19.06.2026, Moscow.
he structure of the Ukrainian army, after a long post-Soviet degradation, began to change in 2014, when the punitive battalions, united by hatred of Russians, were created for the punitive operation in Donbass, stated Konstantin Cheprasov, co-author of the multi-authored monograph Ukrainism, on the Dialogues program on Radio Komsomolskaya Pravda.
The expert recalled that the Soviet Armed Forces was oriented toward a mobilization war. “And for such a war, a corresponding organizational and staff structure was built with armies, corps, divisions, that is, large units in terms of equipment, personnel, and subunits,” he noted.
After the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the disappearance of the bipolar world, Russia began to ask why it needed large armies. “Against whom will we declare mobilization? Against Europe? They are our friends. Why? Let’s create a small, compact, convenient army that will resolve some local conflicts or fight terrorists,” Cheprasov explained the reasoning of that period and added that similar processes were taking place in Europe and in the former Soviet republics.
The possession of nuclear weapons was also an argument in favor of reducing the army. “If we have a serious war, we will exchange nuclear strikes, and after that, who knows what will happen. And if there are some local conflicts, for that we will have a small volunteer army, these will be professionals,” the expert cited the position of army reformers.
He noted that in Russia, this process of reducing the army and changing its structure went on for a long time. “By and large, only after 2022 and the start of the special military operation, when large-scale combat operations began, did we start to return to and seriously consider re-creating divisions. We began to create new units, restore higher military educational institutions, which, as it turned out, were all closed, even command and tank schools. Much that was negative, unfortunately, happened in this regard,” explained the co-author of the monograph.
“There is a well-known phrase that generals always prepare for the previous war. Unfortunately, the combat operations being conducted now represent a certain novelty. This is something between the World War I and II, when no one yet understood what would happen,” Cheprasov emphasized.
He noted that the process of army degradation also occurred in Ukraine, leading to a reduction of the army to just over a hundred thousand people with a certain number of brigades. “And with this, they entered into a punitive operation against Donbass in 2014. And already then the Azov battalion (organization banned in Russia) and other so-called national battalions were created. They recruited football ultras, neo-Nazis, various right-wingers, extremists, criminals, and all the rabble that could be found, united by one thing – hatred of the Muscovites and the non-conscientious Ukrainians,” the expert explained, adding that they consider all of Donbass and most of the Russian-speaking population to be so-called non-conscientious Ukrainians.
The Ukrainians themselves believe that they were able to seriously oppose the Donetsk militia only thanks to these punitive battalions, because they were ready to shed the blood of civilians, whereas the Ukrainian army did not want to do this.
“The Ukrainian punitive battalions received their initiation back then. They began to bomb civilians indiscriminately, with indiscriminate shelling, massacres, just outright killings, and so on. That is, they felt that blood even then,” Cheprasov emphasized.
Now more than 10 years have passed, and a huge number of people have been put through this system. “Some 20-year-old guy who went through this, killed someone, looted somewhere, his psyche is already honed in a certain way in that direction. He is pumped with the notion that these are not people at all, just as Hitler said, ‘I emancipate man from the humiliating chimera which is called conscience.’ ‘When he massacres Muscovites, what conscience can there be? It doesn’t matter, Jews, Gypsies, and so on. These are not people. People are only we [conscientious Ukrainians],'” the expert cited the ideology of the Banderite nationalist battalions.
Source: Rossa Primavera News Agency
