A wind of hope is blowing over Ukraine. The Ukrainian army announced, Thursday, September 8, having recaptured territories from Russian forces. kyiv thus claims advances in the region of Kherson, in the south of the country, within the framework of a counter-offensive carried out for a week. Ukraine also created a surprise by gaining ground in the east, in the Kharkiv region. “We can take back our territories, our lands”, welcomed President Volodymyr Zelensky. Franceinfo takes stock of what we know about this counter-offensive by Ukrainian troops.
A breakthrough in the Kharkiv region
In the northeast of the country, the Ukrainian army has “penetrated enemy defenses to a depth of 50 km”announced Oleksiï Gromov, senior official of the Ukrainian staff. In total, the Ukrainian army claims to have taken over around twenty localities in the Kharkiv region, bordering Russia, and around 700 km2 throughout the territory.
A positive assessment already drawn up, in broad outline, by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Wednesday, September 7, in a video posted on Facebook. “This week we have good news from the Kharkiv region”he said, referring to “localities where the Ukrainian flag returned”.
Since the beginning of the war, on February 24, the Kharkiv region has been partly occupied by Russian troops. The city, the second largest in Ukraine with 1.4 million inhabitants, is regularly bombarded by Russian forces trying to seize it. In vain. Ukrainian troops managed to gain ground this time.
Progress in the Kherson region
In the south of the country, the senior official of the Ukrainian General Staff Oleksiï Gromov specified that the Ukrainian army had “Advanced deep into the enemy defenses, between two and several tens of kilometers” and “liberated several localities” without specifying either the number or the name of the recovered towns. Ten days ago, a first attempt at a Ukrainian breakthrough began in the region of Kherson, a city of 280,000 inhabitants.
Sunday evening, Volodymyr Zelensky announced the resumption of “two localities in the south”, without citing them. On the same day, a military official said that“an enemy ammunition depot” had “was destroyed near Tomyna Balka”a city west of Kherson. “All Bridges” on the Dnieper, a river that flows into the Black Sea, “are out of order”added an army spokeswoman. “Three Floating Bridges” built by the Russian army were destroyed, she said.
Significant losses on the Russian side
According to several observers, the Ukrainian counter-offensive has put the Russian army in difficulty. The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), an American study center that collects data on the conflict, reports that Russian military bloggers “recognized Ukrainian gains important”especially in the east of the country.
The advance in the Kherson region has “inflicted many losses on the Russian forces”, said Colin Kahl, Undersecretary for Defense Policy at the Pentagon, quoted by The world. Same story with General Dominique Trinquand, former head of the French military mission to the UN: “I think that before winter the Ukrainians could take over the entire right bank of the Dnieper, including the city of Kherson”he told France 24.
Ukrainian army targets Russian logistics
Supply lines, ammunition, checkpoints… The Ukrainian army attacks Russian logistics. His goal: to disrupt “the troop management system and logistics” of the Russian army with the help of air strikes and artillery, explained the Ukrainian command. According to him, 250 fire missions on the Ukraine side took place between September 6 and 7, notes the ISW.
kyiv’s strategy is also to isolate the Russian troops to prevent their supply. The front is on the Dnieper River, an area that Ukraine cannot bomb. The army is therefore trying to cut off the occupier from its logistical support by destroying the bridges built by Moscow.
Moscow advances in the Donbass
Despite this progress, the war is not yet won. In the Donbass, kyiv is struggling to move forward. The Ukrainian soldiers only gained two or three kilometers near Kramatork and Sloviansk, towns still under Ukrainian control. Opposite, the Russian forces took north-west of Donetsk the “anthill”an underground bunker in an area where the front line had not moved for eight years, according to The world. They also took the very defended hamlet of Kodema, one of the last localities before the town of Bakhmout.