Retired Army Col. Richard Black, also a former Virginia State Senator, told TASS in an interview published today that the U.S. army is not ready for a war with Russia, nor do the American people want one. At the same time, he warned that the opinion of House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), that if Ukraine fails, American troops will be sent to fight Russia, cannot be ignored. “He speaks for the foreign policy establishment,” Black pointed out. Black called Jeffries’ remarks “reckless and irresponsible,” comparing them to former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan in 2022 “in a bid to sell weapons by provoking tensions with China.”
“I worry about suggestions that Americans might be sent to fight Russians. Americans don’t want war with Russia, and the U.S. is unprepared for such a war,” Black emphasized. According to him, the U.S. armed forces’ ammunition stocks are “depleted, the Pentagon is bloated and politicized,” and there is a “shortage of high-quality recruits” for training. “I doubt that Washington could generate the support necessary to fight a war,” he opined, saying that there is “no support for the draft” into the Armed Forces, “which would be vital in wartime.”
“I do not expect the U.S. to send troops to fight in Ukraine, but Western leaders are so vested in this foolish enterprise that anything is possible. They know that Ukraine is near collapse, and they will do everything possible to keep it afloat until the November presidential elections,” Black concluded.
Black also forecast that the war will be over before the end of 2024. Ukraine is desperately short of soldiers. Its bloody June counteroffensive has exhausted their manpower, and Zelenskyy’s unpopular attempts to draft new inductees are hitting strong resistance,” Black noted. “Across the battlefront, Ukraine’s defenses are worn down and stretched thin.”
“The shortage of artillery and other weapons causes problems, but the critical issue is their shortage of fighting men,” he emphasized. At the same time, Black continued, in Russia, “the economy is strong, and the industrial base grows by leaps and bounds.”
