Transcript:
The Inside Story: Ukraine: One Year Later
Episode 80 – February 23, 2023
Show Open:
Unidentified Narrator:
A grim anniversary in Ukraine…
Met with a visit by the U.S. president…
And a vow of continue support:
President Joe Biden:
Democracy stands. The Americans stand with you. And the world stands with you.
Unidentified Narrator:
Defending Ukraine from Russia’s ambitions ...
Now on The Inside Story-Ukraine: One Year Later.
The Inside Story:
CARLA BABB, VOA Pentagon Correspondent:
Hi. I’m Carla Babb, VOA Pentagon Correspondent.
I’m in Washington, DC near Ukraine’s embassy to the United States, where well-wishers have adorned with flowers and other mementos, marking one year since Russia began its war against Ukraine.
From the start, expectations were that Russia would capture Kyiv within a matter of days of an invasion.
But those expectations went unfulfilled.
Russia’s military strength was overestimated while Ukraine’s defensive capabilities was underestimated.
NATO countries responded by arming Ukraine with defensive weapons to try to push back Russia’s advances.
One year later, Russia continues to attack Ukraine with missiles from the skies and with infantry and tanks on the ground.
We will spend most of our time today looking at the help NATO and the U.S. have provided to Ukraine and its impact going forward.
VOA White House bureau chief Patsy Widakuswara gets us started with President Joe Biden’s speech in Warsaw and stop in Kyiv.
Unidentified Singers:
You Give Me Freedom
PATSY WIDAKUSWARA, VOA White House bureau chief:
U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday returned to the Royal Castle in Warsaw, Poland, where he had delivered a speech last year, a month after Russia invaded Ukraine.
In his latest speech, he defended the Western alliance’s effort to help Kyiv defend itself.
President Joe Biden:
One year ago, the world was bracing for the fall of Kyiv. Well, I've just come from a visit to Kyiv, and I can report Kyiv stands strong. Kyiv stands proud. It stands tall. And most important, it stands free.
PATSY WIDAKUSWARA:
On the same day, Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke to an assembly of Russian lawmakers, saying the U.S. and NATO want to inflict a strategic defeat on his country. He suspended participation in the New START treaty, a landmark nuclear arms control pact, and threatened to resume nuclear tests.
Vladimir Putin, Russian President:
In early February of this year, the North Atlantic alliance made a statement with a de facto demand on Russia, as they say, to return to the implementation of the strategic offensive arms treaty, including the admission of inspections to our nuclear defense facilities. Well, I don't even know what to call it. What a theater of the absurd!
PATSY WIDAKUSWARA:
Speaking directly to Russian citizens, Biden stressed that the West "is not the enemy."
President Joe Biden:
The West was not plotting to attack Russia, as Putin said today, and millions of Russian citizens who only want to live in peace with their neighbors are not the enemy. This war was never a necessity. It's a tragedy.
PATSY WIDAKUSWARA, VOA White House bureau chief:
Biden reiterated what Vice President Kamala Harris announced days earlier at the Munich Security Conference — that the U.S. has determined Moscow has committed “crimes against humanity” against the Ukrainian people.
Earlier Tuesday, Biden met with President Andrzej Duda, thanking him for Poland’s support for Ukraine and assuring the NATO partner that Washington will respond if Russia launches an attack on Poland.
Poland has welcomed more than 1.5 million Ukrainian refugees and provided billions of dollars in weapons and humanitarian assistance.
The White House denied Moscow’s claim that Biden received security guarantees from Russia before his surprise visit to Kyiv on Monday to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymir Zelenskyy.
Zelenskyy said the conversation brought joint victory.
Volodymir Zelenskyy, Ukrainian President:
We can and we must do, so that 2023 becomes the year of victory.
PATSY WIDAKUSWARA:
Before returning to Washington on Wednesday, Biden will meet with NATO leaders from the so-called Bucharest Nine, the countries on NATO’s easternmost flank. Patsy Widakuswara, VOA News, Warsaw.
ANITA POWELL, VOA White House Correspondent:
As Russia’s invasion of Ukraine approached a grim anniversary this week, it was Joe Biden – not Vladimir Putin – striding through Kyiv on a sunny Monday morning.
President Joe Biden:
I thought it was important that the president of the United States be here… I thought it was critical that there would not be any doubt, none whatsoever, about U.S. support for Ukraine in their war against the brutal attack by Russia.
ANITA POWELL:
Biden was supposed to depart for Poland on Monday, but instead flew via Germany to Poland, and then made a 10-hour train ride to Kyiv.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukrainian President:
I think that is a historical moment for our country and very important to be able to speak detailing about the situation on the battlefield. But I think almost to speak about people, about Ukrainians, about Americans.
Mathieu Droin, Center for Strategic & International Studies:
Obviously for Vladimir Putin, having the president of the United States being in Ukraine just a few days before the anniversary is of course a very, very bad signal.
ANITA POWELL:
The White House says it informed Russian authorities hours ahead of Biden’s visit.
Anita Powell, VOA News, Washington.
Russia has occupied --- and subsequently lost--vast swaths of territory, but appears to be regrouping for a new offensive.
Families in areas under fire say they’ve already suffered enormous losses.
VOA’s Heather Murdock takes us to the
Kherson region in southern Ukraine.
HEATHER MURDOCK, VOA Correspondent:
When it was occupied by Russia last year, this village, Pravdyne, in the Kherson Oblast, was surrounded by the Ukrainian army and engaged in fierce fighting.
Victor Sasunovich, Pravdyne Resident:
The front line passed right here. The Russians stood here, all over the street.
HEATHER MURDOCK:
Much of the area has been destroyed or laden with mines, but Ukraine now controls the province.
Dummies set up by Russian troops to scare Ukrainian forces now stand guard against no one — a reminder that on the ground, even high-tech war mostly consists of young men fighting to survive.
This is the airport just outside the city of Kherson. The level of destruction here is breathtaking.
Each side has attacked the airport multiple times. Both would rather see it in ruins than be useful to the enemy.
Inside this provincial capital, street signs declare Kherson a “Hero City!” and say “Family, you are free!”
Bombs still fall day and night, but most of the city still stands. Locals say the vast majority of residents fled long ago. Some escaped when Russian took over. Others left with the Russians when Ukraine took the city back.
Russian forces are only a few kilometers away, and the people remaining say they have nowhere to go, or they have been displaced from even more dangerous places.
Olena Ignatenko, Displaced Person:
We have been here in Kherson for half a year and have only been to our home once. Now there is no road because the bridge was destroyed.
HEATHER MURDOCK:
Ignatenko is also from Pravdyne, where most homes are empty or destroyed.
Victor Sasunovich, Pravdyne Resident:
There were many worse days here. We were fired upon many times. I fixed the windows over and over again before the house was destroyed. So, there were many worse days here. The very worst day was when I saw Russian tanks entering the village.
HEATHER MURDOCK:
Now only remnants of Russian tanks remain in the village, but Sasunovich says that is little comfort when so much has been lost.
And after a full year of war here in Ukraine, locals say that even if it ends tomorrow, the devastation here is enormous.
Heather Murdock, VOA News, Kherson, Ukraine.
Unidentified Narrator:
February 24 marks the anniversary of Russian forces attack on Ukraine as part of a massive scale invasion. Analysts initially predicted it would be a matter of weeks if not days before Russia seized control of the capital key view were prepared for the fears Ukrainian resistance that followed Least of all Russian President Vladimir Putin, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky swiftly rejected an offer from the US government to evacuate him saying the fight is here. I mean, ammunition not a ride, vowing to stay in keep and declared martial law.
The fog of war soon set in. More than 1.5 million Ukrainians became refugees within the first 10 days after being forced to flee the country. Western nations meanwhile, hit Russian officials with a flurry of sanctions as they supplied Ukraine with billions of dollars in military aid and heavy artillery.
By early March, Russian troops made quick advances in the south and east and during the Kerrison region and taking control of Europe's largest nuclear plant located in the southeastern city of separate each. Russian forces also approach the outskirts of Keef, but quickly faced manpower shortages.
In early April, journalists and human rights workers found extensive evidence of apparent war crimes committed in the town of Bucha less than 20 miles northwest of key. They asserted that Russian troops deliberately targeted civilians.
Hundreds of civilian bodies were uncovered after being found scattered across the streets and in communal graves. After the Bucha findings, US President Joe Biden accused Russia of committing genocide in Ukraine . Putin, vowing to continue the war, ordered a new Russian offensive to take control of the Donbass.
In May UN Secretary General Antonio Gutierrez doubled down on calls for Russia to end a war he said it was a senseless in its scope, ruthless in its dimensions, and limitless and its potential for global harm. Several days later, the US, G7 and EU agreed to impose a sweeping new round of sanctions against Russia, including a commitment to phase out most imports on Russian oil by the end of 2022.
In another blow to Putin, Sweden and Finland unveiled formal bids to join NATO, who hadn't had previously cited fear of NATO expansion is one of the main reasons for Russia's invasion of Ukraine. As Somerset in Ukrainian forces made key strides with a string of counter offensives.
By September Ukraine retook nearly all of the hard key region and later recaptured the city of linemen in Donetsk province. Russia, meanwhile, illegally annexed Donetsk Ersan, and advanced on Zhapricha on September 30, significantly deepening Russian control in the East after its 2014 annexation of the entire Crimean peninsula, and occupation of areas of Luhansk and Donetsk.
In October, an explosion of severely damaged a bridge linking Russia with Crimea, the Peninsula that was annexed by Russia in 2014. After accusing Ukraine of being behind the explosion, Russia retaliated by bombing Ukraine's energy infrastructure, destroying keep plants and power grids ahead of winter.
Ukraine celebrated another key victory in early November, when Russian forces retreated from the southern port city of Karason, once home to 250,000 people.
Another crisis was deepening in Europe, as inflation hit double digits amid the fallout from the war. The Kremlin wagered that surging prices combined with new waves of Ukrainian refugees in Europe would strike a blow to European support for the war. However, a January 2023 Eurobarometer poll found that 74% of EU citizens feel strongly approved of Europe's decision to provide support for Ukraine. A similar Ipsos poll from December 2022 found that the vast majority of Americans supported us aid for Ukraine, but concerns lingered about its impact on American households. Nearly half of respondents said Ukraine should settle for peace as soon as possible, even if it meant losing some territory.
A number of grim figures show the devastating cost of war as the one year anniversary approaches. The UN estimates that some 7000 civilians have been killed in Ukraine. Since February 2022. Senior Ukrainian officials estimate up to 13,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in the last year. Russian officials say nearly 6000 Russian troops have been killed in the same time period. Though US intelligence officials say the number of Russian soldier deaths and injuries is much closer to 100,000. The OECD estimates the war will have cost the global economy $2.8 trillion in lost output at the end of next year. And the UN has recorded close to 8 million Ukrainian refugees across Europe alone. To many the human and economic costs of the war may already seem extreme, but analysts remain uncertain as to how and when the conflict will end. Both sides determined to push forward
CARLA BABB:
In response to Russia’s war in Ukraine, the U.S. and NATO drastically ramped up defenses across Eastern Europe.
This month, I gained exclusive access to US soldiers in Estonia preparing to defend NATO’s edge should Moscow invade.
Unidentified:
They’re the closest U.S. soldiers to Russia’s border…
CARLA BABB:
Training with live fires in NATO-ally Estonia on how to take turf from an enemy.
Maj. Jayson Szorady, U.S. Army:
The overall end state of this is the platoon seizing that key piece of terrain, which is that enemy trench line.
CARLA BABB:
U.S. soldiers with the 101st Airborne Division eliminate simulated enemy scouts and defenses at a training site less than 50 km from Russia…
Unidentified soldier:
Alpha Platoon Move Out!
CARLA BABB:
…which invaded its non-NATO neighbor Ukraine one year ago.
And these are real case scenarios. You're seeing this play out on the battlefield in Ukraine?
Maj. Jayson Szorady, US Army:
Yeah, with any type of training exercise we want to provide the most realistic training environment for our soldiers to better prepare them and our leaders for any type of challenges that are in the future.
CARLA BABB:
OK so they’ve just reached the objective, but they’re still taking on enemy fire.
Team leader Liz Fursova trains the platoon’s weapons on the open field ahead.
First Lt. Liz Fursova, U.S. Army:
Because we were expecting some enemy reinforcements as well as a BMP2, which is an infantry fighting vehicle.
CARLA BABB:
They take that out with an AT4, a weapon similar to the Javelin anti-tank missiles knocking out real armored vehicles in Ukraine.
The enemy here is simulated, but the challenges are real as soldiers used to desert warfare for the last 20 years build a new type of readiness.
Sgt. Jack Scott, US Army:
A lot of the soldiers have not seen snow before in their entire lives, so being thrown into this environment can be challenging.
CARLA BABB:
About 200 km northwest, American HIMARS multiple-rocket launchers with the First Infantry Division stand guard, sentinels shrouded by pines.
Maj. Scott Clark, US Army:
We can fire on the move and stay in hide positions and very well concealed and covered locations for long periods of time and once the fire mission is processed, in a matter of seconds, it’s able to deliver a rocket or a missile.
CARLA BABB:
These HIMARS and their operators arrived in December as part of the US military’s enhanced presence in the Baltics. At the beginning of last year, there were about 600 US troops in the three Baltic nations. Now there are about 1500.
Col. Richard Ikena commands the First Infantry Division’s artillery forces. He says U.S. HIMARS operators have trained in Estonia before, but now it’s different, because they’re also part of Estonia’s collective defense for an extended period of time.
Col. Richard “Ike” Ikena, US Army:
We are in the scenario here. It really brings real time what is going on here in order to operate and to be as ready as possible.
CARLA BABB:
Estonians defend trenches that French forces try to seize.
This is how Estonia prepares for war. But because they’re a member of NATO they wouldn’t go it alone and NATO allies are fully integrated into the exercise.
British troops clear the way for Danish Leopard 2 tanks, similar to the ones soon to be seen on the Ukrainian battlefield, to punch through simulated defenses.
NATO allies hope the Leopards, along with Britain’s Challenger 2 tanks, will give Ukrainians more power and protection than the Soviet-made tanks currently in the fight.
Maj. Nick Bridges, UK Chief of Staff of Estonia’s Enhanced Forward Presence Battlegroup:
The battles in the Ukraine will be slow and what you need is you need a heavy tank like Challenger that can take a hit, and more so than a T-72 which will probably be destroyed after one round. Challengers you can take multiple hits and stay in the fight.
CARLA BABB:
But training Ukrainians to use these tanks effectively won’t happen overnight.
Hanno, Pevkur, Estonian Defense Minister:
Tanks are much awaited. We know that, and I really hope that we are just not too late for that. Russia still has, even they have lost more than 2,000 tanks, they still have thousands of tanks in the stocks they can bring to Ukraine. They still have missiles, they still have rockets, which means that of course Ukraine needs as much help as we as we can give.
CARLA BABB:
Estonia’s Defense Minister tells VOA his country has spent 1% of its entire GDP supporting Ukraine and nearly 3% of GDP on self-defense.
Hanno Pevkur, Estonian Defense Minister:
We have a clear understanding that every tank destroyed in Ukraine is one tank less behind our border.
CARLA BABB:
How worried are you that Russia could attack here?
Hanno Pevkur, Estonian Defense Minister:
Well, we have to be ready. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, we are like the front door of NATO, and when the front door is locked, then it's safe to be inside of the house. So, it’s so simple as that.
CARLA BABB:
A message NATO allies have taken to heart as increased defenses pour in.
Several reporters have been killed or seriously injured during the first year of this war.
From Ukraine’s capital Kyiv, VOA’s Heather Murdock shows us what it’s like to cover Russia’s war on Ukraine in today’s Press Freedom Spotlight.
HEATHER MURDOCK:
Over the past year, thousands of foreign journalists have come from all over the world to cover the war in Ukraine.
Ukrainian journalists also traveled into battle zones, instantly shifting their positions from beat reporters to frontline correspondents.
More than a dozen journalists have been killed out on assignment, and many others were seriously injured.
Veteran correspondents say the war is like none other in recent memory.
Paul Conroy, Frontline Club:
I was down in Bakhmut and Soledar about two weeks ago, and to be honest, it was the most, what I’d imagine, World War II was, compared to a lot of the wars I’ve covered - civil wars and small groups of rebels fighting the army. But this is like total war, you know, very, very, very heavy artillery.
HEATHER MURDOCK:
The conflict has brought large numbers of freelancers to Ukraine.
Eager young journalists can “make a name” for themselves in warzones, but lack of preparation can be deadly.
The Frontline Club and other media support groups, like the Lviv Press Freedom Center in Western Ukraine, are attempting to mitigate the risks.
Olga Letnianchyk, Lviv Press Freedom Center:
We can provide them with vests, with helmets, with medical kits. Also we help them build capability by providing some trainings.
HEATHER MURDOCK:
But there’s no way to prevent all field injuries or deaths, no matter how well trained the journalists are.
And some say it’s worth the risk.
Dima Khilchelko, Freelance Journalist:
There is no really safe way to be in the war, especially in this war, because this war is brutal. There are casualties, civilians, and their houses are shot by missiles.
HEATHER MURDOCK:
Like many Ukrainian journalists, Khilchelko sees his work as part of the war effort.
In general, the goal of journalism is to present neutral information in conflict. But, Khilchelko says, he believes that keeping the outside world informed about the suffering of civilians inside Ukraine could be important to their “survival as a nation.”
Heather Murdock, VOA News, Kyiv, Ukraine.
And now a closer look at the human cost of this war. Vitaly Antyshchuk was a soldier in the Ukrainian Army who died during a Russian missile strike in the Zaporizhzhya region in May. He left behind his wife Yulia and their 6-year-old daughter Alyssa. I met them in Warsaw, Poland, where they fled to escape the war.
Yulia Antyschuk, Ukrainian widow:
It was an incomprehensible connection. We watched each other grow up.
CARLA BABB:
After graduating from college, Yulia and Vitaly got married--he joined the army, she started teaching and then came Alyssa.
Yulia Antyschuk, Ukrainian widow:
He always talked to Alyssa during the whole period while she was in my tummy.
He said that she would have eyes like his, lips like mine. He taught her to be sporty, to ride a bicycle. He had no other hobby.
CARLA BABB:
And he was always little Alyssa’s protector.
Yulia Antyschuk, Ukrainian widow:
He was kind. He supported me, hugged me all the time, played with me and taught me how to fight.
CARLA BABB:
But their family was ripped apart when Russia invaded Ukraine.
This is the last photo they ever took together. Yulia fled with Alyssa here to Warsaw, but not long after, Vitaly was killed in a missile strike.
Alyssa, too young to fully comprehend this war, has taken the loss hard.
Yulia Antyschuk, Ukrainian widow:
She began to draw pictures where Vitaly is no longer standing next to us, where he is above us. And when she asked me if he would come back, I had to say. ‘No’. It was very difficult.
CARLA BABB:
Yulia and Alyssa both seek counseling at Warsaw’s U.N. Refugee Agency center. Alyssa gets to play there with other Ukrainians and talk to kids who speak her language.
They’re supported by a foundation called Children of Heroes, a charity that aids Ukrainian children who have lost one of both parents in the war.
Dan Pasko, CEO and Co-Founder of Children of Heroes:
There is between 20,000 and 50,000 children in this situation right now.”// “As of today, we have 3,488 children under our support programs, and we're adding 50 children per day.
CARLA BABB:
Yulia says this war has turned their future, once so bright, into something painful without Vitaly.
You’re still wearing your wedding ring aren’t you?
Yulia Antyschuk, Ukrainian widow:
Yes, because I’m not ready to let him go.
CARLA BABB:
She says her main focus is keeping Alyssa’s happy memories of Vitally in her heart, in hopes they can soon return to the homeland he died fighting for.
That’s all the time we have for now.
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More from Ukraine next week on The Inside Story.
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