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welcome to the espresso channel. today , our program "war and weapons" focuses on two interrelated topics, which some consider a challenge to our security, others, on the contrary, new opportunities. for the country's defense capability, so the first topic is the development and use in ukraine of the potential of private military and defense consulting companies as one of the tools for strengthening the country's defense forces. in ukraine, to things, several draft laws were prepared regarding private military companies, but the work on them was never completed, so what experience and practices should ukraine take into account right now in the conditions of war, what... pros and cons there may

be, and the second the topic for discussion is the expansion of the rights of citizens to own firearms. it would seem that after the 22nd year. the need for an adequate law on weapons, an increase in the percentage of gun owners in the state - these are things that were clearly understood and society demanded some sort of liberal gun law. let me remind you that in the first reading of the draft law on the right to civilian firearms in ukraine, the day before the start of the active phase of the war on march 23, 2022, however, i am currently preparing... the second reading of this draft law in the parliament and a significant number of amendments to this document appeared , and in fact, in the eyes of the editors, it can be regarded rather as a step towards undermining the defense capability of our state. we will also talk about this in our program. my name is serhiy zgurets

the director of the defense express company, which , together with the espresso channel, aims to cover the most relevant events and topics in the life of our army and the defense-industrial complex. and... andrii kepkalo is joining us now, he is the founder and head of omega consulting group. mr. andrii, i congratulate you, i am glad to see and hear you. greetings, mr. serhiy, thank you for the invitation. well, before the broadcast, we had this kind of discussion, not to repeat ourselves, about topics that we seem to have talked about before, but i looked, and in fact we are now talking about private military very little is said about the company, and... you are a person who has considerable experience in creating such companies, and there are a certain number of people who believe that this step and this direction of movement in the state towards private companies is dangerous and irrational. unfortunately, we have not yet been able to find an opponent to your position today, so i will try to offer a little

opinion on some things related to private companies. but first of all, given your experience, i would like you, relatively speaking, to tell me what a private company in a certain standard sense, if at all there is a standard understanding of pvc or consulting companies, because the word consulting in the name of your company, i think, appeared for a reason, well then let's start from the beginning, unfortunately , we have private military companies. they are always associated with mercenaries, it is very bad, i do not support such an opinion, but if we are already talking about mercenaries, then i want to tell you that mercenaries exist as long as there is war, for example, about mercenaries,

it is even written in the bible, and there are a lot of examples when mercenary troops were once used by someone... i even read machiavelli, machiavelli against the use of mercenaries, but i have a different opinion on this matter, and there are also subjects of mercenaries and private military companies, it was unfolding for a very long time , somewhere before the early 2000s, and then in the 2000s, the industry of private military companies, it grew up and became more... regulated, why? because the united states of america, they started, started hostilities actions, both on the territory of afghanistan and on the territory of iraq, and i directly

participated in these activities, and i just want to remind you how since the beginning of the 2000s this, it has developed, we will not talk. there about the 90s, 80s, 70s and so on. how is this pvc topic, has it grown up at all? the united states of america decided to enter the territory of iraq. and i remember at the time, the secretary of defense, if i'm not mistaken, was donald rumsfeld, and he, he went on television, and he said, let's put it this way, it's my opinion. he tried to reassure the people of the united states of america, and he said these things: the war in iraq, it will last, maybe five days, maybe five weeks, maybe five months, but it will not last 5 years.

and it turned out that they, the americans, counted on one thing, another turned out, and when the other turned out, and they realized that it would be a war for years, and then... the question arose, what are we going to do about it, and american politicians, they decided to talk, think together, and what to do about it, and there were three options, again, this is not speculation on some facts, i... directly took part in this and there were three options: the first option is to collect your things and leave iraq, it was not immediately, well, they did not accept it. the second option was to declare mobilization, and then it was a political suicide, not suitable either. and so they chose the third option: to create private military companies. and involve private military companies, both on the territory of iraq and on the territory

of afghanistan, that is, what we are getting here in this short excursion into history, that the united states of america is the country that uses private military companies the most, the second country is probably the united arab emirates, for them a private military company was a support in a critical situation, unfortunately, in our country we look at private military companies as on some you see, private military companies, there is a demand for them, everybody today uses private military companies, governments use private military companies, multinational corporations like exsanmobil, shell, total, they all they use, they use the services of private military companies, non-governmental organizations, such as save the children or caritas, they use the services of private military companies, no... a little bit of other services, even some logistical or other services, but these are private military companies, the security

of the vatican, who is involved today, the swiss, well, how did the swiss get into the vatican, you can say mercenaries, and i don't want to use this example, because it is very bad, i wouldn't want to use it, but i have to, even terrorists have their own private military companies, i can call malgam like this: it is based, if i am not mistaken, in afghanistan, but it works for the benefit of terrorist organizations, that is, the whole world uses the services of private military companies, and for some reason it is always taboo here, and i don't understand why. and when we talk about a private military company, what are the signs or symptoms, well, the basic things that can really be said that this structure or this group of people is private. how the company or consulting company or defense consulting company, what are

the unmasking signs of a private company? it is a company, it is very simple, it is a limited liability company that provides services of a military nature, for example, we are engaged in the training of the armed forces, we were engaged in, we are not engaged in now, because we do not have the resources, we were engaged in the training of the armed forces of ukraine, we trained ee... operators, for example, for example, anti-tank missiles, manpads, we trained sappers, we trained saboteurs and so on, that is, such activity, it has signs of activities of a military nature, well, for example, the signs of the pmc, fine, but if the company is engaged in medical medicine, the training of medics there, is engaged in airfield security, is engaged in gathering intelligence in the interests of the forces. structures are also private wax companies?

no, but the last thing, when you said intelligence gathering, it can already be considered as a private military company, and by the way, there is a very big demand in the market right now for private, let's call it that, for private intelligence agencies, intelligence companies, if you want some example then let me give you that example bellingcat. well, this is a private company, well , it’s a journalistic investigation, the conclusions of this company are listened to, for example, by the haab court, well, then it means that the boundaries of private companies are still quite blurred, it’s difficult to determine here, why i ask this, because linguistically speaking , we had this, the 20th year, president zelenskyi says that we really need to decide on private companies, two legislative... projects are being developed, they are hanging somewhere, zelenskyi says about what needs to be done so that they do not

become the basis of certain oligarchic forces there and so on, where does this threat or warning to private companies come from, if it does not correspond to the essence of the pmcs themselves in view of what you said before. that's, that's a very, very relevant question that you've asked now. uh, you see, uh, in civilized countries, i don't, i don't want to offend anyone, but in civilized countries there is no such thought that a private military company... can obey some oligarch there and work in the interests of some there are private individuals and, god forbid, they try to remove the government or something else, well , the same big private military company in the united states is black water, which does not exist today, and i know its head, rick prince, well, believe me, it doesn't

even occur to him such an option that he can someday his private. turn the military company black water or some other against the government and go there, well, i don’t know, put the government there, who is currently joe biden, and change it to trump, for example, well, this is such a great example simple, you understand, that is, those events that happened in ukraine earlier, for example, if i'm not mistaken, this was an incident in which he took part. mr. kolomoisky, when there were certain actions with ukrtransnafta, well, there were some people in black, armed, unarmed, they entered the territory of the enterprise and so on, listen, frankly speaking, it is not my problem that our power structures allow, that there were some illegal armed groups in ukraine, and they

could enter some enterprises there, their or to close or open and so on and the like, do you understand? that is, a private military company, it is registered somewhere, that is, it is a legal entity, it can no longer be considered as an illegal group, because there is registration, of course, if there is a group, a group of people who have weapons available and there are some means of individual protection, and there are a lot of them, so it falls, if i am not mistaken , under article 260 of the criminal code of ukraine , illegal armed or armed formations, but a private company, she she registered somewhere, you understand, this is the first, second, mentality, mentality, we looked at what happened in the russian federation, when wagner's pmk went to storm, relatively

speaking, moscow, i don't want to offend anyone, but people who do nothing... bad did not commit, they are not afraid of anything, you understand, that is, to be afraid that some pmcs will try to remove the government there, look at the events of 2014, ah, people, people did not like what was happening in the country, people stood up, they used power, that's when we lost it the monopoly on force, the state lost its monopoly on force, the people rose up and they... removed the power, that is, yanukovych fled ukraine and we , how to say, achieved this, in the ukrainian language, i don't remember, with the help of the population, and not with the help of the pmc, that is, i do not remember any cases in ukraine where the pmc, private military companies were involved in some

illegal activities, that is, these fears that we have, they are absolutely not justified by the pmc. it is a tool of the state, not a tool against the state, but for some reason people do not want it to hear, or well, they just don't hear , you understand, that is, as i understand it, the current attitude towards the pvc is rather a consequence of the fact that we are held hostage by our old mythologists, and because of this, relatively speaking, we do not want to see the potential that is currently hidden for the pvc as an association of structured citizens, which can be provided by the improvement of education or the creation of yaks. units of the armed forces or individual units of other power structures, but then there is the question of rationing, the law on private companies, britain, the united states, there are no such laws, although these companies are represented all over the world, we have then, which way to go, these flirting with the law, they, the legislation should

probably be limited, except by certain licensing of such activities and create transparent... mechanisms for registration and control of such structures, well, it is like one of options, well, let's say so, a license, licensing, yes, it is possible to get it, but you understand, we have licenses for, for example, the transfer of knowledge, if we are talking about the transfer of knowledge, that is, we are limited only to training, that is, if a private military company... for example, it is, relatively speaking, going on a business trip to the congo, in order to conduct training for the armed forces of the democratic republic of the congo there. it needs a license to transfer knowledge, but here we limit the pmc because we, we limit the pmc's activities,

because we are talking exclusively about the pmc's activities outside ukraine. if we return to the law of ukraine on pmcs, then the law of ukraine already answers the question. this is a law of ukraine that can only be applied on the territory of ukraine. the law of ukraine will not apply on the territory of mozambique, and... or to the territory of mali or burkina faso, that is, what in ukraine do we regulate with such a law? unfortunately, when there was a debate on this issue, the author of this bill, mrs. vasylevska smaglyuk, she created a working group, but i don't know how many times this working group met, but i was invited to one meeting, i spoke there, and i was more i was not in favor of this meeting of the working group... because i was categorically against many points of this law, for example, i don't see why our ukrainian pmc should create any

warehouses with ammunition, with weapons, with armored vehicles and so on, what are we going to do with it, that is, this law in the format in which it was written, it is absolutely counterproductive, but it will never pass in the verkhovna rada, the law, in to which it is written that... a private military company, i have a training ground, and what should i do now, should i drive 10 batteries to the training ground, put mortars there, put machine guns, weapons, ammunition and so on there, put up guards, arises the question is why you need all this in the territory of ukraine, and that's why i i believe that the law, the bill that was drafted, was drafted incorrectly. i expressed my opinion, i do, from this, from this working group. and when we still talk about private military companies, then

what is the mechanism of financial existence for such enterprises, relatively speaking, if we say that these companies perform tasks outside of ukraine, then they really have contracts there with potential foreign customers, if they work in ukraine. what should they pay money for and who will get this money pay? yes, also a very interesting question, first of all, let's understand, if a ukrainian private military company has concluded a contract with a foreign customer, then it is the responsibility to pay for the services, it is the responsibility of the foreign order only. if a ukrainian private military company, for example, goes on a business trip, i call it a business trip, goes on a business trip, for example, to burkina faso, and

it goes on a business trip in the interests of the state , then of course, first of all, such a business trip must be financed by the state, because we we work in the interests of the state, after that there may be others there. financing options, but in order for us to have a launch abroad in the interests of the state, the state must pay for it. if we are talking now in the conditions of a war, a full-scale war with russia, the use of private military companies in ukraine, on the territory of ukraine. yes, i understand that this is a very unpopular opinion, but it should be financed by the state, you know, privately. the wax company is not a beggar who has to go around and beg for money. you want us to do some, some certain actions? well, i can't, i

have people, i currently have people in ukraine whom i can use, and they want to work for us, but i personally do not have the resources to attract these specialists. the problem is that i have specialists, and these... the specialists are currently working under contract with the armed forces of ukraine, but the specialists work as stormtroopers, that is, they go and storm the trenches, and i believe that this is an inappropriate use of its resources . i have another offer, i already made this offer expressed some people heard me, but there are no sanctions, you know, no sanctions, so that i can take these people and use them somewhere in some other way. i have no money, no financing, no authority to take these people and

use them somewhere. meaning, this is the problem, i want to tell you that this is not the first case, because i watched, i saw how we use, this is not a criticism, maybe some experts or experienced people will say that andriy, you are wrong and so on, but this is my personal opinion, i saw how we use, use ssso operators in the assaults of the same trenches, and now i have a question, if in a frontal attack... both the ssso operator from our side and the banal mobilized from the side of the russian federation will die , how much time and money do we need , time is very important to prepare another sso operator who accidentally died in frontal contact with a mobilized from the russian federation, and how much time and money is needed to restore this mobilized from the russian side

federation. uh, on the front in ukraine, you see, we have to train sso operators for at least six months, and the russians will replace this mobilized tomorrow. what am i talking about, we use our resources, sometimes, sometimes, i'm not criticizing, again, this is a statement of facts, we use our resources inappropriately. i have people now sitting in ukraine, i can use them in other directions, but they just go and storm. cops: these are people who have 20 years of combat experience. well, that is, in fact, you are talking about the fact that what if these people, what trained in your company , who have considerable experience, were used according to the complexity of the tasks, then it would be much more effective than just using them as attack aircraft that repelled one plantation near avdiyivka, and we understand that then it does not correspond at all to the potential that

embedded in these people who... kami, accumulated, acquired filigree opportunities for combat operations. then the question arises how to find, i am 100% sure, how to find a way out of such a labyrinth so that, relatively speaking, the heads of private companies have more opportunities to interact with the military leadership, to receive some tasks that they solve comprehensively, relying on their capabilities, and not dispersed among the stormers there. sections of existing brigades? you understand, we , you and i talked for a long time about this matter, i talked with mr. bodrak and with other people, and we always talk about problems, problems, these are the problems, problems we have, we have to ask questions about -other, what needs to be done in order to solve these

problems, and here in order to solve... these problems, we need the authorities to listen to us, i myself , you understand, because i have no leverage, no contacts, and so on, i also wrote a letter to the president, the former poroshenko, and i addressed president zelenskyi, i have there is a letter, a reply, and they are writing to me from the office of the president of ukraine, informing us that your appeal. from the proposal regarding the possible use of private military companies, in particular megaconsulting limited liability companies for the performance of tasks related to the sphere of national security and defense of the state, sent to the apparatus of the council of national security and defense of ukraine and the ministry of defense of ukraine with a request to consider and inform you about the results. that's the end of it, that is, we have a lot of bigots who can come, i'm sorry, and say that

this is what needs to be done... and then we need to assemble a working group, but experts must be invited to this working group, you know, someone from the national security council, we should be invited, someone from the general staff, from the ministry of defense, as it is called, should be invited profile, profile committee, if i'm not mistaken, of the verkhovna rada of ukraine, and discuss, we have an urgent issue, we need to discuss. together, is it expedient, and if it is expedient, then how can we use private military companies, if it is not expedient, then some arguments are needed, but it should be decided collegially, and not as some analyst in ukraine said: i against, because the state should have a monopoly on force, and we listened to him and said, well, he is against and so on, all these conversations about

the fact that private... military companies are prohibited in ukraine, they