documentary on al jazeera. nastasya: russia steps up missile attacks on kyiv and ukrainian troops make territorial gains in the east. volodymyr zelenskyy asks for more weapons from the east. does diplomacy stand a chance? this is "inside story." ♪ nastasya: hello and welcome to the program. 15 months into russia's invasion of ukraine president zelenskyy

has secured further military support from western allies promising more weapons but stop short of providing fighter jets he says could be a game changer. as russia escalates missile attacks ahead of an expected counteroffensive six african leaders are planning a peace mission. what are the interests at stake and how could they shift political alliances? first come of this report from our reporter. ♪ reporter: ukraine's president had a long wish list for his three-day european tour and much of it was granted with leaders provide -- promising billion's of dollars in equipment. >> we are returning home with new military help and new more powerful weapons for the front lines and more protection for our people. we also have greater political support. reporter: however, his request for fighter jets has been rejected with programs offered

instead. >> it means we are training ukrainian citizens to become combat ready aircraft pilots. reporter: many western allies, notably joe biden, are hesitant to supply kyiv with american-made weapons that can reach russia and soil but president zelenskyy insists the weapons are vital to defend ukraine against escalated airstrikes. the latest offer to mediate comes from african nations with a delegation from six countries including egypt and south africa are set to meet the leaders soon. >> president putin and president bill lenski agreed they would be willing to receive -- president zelenskyy agreed they would be willing to receive an african mission. reporter: most african nations

have abstained from voting on the u.n. resolutions condemning the invasion. russia has been building close ties on the continent since the invasion began. 15 months into the war the list of countries attempting to broker peace between russia and ukraine is spreading across regions. ♪ nastasya: let's bring in our guests. in kyiv we have peter come of the of the eurasia democracy initiative, a nonprofit promoting democracy. in london we have samuel who is an associate fellow. samuel is also the author of putin's war on ukraine. and in moscow we have a

vladimira, an associate professor of international relations at the high school of international economics. a warm welcome to you all and thank you for joining us on "inside story." president latimer zelenskyy has just come back from his european tour. he has gotten a lot of his wants on his wish list but not the fighter jets. was it a success? peter: overall i think it was a success. and the fact that our president has collected pledges by member states of nato including france that supports ukraine's eventual membership with nato and that was important. i would discount the importance of the f-16 short-term because it will take months to get our pilots trained. this may be a little of -- a

little bit of a red herring. what is important is to get as much artillery support, tanks, electronic devices, etc. that ukraine needs to stage a successful counteroffensive. fighter jets are important and i believe they will come eventually for whatever post war security arrangement is found for ukraine. long-term i think ukraine needs them but short-term, it will be tough but i think ukraine's counteroffensive can be successful without them. nastasya: we have seen a robust round of weapons commitments. it is a fine line. how is the latest round of commitments being viewed in moscow? vladimir: i think actually all

of the offers which my ukrainian colleague mentioned in his view, actually, they are not welcomed. they are not welcomed in moscow. i think russ -- i think russia will utilize all possible efforts including strikes which we have seen just now in the previous night and before that and also i think the situation will be that these strikes are reoriented on the fronts of the routes of the tanks. i'm not sure at all that the united states or some european allies are going to supply ukraine with f-16s because that means the syria's weapon is

already engaged and the war will be escalating. i'm not sure the european allies and the united states would like to escalate a war with russia. i think russia will undertake all the necessary measures to cope with the problems of the western backed supplies of sophisticated weaponry to ukraine. nastasya: it does not sound like moscow views this as an escalation. you -- the u.k. says it will supply long-range missiles. how much of a different do you think these weapons will make to fighting on the ground and strategy? samuel: the russians have said the storm shadow missiles were already on the battlefield.

these will be paired with additional drone technologies. the ukrainians have been wanting long-range drone missiles for a long time but there are concerns in western capitals that ukraine might use them outside of the occupied regions and use them to strike russia proper. i think it is a significant advantage for the ukrainian cause and it is interesting they have been swiftly integrated onto the battlefield unlike the f-16s. nastasya: just a follow-up, the line that kyiv is sticking to is that it is acting defensively and not attacking russian territory. how true is that in your assessment? samuel: it depends on how you define difference of actions. zelenskyy and his team have denied they are striking targets in russia that we have seen some anecdotes to the contrary.

there was some interesting news that came through from the washington post suggesting he was considering occupying russian villages and there was also a plan to strike syria for the brakes to be put on. there has also been a reoccurrence of shelling near the borders of russia and further on which could have been triggered by ukrainian attacks and infiltration behind enemy lines. but if they are targeting it just takes and the military pressure from the inside that could be deemed a defensive operation in a sense because it is preventing the russians from attacking ukrainian cities but the russians probably view it as an offensive action. nastasya: peter, i see you nodding there, is that also your assessment? peter: i would say in response

to the previous panelist and the russian participant that russia considers anything escalatory considering the occupied territory with -- where ukraine is hoping to stage the counteroffensive, they are already according to the russian constitution part of russian territory and there is no difference between moscow and crimea in the eyes of russian lawmakers or politicians or the military. it is a moot point at this point after we have seen how russia has reacted to these escalatory tactics. they have thrown everything they have at ukraine. i wish our co-panelist from russia experienced at least one night like we experienced three days ago where we were awakened at night where it felt like all

hell was breaking loose. at this point i don't understand what that escalation that russia is warning about could mean short of a nuclear war. i would not put too much stock in it. nastasya: i do want to ask you about something you said a moment ago which was -- your suggestion that kyiv does not need these f-16s to win the war talking about using them in a postwar context. i'm curious why kyiv wants these f-16s. there are few facilities that can handle the jets. is this about symbolism or is it about strategy? peter: it started with the longer strategy of security for ukraine. ukraine is mindful that when it comes to our allies in the west, members of the coalition and nato states, these are democracies and the winds of

democracies are very capricious. to put it bluntly ukrainians are concerned about these winds in washington and whether they will shift, the elections in 2024. if the republicans or donald trump take power all bets are off. this is a way to get in as much weaponry and security guarantees as possible before those inevitable winds of change sets in in the u.s. and other western capitals. nastasya: anxiety potentially in key have given the context of the 2024 election. how is that sitting in moscow? vladimir: i just want to make a point to the reply of the panelist. i would like you to know that

you will get the experience of having sustained continuous bombardment of ukrainian drones on the battle area. my close relatives live there and have small children. i'm sorry to say that but they have had to abandon their houses because of ukrainian drones bombarding the areas with rockets. that is also an experience problem for you. the other thing i would like to point out is that moscow actually is not fearing the ukrainian so-called counteroffensive at all. we are concentrating our troops and i heard in the news that the total amount of the troops may be around 500,000. that is one thing and another point is that russia is making

tactics as far as i can understand in the waging of combat operations. russia is dealing with professionals like a private military company and the wagoner company is doing the job right. so i think at the end of the day , my point and i'm sure of it is that if and when these so-called ukrainian counteroffensive were to take place and i anticipate it will take place in a week or a month or between these times. ukraine will get much of the advantages and much security. nastasya: i feel like this is a

good time to take a look at who controls what on the ground. ukraine says it continues to make gains in the east particularly around bakhmut. and fighters belonging to russia's wagoner group -- russia says it is carried out several ground attacks along the donetsk front. vladimir, you just said the group was doing an excellent job. there were disputed reports that the wagoner group had been sharing intelligence with key have -- with kyiv. you cannot deny there has been a huge amount of disunity along the russian front. vladimir: i think this is rubbish and i don't know where you got this information but the information that the wagoner group is sharing intelligence information with the ukrainian military is wrong.

the chief of the wagoner group is not going to be a traitor for his own country. that is one thing. what was the second part of your question, i just lost it. nastasya: i understand these are disputed reports but there has been huge amounts of disputes between wagoner group and the russian military, very public wounds --public ones particularly around bakhmut. vladimir: there were some reports that there are ongoing battles in bakhmut but i think there was information and i am just reiterating myself again that the huge amounts of troops,

russian troops, will be or are going to be massed along the front line which is quite a fixed line, actually, right now and i think the war, the ukrainian-russian war is at the moment a position war. knows side is going -- no side will undertake anything without much preparation. nastasya: let's talk about this counteroffensive. from previous ukrainian strategies do you see this as taking territory or taking out strategic targets and how intense could the fighting get? samuel: i think the counter and pensive will be important in terms of taking territory. we have seen limited movements

in shaping operations preventing and derailing russia's ability to retaliate for ukrainian advances. we are seeing some shaping operations take place near to -- mira topol. another area where the ukrainians are trying to expand is in donetsk. there are hub -- there are heavy russian fortifications there. the ukrainians are making slow advances there. and near bakhmut where the your -- where the ukrainians are taking advantage of the fact that the wagoner group forces are working in the city center. there will be a multiple axis counteroffensive combined with

attacks on russian logistics and the occupied territories and perhaps inside russian itself. nastasya: it sounds like preparations are in place. how is this being viewed in kyiv? there have been escalating missile attacks on them capital -- on the capital. is it viewed as russia being worried about the counteroffensive or is it about preempting it? peter: it is very troublesome for moscow. a drone attack on the kremlin was the first time this impregnable, until then, impregnable fortress in the heart of the country from in the heart of the capital was breached. the first was in 1986 when the german pilot landed on red square. a scandal of major proportions.

throughout russia we have seen starting last summer a spate of arsons, fire attacks, attacks on various oil depositories and military objects and just a few days ago, three helicopters and two planes shot down over the -- area as they -- civilians all down. and yesterday a milestone was reached with 200,000 russian soldiers having died in the war which is 10 times the number of soviet soldiers that died in the war in afghanistan in 10 years. yes, russians and the kremlin's are very concerned about the coming counteroffensive and obviously, based on that, a lot

of them are retaliatory attacks. the shelling -- ukrainians have shown a tremendous success rate shooting down these missiles including the missile that vladimir putin claimed could not be shot down. the patriots that have been delivered to ukraine are now being shown to successfully disable even these hypersonic missiles. nastasya: i want to take a step back at this point because it has been a year and a quarter, 15 months since the war began. moscow has been releasing policy documents about countering the west broadly. they hardly mentioned ukraine. surely this is viewed as part of that. is this more viewed as a broader russian foreign policy and therefore russia is in it for the long haul? peter: yes, there was a new

concept of russian foreign policy and the problem for us actually is it is a proxy war by western countries as a policy document was saying. i think the relations between russia and the western countries are not, talking about the united states and europe like germany and france and others, i think these relations have been spoiled for years to come. i think the ukrainian conflict -- another thing also i would like to add is that since 2014 it became clear that russia is not going to be accepted by the western countries in terms of how it conducts foreign policy.

i think it is no wonder that these new policy documents -- i think other concepts will soon show a continuation of the war. nastasya: it feels the kremlin is playing a waiting game to see how long western unity will last. samuel, i want to ask more about the f-16s. ukraine got their tanks from the west in march. six months before that tanks would have been seen as a huge escalation. is it just a matter of time when it comes to the f-16? will western unity hold? samuel: the west has remained remarkably united during the war. we saw lavrov yesterday remind

international audiences about the fact that the u.s. abandoned the afghanistan government and allowed the taliban to take over and suggested the same thing could happen for american support of ukraine. turning to the 16th, think it is more likely the u.s. will cave on supplying these as well as other items to the ukrainian army. supply constraints were an issue. the avenue sixteens -- they will not arrived in time for the current counteroffensive. the more the countries are training ukrainian pilots to use them like the british and belgian training efforts and others that we have noticed over the last few weeks, it seems ukraine is prepared to use them and i think the f-16s will eventually enter the battlefield. this counteroffensive regardless of whether it succeeds or how

much it succeeds or not, it will probably not be the last one in this war. they are in this for the long haul. and the f-16s could become an issue in another counteroffensive. nastasya: if everyone is in it for the long haul, let me ask about the mediation efforts. china has a mediation effort going. african leaders are on their way and pope francis wants to get involved as well. how is this viewed in kyiv and is any of this going anywhere? peter: they cannot antagonize china given how significant they are in world affairs. having said that, ukraine is wary that china is guided by its imperative to not allow vladimir putin to lose face or to lose the war to dramatically because

putin thinks their governments are alike in that they have challenged the liberal world order led by the united states and its allies. these various peacekeeping initiatives that we see coming and not just from china but also from brazil and south africa, these are all members of the so-called bricks which is a member of -- which is a group of countries which russia is a member of as well. we are very concerned about the partiality of these players and the way they are trying to keep vladimir putin's face intact. nastasya: you mentioned impartiality. let me ask vladimir to comment on that, how is the african peace initiative being viewed? vladimir: that is the proper question. it has been welcomed. the russian foreign minister just today published a statement

that says moscow is welcoming this initiative and i think there will be real talks during the visit of the african nations to moscow not just between the delegations and the russian foreign minister but also with the president. another thing, i just want to make short -- one short point, if any plan will not be including any -- anything which is not suitable for russia, the negotiations will not be successful at all and they will fail. i hope this african delegation, i'm not familiar with the details of their plan but i hope they have a realistic plan to settle this. nastasya: we will leave the

discussion there for now though there is plenty more to talk about but thank you to all of our guests. thank you for watching. you can see the program again any time using our website, al jazeera.com. and for further discussion go to our facebook page. a member you can also join the conversation on twitter. from me and the whole team here, goodbye for now. ♪

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