Pentagon chief asks Putin to ‘seek a diplomatic solution’ of Ukraine crisis

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin claimed that Russia made “missteps” and “struggled with logistics” in its military campaign in Ukraine, and asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to “seek a diplomatic solution.”

When CNN’s Don Lemon asked Austin about his assessment of Russian forces in Ukraine, the Pentagon chief said, “Oh, it's hard to tell, Don. I think, you know, they have not progressed as quickly as they would have liked to. I think they envisioned that they would move rapidly and very quickly, seize the capital city, they've not been able to do that.”

“They've struggled with logistics. So we've seen a number of missteps along the way,” he said in the interview on Friday.

“I don't see, you know, evidence of good employment of tactical intelligence. I don't see integration of air capability with a ground maneuver,” he continued. "And so there are a number of things that we would expect to have seen that we just haven't seen, and the Russians really have had some … presented … some problems. So, many of their assumptions have not proven to be true as they entered this fight.”

Austin said that President Putin could pursue diplomacy if he wanted to.

“We're here because of his decision to launch this attack. He can make a decision today to end this and seek a diplomatic solution. He's had a number of opportunities along the way. He has opportunities today to decide to do something different,” Lloyd told Lemon.

“This is not going well for him on the battlefield. And there are a number of things that are now coming into play that will make things more difficult for him as he goes forward,” he added.

‘Russians are fully in control of Ukraine operation’

American analyst Daniel Patrick Welch said, “I'm talking to people who live in Kharkov, and Kiev, talking to Russians, looking at maps that are gathered from satellite data, from the Ministry of Defense. This is not true at all--it's the exact opposite of the truth. The war is over--it's always been over. Kiev’s fighting capacity was destroyed in the first 48 hours.”

“Now the Russians are going slowly because they're bypassing major population centers, they’re encircling 60,000 Ukrainian troops! It's not rocket science; anyone outside this shitty little bubble of Western thought can see this,” he told Press TV.

"No, two bit political hacks like Austin lie for a living, but can't do it convincingly,” Welch said.

“The Russians are fully in control of their operation and have offered constantly to end it. It is the Ukrainians, no doubt on strict orders from their Yankee overlords, who are inexplicably dragging their feet,” he stated.

Despite US Empire’s stranglehold on information, most of the world has little trouble spotting the villain

Joe Biden

Putin on February 24 ordered a “special military operation” in Ukraine’s Donbas region. Putin said his country was defending Russian-speaking communities through the "demilitarisation and de-Nazification" of Ukraine so that their neighbor became neutral and no longer threatened Russia.

US President Joe Biden, however, called the Russian military action in Ukraine an "unprovoked and unjustified attack," and the mainstream American media described it as the biggest assault on a European state since World War Two attack by Russia.

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