Washington — White Home nationwide safety adviser Jake Sullivan stated Sunday that Russian President Vladimir Putin's latest call-up of reservists into the navy and referenda being carried out in occupied areas of Ukraine don't sign rising energy, however moderately that the Russians are "struggling badly" of their ongoing warfare.
"What Putin has finished shouldn't be precisely an indication of energy or confidence, frankly, it is a signal that they are struggling badly on the Russian facet," Sullivan stated in an interview with "Face the Nation." "And we'll assist the Ukrainians be capable of make the most of the positive factors they've made, and to proceed to push again towards the Russian forces which can be brutally occupying parts of their nation."
Putin introduced a partial mobilization of his navy reserves final week, a transfer that has prompted protests in Moscow and an exodus from Russia of fighting-age males fleeing to keep away from being conscripted. The mobilization by Putin got here two days earlier than individuals in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine started voting on whether or not to develop into a part of Russia, a course of that has been condemned by the White Home and U.S. allies.
Sullivan stated neither Putin's call-up nor the "sham" referendums will cease the U.S. from offering Ukraine with the "needed means and applied sciences" wanted for the nation to defend itself from Russia within the ongoing warfare.
"I feel what we're seeing are indicators of unbelievable battle among the many Russians," he stated. "You have obtained low morale, the place the troopers do not need to battle. And who can blame them as a result of they need no a part of Putin's warfare of conquest of their neighboring nation. You have obtained Russia having depleted its shops of precision-guided munitions. You have obtained Russia disorganized and shedding territory, to a succesful Ukrainian pressure. And you have an enormous quantity of infighting among the many Russian navy management, and now the blame recreation has began to incorporate these replacements."
Sullivan stated that whereas Russia is "struggling," it "stays a harmful foe and able to nice brutality," as demonstrated by mass graves present in Izium, a metropolis in northeastern Ukraine.
"We proceed to take that risk critically," he stated.
Sullivan additionally pledged Ukraine will get extra artillery, air defenses programs and tanks, and famous the U.S. has supplied Ukraine with greater than $15 billion in weapons and facilitated the switch of tanks from NATO allies.
"We proceed to see our obligation being offering Ukraine all that it wants to have the ability to successfully defend itself and defend its nation and defend its freedom," Sullivan stated. "That is what we're intent on doing. And we aren't taking our eye off the ball."