(MOSCOW) – Russian state radio host Vladimir Solovyov has claimed he keeps deceased contacts in his phone book because “they are alive for me,” while mocking American military capabilities in a broadcast that veered from maudlin sentimentality to geopolitical delusion.
Speaking on his programme “Full Contact,” the Kremlin’s most prominent propagandist described war as mornings beginning with the death of someone close. “Many are leaving. I don’t remove them from my phone book. I don’t remove them. They are alive for me. This is war,” he said. “Unfortunately, people die in war.”
He then pivoted to a philosophical meditation on mortality. “Man is mortal in general, but what matters is what you lived for,” Solovyov said. He claimed many servicemen “lived for these four and a half years, for the victory they forge through daily labour,” and that others who had planned entirely different lives “accepted this challenge with honour and gave themselves” to the war effort.
Solovyov praised those working in the rear, saying they “provide for the army, weave nets, collect aid, work behind the lines, and introduce new types of weapons at gigantic speed.”
He then turned on Russians who fled the country, calling them “unworthy” of their ancestors and describing them as traitors. “A Russian person without a homeland is worthless, regardless of nationality,” he said. “First you betray yourself, then you betray your homeland, and then humanity itself.” He added that those who chose “internal migration” while serving the Kremlin had merely adopted “a figure of silence.”
The broadcast then shifted abruptly to claims about American military failures in the Middle East. Solovyov cited photographs showing “large-scale destruction at several US military facilities” and mocked Washington’s assertions of technological superiority.
“They told us for so long that America surpasses everyone in military technology,” he said. “The country they are fighting is, amusingly, a backward nation under sanctions for many years, which supposedly cannot have anything advanced.” He listed American assets with contempt: “There’s America, there’s NATO, there’s Europe. We have artificial intelligence, we have geniuses of our time, we have Starlink with Musk. We see everything, we can do everything, we intercept everything.”
He claimed the United States had “invested insane money in its own military industrial complex” and used Ukraine as a laboratory for weapons development, yet “by the end of the day, it’s all talk.”
Solovyov asserted that Western air defence systems failed to protect bases and that “phenomenal quantities of equipment” were lost. He mocked US President Donald Trump’s earlier claims that two weeks would suffice to achieve military objectives. “Half a year has passed, not a single assigned task has been resolved,” he said.
He claimed Iran had strengthened its position, controlling the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab-el-Mandeb. “The reputational losses for the United States are colossal,” Solovyov said. He dismissed Ukrainian requests for Patriot missile systems as futile, saying “we have seen the real effectiveness of the protection system.” He also said Israeli air defences, despite “insane PR,” had failed to repel attacks, and claimed Russian air defences were “the most effective.”
The broadcast was monitored by Russian Media Monitor, a project that tracks Russian state media propaganda.
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