Russian State TV Host Furious at Kherson Retreat: 'Blew Up the Bridges'

Russian state TV presenter Vladimir Solovyov, nicknamed 'Putin's voice' due to his pro-Kremlin views, expressed his frustration at Russian forces blowing up bridges as they retreated from Kherson, a key southern city back in Ukrainian hands.

Ukrainian flags are now flying over Kherson, the only provincial center Russian troops managed to capture following their invasion of Ukraine on February 24, after Moscow's forces retreated across the Dnipro River.

On Saturday morning Solovyov, appearing on his Vesti FM radio show 'Full Contact,' claimed Russia had withdrawn its troops from some occupied parts of Ukraine as a "good will gesture."

Becoming increasingly animated, he suggested the Russian military should have attacked Ukrainian infrastructure earlier. He also noted Russian forces destroyed bridges across the Dnipro River as they retreated from Kherson, making a counter-offensive more difficult.

Solovyov said: "I've been screaming out loud since February that we need to strike the bridges, destroy the infrastructure, delivery entryways. They [Russian military] said, 'You don't understand anything, they'll bring their equipment to the same area and we will smash it!'

"So did you smash it? 'You don't understand, it's a brotherly nation, we'll have to restore these bridges, we'll enter through them'.

He added: "Where? Where will we enter? When they were leaving [Kherson], they blew up the bridges. Where are we going to enter?"

Solovyov went on to blame the West for the war, saying Western leaders have "stupid faces that look like fish faces."

He commented: "With these fish faces, they are telling us that Russia is waging an unjust, unprovoked war. Are you out of your minds? You started this war!"

The state TV presenter added Russia is now engaged in a "religious war" against the West, stating: "We still can't grasp that the goal of this war is our destruction. The sole goal of NATO is the annihilation of Russia.

"They have no other goals. They want to destroy Russia because, despite its atheist Soviet past, Russia is a country of traditional values. It is a great Orthodox, Muslim and Buddhist nation."

On 30 September President Putin formally annexed four Ukrainian provinces, including the southern Kherson region, into Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has expressed confidence his country will recapture all the territory it has lost, including Crimea which was annexed by Russia in 2014.

During one of his nightly addresses to the Ukrainian people, he said: "We will definitely liberate Crimea.

"We will return this part of our country not only to the all-Ukrainian space, but also to the all-European space."

On Thursday the Institute for the Study of War, a U.S. based think tank, said it expects Ukraine to continue its counter-offensive and warned a ceasefire now would be a win for Putin.

It said: "A wintertime ceasefire would only benefit Russian forces, who would use that opportunity to bolster their faltering defenses and continue their genocidal campaign to eradicate Ukrainian identity in occupied parts of Ukraine.

"Well-supplied Ukrainian forces are unlikely to halt their counteroffensives due to the arrival of winter weather and may be able to take advantage of frozen terrain to move more easily than they could in the muddy autumn months."

Newsweek has contacted Russia's defense ministry for comment.