Russia confirmed on Tuesday (19) that it had started the battle for control of eastern Ukraine, the Donbass, and said it had quadrupled the number of military targets hit in the neighboring country compared to the previous morning.
Its forces are bombing positions across the region this morning, and at least one town may have been taken by Russian soldiers to the north, sparking what it suggests is a move to bypass the former border between the breakaway areas of Donbass and those controlled by Kiev. , aiming to encircle the perhaps 40,000 Ukrainian military in the region.
The battle itself began with a massive bombardment of 315 missile targets on Monday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening speech. On Tuesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov broke the silence and said in an understated tone that “another stage of this operation is starting and I am sure it will be a special moment” to an Indian TV.
This morning (dawn in Brazil), the Russian Defense Ministry claimed to have hit 1,260 military targets, four times more than on Monday, with missiles and artillery. Unlike the second, however, the attacks seem to be concentrated in the eastern and southern parts of the country, regions with great Russian control.
Tactical aviation, meanwhile, attacked 60 points, like missile launchers, and shot down a Ukrainian MiG-29 fighter, according to the report, in the Donbass. The area, which before the war had around 4 million inhabitants on the pro-Russia side, is one of the central reasons for the conflict for the government of Vladimir Putin, alongside the idea of ​​demilitarizing Ukraine and preventing it from joining NATO. (western military alliance).
More importantly, in the late morning (early day in Brazil), unconfirmed reports emerged that the Russians had taken Kreminna, a small town of 18,000 north of Severodonetsk.
If confirmed, the move indicates an attempt to bypass the well-defended line of contact, the former border in the eight-year civil war between pro-Russian rebels and Kiev. There were bombings across the region, particularly Marinka, Slavianski and Kramatorsk.
These forces, in Moscow’s presumed plan, are to be joined by soldiers from the south. There, the fall of Mariupol, a port that was turned into a ruin after nearly two months of Russian siege, is expected this Tuesday.
This was announced by the leader of the Russian republic of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadirvov, a Putin ally who has forces in the city. Moscow has offered a ceasefire for the remaining defenders, holed up in a metallurgical complex, to surrender. It offered the same to the Ukrainian Armed Forces as a whole, in which it should be ignored.
Kiev can have its troops surrounded or see them flee, in the worst case. But it can also win, given that Moscow is estimated to have twice as many attackers (about 80,000 men) on the field as defenders: military theory advocates a ratio of 3 to 1 to guarantee a victory for the aggressors.
But numbers and theory are relative, depending on the quality of training and equipment on the ground. A Zelensky aide, Oleksii Aretovitch, said that “the offensive will fail simply because they [os russos] don’t have enough strength”.
That may be, but that was the central reason for the failure of Moscow’s initial attack, which was divided into many fronts without concentration of firepower – one wonders if Putin would make the same mistake twice. Arestovitch said the Russians were moving “cautiously”.
For its part, Ukraine is preparing resistance and has received armored reinforcements from Poland and American artillery pieces, an escalation in the level of aid so far. On Monday, the Pentagon said there are tanks, helicopters and howitzers already on the country’s borders, ready for action, as part of an $800 million support package announced a few weeks ago by President Joe Biden.
Kiev signals to be alive too. This morning, according to the government of the Russian region of Belgorodo, the Ukrainians bombed with artillery a village near the border called Golovtchino. It is the 12th such incident in the war, and three people were injured, the report says.
For Russian Defense Minister Sergei Choigu, “Washington and some Western countries want to prolong the war” for reasons of their own. It was his first statement in several days. There is no confirmation, but rumors in Moscow suggest that the minister lost much of his status with Putin because of the initial performance of Russian forces.
Analysts are expecting a different action now, as Donbass has smaller cities and more open ground for manoeuvring. In theory, this is an advantage for the Russians, despite their relative numerical position in the field.
