Igor Klymenko: “The Guard of the Offensive” is formed and ready for orders
“All eight brigades — plus the formed ninth volunteer brigade “Charter” — will be subordinated to the defense forces during the offensive. All of them are fully formed and ready, on the instructions of Supreme Commander Volodymyr Zelensky and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces Valery Zaluzhny, together with the defense forces, to take part in hostilities,” the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Igor Klymenko said in an interview with BBC Ukraine.
The Minister also noted that it is not fundamental that the brigades are formed in the system of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and not the Armed Forces.
“All our brigades and the Armed Forces and the “Guards of Offensive” have approximately the same armament, perhaps only with the exception of some types of weapons, primarily heavy weapons. The main goal of creating these units is to carry out offensive actions as part of the defense forces to liberate the territory of our state and reach the border in 1991,” said Igor Klymenko.
The head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs separately singled out one of the brigades of the “Guard of Offensive” “Fury”, which was created as part of the National Police.
“If a policeman who has the rank of senior lieutenant or captain of the police and has a desire to go to war, then in order to go to the Armed Forces, he must resign, lose his rank, lose those social preferences that a policeman has, and go to the Armed Forces as an ordinary. By forming the appropriate unit in the National Police, we leave room for this volunteer in the future, and after the end of the martial law, the person returns to his position of investigator or deputy commissioner, or special officer in the National Police,” the Minister said.
Moreover, the Minister is confident that with a different approach, the formation of assault brigades would take more time.
“We would have formed this way much longer if employees from some units, which, for example, are engaged in the protection of public order, were transferred to the Armed Forces. It would take months and months. And we quickly formed these units from both civilians and current employees in order to achieve efficiency and most importantly - to have time to prepare these units for participation in the war,” said Igor Klymenko.
The Minister of Internal Affairs paid special attention to who exactly is being trained in the “Guard of Offensive”.
“We are preparing the military, not police troops with batons and gas. I want to say to those who doubt this and write about it — the so-called “experts”. These guys are going to die and get hurt. I wish those people who write this to go to the hospital, where the police, border guards and national guards lie. No eyes, no hands, no legs. Go and see if we prepared them so that they would clean the streets and participate in mass events? Apparently, someone forgot that we are now fighting a bloody war,” Igor Klymenko stressed.
Once again, the Minister stressed that the “Guard of Offensive” is formed exclusively from volunteers: “We have already said that these are volunteers. They themselves decided where to go. This is the perception of every volunteer who has a personal deep motivation to defend the country. We did everything to make people believe us. Believe me, a motivated fighter is much more effective.”
Department of Communications of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine
