Retired four-star General Philip Breedlove isn’t afraid to offer up an unpopular opinion. In a recent discussion with Independence Avenue Media, the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe offered a stark reassessment of Moscow’s aims in Ukraine.
“I will be criticized for what I’m about to say, because there are a lot of people that disagree. But … everyone wants to say Russia’s winning the war. I do not believe they are.”
Warning that President Vladimir Putin, despite diplomatic overtures, “never was and never will be a partner for peace,” he thinks Washington is long overdue to put Ukraine on equal footing with Russian forces, allowing Kyiv to strike deep in Russian territory.
“We don’t want the Ukrainian military to do to Russia what Russia’s military has been doing to Ukraine for 11 years, [but] we have limited Ukraine’s ability to fire back deeply, because we didn’t want the war to escalate,” he said. But Putin has not only continued to escalate, he added, he’s “escalated on the escalations.”
Breedlove’s comments come in the wake of President Donald Trump’s unexpected trimming of a ceasefire deadline for Russia. “I want to be generous, but we just don’t see any progress being made,” Trump said Monday, signaling mounting frustration over Kremlin intransigence.
According to Breedlove, Putin’s rejection of Trump’s original timeline—and his refusal to negotiate — demonstrates that diplomacy is futile without leverage. “Putin took the offer and very loudly, very proudly rejected it,” the retired general said. “Trump now understands what many of us have long known: you cannot make peace with someone who isn’t interested in peace.”
Breedlove also criticized Moscow’s long-standing strategy of coercive messaging—using nuclear threats and World War III rhetoric as psychological tools — a doctrine known as “reflexive control.” “It’s worked magnificently,” he said. “Why would Russia stop using it?”
Welcoming increased NATO coordination on arms transfers and defense planning, Breedlove nonetheless insists U.S. leadership must remain central. “NATO is stepping up — but American leadership must remain at the heart of it,” he said, echoing a longstanding view that European solidarity must be matched by enduring U.S. commitment.
The following interview was recorded on July 29, 2025, and has been edited for length and clarity.
Independence Avenue Media Editor in Chief, Ia Meurmishvili: Let’s start from President Trump’s announcement where he said that he’s decreasing the 50-day deadline he gave to Russia earlier to 10 or 12 days. So, we’re talking about August 5th or 7th. What do you think happened? Why do you think he changed his mind?
Former Supreme Allied Commander Europe, General (ret.) Philip Breedlove: Well, as has happened across the last four or five times we’ve tried to make peace overtures to Russia, Russia rebukes America, sends massive attacks into Ukraine to make a point, and sometimes senior Russian leaders come out with their own pronunciations. What we have seen from Russia’s most senior leadership across the last a few weeks, since the first announcement of 50 days, is Russia saying 50 days is not enough and they’re not going to make it.
They basically took the U.S. president’s offer and very publicly, very loudly, and very proudly said they would not comply. So, I think President Trump is beginning to see that Mr. Putin is not a partner for peace, and he never was a partner for peace, and he never will be a partner for peace. I think President Trump has decided that he will not give Mr. Putin 50 days of protected attack time on Ukraine. Mr. Trump appears to be shortening this timeline and forcing Mr. Putin’s hand to see how it goes.
Meurmishvili: There are some Russian statements that are basically threatening a war with the United States. What do you think that means?
Breedlove: Well, this is a long history of how Russia has tried to maneuver the West. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the term “reflexive control,” but essentially Russia has been practicing reflexive control over the West, and it’s worked magnificently. We have given Russia so many concessions in this war against Ukraine. Essentially, the West has guaranteed sanctuary for Russia for years and years. Remember this war is really 11 years old. I don’t get it how people say the war is 3 or 3-1/2 years old—it’s 11 years old. And across that whole time, Russia has used the threat of tactical nuclear weapons, and the threat of World War III to reflexively control the West. And it’s worked magnificently.
So, it doesn’t surprise me that they go back to the tool that has worked so well. Why change when it’s working? They will threaten us with nukes. They will threaten us with World War III. And we’ll see how the West reacts.
Meurmishvili: But they did not have President Trump’s character to face those threats as they do now.
Breedlove: This is a change. There were many of us that didn’t agree with 50 days. But what we really liked was the fact that the president has made the determination that he doesn’t have a partner for peace in Mr. Putin, and he’s got to start upping the game and making costs rise on Mr. Putin.
When he announced his 50 days a lot of people said the same thing—that’s 50 days to pound Ukraine and then we’ll start a whole other regime with the U.S. president. But President Trump, I believe, has seen through this. Like I said, I believe now he understands he never did have a partner for peace. He does not have a partner for peace right now and he never will in the future. Russia has made that very clear in the words they’ve used since Mr. Trump put out the 50 days deadline, and now you’ve seen some even more frantic replies from Russia after the 10 to 12 day pronunciation.
Meurmishvili: President Trump two weeks ago announced that Ukraine basically can have unlimited supplies of weapons as long as NATO allies and European partners pay for those American weapons. What is Ukraine getting? Do you know anything about what sort of weaponry we’re talking about?
Breedlove: Well, the JASSMs [Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles] would be a magnificent weapon, but I don’t think that’s on the table right now because Russia fears the JASSM, especially the JASSM ER, the stealthier and long range version of it. I have not heard the discussion of JASSM. I would personally be very happy to see the United States enter a conversation about JASSMs. But also, the current aircraft flying in Ukraine would take significant modification to carry JASSM missiles.
What I hear is basically what you’ve seen in the press. I haven’t heard anything through my channels that’s different. There are Patriots, there are possibly more Javelins, there are a lot of smaller weapons that they need. Some of them “offensive,” but not [with] deep-striking capabilities. We’ll all find this out.
I read an interesting article yesterday that one of the American firms has signed a deal with Ukraine—maybe via NATO, I don’t know how the funding is working—but they’re going to sell them about 30 electronic boards to be installed in Ukrainian missiles that gives them AI and will make them much more lethal, much more capable and will overcome a lot of the jamming and electronic warfare techniques of the Russians. That’ll make 30,000 weapons much more lethal as Ukraine builds its own kit to attack Russia.
I think what we’ll see over the next days, weeks, and months is that with money available, there will be a lot of U.S. capability that will begin to be added to the Ukrainian arsenal, and some of it will be a quite capable kit.
Meurmishvili: What’s your view on NATO’s new role that we’re witnessing — NATO coordinating acquisition, distribution of the weapons for Ukraine?
Breedlove: Well, I really like the idea that NATO is even more involved because that shows to the American president that they are involved and that they see their role and their requirement. I do not believe that because NATO becomes more involved that the U.S. should become less involved. I want to see both. I want to see NATO leading and as the president has intimated, helping in the funding of this. But what I really want to see is American leadership remaining a big part of NATO.
Meurmishvili: It seems like Europe is looking for that because President Trump’s announcement about reducing the number of days for Russia to initiate a ceasefire was met with a lot of excitement.
Breedlove: I hate to keep saying this, but I need to say it one more time. The NATO leadership has [long] seen that Mr. Putin and Russia was not going to participate in building a durable peace in Ukraine. They have no interest whatsoever—none—in a durable peace in Ukraine. They want a Pax Russia, a peace that is beneficial to Russia, that allows Russia to dominate politics, dominate economics, and dominate security in Ukraine. And that is not what the rest of the world wants.
I think that NATO and the E.U. and all our partners around the world have recognized that over time. I think that what they’re excited about in Europe is they’re beginning to see that the U.S. administration is also beginning to understand—I’ll say it one more time—Putin never was a partner in finding peace. He is not a partner in finding peace now, and he never will be a partner for finding peace in Ukraine.
Meurmishvili: What’s your assessment of what’s happening with Russia’s summer offensive in Ukraine? What are you seeing on the front lines right now?
Breedlove: What we see is basically three elements. The first element is that the actual ground army offensive by Russia is doing almost nothing. You’ve heard all the numbers. We won’t go over them here, but [they are] gaining tiny bits of ground at immense costs in Russian soldiers. There was even a new story today about how Russia is telling people at home that their sons have deserted and gone because they don’t know how to tell the people about all the death and destruction that this war has cost the Russian military.
I think that we see a Russian offensive that is very much—not stalled, I wouldn’t use that word—but it’s grinding forward at a cost that no country in the world can truly support for a long time. The second thing I would say is that their real offensive right now is through the air. Not their air force, which has failed, but the use of drones and rockets are now the only true offensive capability that Russia knows how to use. They are building more capability, and frankly, they’re building even better capability. Much like how the United States is going to start providing Ukraine with electronics boards, China, Iran, and North Korea have been helping Russia to build better attack capabilities. And the Russians are building capabilities that are harder to shoot down.
Third, we see a very different military approach. This is one of the things the West has not grasped yet because, if they did, then they would embrace it. Russia is fighting what we call a “counter-value fight.” Russia is taking its fight to the Ukrainian people, the Ukrainian infrastructure. They’re trying to essentially eliminate Ukraine as a country so they can once again subjugate it both militarily and politically. On the other side, Ukraine, if you look at the reporting, it’s really straightforward, is attacking the military and the military capability of Russia very precisely. This is called a “counter-force fight.” Ukraine is doing a counter-force fight and attacking the Russian military. Russia is doing a counter-value fight and attacking the people of Ukraine. I wish, I hope and I continue to work to try to get everyone in the West, including our leadership, to understand the difference in the two and how we should react to it. So long as Ukraine continues to show discipline in a counter-force fight, we should change our policy to allow Ukraine to strike deeply [inside Russian territory] with anybody’s weapons, including ours, as far as policy goes. And then we begin to give them more of those capabilities. For example, you brought up JASSMs. I don’t know that they will ever have them. I’ve heard a lot more talking about Tomahawks. So, there are weapons that are in the conversation, but not on the agenda yet. And I think that we should do that.
Meurmishvili: President Trump did not specifically deny Ukraine’s use of some of these weapons to strike military targets deep inside Russia. Do you take that as an indication that the policy we’ve had for the past 3-1/2 years has ended?
Breedlove: I believe that we have had this policy for a long time. We don’t want the Ukrainian military to do to Russia what Russia’s military has been doing to Ukraine for 11 years. We have limited Ukraine’s ability to fire back deeply, because we didn’t want the war to escalate. But Mr. Putin has continued to escalate. He has escalated on the escalations! He is firing from nearly all points around the compass into Ukraine by the hundreds of thousands and we are telling Ukraine “no.” I think the first thing that needs to happen is a public, declaratory, loud and proud pronunciation by the West, including the United States, that we are not going to allow Mr. Putin to win this war and we are going to allow Ukraine to begin to carry on a deep counter-force fight.
Meurmishvili: And this is my final question, probably the most difficult question to answer. Knowing what we know right now, where do you think the war is going? Are we going to stalemate at some point or do you anticipate different scenarios?
Breedlove: I will be criticized for what I’m about to say, because there are a lot of people that disagree. But there are also some very deep-thinking people who agree. The signs that I see on the battlefield are not about Russia winning this war. Everyone wants to say Russia’s winning the war. I do not believe they are. And there are a lot of other people that don’t. Let’s just go over a few signs: Russia has got a manning problem that is incredible. They had to ask North Korea to send 30,000 North Korean troops to Russia to retake sovereign Russian land in the Kursk territory, and they have yet to do that. There are still Ukrainians holding Russian land. So, Russia couldn’t do it with their own military. They had to ask the North Koreans to come help them. Second thing: we’re beginning to see their industry, especially their military industry, suffer from lack of manpower. And what have we heard about recently? That the North Koreans are going to send people to man the industry segments where they are building these offensive capabilities to fire into Ukraine. So, we have an army that can’t even retake Russian land. We have an industry segment that now is hurting so badly that they’re having to ask people to come in from outside of their country to man their industrial sites. And third: now we hear a second time they’re asking for more North Korean soldiers to come fight for them. Does that sound like an army that’s winning? No, I don’t think so. And the losses are incredible. I believe they’re unsustainable. The sanctions have not and never have changed Mr. Putin’s opinion and how he runs the ground war. But they may soon begin to do that, especially if our president levies strict sanctions and then we enforce them.
The first thing I would do if I was enforcing the sanctions is that I would enforce one that’s already out there that’s being broken every day. Russia has a shadow fleet of—I think it’s now over 140 ships—that are hauling all around the world. I’d turn that off. So, I think that this is a Russia that is not winning. Whether Ukraine is winning is also a debate, but the fact of the matter is Russia is not winning this war.
Meurmishvili: General Breedlove, thank you very much for your time and thoughts.
Breedlove: It was my pleasure.
