RT-Engels: 26-11-2025,
Moscow is serious about the demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine – and the longer it takes the West to grasp this, the longer the war will last
By Larry Johnson, political analyst and commentator, former CIA analyst and member of the US State Department’s Office for Counterterrorism
From the start of its military operation in February 2022, Russia has been unequivocal in its objectives: demilitarize and denazify Ukraine. The US and its NATO allies, however, apparently do not believe that Russia is serious about this. If the reports about US President Donald Trump’s peace plan are accurate, then it will be rejected by Russian leader Vladimir Putin. There is no room for negotiation on these two points.
Western media reports, citing senior officials following talks in Geneva, claim that Ukraine agrees to limit the number of its armed forces to 800,000 soldiers. That is a non-starter for Russia because it would require Moscow to accept Ukraine having a larger military than it had at the start of the conflict.
On February 22, 2022 – right before the start of Russia’s operation – Ukraine’s military was undergoing reforms to modernize and expand its forces, but it remained smaller and less equipped than Russia’s. Data from authoritative sources such as the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), the Military Balance 2022, and contemporary reports, estimated Ukraine’s core standing army, including ground, air, naval, and support units, to be 196,000 in February 2022;