The militaries of NATO member states continue to rely on security principles and weapons "inherited from the Korean War" that will not be relevant in modern warfare, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Ukraine's former commander-in-chief and current ambassador to the U.K., said on Oct. 17, according to a Kyiv Independent reporter.
"There will be no war of the 1953 model. I am talking about the Korean War. It ended in summer 2023 in Ukraine, when two professional armies of more than a million personnel each faced each other on the battlefield," the retired general said at Chatham House in London.
When Zaluzhnyi was in charge of Ukraine's army in 2023, the Ukrainian military launched its counteroffensive aimed at pushing toward the Sea of Azov to cut Russia's land corridor to Crimea.
Failing to reach its goals, it was limited to the liberation of a few villages in Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk oblasts, significantly slowed down by Russian minefields and a lack of air superiority and equipment.
Since then, the near-complete saturation of the front line with drones and other unmanned system has continued to change how the war is fought.
The ambassador also stressed that modern warfare brought new technologies to the battlefield, such as drones and artificial intelligence.
Zaluzhnyi noted that it is impossible to produce expensive missiles, fighter jets, and aircraft carriers at the "massive scale" that modern warfare requires, meaning these systems will become less efficient.
South Korea and the U.S. fought against North Korea and China in a bloody war in 1950-53, leading to a ceasefire and a division along the demarcation line that stands today.
In the same speech, Zaluzhnyi said that it is almost impossible to escape the state of "protracted" war with Russia.
Martin Fornusek
(Updated: )
