“People should grit their teeth and ignore the words [U.S. President Donald] Trump used about Ukraine or President Volodymyr Zelenskyy being the last person he would turn to for help,” Prystaiko said.
“Zelenskyy was right, it was merely rhetoric. You should take Trump seriously but not literally. He won’t be able to keep refusing help when Ukraine really represents an interest. Unblocking the Strait of Hormuz, which the president mentioned, is a very complex technical task.”
Prystaiko said many Ukrainian design bureaus and drone manufacturers, especially those working on naval drones, are now thinking about how to address the problem.
He compared Russia’s blockade of the Black Sea to stop Ukrainian grain shipments with Iran’s blocking of the Strait of Hormuz for commercial traffic.
“Remember how it was at first? Efforts were bilateral and multilateral, the United Nations and the International Maritime Organization got involved,” the diplomat described the initial 2022 Black Sea Grain Initiative that worked through diplomatic means.
“In the end, after all those attempts, Ukraine — with Turkey’s help — unilaterally broke that corridor through, and ever since people have forgotten how Russia had us by the throat and prevented our ports and our economy from functioning. I think it’s a fair comparison with what is happening now in the Strait of Hormuz.”
Prystaiko warned that Iran will exploit similar “pressure points.”
“To relieve those points… we can say we know how to do it.
Whether we can actually do it is another question,” he added.