Putin is losing and Nato will 'crush him' if he goes ahead with nuclear threat, says US general
Retired four-star General David Petraeus told ABC News that the US and its allies would destroy Russia’s troops and equipment in Ukraine – if Russian president Vladimir Putin uses nuclear weapons.
"Just to give you a hypothetical, we would respond by leading a Nato – a collective – effort that would take out every Russian conventional force that we can see and identify on the battlefield in Ukraine and also in Crimea, and every ship in the Black sea," Petraeus said on ABC's “This Week with George Stephanopoulos”.
Ukraine on Sunday claimed full control of the eastern logistics hub of Lyman, its most significant battlefield gain from Russia in weeks, providing a potential staging post for further attacks to the east while heaping further pressure on the Kremlin.
The stinging setback for Putin was delivered after he proclaimed the annexation of four regions covering nearly a fifth of Ukraine on Friday, an area that includes Lyman. Kyiv and the West have condemned the proclamation as an illegitimate farce.
Nato secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said the capture of the town, where Ukrainian flags were raised over civic buildings on Saturday, demonstrated that Ukraine is capable of dislodging Russian forces and showed the impact Ukraine's deployment of advanced Western weapons was having on the conflict.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday that the success of the country's soldiers was not limited to the recapture of Lyman.
Ukraine forces have liberated the small Arkhanhelske and Myrolyubivka settlements in the Kherson region as well, he said.
Ukraine's Interfax agency reported that according to Serhiy Cherevatyi, spokesman for the Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces, the country’s forces recaptured Torske, a small village in the Donetsk region, about 15 kilometres east of the now-liberated Lyman.
Reuters was not able to immediately verify the reports.
Reuters
