Before Russia's full-scale invasion, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky refused to relocate the government from Kyiv and tried to prevent panic in the public, The Washington Post said in the article entitled "Road to war: U.S. struggled to convince allies, and Zelensky, of risk of invasion".

According to the article, Zelensky resisted calls to relocate his government and was adamant that he not panic the public. Down that path, he thought, lay defeat.

"You can't simply say to me, 'Listen, you should start to prepare people now and tell them they need to put away money, they need to store up food," the head of state said.

"If we had communicated that — and that is what some people wanted, who I will not name — then I would have been losing $7 billion a month since last October, and at the moment when the Russians did attack, they would have taken us in three days. ... Generally, our inner sense was right: If we sow chaos among people before the invasion, the Russians will devour us. Because during chaos, people flee the country," he said.

For Zelensky, the decision to keep people in the country, where they could fight to defend their homes, was the key to repelling any invasion.

"As cynical as it may sound, those are the people who stopped everything," he said.