One-on-One: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

**SPEAKER_1** (0:04)
Fox News Podcast presents The Bret Baier Podcast with FOX News Chief Political Anchor, Bret Baier.

**Bret Baier** (0:20)
Mr. President, great to see you again.

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (0:21)
Good to see you too, Bret.

**Bret Baier** (0:22)
Let me start with this. Is Ukraine winning right now?

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (0:28)
Not losing.
Not losing. Yes, it's very important.
Between us, winning is not to lose our country and our independence. So from this side, we are winning. But from real situation in the battlefield, it's important that initiative is not in the hands of Russia. We are not losing and they are not winning. So I want to be cautious with such phrases and with such words. Yes, I want to be very realistic and be clear for the audience. So this is important. We are better on the battlefield and we have questions in the sky. This is true.

**Bret Baier** (1:07)
Much better on the battlefield.

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (1:08)
It's true.

**Bret Baier** (1:09)
The current advantage in drone warfare seems to be a result of a lot of planning, cooperation between private and public companies developing this technology. How has that partnership worked? How do you see it on the ground?

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (1:25)
So, from the very beginning of this war, we have, you know, some companies. Now we have around 500 mil-tech companies.

**Bret Baier** (1:33)
500?

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (1:33)
500 Small and big, and dozens very big companies, really. Very strong companies. Now, they are focusing already not only on drones, electronic systems of electronic warfare. They began to produce ballistic missiles. Just the first steps. But this year, we already saw, this year we will have our Ukrainian ballistic missiles. You know that there is a big problem with anti-ballistic systems.
You have, Americans have the best in the world. It's a patriot and that. It's the best in the world. It's true. We want to do something similar. This is difficult, but cheaper. And maybe with a cooperation with our American companies, we will do it this year.

**Bret Baier** (2:15)
For reports on the ground over there, we sent a crew all over the place looking at these drone fields and brigades. There are now a lot of American private defense tech companies working in Ukraine, and they're learning from Ukrainian companies, but also contributing new ideas. Is that how it's working?

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (2:32)
It's true. We give them, we give Americans, we are very open. They helped us from the very beginning of this war, and now we give them our experience. And really, they have these ideas. A lot of co-production with Americans in Ukraine. And of course, we want to make progress in productions in the United States, co-production, Ukraine and the United States. We share drones, we share for them how to save bases, military bases, soldiers, and et cetera. This is real experience from the front, that we share it with American partners.

**Bret Baier** (3:09)
We had a crew go to Brave One, a demonstration day. In the middle of a big field, there were newly developed unmanned ground vehicles, all different sizes and functions driving around. He said it was like Mad Max, the movie.
How are these unmanned vehicles changing the battlefield?

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (3:29)
You know, first of all, understanding that Russia loses 30,000 people per month, and we can't do it because people are the first. This is a priority. Of course, we used the ideas of technologies, different robotized systems to help people which are wounded, to give them food, to bring them water, not send people, because they can be in the death zone, it can be wounded or dead. So that's why we made a lot of progress in it. So we use it, demining drones, attack drones, drones interceptors, which are destroying Iranian shahids and et cetera. So of course, all this technology, all this miltech move the world to another story.

**Bret Baier** (4:20)
Yeah. Is it a race against Russia when it comes to that technology?

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (4:26)
Yes, it's race, and it's true. And when somebody said that they can't do the same, we are quicker, it's true, but they long, and it's true. So we have to be quicker, otherwise it will be for us, will be very difficult.

**Bret Baier** (4:44)
Do you know how many Russians have been killed in this war? Do you have an estimate?

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (4:49)
Yeah. And so their losses, 1,600,000 losses, and about 700,000 killed, about.

**Bret Baier** (5:02)
And then compared to Ukraine?

**Volodymyr Zelenskyy** (5:04)
Compared to Ukraine, it's really very difficult to say. Sorry, be honest. I don't want to be very open about it. Yeah. Because Russians will understand what's going on with our army. So we have about 50,000 killed soldiers, killed.