Former Commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, General Naev, responded to the question of who cleared the mines in Chonhar.

The former commander of the Joint Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, General Naev, responded to the question of who defused the mines in Chonhar.

According to the ex-commander of the Joint Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Lieutenant General Sergey Naev, to prevent the enemy from breaking through from temporarily occupied Crimea in 2022, it was necessary to adopt legislative measures regarding the use of the Armed Forces and to establish a legal regime of martial law.

Naev mentioned this in an interview with "Ukrainian Truth".

"In 2014, when the temporary occupation of Crimea occurred, troops were deployed in various directions - to the Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv regions, and also towards Crimea, thus the Ukrainian army took measures to resist the aggression.

In the Crimean direction, our military dug some trenches, there were several brigades, and then they mined five bridges in the isthmus: two on the Arabat Spit, which were blown up using a placed charge. Directly in Chonhar, there were three bridges - two for vehicles and one railway. They laid explosives there, a little more than 1500 mines. To be prepared for resistance, there should have been about 200,000 mines there."

The general noted that this refers to 2014. Subsequently, these brigades from the Crimean direction moved to the territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, while small units remained in the south. According to Naev, the leadership of the Armed Forces requested that at least an anti-terrorist operation regime be introduced in the territories of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, so that troops could be legally deployed.

"Imagine, a military commander comes to the owner of a property complex and says: 'Can we place an artillery battery on your property?'. And the owner of the property complex replies: 'On what grounds?'.

There were no decisions even to deploy these forces. It was refused, stating that such legal regimes would not be established in the territories of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions," Naev explained.

Regarding the most resonant question in society - "who defused Chonhar?", the general clarified the following.

"There is no sense in this question. This direction was subordinate to the 'South' group of troops, and there was a separate battalion on this isthmus. In this battalion, there are servicemen who blow up these bridges. Accordingly, on the night before the offensive, when I was convincing the commanders that an attack was possible the next day, I also told the commander of the group in this direction to prepare these bridges for demolition. And when the offensive occurred, those soldiers were supposed to blow up the bridges.

But we must realize that the bridges were not blown up by robots - they were ordinary people, just like you, just like me. And they had to do this while bombs and rockets were falling."

Regarding what could have been done differently in the south, Naev noted that, in his opinion, it was necessary to make a decision on the use of the Armed Forces and to introduce a legal regime of martial law. This pertains to the preparations in the previous years.

According to the general, in the territories of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, a decision should have been made that was similar to that in Donetsk and Luhansk regions. Then the military command would have been digging trenches, laying mines - not one and a half thousand, but hundreds of thousands.

Right before the war, it would have been necessary to increase the number of troops through mobilization. Then there would have been two additional territorial defense brigades in the territories of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, as well as brigades from the reserve corps, mechanized tank units that the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine would have provided, Naev added.