he s basically trying to displace the russian military hierarchy. this is the whole point by the way about his fight in bakhmut. it s not a terribly important military. prize but he, saying, look russia hasn t had a lot of winds, one win arguably it s not done yet, but the one would argue that russia has is under me. not under the administrative. defense not under these four star general, that s under me. it s very much a power play inside the kremlin. which by the, way he wouldn t anticipate a frat boy would challenge enemies to a top five. but that s the nature of the testosterone fueled conflicts inside the kremlin.
about prigozhin s growing influence in moscow. the former u.s. commanding general for europe earlier tonight told me if prigozhin went up in a mig above ukraine, he would be shot down and killed. why is he engaging in this propaganda in a fighter jet and seemingly childishly suggesting he and president volodymyr zelenskyy have an air duel? well, it s all understandable in the context of what it is he is trying to do. he is trying to displace the russian military hierarchy. this is the whole point about his fight in bakhmut, which is not a terribly important military prize. but he is saying look, russia hasn t had a lot of wins. and one win arguably, it s not done yet, the one win is under me, not under the minister of defense, not under all the four-star generals. it s under me. it s very much a power play inside the kremlin. which by the way, you wouldn t anticipate that a frat boy would challenge enemies to a dogfight. but that s the nature of the
and its infrastructure into submission. his mercenaries are given a more prominent role at the expense of russia s military hierarchy. what is interesting are, from my point of view, the new ambition that he s obtained, in that he believes he is much better than the regular army. his people are better equipped than the regular army. reporter: a confidence in wa wagner, vladimir putin seems to share. the wagner defense line shoring up positions in the donbas. the head of the watchdog is frustrated by the lack of progress at the zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. he s been pushing for a safety zone around the plant, but it hasn t been established yet. he said the need for the zone is o no-brainer for him because the plant came under artillery fire several times. the plant is occupied by russia
expect him to do. he would try, if he could do it, to mount some more military operations that potentially he will try to go after the people that he thinks are directly responsible for this. that might be a harder thing for him to do, but it s certainly on his target list. i m certain of it. and then we also understand that russia s defense minister appointed a new commander for operations in ukraine. of course, this comes as ukrainian forces have liberated nearly 1,000 square miles in its latest offensive. how critical is this moment? well, it depends on the new commander. it s very interesting when they try to shuffle the decks, if you will, on this particular military hierarchy. it seems as if a lot of the people that they put in these positions have not succeeded. the predecessor was a general
support for this on the russian territory of ukraine itself. of the 19,000 people that an official statement from the donetsk peoples republic voted. that is where one of the fake russian referendum were occurring, or are recurring now. 550 people on occupied ukrainian territory voted. the remaining voted from inside russia itself. even if their public statements, it appears russian officials feel this is a genuine sense oof endorsement. some individuals may have been mobilized by mistake. also to russia making key moves in its military hierarchy, replacing the deputy defense minister for low skwrfbs. for the last six to seven months