Hey, welcome everybody to the gray zone. It's Max Blumenthal. I'm here with Aaron Mate and another expert guest today. We have Scott Ritter, former UN's weapon inspector, UN weapons inspector, probably needs no introduction for our regular viewers. And is someone who brings a wealth of expertise,

military expertise, political expertise. He's been in the room. He's been, he's jousted with

the president, Joe Biden back when Biden was, I would say, much more articulate. And we're going

to just jump right into a discussion of what's

happening or what we know about what's happening in the Ukraine-Russia war. Welcome. Scott, I wanted to

first ask you, we're hearing a lot of mixed reporting, but generally one side of the narrative,

which is echoing kind of the Ukrainian government side in U side of the narrative, which is echoing kind of the Ukrainian

government side in U.S. media, which is that this plucky underdog David fighting the Russian

Goliath in Ukraine is holding off the Russian advance around Kiev and is doing serious damage

to the Russian military machine in the east. That seems to be different from what I'm seeing on Telegram,

including Russian language channels on Telegram,

as well as alternative media and what seems to be fairly obvious.

But what's your read of what's happening right now?

Is Russia winning or has its strategy completely collapsed?

Well, let me start off with the caveat that unlike apparently the former generals who provide expert opinion on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox, I don't have access to the Russian

plan. Yeah. I mean, I keep hearing that this invasion, this incursion hasn't gone according to

plan. I have yet to see the plan. You know, so I'm operating a disadvantage there. I can't compare what's

happening with the plan that everybody speaks of. I also don't have access to the Russian

playbook because apparently every day I'm told that this is straight out of the Russian playbook.

I don't have the Russian plan. I've studied the Russian military for 35 years.

I spent a lot of time training to close with and destroy the Soviet military in combat.

I think I know a lot about them, but I don't have their playbook.

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