“The role that technology has played for Ukraine, has been jaw-dropping”: General Patraeus on the war in Ukraine

Vladyslav Faraponov, Head of the Board at the Institute of American Studies, interviewed General Petraeus at American University Kyiv. Petraeus, a key donor to AUK, has contributed to the AUK Scholarship Fund to support talented students pursuing an American education in Ukraine. The conversation touched on critical topics, including the AI- and big data-driven project "Mental Help Global," which aims to support mental health services in Ukraine, as well as broader issues in US foreign policy and the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.

General Petraeus is a former US Army general, former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, a partner at the global investment firm KKR, and Chairman of the KKR Global Institute.

On the new initiative offered by General

— General, thank you for being with us. Can you tell us why we are now meeting at American University Kyiv?

— First, it's good to be with you; thanks. We're here at AUK because I've long supported the American University Kyiv. I know the president, Dan Rice, very well, as he's a fellow West Point graduate, so I've watched his career over the years. I have also supported the son of a fallen Ukrainian hero in getting an education here: my wife and I funded his scholarship to pay for his tuition.

Today, in addition to doing what I always do when I come to Ukraine—spending time on stage answering questions from students and my moderator today, Dan Rice, I also had a new initiative to announce. It's called "Mental Help Global," and it will be based here at the American University Kyiv.

The objective of MHG is to build a nonprofit AI-enabled social media platform, which could help meet the unmet mental health assistance requirement here in Ukraine. It's estimated that as many as half of the population may need some kind of assistance, and the number of mental health professionals is wholly inadequate for that considerable need. So this initiative is meant to augment it, not to replace it. It'll be built within a large language model, free and accessible to all.

President Rice is actually building a department that is focused on psychology, and I've been able to obtain funding for fellowships: two annual grants of $100,000 each, which allows the university to hire mental health and IT specialists.

There's also a startup whose co-founders I had been advising once, they literally are building the server stack and providing the large language model that will be the enabler, the hardware, and the software component of this project. Thus, these co-founders will oversee our initiative, but it all largely will be done here in Ukraine by Ukrainians.

It might take up to a year to build a fully functioning platform. But if the principle proves true here, we would then seek to introduce it to other countries with similarly large populations experiencing a variety of mental health issues.

— Do you plan a close collaboration with other American or European organizations that are doing the same in their countries?

— We are seeking assistance, experience, lessons learned, however, we've not found an organization that does this specifically. There are a lot of organizations that can essentially connect you with a mental health expert for a price. Most of these are for-profit endeavors, and we were not aware of one that does this specific range of tasks that is free and accessible to all. It is our idea and the intent to do so. 

We think this is doable. But we need to translate a vision into reality, which is never easy. I've had to do that a couple of times in two different wars. But it's a very exciting prospect—the idea of being able to do that at the American University Kyiv, where you have the tech skills, the mental health skills, and the English-speaking capability, which is helpful for the interface with the co-founders who have conceptualized this. 

Supported also by Mitzi Perdue, who is the widow of Frank Perdue (the deceased CEO of Perdue Farms), huge conglomerate—and by me. Mitzi is so committed to Ukraine that she once auctioned off her engagement ring from Frank Perdue for $1.3 million and gave it to the Ukrainian police. She's also written over 150 stories in the past two years, some of them about Ukraine—she's a very talented and gifted journalist. She's been here numerous times.

On the war in Ukraine

— Many in Ukraine right now talk about America in the context of elections. Former President Trump said that US withdrawal from Afghanistan was one of the turning points that actually made Putin invade Ukraine. So, could you elaborate on that? I don't think many Ukrainians understand President Trump's point.

— First, you need to understand that President Trump was the individual who, while in office, first built up forces in Afghanistan. It was quite encouraging for someone who commanded Afghanistan, someone who commanded the region, and was the CIA director. 

Then he decided we needed to get out and agreed to what, I believe, is the worst diplomatic agreement in modern American history. Not only did it give the Taliban what they wanted—our departure—but it also required the Afghan government to release 5,500 Taliban detainees, including several former senior leaders. Contrary to the agreement, many of these leaders rejoined the Taliban and played significant roles in bringing down the Afghan government and forces after the departure of US forces and the support they had been providing to the Afghans.

I believe that we could have easily sustained what we were doing in Afghanistan. This was not a war like the one in Vietnam, where there was no way we could sustain it, where the cost of blood and treasure was just too great. In Afghanistan, there was almost no cost in blood in the final year, we were no longer on the front lines, but not because of the diplomatic agreement. We were doing what's called "Advise, Assist, and Enable" operations—advising the Afghan forces and then assisting and enabling them in a variety of ways, but not fighting on the front lines. So, the cost in blood was quite minimal. 

The cost of the war, which amounted to $25 billion a year, along with an $800 billion defense budget, was certainly more than sustainable

The situation was maddening and frustrating, it was a long war, but there is no rule that you have to end endless wars. Sometimes, you can continue these efforts and work to stabilize the situation, making it, once again, sustainable.

I think we were fairly close to that, although there had been a clear deterioration in the security, but in part, because the Afghans and the enemy knew that we wanted to leave. Which is particularly unhelpful if you're in a contest of wills with an enemy. 

So for Donald Trump to say that is quite fascinating, because he would have withdrawn on an even quicker timeline, which would have meant that it would have been even more difficult to do so. It was poorly planned and executed as it was, but you can't get out of that kind of situation easily.

It was, though, I think, an event that led President Putin, along with other events, such as the minimal response by the Western world to the occupation of Crimea and the Donbass in 2014. To think that US and Western response to a further invasion of Ukraine would not be that significant, but he was wrong.

He believed what President Xi said after we pulled out of Afghanistan: "See, you can't count on Americans as allies. And look how that departure went—chaotic. They're not a great power anymore, either." 

I disagree with both of these. I think US-led Western response has shown what we can do, although, to be sure, certain decisions have taken a good bit too long. The current one is eliminating the restrictions on USe of our longest-range American tactical missile, the Army Tactical Missile System, which is restricted in various ways when it comes to use on Russian soil.

— General, do you think that the perception of this war as another endless conflict is the biggest concern for Americans, especially given the criticisms that there hasn't been a clear strategy or vision for its conclusion—and how does this relate to Ukraine's efforts to shift the narrative with talks of a potential Second Peace Summit?

— First, this is not a US war. The idea that we're fighting an endless war is wrong. The Ukrainians are fighting a tough, hard war against a barbaric enemy that denies Ukraine's very right to exist as an independent state and believes it should be part of the Russian Federation. But it's Ukrainians who are fighting and shedding blood for their country, not Americans.

We have no boots on the ground, apart from the tiny little group that's at the embassy. So I think we have to understand first and foremost that what we are doing is enabling a country that is valiantly, courageously, and with enormous innovation in entrepreneurship, trying to ensure its very survival and to preserve its independence. We should be doing everything possible to enable Ukraine to do that—and that's my bottom line. I think all freedom-loving people around the world should be doing more than they have. And there's a lot being done, $61 billion in US assistance in just the latest package. That's bigger than the defense budgets of, I think, any European country. So it's very, very significant.

On the factors affecting the war's outcome

— In your talk with the AUK community, you mentioned the importance of conditionality, in particular, in talking about some big ideas. So I'm going to ask you, in your perspective, what does Ukrainian victory or success right now depend on?

— The course of the war, whether Ukraine makes progress or experiences setbacks, will depend on many factors. One of those certainly is continued US assistance, and I think that will continue. $61 billion is going to last for quite a while, but we need to accelerate delivery and so forth, though it is very doable. There's continued EU assistance in an aggregate way, collectively, and then also in individual European countries and other Western countries around the world. I think all of that will continue, and I hope it will even accelerate and increase. Certainly, the production of weapon systems, the production of munitions, like 155-millimeter howitzer ammunition. We're ramping that up very dramatically in US as well as in our various European allies. It also depends on continued Ukrainian innovation. The role that Ukraine has, the role that technology has played for Ukraine, has been jaw-dropping, frankly. For a country that has no navy to sink one-third of the Russian Black Sea fleet, it is hard to explain. But you explain it as there are great Ukrainians who have made air drones that find the ships and then great maritime drones made by Ukraine that sink them. It forced the Russian Black Sea fleet to withdraw its last ship from the centuries-old port of Sevastopol in western Crimea and from the Western Black Sea, which allowed Ukraine to export grain by ship.

The role of technology on the front lines: 1000s of suicide drones are thrown at the Russians every single day. And the increase in production of these drones is staggering. The goal used to be 1 million drones every 12 months, which seemed almost inconceivable to me. Now, I was told last night by the Minister of Strategic Industries that their objective is multiples of that. I would rather not get more specific than that, but that is just incredible.

The way in which all of this will be utilized, including command and control and how AI facilitates it, as well as navigation in a GPS-denied environment and in the face of electronic warfare. In which the Russians have significant capabilities.

All of this is hugely impressive and critical as a factor in determining the way forward. Of course, another big issue is Ukrainian force generation. Ukraine, after quite an emotional debate itself in the Rada, in your parliament, just as we had an emotional debate in the House of Representatives, did resolve the conscription law. Changed it. Made some adjustments to it, reduced the age of conscription, closed some loopholes, etc, and over recent months, Ukraine has now been ramping up the ability to recruit, train and equip. Which is, again, very, very significant, and that's a massive factor going forward. Ukraine, yes, it is heavily outnumbered four maybe five to one in manpower. In economic terms, 10 or more to one, perhaps 10 to 15 to one.

It seems like the country is using technology to compensate for something and is sending thousands of drones to attack the Russians every day. The drones are targeting refineries, storage areas, airfields, and other critical infrastructure to disrupt Russia's ability to stay in the fight. The Russian military is facing challenges with their equipment and training, and they are suffering significant losses. Despite this, the country's president appears to be unconcerned about the loss of Russian soldiers' lives.

Losses are staggering, but it's a big country with a president who seems unconcerned by the loss of life of his Russian soldiers. And so that's a tough factor there as well. So then it depends on, does Russia get continued support from North Korea, China, or Iran? Will countries continue to buy Russian crude oil and natural gas, etc. So as always, there's no single factor that determines the course of the war over the next few months. There are a number of factors. You're never sure what the coefficient in front of it is. It can actually change a bit. But clearly some of these are more important than others, especially if they're not going well, and they all bear careful watching as you try to identify, to determine, to assess how the war will go in the weeks and months that lie ahead.

— Thank you very much, General.

— A privilege to be with you. Thanks, Vlad, thank you.

Watch the full version of the interview on the YouTube channel of the "Institute of American Studies":