Finnish Officers Speak Out About the State of the Ukrainian Army, its Mistakes, and Poor Morale

Let's see how much longer the incompetent Neocons are able to keep Western electorates distracted from the impending disaster in Ukraine

About a week ago, Swedish news outlet Nyheter i Dag (‘Daily News’) published the below piece about the experiences of Finnish officers training Ukrainian troops.

H/t to reader Rikard who posted this in one of his comments, and after re-reading it in the wake of Wagner Group (all but) cutting off Bakhmut (Artomovsk), I decided to share the below translation with you.

As always, translation and emphases are mine, as are the bottom lines.

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Finnish Officer On the Ukrainian Army: ‘Their command is very bad’

By Johannes Nilsson, Nyheter i Dag, 1 March 2023

The Ukrainian army is far too poorly trained to win the war against Russia and reclaim its entire country. That is, according to a Finnish officer who has been training Ukrainian soldiers since April last year:

The Ukrainians have a strong will to fight and win, but with their tactics, they will not succeed.

After the autumn’s successful [I doubt that: lots of empty square kilometres, but no strategic victory] offensives in Kharkiv and Kherson, as well as Russia’s inability to make much headway over the winter [this is a disputable claim, I’d argue: Bakhmut is falling], many in the West have begun to hope that Ukraine will be able to win the war and throw the Russian invaders out of the country, including from the Crimean peninsula. [I’d call that wishful thinking, at best, delusional seems more apt]

But a senior Finnish officer who has been training Ukrainian soldiers since last April warns that the Ukrainian army is in far worse shape than many in the West hope [since when do we base our strategic planning on ‘hope’?] Above all, they are too poorly trained, he tells Finnish state television Yle, which interviewed him on the spot in Ukraine’s capital Kyiv:

Ukrainians believe they are skilled soldiers. But you don’t become a good soldier by lying scared in a trench for eight months. What you need is training.

The officer wishes to remain anonymous because of his high military rank, but Yle has confirmed his identity. He says the Ukrainian success in the war is due to Russian mistakes, which one cannot hope they will continue to make [note that this is the third time this officer uses the word ‘hope’ in lieu of anything concrete or actionable]

‘The Russian forces have learned from their mistakes, the same cannot be said of the Ukrainians’, the officer adds.

Recently, Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky fired Ukrainian commander Eduard Moskalyov without citing a reason, and according to the unnamed Finnish officer, it is mainly the Ukrainian war leadership that is at fault:

‘The leadership is very poor, as are the tactics and combat techniques. They have taken their templates mainly from video games’, claims the officer, who believes that Western media are being fooled by Ukrainian propaganda:

The Ukrainians have a strong will to fight and to win, but with these tactics they will not succeed.

One problem with the Ukrainian army is its Soviet legacy, with a hierarchical system that follows orders without daring to question or make its own suggestions [that, arguably, also characterises US and NATO planning; it has been argued that the best military in terms of tactical leadership would have been the Wehrmacht in WW2, leaving aside its criminal participation].

‘Captains and majors tell me that the idea is good, but their pay grade is not sufficient to take the issue further’, the officer says, adding, however, that younger Ukrainian officers and officials are more open to reforms in the field of education.

The West has in recent months increased aid to Ukraine in the form of arms supplies of more advanced tanks and artillery systems. But the Finnish officer says the best support it can give the Ukrainians is improved education—and that is where Finland could make a particularly valuable contribution:

Finland’s army has the best training in the world in the art of warfare against Russia. We’ve been training for a hundred years, and we’ve fought twice. No one else has such a broad knowledge of forests and terrain as we have in Finland.

And that’s what should be taught, he believes, pointing out that there are many Finnish trainers who will stand by if Ukraine and Finland reach an official agreement. [good points, but at this point: too little, too late, for NATO had the time to do so since 2014, but for whatever reason they didn’t opt for it…]

[Finnish] ‘Reservists are already lining up and it wouldn’t cost much’, he says. [EDIT: originally, I’ve written this: ‘watching forced recruitment drives—’pressganging’, as the historian would call it, I find it hard to believe many reservists are left…’, but thanks to reader Rikard (who’s actually from Sweden, as opposed to me who’s been living in neighbouring Norway since summer 2020), he pointed out that this paragraph relates to Finnish troops; Rikard explained: ‘The finnish officer talking about reservists is referring to finnish reservists, not ukrainians - someone still in any active capacity cannot go to Ukraine as that would constitute active participation; a reservist can go as a private individual (even if it in reality would be with the full tacit backing of the state) and train ukrainian troops. Think US and french or russian and chinese "advisors" in Indochina and Aghanistan.’]

Another Finnish volunteer soldier in Ukraine [oh, look, confirmation], who also wishes to remain anonymous, confirms the officer’s picture of the Ukrainian army's weaknesses. The soldier, whom Yle calls ‘Erki’, says the main problem is the lack of trained commanders, which leads to poor communication and confused actions in combat:

The Ukrainians don’t even know how to defend themselves and move in a firefight. For example, they just advance straight ahead and don’t aim properly.

Another problem, according to Erki, is the lack of training:

When the soldiers are in their camps, they just lie around and rest, even though they should be training.

However, volunteer soldier Kenneth Grägg has a partly different view of the Ukrainian army’s competence. He agrees that their training was poor at the beginning of the war, but says it has improved, and the chain of command has become more flexible.

According to Gregg [that nomenclature inconsistency is in the original], Russia’s success in capturing the town of Soledar in January was due to the large number of troops it threw into the fight:

We didn’t have enough artillery and the Russian soldiers came through in numbers.

Gregg, however, believes that the new weapons the West has promised will turn the war in Ukraine’s favour, no matter how many troops Russia manages to mobilise. This is because the Russian army is running out of weapons [after hearing this claim since, well, the better part of a year now, I won’t hold my breath]

‘They can force a million men to the front, but what will they be armed with? An axe?’, asks Grägg.

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Bottom Lines

Most of what is said in the above piece is, well, ‘normal’. I recall it was Clausewitz or the elder Moltke who famously quipped that no battle plan survives first contact with the enemy.

Ye, the above piece is striking as it reveals how badly mismatched Ukrainian, Western, and Russian expectations and perceptions were (are).

After the Maidan putsch in 2014, what in heaven’s name were US and NATO personnel doing? I mean, irrespective of where you fall on the pro-Russia vs. pro-Ukraine spectrum, if I’d paid for such outcomes, I’d probably wanted my money back.

Sure, one may only continue to wage war as long one a) survives and b) continues to learn. And learning both the Russians and Ukrainians are doing, for otherwise this conflict would have ended one way or another some time ago.

Yet, the most interesting aspect of the above piece, I’d argue, are the stunning levels of incompetence that are characteristic of the Neocon Cabal in Swamplandia, formerly known as Washington, D.C.

Is there anything these guys can ‘get right’? I mean, Afghanistan, Iraq, Georgia, Syria, Libya, Yemen, and now Ukraine.

I suspect once more of this kind of ‘information’ is given to lawmakers and the electorate—which I’d expect to be harder and harder to conceal or gloss over—the faster this conflict winds down.

That, however, is a topic for another posting.