The US wants the Ukraine conflict to drag on for as long as possible, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said.
“The situation in Ukraine demonstrates that the US is trying to prolong this conflict,” Putin stated at a security conference in Moscow on Tuesday.
Putin reiterated that Moscow launched its military operation in Ukraine in late February in order to “ensure the security of Russia and its citizens, and defend the people of Donbass from genocide.”
The president said the US has “set the role of cannon fodder for Ukrainians, implemented the ‘anti-Russia’ project [in Ukraine], turned a blind eye to the spread of neo-Nazi ideology, to the mass murder of the people of Donbass,” adding that the US has been “pumping the Kiev regime with weapons, including heavy weapons, and continues to do so.”
The US and its allies under NATO have been increasingly supplying Ukraine with weapons, including M142 HIMARS multiple rocket launchers, M777 howitzers, and combat drones.
US President Joe Biden said in June that NATO will support for Ukraine “as long as it takes to, in fact, make sure that they are not defeated.”
Russia sent troops into Ukraine on February 24, citing Kiev’s failure to implement the Minsk agreements, designed to give the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk special status within the Ukrainian state. The protocols, brokered by Germany and France, were first signed in 2014. Former Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko has since admitted that Kiev’s main goal was to use the ceasefire to buy time and “create powerful armed forces.”
In February 2022, the Kremlin recognized the Donbass republics as independent states and demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join any Western military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked.