The head of the German intelligence agency (BND), Bruno Kahl, said on Monday that he does not see any weakening of the regime of Russian President Vladimir Putin. “Russia is still capable of waging a protracted war,” he said, DPA reported, citing Reuters and news.ro.

“We don’t see any cracks in Putin’s system,” Kahl told the Federal Academy of Security Policy (BAKS). Kahl argued that public criticism of the conduct of the war is a normal controversies in Russian society and does not pose a threat to the Putin regime.

“Russia is still capable of waging a long-term war,” he said, pointing to newly minted soldiers. Kahl noted that Russia also has enough equipment and ammunition. However, Kahl noted that Russia has certain vulnerabilities, including the effectiveness of its armed forces. The intelligence chief argued that Putin’s long-term strategy could prevail if the West did not support Ukraine in a very organized manner. Kahl stated that the BND knew that Russia would launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine two weeks before the start of the war on February 24, 2022.

“About 14 days before the start of the war, we discovered phenomena that could not be explained otherwise,” he said.

Responding to criticism that U.S. and British intelligence agencies expected the attack much earlier, Kahl said the BND based its assessment on the fact that the decision to attack ultimately came from Putin. Kahl claimed that Putin took into account factors other than “the number of missiles or tanks.”