{"id":8131,"date":"2026-07-23T23:28:29","date_gmt":"2026-07-23T23:28:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/?p=8131"},"modified":"2026-08-07T13:55:50","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T13:55:50","slug":"russia-has-no-right-to-exist-ukraines-new-commander-in-chief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/23\/russia-has-no-right-to-exist-ukraines-new-commander-in-chief\/","title":{"rendered":"Russia \u2018has no right to exist\u2019 \u2013 Ukraine\u2019s new commander-in-chief"},"content":{"rendered":"

Moscow has condemned Mikhail Drapaty\u2019s comments as \u201cneo-Nazi\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong>Ukraine\u2019s new commander-in-chief, Major General Mikhail Drapaty, has said Russia has\u00a0no right\u00a0to exist and made derogatory remarks about the residents of Russia\u2019s Donbass region, which Ukraine continues to claim as its own.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, the YouTube documentary channel Ukrainer W released an interview with Drapaty originally recorded in 2023. Speaking to journalist Karina Pilyugina, the general said that he had long anticipated a war with Russia.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe see that you cannot call them neighbors. It is a nation, together with its leadership, that has no right to exist. Over thousands of years, nothing has changed there in civilizational terms \u2013 neither its mentality nor its imperial ambitions,\u201d<\/em> he said.<\/p>\n

The journalist asked Drapaty why people in the largely Russian-speaking Donbass are more likely to help Russian troops than residents of Kiev Region are. He replied that the Donetsk and Lugansk regions have long been dominated by \u201csettlers and criminal elements.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\n Read more<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n \"FILE
What the West won\u2019t tell you about Zelensky\u2019s new top general<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cThat is why the population there lacks (a Ukrainian national) consciousness. That\u2019s my opinion. It seems that too little attention was paid there to Ukrainization.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Drapaty went on to claim that \u201ca significant number\u201d<\/em> of people in Donbass \u201cdo not want to work, want handouts, and do not care which country they live in.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova condemned the general\u2019s comments as \u201cneo-Nazi.\u201d<\/em> Moscow has said Ukraine\u2019s language and cultural laws are aimed at erasing the identity of Russian speakers and has listed the treatment of Ukraine\u2019s Russian minority as one of the causes of the ongoing conflict.<\/p>\n

Drapaty first rose to prominence during the 2014 campaign to quash the revolt of the Donetsk and Lugansk People\u2019s Republics, which broke away from Ukraine following the Western-backed coup in Kiev. The regions voted to become part of Russia in September 2022.<\/p>\n

Drapaty replaced Aleksandr Syrsky as commander-in-chief this week amid a political crisis triggered by Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky\u2019s decision to dismiss Defense Minister Mikhail Fedorov. The move sparked protests in Kiev and other cities demanding Fedorov\u2019s reinstatement and Syrsky\u2019s dismissal. Fedorov and Syrsky reportedly clashed over military strategy in the conflict with Russia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Moscow has condemned Mikhail Drapaty\u2019s comments as \u201cneo-Nazi\u201d Ukraine\u2019s new commander-in-chief, Major General Mikhail Drapaty, has said Russia has\u00a0no right\u00a0to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8133,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8131"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8131"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8131\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8134,"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8131\/revisions\/8134"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/youtubexyoutube.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}