The Duran Podcast - Zelensky vs. Budanov: Controlling Money Flow While the Front Lines Crumble

Episode Date: April 29, 2026

Zelensky vs. Budanov: Controlling Money Flow While the Front Lines Crumble

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the situation in Ukraine with Project Ukraine and what is going on with Zelensky, the drone manufacturing industry that he's building in Ukraine. The fact that the New York Times now claims that Zelensky is the leader of the free world, that he has taken over the reins of leading the free world from Donald Trump and the United States. We have the 90 billion euro loan, which was approved of last week. We have the 20th sanctions package, and now we're going to the 21st sanctions package. The Western media claims that there is a stalemate with the war in Ukraine, that the Russian economy is faltering and is set to collapse. They never talk about the fact that Ukraine needed 90 billion from the collective West. It now needs, according to the Wall Street Journal, an extra 19 billion to plug up even more holes in in their budgets. So anyway, what's the situation going on in Ukraine? We also have a coup

competition slash coup developing between Budanov and Zelensky. We've talked about this in the past, but it's gaining more and more traction that Budanov is now gunning for Zelensky's position of power. Absolutely. Well, let's, I mean, unpack some of this. We don't need to dwell too much on the fictitious stalemate, which on the battlefronts, which we've discussed in many, many, many places. There is no stalemate. The Russians are continuing to advance. In fact, and I've discussed this on my own programs, the pace of the Russian offensive has increased, and people who have now started to look more closely at the numbers that the Ukrainians themselves have been providing have come to the conclusion that on the basis of Ukrainian statistics, the pace of Russian losses is falling

and the pace of Russian territorial expansion is increasing. These are Ukrainian figures. But we don't need to dwell too much on any of that. Now, in all other respects, for Zelensky, one needs to understand two absolutely key things. For him, the most important thing is to keep control in Kiev. What happens on the battlefronts is important, but ultimately it is a secondary consideration. He has to keep control in Kiev. Because by keeping control in Kiev, he is able to benefit himself personally and his friends.

The entire approach, policies that Zelensky is taking is based around this. At the same time, in order to do that, he has to retain sponsors in the West. And he does this by obviously talking up the achievements of his army on the battlefronts. He talks up his successes, the successes of his drones. There's good reason now, by the way, to have much greater skepticism about all of this. Again, some people have looked at the effectiveness of the Ukrainian drones on the battlefronts. And yes, they are effective, but perhaps not to the extent. and in the way that Zelensky says. As for Ukraine drones that are used to shoot down Russian drones,

Zelensky came, if you remember, with all of that technology and all that personnel to the Gulf, you're trying to sell it to the Persian Gulf states. It was all attempted there against Iranian drones, and it failed. And the Gulf leaders basically sent him packing. They weren't impressed. So, but anyway, he talks up his great achievements with his drones. But above all, he needs to keep the money flowing. He's got this 90 billion euro loan approved now. His cart, or rather Ukraine's cut out of this, is actually going to be around 30 billion euros. But, well, that's still money and it's coming to him, and that is good.

And of course, it will be subdivided, and no doubt he will do personally quite well out of it also. But we always said, we said right from the first day, right from the moment when this 90 billion euro loan was first being talked about back in December, that it wasn't going to be enough, even if it actually materialized, which by the way, it still hasn't properly speaking done so. But we always said it wouldn't be enough. And here we have more demands, ultimately coming from Zelensky. Thank you for the 90 billion. Now I need 19 billion more. And he'll get it. He's going to come to the Europeans and they are going to get it to him.

And you can already see that his friends in Washington are maneuvering. They're thinking forward to the moment when, after the midterms, the Democrats regain control of Congress. And, well, so he is the true leader of the free world. He is the man we must support. We must give him more money. We must give him more weapons to the extent that we've got any weapons left. Obviously, Trump doesn't like him, but that just proves what a great leader of the free world he is. So you could see that from a certain perspective, Zelensky's strategy is working. He may not be winning on the battlefronts. The drone war may not be going very well. The situation in Ukrainian cities may be dreadful. There may be,

frankly, horrible pictures coming out of Kupiansk, showing emaciated Ukrainian soldiers there, in precisely the place, by the way, where the Russians said was a cauldron. But from his point of view, he's getting the money coming in. His position in Kiev at the moment appears to be sort of stable. We'll come to that in a moment. And, well, the money's still coming. More money. And that's ultimately what this is. This war in the end is all about. So it's not difficult to understand Zelensky's strategy. That is what he is. No wonder he was partying with all the others in Cyprus. Yeah. Boy, were they partying. But I mean, that's his job. He doesn't even run Ukraine. His job is to run around the world and raise funds. And he accomplishes many things by raising the funds. He keeps the globalist pockets full.

he keeps the military industrial complex pockets full. And this is a good segue to talk about Budanov. He also makes sure that he keeps the people in Kiev, all of the warring factions, the oligarchs, the banderites, all of these people, he keeps them calm and keeps their pockets full as well. Because if the money runs out for them, that's when they're going to make moves on Zelensky. So he makes sure that he keeps everyone paid.

And he is doing a good job at that. I mean, everyone's invested. It's in their interest to give Zelensky money. It's in the interest of Congress, in the interest of the EU, of the globalists, all these people to make sure Zelensky gets money because his money is their money. But Zelensky also makes sure that the factions

in Kiev and in Ukraine that would like to see Zelensky go and would like to take power, they also take a step back and say it would be great if we were in power in Kiev, but Zelensky is still keeping our bank accounts very nicely padded, so maybe we don't rock the boat. You've described it exactly like. That is exactly what this Zelensky grift is all about. That is all it is. I mean, he comes up with all sorts of extraordinary rhetoric.

He says all sorts of things. He comes up with bizarre statements and improbable plans, but provided he can keep the money flowing, he's doing his job and he's succeeding. From his point of view, from the point of view of the people, all of the people that you identified, the globalists, the industrial, community industrial complex, the KIA factions. he manages to keep the money coming. And that's what they want. Now, Budanov. Budanov is a strange person because it's not entirely easy to figure out who and what he is. First of all, he started as a special forces soldier in the Ukrainian army.

When he first emerged on the scene, the universal assumption was that he was a very hardline nationalist. somebody who wasn't prepared to make any kind of consertions to the Russians at all, and somebody who basically wanted Ukraine to go on fighting, and if it was defeated, so be it better to lose heroically than to compromise. Well, over the last, especially the last year, Budanov has shifted. And, well, we had that crisis. You remember the Golden Toilets crisis last summer, which notice nobody in the West is talking about any longer, that particular corruption scandal

has been basically forgotten. But as a result of that scandal, Zelensky was forced to sack Andre Yermak, his chief of staff, and Budanov became his chief of staff in Yermak's place. And Budanaf has been making all sorts of interesting comments and statements recently. He's again taking a much more pessimistic view, a more realistic view, I would say, of the military situation than Zelensky is. He is talking about the need for some kind of peace settlement. There were reports that at the talks in Geneva that took place in February, Budanov was leading. a more accommodating faction than the one that was led by the man who was heading the one, you know, the Ukrainian peace delegation was basically split into two parts, were the more

accommodating, one more willing to talk to the Russians, which was headed by Budana. And by the way, interestingly, Budanov has also recently attended a service at an Orthodox church that apparently continues to be aligned with the canonical Orthodox Church in Ukraine, the one which Zelensky appears to be trying to suppress. So the big question is, what is Budanov doing? Now, there is a view that Wadana himself is an American agent, that he's doing what the Americans are telling him to do. They're wanting to push Zelensky towards negotiations. Perhaps there is a further view that Zelensky, that Budanov is aligned with other various factions in Kiev, particularly the one led by Poroshenko, who was the former president.

Poroshenko also recently has started to talk about a peace agreement and a need for a peace agreement with the Russians, a more realistic approach. And the other possibility, which I think is, probably the more likely one, is that again, this is a power play between Budanov and Zelensky, that there isn't any great ideological rift between the two. But Budanov is his own man. For that reason, Zelensky doesn't trust him. For that reason, also, according to some reports, the person who's really running things in the Chief of Staff's Office continues to be Yermak, even though he's not really in place and that the appointment of Budanov to the post of Zelensky's chief of staff

was really a power play to take Budanaf away from Ukrainian military intelligence, which he used to run and which was his power base. So I actually on balance, I think the last is the most likely that this is a pure power play between Ukrainian factions with some of them who are still on the outside, unhappy that they are on the outside, and wanting to maneuver back into the center so that they can get their access to the money flows as they come in. Yeah, but the muddy flows are dependent on Zelensky at the moment. So Budanov, it's a long shot for Budanov to seize power. And Budanov is a CIA guy.

I mean, the New York Times has confirmed in multiple reports that Budanov was picked up by the CIA, trained by the CIA, groomed by the CIA. I mean, he's CIA through and through. So, I mean, you know, unless you can assure all of the various factions that you can do just as good a job in security. all of the big money that Zelensky secures, you really don't have a good chance to take power in Kiev. You have no chance at all, but this is where the military situation becomes important. Because whilst Zelensky can come to the Europeans and the Americans and say to them, look, I'm holding things together on the front lines, go on giving me the money. they have no reason from their point of view to stop doing so.

But the moment things start to go wrong or visibly or indisputably, undeniably, wrong on the front lines. And at that point, we're going to veer back to talk about the phony diplomacy that we have seen, you know, the ceasefires and the territorial swaps and all of that, all of which is, I mean, nonsense. to say clearly. But the moment it becomes, again, useful to start talking about things like that, this is when Budanov and the others around him suddenly begin to become more attractive and where they might make their move. They might come along to the Americans and even more to the Europeans and say, look, you gave all that money to Zelensky and it's turned out to be a bad investment, bring us in, support us. We can take over. We are a much better, longer term investment for you. We can patch up something for the Russians, which means that you will keep

what you already and still have in Kiev. And Zelenskyy's never going to do that, because the Russians have made it absolutely clear, which they have, by the way, over the last few months, that no peace settlement in Ukraine is possible so far as they're concerned, while Zelensky remains Ukraine's president. So you could see that in the event of a military crisis, say Donbass falls, which it's likely to do at some point this year, that that might be the moment for Budanov and Poroshenko and all of the others to tour the European capitals to go to Brussels and Berlin,

in and London and of course Washington and say this is the moment what we have to take charge. Yeah. All right. We will end the video there. The durand.com. We are on X-Rumble Telegram. We are also on substack. Go to Durandshop, pick up some merch.

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