It’s not just on the frontlines that fighting is raging in Ukraine, there is also a war between Volodymyr Zelensky and the army leadership, according to a frank testimony by former Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych.
Arestovych has accused Zelensky of persisting with a military strategy that is ineffective and blamed him for the failure of Ukraine’s counteroffensive operation this autumn. He also revealed that there is a conflict between his former boss and army generals over how to proceed.
“The president’s speeches are becoming increasingly emotional because of the criticism he is receiving. His policy is ineffective, and the main reason for this is the unsuccessful counterattack. Western aid is being misused. They lack competence and have reached the limits of their capabilities,” Arestovych said, agreeing with Ukrainian Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief Valery Zaluzhny, who claimed the conflict in Ukraine had reached a dead end.
“We are now faced with a situation where the commander-in-chief says one thing about the war and the prospects of victory, and the president says quite another. This is an abnormal situation,” said Arestovych, who believes that either Zelensky is too self-centered or too Ukraine-centered.
“We need confidence, not repression. Basic education must be in Ukrainian. But if we want to publish a book in Spanish, Russian, or Bulgarian, we need to make room for it in our country. Because the next step will be to suppress the Church in a completely stupid way,” Arestovych noted.
The former presidential advisor, who has now left Ukraine, announced earlier that he would run for the post of head of state. He then began to actively criticize the actions of Zelensky and his immediate entourage.
In particular, he has accused the country’s leadership of strategic errors in state and military management. On Nov. 1, the presidential candidate published his program, one of the points of which was that Ukraine would join NATO on condition that it did not retake the territory it had lost up to that point.
