He also said that the motive behind Ukraine’s attack was to improve its negotiating position.
“The armed forces of Ukraine are suffering more and more losses, especially among the most capable units that the enemy sends to our border,” V. Putin assured and added:
“The enemy will certainly receive a suitable response, and there is no doubt that we will achieve all our objectives.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Saturday evening for the first time acknowledged the attack on Russian territory. He said Russia had launched 2,000 attacks this summer from its Kursk region and deserved a response.
A senior Ukrainian official told the AFP news agency that thousands of troops are involved in the operation, far more than the small incursion initially reported by Russian border guards, according to the BBC.
This is the largest coordinated offensive by Kiev’s conventional forces on Russian territory.
Analysts assessed the benefits of the operation in the Kursk region for Ukraine
The offensive of the Ukrainian armed forces in Russia’s Kursk region allowed the Defense Forces to take the initiative at least temporarily on one front and continue the fight on the entire battlefield, analysts of the Institute of Military Studies (ISW) announced in their report.
According to them, having the initiative in the entire hostilities area from November 2023 allowed the Russians to determine the location, time, scale and requirements of fighting in Ukraine themselves, while Kiev was forced to devote material and human resources to reactive defensive operations.
However, the operation of the Ukrainian armed forces in the Kursk region forced the Kremlin and the Russian military leadership to react and move forces and equipment to the section where the Ukrainian troops launched the offensive.
The Russian army did not conduct active combat operations in the Kursk region, but used its own initiative to put pressure on Ukraine. Among other things, the Russians prevented Ukrainian forces from marshalling manpower and assets for future counteroffensive operations, while setting the pace of hostilities to allow them to sustain their offensive.
“Russian President Vladimir Putin and the leadership of the Russian military probably wrongly decided that Ukraine does not have the ability to seize this initiative, and Ukraine’s ability to achieve operational surprise and seize the joint military initiative calls into question the operational-strategic assumptions underlying Russia’s current offensive efforts in Ukraine,” he notes. analysts.
In their view, this operation by the Ukrainian armed forces and possible further incursions across the border force Russia to make a decision on whether to consider the 1,000-kilometer international border with Ukraine as a legitimate front line that Russia must defend. This may lead to constraints on long-term operational planning that Russia has not faced before.
As UNIAN wrote on August 6. an invasion of the Kursk region from the territory of Ukraine was reported. August 7 Russian social networks announced that Ukrainian armed forces have taken control of several settlements in the area and are pushing deep into Russian territory.
On Saturday, the Russian authorities announced that more than 76,000 people had been evacuated from the border areas of the Kursk region to safer places. population.
2024-08-13 01:42:45