and it began with the annexation of Crimea, of course, and then an insurgency which the Russians armed and at times sent their own troops in to take part in. And you had a quite serious war in two fourteen and fifteen, about fourteen thousand people died. And you know, then you had a peace settlement which was really a ceasefire, and the firing never ceased. So all
along a you know, a front line. There were trenches, you know, opposite each other, artillery being chills being exchanged, you know, reconnaissance parties going across the other side to get behind the line. So for eight years the Ukrainians were preparing. They had had a non existent army, in part because through the previous pro Russian government had actually
dismantled parts of the military. Large arms deposts had been blown up over a period of years, so it was quite deliberate, and so for eight years they did have the chance to rebuild and to train. They were rotating. Estimates run from three to five hundred thousand soldiers who rotted through the trenches spent six months tours fighting, so you had almost half a million people who had direct
recent experience of fighting. At the same time, they were getting training from NATO partners, NATO training and so on, and they restructured the armed forces so that they would have a more kind of Western style armedforce than The critical thing there was that you have a strong non commissioned officer corps, the sort of low level officers who were very much connection, working very closely with the ordinary troops, and they are kind of mentoring force, provide experience, support
and all that sort of thing, and all of that has really helped the Ukrainians more than I think anybody thought training could help. But it's helped a lot. And I think the second thing I was just going to mention that I think has made the difference is the use of intelligence. Knowing that they were outgunned at times by ten to twelve to one in terms of the ampt of artillery shells that were being fired, the Ukrainians understood that they had to find a way to make
every shell count and they have. And there's a number of apps and so on at the front line that are being used at very sophisticated apps that are being used in order to connect drone intelligence and other kinds of data and just put it in the hands of the people who are actually firing the guns. And these apps will calculate for them exactly once they've got the coordinates. It will calculate for them exactly what the trajectory of the missile should be and how they should aim it.
And they are simply much much better at hitting a target. Our conversation continues after the break, we defeated Russia in the battle for minds of the world. We have no pr nor should anyone in the world have it. Ukraine's gained this victory and it gives us courage, which inspires the entire world rous. One person who has been at the center of this, of course, is Ukraine's President Zelinski.
He's become a very visible international figure, testifying before the US Congress, going to other capitals to make the case why the world must keep its attention and Ukraine must keep delivering arms and other aid to Ukraine. How important has President Zelinsky been in maintaining Ukraine's unity at home and also its ability to keep fighting well, incredibly important and arguably he's been just the president that Ukraine needed
in this moment. And it's funny thinking about the run up to the war now and away, because people tended to dismiss him very much as someone who didn't have the heft to be a president during wartime, you know, of course, there was all this talk that he might even leave the country, and famously he declined the offer
to do so. But you can see that his skills at presenting a message, it's selling in fact, Ukraine's cause in this moment relentlessly on social media videos, all of it appearing speeches at parliaments, you know, you name it, he's done it. He's done anything that he can to remind people that this war is going on, that Ukraine needs more money and more weapons to keep fighting, and no event is too small or too large to do that.
And you could say arguably that's made a tremendous difference in keeping the world's attention on Ukraine in rallying cause for money and weapons. If you look at other conflicts around the world that have gone on for a period of time, you can see that there's been a real challenge to maintain that kind of momentum, and perhaps that challenge will come for Ukraine if this war goes on for another year or beyond. But you can see some
of that concern creeping in. Potentially now you've seen President Zelinsky leaving Ukraine more regularly, coming directly to the rest of the world to spread that message. Kind of saw that very clearly in his recent trip to the UK and to France and to Brussels, very much perhaps recognizing that this is a moment where he needs to work even harder to do that. So in terms of just being sort of the front facing element of the war
for Ukraine. He's really really done his job. How much he has sort of been important behind the scenes in terms of directing the war effort and someone is less clear, and perhaps dash Roma might have views on that. But if he had just had to do one thing in this moment, and that's simply to really sort of like keep Ukraine front and center for the world, then certainly he's delivered Rossio exactly right. He did the right thing.
He concentrated on delivering the message to the world, and he's very good at that because his background is showbiz. He knows how to do videos, he knows how to reach the audience. He has an excellent speechwriter, so the you know, words really touch people. And locally he doesn't really at least was not really involved in planning operations. He picked up a very capable top army chief and the guy is doing his job and he not just the Lenski himself doesn't interfere in that because, as he said,
it's up to military people to decide operations. Mark These appeals President Zelinski has made around the world have been met with a lot of aid from the US, from Europe, from other parts of the world, providing a lot of munitions and some sophisticated weaponry will. US and Germany are poised to announce that they will provide main battle tanks to Ukraine. Germany's Defense minister says chance Schultz is talking
to his allies about supplying keep with the Leopard tank. Today, I'm announcing that the United States will be sending thirty one Abram tanks to Ukraine, the equivalent of one Ukrainian battalion. And that's the conversation that we've been having most recently about how can we provide air defense to protect the
Ukrainian population. That has been the thing that we've talked about, probably most in all of our conversations, which is why we've provided thousands of surface to air missiles and air defense systems, and we'll continue to do so, and more are coming over the next few weeks. I think in the beginning of the ward, there was some question about whether the West would give as much as it has for fear of provoking Russia into a wider war. And
yet as it's gone and the West has really stepped up. Certainly, I before this war began and certainly present putin the expectation was that Europe would not really be as united or determined as it has been, and that it couldn't last very long. The record, you know, in the response to Crimea, the response to the fighting in Georgia in two thousand and eight was not good in that sense. You know, I'm very strung that the perspective is different.
So the first thing to remember is this is a high intensity war that we haven't seen since World War Two, and that you know, those kinds of wars they require just mass mobilization of economic resources, people, etc. And so seen from Kiev, you know, there's a lot of gratitude about the weapons that have come, a complete understanding that without them they wouldn't really have been able to survive, certainly wouldn't be able to think about whether they can
take the territory back. But at the same time real failure to understand why it always takes so long, that it is this long, ratcheted process where you begin with you know, shoulder held anti tank missiles, and then it takes a while before you get to you know, bigger artillery, even though it's very clear that the Ukrainians desperately need the big artillery, and then it takes a while before you get to you know, the next thing, you know, to the big air defense or to the tanks, and
now of course they're you know, sort of pressing for jets. And so from that point of view, if they had been given everything they've been given right away, then you know, the outcome might have been much better for Ukraine. This question of tanks and jets has been going on for quite some time now. At first the Germany, poland other nations were hesitant to give over tanks, and now as Mark describes that sort of softening and those are moving
toward Ukraine. Jets seem to be a real sticking point though. Do you think ultimately that Ukraine will receive jets from Western militaries. You know, more and more countries are sort of looking at how much they've sent in and also going, well, wow, we're running really low ourselves, and defense companies just can't sort of turn on a switch to the factory and magically produce a whole lot of extra equipment with great speed.
That's why we're seeing talk about a common fun potentially for the EU for ammunition, But that would be to sort of like get companies to start making ammunition in six to nine months from now and in a lot of countries have got stockpiles that have been depleted, and you know, there's a point where they have to sort
of say, well, we can't actually send anymore. And of course they haven't said modern fighter jets, but as they don't necessarily have a lot of them to start with, and countries like Poland so well, we can't send them unless we had a guarantee from the US of replacement, and there's no certainty about that either. And if you look at the language around fighter jets, yeah, they're sort
of saying, well, we could look at it. Maybe in the longer term, there could be an assessment about it, but the language on that remains really really cautious and suggests that that's really quite a large hurdle to get over. We'll be right back after when you're fighting. Ukraine is looking at another year ahead. I don't think anyone expects
this war to be over anytime soon. What can we expect in the months ahead, Well, the question is is Russia really going to launch a major offensive or has it already started as Mark talked about earlier, And is it not sort of one big shebang moment, or is it just sort of a gradual increase in intensity in the coming months, because Russia obviously sees a window here before Ukraine does start to get some of that more advanced weaponry, which is sort of months away, so now
would be the time to try and gain more territory rather in the East. And that's a difficult time potentially for Ukraine in the coming weeks to be able to sort of hold that back, And that's perhaps reflected in the sense of how people are feeling that Mark and Dasha were talking about earlier in Kiev at the moment, because any kind of full offensive by Ukraine is probably some months away and more likely to come in the South.
But as you say that, beyond that we just headed for the reality that a war that will go on for another year or more even possibly three four years, does it turn into a grinding conflict just in the East and the South. And the challenge there for Ukraine obviously is again keeping momentum for the world on its plight there and supporting its military or do people sort of get to the point where that fatigue does set in.
So it's probably quite a difficult time ahead for Ukraine potentially, and all of that about from this situation that is now more challenging. In the east. Ukraine launched, though to very successful country offensive operations back last year, because there was also an element of surprise, they kind of just unexpectedly for Russia, launched it in the north of the country and then in the south. Now it's kind of options are much more limited, and of course Russians are
preparing for that for any possible Ukrainian contrafensive. This is on one side. On the other side, there is a question of economy. Last year, obviously there was some you know, some stuff left from the previous years. You know, this year, at least from what I hear from companies, it's going to be more difficult for them to operate. Plus it's unclear what's gonna happen with the world economy. Obviously it has an impact here and also a very important part
of Ukraine's if you want rebuilding after the war. There's a question of for immigration, whether people who left the country, those were mainly women with kids. They fled the country
last year. Many of them already found jobs there. So once the war is over, the question is whether people would come back or rather men who are now prohibited to live the country and after the war, obviously answer all limitations will be lifted out out whether those husbands will rather join their families in the European Union, which
means Ukraine will lose lots of people. Mark, the last time you were on this podcast talking about Ukraine, you said that Vladimir Putin's own personal investment, his own reputation, is so tied up in winning this war that you didn't see any way in which he would accept a settlement in which he was seen as having lost. Do
you think that that's more or less true now? Ultimately, most conflicts and with some kind of settlement, And at the moment it's almost impossible to see any room for a settlement because for Ukraine the issue is to recover their territory, and for Russia, for President Putin, the issue is to gain the territory that he is the next because he annexed several provinces, declared that they were now part of Russia, and his troops didn't even occupy all of them. So you have these two sets of goals
that are in complete conflict. So it's very, very difficult to see how any time soon there can be any kind of settlement, neither side has an interest, neither side is exhausted that the Ukrainians have, you know, still a motivated force, They're still getting armed, and the Russians have mobilized and sent you know, several hundred thousand new troops to the front. They now have more in Ukraine than they had at the beginning of the war. So it remains true. And the question always is what can he
sell it as a victory? And I do think, you know, the sort of glimmer of light there is that, in the same way that he has been able to control the message at home, you know, as far as a kind of mendacious way about what's happening in Ukraine, there is the glimmer of hope that if he decides that he needs to sell something that is objectively a defeat as a victory, he may be able to do so.
But I think that that basic point that he can't afford a strong men cannot afford to lose, that remains and it's only a question of what losing consists on. Dasha Rosmark, thanks so much for talking with me today. Thank you, thanks us, thanks for listening to us here at the Big Take. It's a daily podcast from Bloomberg and iHeartRadio. For more shows from my Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen, and we'd love to hear from you. Email us questions or
comments to Big Take at Bloomberg dot net. The supervising producer of The Big Take is Vicky Bergolina, Our senior producer is Catherine Fink. Federica Romannello is our producer. Our associate producer is zenib Siddiki. Raphael Mcii is our engineer. And our original music was composed by Leo Sidrin. I'm west Kosova. We'll be back tomorrow with another Big Take