Russia admitted on Thursday that it was vulnerable to attacks in Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula annexed in 2014, an admission that comes after several strikes, attributed to Ukraine, on Russian targets far from the front.
In recent days, several Russian military bases, including two located some 500 kilometers from Ukraine, or as far as the Russian capital Moscow, have been targeted by attack drones.
Also on Thursday, a drone was shot down by the Russian fleet in Sevastopol in Crimea, local authorities said, a sign of the risks that continue to weigh on the annexed peninsula that Kyiv has sworn to take back.
These attacks, associated with a series of Russian retreats in Ukraine, seem to testify to the fact that, nine months after the start of the offensive, Russia is struggling not only to consolidate its positions but also to protect its rear bases far from the front.
In Crimea, “there are risks, because the Ukrainian side continues to follow its line of organizing terrorist attacks,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday.
But the fact that the drone was shot down “shows that effective countermeasures are being taken,” he said.
Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, based in the port of Sevastopol, was hit in late October by what authorities called a “massive” drone attack, which damaged at least one vessel.
And this fall, the bridge connecting the peninsula to Russia was partially destroyed by a huge explosion that Moscow attributed to Ukrainian forces.
It is in this context that the authorities installed by Moscow in Crimea announced the construction of fortifications and trenches, especially since the Ukrainian forces took over part of the Kherson region, bordering the peninsula, in November.
‘Spies’ arrested
With front lines in danger of freezing with winter, the Ukrainians are increasingly turning to drones to strike Russian bases in the rear, while the Russians are bombing Ukrainian energy infrastructure, leaving to plunge civilians into the cold and the dark.
Thus, the Ukrainian Minister of Defense, Oleksiï Reznikov, indicated that the Ukrainian army had integrated “seven models of drones manufactured in Ukraine” during the previous month, against only “one or two” per year before the Russian offensive .
In a sign that the Russian authorities are on their toes in Crimea, the Russian security services (FSB) announced on Thursday the arrest of two residents of Sevastopol suspected of having transmitted information on military targets to Ukraine.
In a press release, the FSB indicates that one of the suspects was recruited in 2016 by Kyiv and transmitted, since the massive attack of the Kremlin against Ukraine at the end of February, information on the location of installations of the ministry Russian Defense”.
The Ukrainian army has moved closer to Crimea thanks to a victorious counter-offensive which enabled it to retake the strategic city of Kherson in the south of the country in mid-November.
In this area, where the bulk of the forces of the two camps are separated by the Dnieper River, the situation remains tense, with regular Russian strikes on the city of Kherson.
Oleksiï Kovbassiouk, a resident of the region met by AFP, crosses the river despite the risks and the freezing temperatures to help the inhabitants trapped on the left bank, occupied by the Russians, to flee.
“I’ve already had two bullet holes in my boat,” he said.
«Russophobia»
The Kremlin also accused Thursday of “Russophobia” the American magazine Time, which on Wednesday named Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as personalities of the year 2022, as well as “the Ukrainian spirit” against Moscow.
While Moscow has suffered several stinging setbacks since the summer, which has forced the Kremlin to mobilize several hundred thousand reservists, Russian President Vladimir Putin seems to be preparing public opinion for a conflict likely to last.
The intervention in Ukraine is “a long process”, he acknowledged on Wednesday, while assuring that “the appearance of new territories” that Moscow claims to have annexed was a “significant result for Russia”.
The master of the Kremlin also seemed to relativize the risk of recourse to nuclear weapons. “We haven’t gone mad,” he said, adding that the ultimate weapon would only be used in “retaliation”.
These statements were condemned by Washington, which described as “irresponsible” this “light talk” on nuclear weapons.
On Thursday, Mr. Putin at a rare public ceremony in the Kremlin decorated soldiers deployed in Ukraine with the order of “Heroes of Russia”.
“I want to say to everyone who is on the front line that for me, for all of our fellow citizens, you are all heroes,” he said.