Retired Kremlin colonel who gave damning assessment of Ukraine invasion suddenly backtracks on claim

A retired Russian military commander has re-appeared on state television waring Ukrainian officials not to underestimate Russia’s military and economic might, despite having disparaged his nation’s war efforts live on air just days ago.

Mikhail Khodaryonok, a former air defence commander and graduate of some of the Soviet Union’s top military schools, took to the stage yesterday where he waxed lyrical about the quality of Russian weapons and boasted about the strength of the military.

The Russian Federation has not yet committed even a tenth of its military and economic potential.. so be careful what you wish for, gentlemen!’ the colonel quipped.

‘When a country buys Western-made equipment, it sometimes stops working or malfunctions right in the heat of battle…. our arms are different in their reliability – you get exactly the weapons described,’ he declared.

But his comments directly contradicted his interview broadcast just days ago, when he appeared on the same show and gave a distinctly bleak prognosis for Russia’s war.

The retired commander last weekend told viewers that Ukraine ‘intends to fight to the last man’ and has mobilised a million-strong army of Western-trained fighters equipped with an endless stream of modern weaponry – much to the display of Kremlin propagandists stood alongside him.

Russia’s position on the world stage is no better, Khodaryonok added, pointing out ‘we are in full geopolitical isolation, and that, however much we would hate to admit this, virtually the entire world is against us. And it’s that situation that we need to get out of.’

The sudden U-turn has stoked suspicions Khodaryonok was subject to a stern talking-to from Vladimir Putin behind the scenes.

Though the colonel has seemingly reversed his publicly negative perception of Russia’s invasion, he continued to refer to the conflict as a ‘war’, rather than a ‘special military operation’ or ‘demilitarisation operation’ as Putin prefers.

Speaking last week on the talk show of Olga Skabeyeva – who is known as the iron doll’ of Putin TV for her strict adherence to the party line – Khodaryonok let loose on the situation in Ukraine and shocked the Kremlin propagandists sharing the stage with him.

First of all, he said that rumours of a ‘moral and psychological breakdown in the Ukrainian armed forces’ were ‘to put it mildly, false’.

‘The situation… is that the Ukrainian armed forces are able to arm a million people,’ he added, arguing such a force will be equipped with western weapons and trained how to use them by armies that are part of NATO.

‘So a million armed Ukrainian soldiers needs to be viewed as a reality of the very near future,’ he insisted.

Batting aside objections from Skabeyeva that most of those men will be conscripts, he insisted that what really matters isn’t how an army is recruited, but its willingness to fight.

‘A desire to protect one’s homeland, in the sense that it exists in Ukraine – and it really does exist there – they intend to fight to the last man,’ he said.

‘Ultimately victory on the battlefield is determined by a high level of morale among personnel, who shed blood for their ideals.’

On the world stage, Khodaryonok said, things hardly look better.

‘We are in full geopolitical isolation,’ he said, adding: ‘However much we would hate to admit this, virtually the entire world is against us.’

Khodaryonok declared that Russia’s tried and tested policy of nuclear sabre-rattling will do little to deter Russia’s enemies and in fact ‘actually looks quite amusing’ when the whole world is arrayed against the Kremlin.