Wednesday 5 October 2022 10:31 PM Putin 'will be overthrown by Russian generals in coup if unhinged tyrant ... trends now
Vladimir Putin faces mutiny or death if he attempts to launch a nuclear strike in a desperate bid to secure victory in Ukraine, an expert has claimed.
The 'desperate' tyrant - who turns 70 this week while allegedly battling serious health issues - would spark a Kremlin coup if he unleashed the devastating weapons, a British source who advises governments on Russia said.
It comes as the unpredictable Russian leader annexed four regions in the east of Ukraine this week following a spate of 'referendums', which were branded a 'sham' by the wider international community.
Meanwhile, Ukraine's forces, lead by comedian-turned-president Volodymyr Zelensky and bolstered by the West, continue to force the Russians to retreat in the likes of Kharkiv and Luhansk, setting up a potentially humiliating defeat for Putin - one many experts believe he could not survive.
Moscow's military elite believe the despot's threats to employ nuclear weapons are currently working as leverage against the West, but one source suggested they would block any attempt by the warmonger to launch the catastrophic missiles.
They told the Mirror: 'Faced with Putin's recklessness and the need to prevent use of nuclear weapons, the military are most likely to stage a coup to depose him.
'The second most likely group are Putin's Presidential Administration of acolytes, ex-KGB spies and ex-military led by Evgeny Viktorovich Prigozhin. So far they think his nuke statements are serving their purpose.'
Vladimir Putin faces mutiny or death if he attempts to launch a nuclear strike in a desperate bid to secure victory in Ukraine, an expert has claimed
Putin, who analysts fear is becoming increasingly impatient as he approaches 70 while allegedly battling serious health woes, would 'spark a Kremlin coup if he unleashed the devastating weapons', an expert has said (Pictured: Handout photo released by Roscosmos Space Agency Press Service on Wednesday, April 20, 2022, shows the nuclear-capable Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missile being launched from Plesetsk in Russia's northwest)
Ukraine earlier claimed victories over Russian troops in the eastern region of Luhansk as the Kremlin vowed to recapture territory lost in a lightning Ukrainian counteroffensive. In recent weeks, Ukraine's forces, bolstered by Western weapons, have wrested Russian troops out of a string of towns and villages in the southern Kherson region and the eastern separatist strongholds of Luhansk and Donetsk
A view of destroyed armored vehicles and tanks belonging to Russian forces on Wednesday after Putin's forces withdrew from the city of Lyman in the Donetsk region
The source added that the most likely replacement would be Putin's confidante Mr Prigozhin, 61, dubbed his Cook, because his high-end catering firm worked for him.
He also has close links to Moscow GRU and allegedly founded Putin's notorious shadow mercenary army the Wagner Group.
It comes after Putin said Wednesday that he expected the situation to 'stabilise' in Ukrainian regions annexed by the Kremlin after Moscow suffered military setbacks and lost several key towns to Kyiv.
He also ordered his government to seize control over Europe's largest nuclear power plant in the Russian-controlled region of Zaporizhzhia with IAEA head Rafael Grossi en route to Kyiv for consultations on the facility.
Ukraine earlier claimed victories over Russian troops in the eastern region of Luhansk as the Kremlin vowed to recapture territory lost in a lightning Ukrainian counteroffensive.
In recent weeks, Ukraine's forces, bolstered by Western weapons, have wrested Russian troops out of a string of towns and villages in the southern Kherson region and the eastern separatist strongholds of Luhansk and Donetsk.
'We are working on the assumption that the situation in the new territories will stabilise,' Putin told Russian teachers during a televised video call.
Just hours earlier, the Ukrainian-appointed head of Luhansk Sergiy Gaiday announced that the 'de-occupation of the Luhansk region has already officially started'.
A senior Russian lawmaker called on military officials to tell the truth about developments on the ground in Ukraine following the string of bruising defeats.
'We need to stop lying,' the chairman of the lower house of parliament's defence committee, Andrei Kartapolov, told a journalist from state-run media.
'The reports of the defence ministry do not change. The people know. Our people are not stupid. This can lead to loss of credibility.'
Meanwhile, Putin on Wednesday signed into legislation his annexation of four Ukrainian territories - including Luhansk - as the European Union agreed a new round of sanctions against Moscow in response.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow would take back land it lost to Kyiv within the annexed regions, vowing they would be 'Russian forever and will not be returned'.
Putin initially inked agreements with the Moscow-installed leaders of the four regions to become subjects of the Russian Federation, despite condemnation from Kyiv and the West.
The four territories - Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia - create a land corridor between Russia and the Crimean peninsula, which was annexed by Moscow in 2014.
Together, the five regions make up around 20 per cent of Ukraine.
The Kremlin annexed the territories after hastily conducting referendums, denounced as void by Kyiv and its Western allies, but has yet to confirm what areas exactly of those regions are being annexed.
Russian forces do not have full control over Kherson or Zaporizhzhia and recently lost control of several settlements in Donetsk.
The latest battlefield maps from Moscow showed that Russian troops had left many areas in Kherson, including along the west bank of the Dnipro River.
In Kharkiv, the maps indicated that Moscow's forces had almost entirely abandoned the east bank of the Oskil River, potentially giving the Ukrainians space to shell key Russian troop transportation and supply corridors.
While Russian authorities remain largely silent about the extent of the setbacks, war correspondents of pro-Kremlin media admitted that troops were in trouble.
'There won't be any good news in the near future. Not from the Kherson front nor from Luhansk,' newspaper journalist Alexander Kots wrote on his Telegram channel with more than 640,000 followers.
In the town of Lyman, Ukrainian police officers were moving back in to the station used until last week by the Russian occupation force.
'They lived like rats,' said the town's police chief, Igor Ugnivenko, returning to his pre-invasion office and surveying the debris.
In front of the central administration building queues of mainly elderly residents built up for two ambulances distributing meagre humanitarian aid.
'I don't know if the situation is better or worse,' said 62-year- old Tatiana Slavuta of the town's recapture by Ukrainian forces.
'All the shops are closed, we don't have money, we don't have light. Nothing.
'We don't see any change,' she added before correcting herself and brightening.
'At least now there's silence - no shelling.'
Putin's decision to wrest control of the Zaporizhzhia plant comes after months of tensions around the facility with both sides blaming each other for strikes that had raised fears of a radiation disaster.
'On our way to Kyiv for important meetings,' International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Grossi wrote on Twitter, saying the need for a protection zone around the site was 'more urgent than ever'.
On Tuesday, US President Joe Biden told Zelensky that another $625 million in military assistance was on the way.
The new batch includes more HIMARS multiple rocket launchers, which have allowed Ukraine to strike Russian command depots and arms stockpiles far behind the frontline.
From the EU, there were no details about the nature of fresh sanctions agreed against Russia.
The latest package - the eighth since Russia's invasion in February - is now going through a final approval procedure which, if no objections emerge, will be published and come into effect on Thursday, the Czech Republic's EU ambassador said on Twitter.
How Ukraine could achieve victory against Russia: As Kyiv's forces advance in the south and east, expert lays out the path to victory - with all roads leading to Crimea
By Chris Pleasance for MailOnline
'This war began with Crimea and must end with Crimea - with its liberation,' President Volodymyr Zelesnky declared back in August. And, according to military experts, that is exactly what his generals are aiming to do.
Ben Hodges, former commander of American forces in Europe, has outlined what he believes to be the Ukrainian route to victory - going via the cities of Kherson and Mariupol and ending 'when the last Russian soldier crosses the [Kerch] bridge out of Crimea.'
General Hodges, now at the Center for European Policy Analysis, believes Ukraine's main effort will remain capturing Kherson in the south - where a major assault has been underway since early August - with a secondary attack hooking down through the Donbas and towards the city of Mariupol.
When Mariupol falls, he told a CEPA conference last week, those troops would also converge on Crimea - hammering the peninsula with HIMARS rockets and forcing the Russians back beyond the border.
Dr Mike Martin, a visiting fellow of war studies at King's College, also raised the prospect of a third assault with Ukraine using its reserves to split the Russian frontline in two and making it difficult for Putin to move reinforcements around as he gave his own thoughts on Twitter.
Nothing is guaranteed in war, and Putin will certainly do everything in his power to stop Kyiv - from piling conscripts on to the frontlines to possibly using a nuclear weapon.
But, as Ukraine's path
