Page 32 - May 9th News Today

Operational security. their command and control is broken. their entire war plan has failed on multiple levels. the vulnerability of their generals to ukrainian fire is evident from this report and many others. >> all right. western officials speculate that vladimir putin may use russias victory day on may 9th as a means to declare an official war against ukraine. the holiday traditionally celebrates the soviet unions defeat of nazi germany. since russias invasion has failed to produce many vict...

>> translator: for us, this is not going to change anything. for us, war is going on for eight years now. the full-fledged war is going on for 70 days. whatever putin is going to say, the possibility or the probability is there. they want to show what kind of czars they are. they wounded the entire city. thatd be like in a bad hollywood movie. is that the victory that we are striving for? for the civilized world, this is defeat. the may of 9th is going to be remembered in the world as a tragedy,...

Getting from those fighters is that they need more heavy artillery. you know, the javelin missiles are important, but if youre going to break the siege of mariupol, you need serious cannons and more serious firepower, which is starting to arrive in ukraine, but not enough to break that siege. >> im just wondering if, indeed, mariupol does fall to russian hands, russian control in its entirety, what do you think this would mean for -- and what weight would it have on zelenskyy? >> i think he woul...

I think it is a pr stunt for him, for his internal audience. remember, jonathan, more than 15,000 russian troops have died in this campaign already over the last 70 days. thats the entirety of the amount of russian forces, soviet forces, that were lost during their multi-year campaign in afghanistan. so he has a very bad story on his hands. as russian mothers and fathers and siblings and even children grieve the losses of their fallen countrymen, i think its incumbent on putin to try to reverse ...

And president putins intentions then. there were some who are concerned that he might announce an expansion of this war, including a national mobilization, which would be a draft, in effect, and therefore expand the number of forces that he could use in ukraine. and others who think that would be too costly, even for putin, and that really he tries to claim some sort of fake, manufactured victory on may 9th and keeps on keeping on. whats your view? >> im probably in your second camp and i will g...

If, however, he decides that thats as good as it is going to get, then he will look for a way to put a bow on it, as you said, even though he has not achieved what he is after. hes always wanted to dominate ukraine. hes failed at that. the ukrainians have been valiant and heroic in pushing him back. he cannot win this war, joe. ukrainians will win. thats what he is going to have to face on may 9th. >> so, jeremy, i reported a few weeks ago that u.s. officials have been watching this may 9th date...

Plant have tied down and pinned down so many russian forces and the russian forces now are desperate in some ways to try to get a victory, prior to may 9th. but it is a shame that there is no third party solution for those brave ukrainian soldiers. >> sad to watch, playing out before our eyes. i do want to talk about the intelligence that the u.s. is providing ukrainian forces, this is not new, it happened throughout the conflict. and it is clearly helped, as have weapons, the shoulder fired ant...

Victory. only problem on the way to that parade stand is the fact that putin cant win a battle. he cant win anything. the russians just keep getting knocked back on their ass in every phase of this war. so the question is, how does he -- how does he claim victory on may the 9th? what does he do? >> joe, its a great question. its a great question. this demonstrates, joe, what you just said, that is, he now will have to realize that hes not been able to succeed on the battlefield. hes been defeate...

And in order to save lives of those kids, we need heavy weaponry. this is the first and basically only thing that can help those people in besieged and occupied cities right now. >> may 9th, as you know, is victory day, as its known in russia. are you concerned that russia will expand the war in ukraine next week? >> i think this can be expected. this can be expected. of course, it is very difficult to to plan or speculate of what russia may do or may not do, because our experience with russia i...

Desperation. these are long range weaponry, usually shot from the black sea, but theyre very expensive and theyre not the most accurate in the world, but i think because of the huge losses on the battlefield of soldiers and also equipment, that theyre turning to these other methods and thats why i kept on saying that no inch of ukraine will be safe unless they have the ability to close the skies off. >> and weve been hearing from u.s. and western officials that they believe putins objective here...