The Ukrainian army said it blew up a major Russian crossing of the Siverskyi Donets River on the eastern front, causing heavy casualties and could deal a major blow to the Kremlin’s plans for the Luhansk and Kharkov regions.
Images shared by the Defense Department showed a crumbling pontoon with dozens of wrecked or damaged armored vehicles on both banks.
“Gunners of the 17th Tank Brigade of the #UAarmy the Christmas season kicked off [Russian forces],” the Ministry called On Twitter. “Some bathed in the Siverskyi Donets River, and others were burned by the May sun.”
Kiev Strategic Communications Directorate tweeted images of smoldering wreckage and two crumbling bridgeheads, and the army said: 80th Separate Assault Brigade it had “destroyed all attempts by the Russian occupiers to cross the river”.
The Siverskyi Donets, which flows from southern Russia through Ukraine’s breakaway Kharkiv and Luhansk regions, has become a major obstacle to Russia’s efforts to consolidate the territory it has occupied since. invade in february†
The Ukrainian army said on Wednesday that Russian forces tried to take full control of Rubizhne, a city of 55,000 on the eastern bank of the river, and launched an offensive in Lyman, about 50 kilometers (about 31 miles) away. West.
†[The] The Russian enemy is trying to take up positions on the right bank of the Siversky Donets River.” He said†
The British Ministry of Defense said on Thursday that despite initial successes in Kharkiv, Russia has achieved in recent days: started moving units on the eastern flank of the Siverskyi Donets to “reorganize and rebuild their troops after heavy losses.”
In April, Ukraine eruption a bridge in the neighboring region of Kharkiv in an attempt to stop the Russian advance.
“Russia has been working to encircle Ukrainian forces,” said William Alberque, director of strategy, technology and arms control at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies.
“The Ukrainians have blown up some critical bridges to prevent this. Then the Russians created this floating bridge, creating a bottleneck with a large number of equipment.
Said the details in the website photos -which showed severe but concentrated damage- suggested very precise use of heavy artillery led by drones or nearby ground forces.
Serhiy Haidai, a Ukrainian military officer in Lugansk, was quoted in the local media saying that the pontoon attack took place on Russian units trying to cross the river near the town of Bilohorivka and near the Highway Lysychansk-Bakhmutan important supply route to Ukraine.
“Bilohorivka is now an outpost in Lugansk Oblast, where Russians keep trying to cross the river, but end up feeding the fish,” he said.
Alberque said that although Russia lost several armored personnel carriers in the attack, it was unlikely to change the course of the conflict in Kharkov and Lugansk.
“I think it will significantly affect operations in the region for some time, but it’s not like Russia is running out of aircraft carriers,” he said.
Instead, Siverskyi Donets’ pontoon attack may provide clues to the tactics employed by both sides.
“Ukraine uses geography, uses rivers, everything it can to force the Russians to take bottlenecks and then attack those bottlenecks when they become lenient targets,” Alberque said. †
“Having so many vehicles in such a small space so close to the Ukrainians shows unbelievably bad discipline on the part of the Russians.”
