Former DPR Defense Minister Igor Strelkov said Russia needed to call in half a million troops. Above all, according to him, the front lacked infantry.
“To defeat Ukraine, you need to call in half a million soldiers,” Strelkov said in an interview with RTVI, “But you don’t just need to call them up and put them under arms, they also need to be properly armed, organized, trained from forming them into new units, formations, to train within the framework of these units and formations, so that they are not crowds of mobilized, namely regiments, brigades and divisions. Then you can count on victory over the so-called Ukraine. Six months to prepare, another six months or a year to grind.
“The front needs everyone, but above all, the front lacks trained infantry.”
In fact, everything is missing from the front – both artillery units and tank units, but their number is limited by the amount of equipment we have in service. We simply do not have modern equipment in our armed forces to equip new tank and artillery units, and old equipment that is removed from storage, T-62 tanks and various old artillery systems , can only work in defense in fixed positions and fire from closed positions, and not directly fight a battle in the field.
Therefore, what is missing most is simply infantry, which is spent on frontal attacks in the Donbass, I emphasize, trained assault infantry, and not badly trained in shooting and completely untrained in tactics mobilized. This is a very big problem, it is multilateral, and it can only be solved very partially by simply pouring people into the troops, ”said the former DPR defense minister.
