military claiming they have encircled izyum. if the russians can not link up these two lines, they re in real trouble. down here in the south you ve seen in mykolaiv, the russians get stopped by the ukrainian military. there s a shocking article about hundreds of russian bodies and soldiers just stacked out here where they ve taken such combat losses. the russians you can see just and the real battle is here in the east. if you ukrainian military can hold off in and and around isam and they may stop the third
they attacked everywhere. they failed on three fronts. they re going back to refit. they have to reorganize because of combat losses. as a result, they ll reposition their forces to achieve the political directive which is the administrative boundaries of luhansk and donestk. they have to have that. they re not the only ones that have a say. the ukrainians have a say. they re performing better than anyone expected maybe other than anyone like you. what would you be doing if you were the ukrainian military in the strange, weary days? i would continue doing what
over time. president zelenskyy has said repeatedly that he s willing to negotiate over donbas without getting into the specifics. he said they could talk about language, that that effectively can be worked out. now, they may have more details about how that will be worked out in the talks, but publicly hasn t given any indication of how that specifically would play out. so, to go back to your question, what are we seeing that s different? this commitment by the russians to pull back from some parts around the capital and some indications that perhaps they are, but that was also the area where they were already being in retreat, where they had already been suffering combat losses. right. reporter: so, yes, there is some diplomatic progress because they met and apparently will again and they ll take this to vladimir putin, but are we anywhere different today than we were yesterday? it doesn t seem that we are. well, look, you ve given me my first question for general
now they ve had significant combat losses, particularly in their leadership. they re conscripting new soldiers. they re bringing in allegedly mercenaries from the wagner group. they re allegedly recruiting syrians who are a murderous lot themselves and bringing them into the fight. they re trying to refit these organizations and move them hundreds of miles to a new attack access. i m not too sure they will be able to pull this off. this is their period of vulnerability. the ukrainians have to go after them now, not next year. that includes going after the russian navy in the black sea and sea of azov. secretary blinken, who has lead for the approval of foreign military sales and in the international communities, he and secretary austin have to step up and do it and the president has to back them and bust through domestic concerns. all right. retired four star army general